Today is Ghana's Memorial Day when they remember the guy who helped them gain freedom as a country.  Can't remember his name.  It is September 21, 2021.  The mountains of Utah are turning colors and we decided to enjoy the holiday (and the first day of Fall) by going to Aburi and seeing the Oboadaka Falls. Aburi is north of Accra about fifty minutes without much traffic, in the mountains, and always green because it rains there all the time according to Yao.  Yao is Gabriel's brother-in-law.  Gabriel works for the Church and works with the Woodbury's who are the Area's humanitarian missionaries.   We have traveled a lot with them recently. Gabriel and the Woodbury's picked us up at our apartment compound this morning and we headed up. The Aburi area is a welcomed change from Accra.  There are mountains covered from top to bottom with vegetation.  Little villages here and there beyond Aburi.  Aburi itself is pretty big.  We drove on ...

Last June (2021), on the 12th in fact, we were in Abidjan, Cote 'd Voire, involved in training our A2AAs or audit managers who live in Cote 'd Voire.  They speak French there and I spoke English there out of necessity to be understood.  Good thing Mermoz Amani speaks both languages. June 12 is our wedding anniversary.  Monday, June 14, after the District visits, we had the driver drop us off in Assinie-Mafia a coastal area that is a favorite resort for the well-to-do who get out of Abidjan to vacation there. After our District leadership visits, we had the driver drop Elaine and I off there at a very small resort on the beach where we could enjoy our wedding anniversary together.  Atobora and Mermoz were not sure about leaving us there alone.  It was easy to see on their faces.  I convinced them we would be fine.  The big deal was getting a ride to Abidjan on Wednesday morning to catch our flight back to Accra.  I had already arranged for that thr...

Last June (2021), on the 12th in fact, we were in Abidjan, Cote 'd Voire, involved in training our A2AAs or audit managers who live in Cote 'd Voire.  They speak French there while I speak English there.  Not out of choice but out of necessity to be understood.   We spent Friday, June 11 training, Saturday, June 12 training, Sunday, June 13 visiting stake leadership around Abidjan, Monday June 14 visiting outlying District leadership in Aboisso and Alepe Districts.  In the very short time we visited with brother Simplice Gnonzion, the counselor in the Aboisso District Presidency and District Audit Committee Chairman, I grew to love him.  Kind, humbly inviting and friendly.  Not embarrassed to use his meager English, which is actually good.  He was baptized less than ten years ago, made branch president a week later, has been the president's counselor since 2015 while still acting as branch president because there is no one to replace him.  St...

Last month (August) we got the opportunity to help two young missionaries improve their English before leaving for their assignments in Uyo, Nigeria.  Everyone in Africa speaks English.  Not really well, or I should say not like it is spoken in the States or other countries I have traveled to.  African English has its own sound.  Pronunciations of some words have a UK accent.  Other words have the accents of the person's native dialect, one of the hundreds of dialects spoken in Africa.  In addition, sentence structure and tenses are a bit messed up.  However, the Africans seem to understand each other well and just roll with it. The MTC in Accra, Ghana, is the MTC for all of Africa.  We have met young missionaries from Kenya, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Zambia among others.  They all have that "doe in the headlights" look just because this is the biggest adventure of their lives and they are soaking up everything they see, smell...

One thinks of wild animals an instant after Africa comes to mind.  Big animals, running free in a big open plain, or smaller animals being chased by a faster or bigger one who is bent on getting its dinner taken down.  It's a natural thing to do. The only animal that isn't regularly chased or seen very often running fast is the elephant.  The adults are too big to be considered dinner by other wild animals.  We were in Mole National Park last weekend hoping to see some elephants and the wild animals in the park.  We were not disappointed. We flew from Accra to Tamale on Thursday evening (August 26) and stayed overnight in Tamale with Larry and Pat Woodbury.  Just so I can remember it, we were picked up by Edmond and his two little boys, one five and one year old.  Elaine sat in the back seat with them.  The little guy snuggled next to his big brother and put his hand in the brother's lap to be as close as he could.  We were driven to the hote...