We thought the rainy season was over, but it is pouring rain today, the hardest since we have been here.  We realize how accustomed we have been to taking water for granted.  The Institute uses several large water tanks to collect rain water.  They sit at the corners of the buildings and downspouts from the roof gutters direct runoff into them.  They are certainly getting a good refill today!  Our bathroom and kitchen both have barrels of water to use when no water comes from the faucets.  They are refilled when needed from the rainwater collection tanks.  At least we have faucets.  Many in Akropong do not. Every morning a stream of children walk down the street outside our guest house with buckets on their heads to collect water for their families for the day.  We are doing our best to learn to conserve, but old habits are hard to break.  No standing under the shower, rinsing dishes under running water, etc. We need to use bottled water for cooking, tooth brushing, and contact lenses, so that helps limit our consumption.  Having all the clean (and hot!) water we desire whenever we turn on the faucet is something we won't take for granted in the future!

Since our first encounter with the roach in the kitchen, we have been pleasantly surprised by the lack of bugs.  There are lots of small geckos running around.  After all the Geico insurance commercials we are used to seeing at home, they are very cute and seem to have a lot of personality.  They are also very fast, so it is good to keep the doors closed so they don't come to visit!  We get a few bites, but never see what is doing the biting.  They are not bothersome enough to require mosquito netting or constant coating with repellant. There are cats and dogs around people's houses along with animals headed for the dinner table, e.g. chickens, sheep, and goats.  The only "African" wildlife in evidence are monkeys.  They are very cute but not good to tangle with.  We were taking a walk one day around the teacher's college next door when a small boy came up to us and pleaded with us to retrieve his soccer ball from a monkey who was playing with it up on a ledge. The monkey was literally "having a ball."  The boy was very distraught and we felt pretty helpless.  We scolded the monkey from afar and encouraged the boy to be patient.  Hopefully he and his soccer ball have been reunited! 

As those who visited ACI with the Chicago Presbytery mission team can attest, it can be quite noisy during the night in Akropong!  There are no "front yards," so houses are next to the street.  Beds are often only a few feet from those walking by outside.  Our guest house doesn't have glass in the windows, only screens and wooden shutters.  So there is little to block out the sound from outside.  In addition to music from town at night and the persistent roosters early in the mornings, we have often heard singing and shouting and commotion that sounds like a church service, sometimes as early as 4:30 or 5:00 am.  We asked about it today and discovered that it is called the "Dawn Broadcast!"  Ghanaian Christians are very enthusiastic and creative about their evangelism.  Since few people have TVs, radios, or even electric clocks, some congregations gather early on weekday mornings and walk together through the town to help their neighbors "wake up" to the gospel message.  They stop in several places for someone to preach and the group to sing.  It is sort of like setting your alarm clock to K-Love on the radio with the volume turned up!

Classes have begun for students and, gratefully, for Jerry and me too!  We have the wonderful opportunity to sit in each morning on a beginning master's level theology class called "History of Christian Thought." As with every course at ACI, the goal for students is not just to accumulate information and give it back on an exam or in a paper, but to learn to reflect theologically and most of all to integrate their learning into their own faith and lives.  ACI emphasizes study as an act of spiritual devotion, loving God with all of our hearts and minds.  All of us are "missionaries," whether we know it or not.  Our lives are our mission, our witness to who Christ is for us.  Our lives are also the expression of our theology, our understanding of who Jesus is and what he means to us.  Pray that students would see Jesus in us and in our lives as we seek to minister to them.

We're eating well in Ghana.  There is food in abundance, though it seems somewhat monotonus after all the variety we have been used to.  The main vegetable is cabbage.  The fruits are bananas and pineapple.  There are also oranges but I find them rather bitter.  Meats are chicken and fish - small whole fish with scales, eyes, and all.  (I'm actually getting to the place where I can get some fish out of one, rather than just a pile of skin and bones!). There are also beans (black-eyed variety) and eggs. Carbs come in the form of rice and yams.  The yams are different from those in the US though.  They are huge, white, and served in big slices.    Everything generally comes with one of two sauces -- a green sauce called palava made from cassava leaves or a red sauce made from tomatoes and peppers.  The only milk is canned or powdered and coffee is instant.  The big treat for me is Ghanaian cocoa.  Ghana is the world's 2nd largest producer of cocoa.  So some cocoa, powdered milk, sugar, and hot water make me a happy camper!

Food is not so abundant elsewhere in Africa right now.  I'm sure you have seen the news accounts of the famine in Somalia.  Please pray for God's intervention and provision in this desperate situation.

One of the things I wonder if they teach in missionary school is how to do laundry by hand.  I could use some lessons but have gained a few valuable tips from my first experience today for those of you who want to give it a try.  First, in doing laundry by hand, "hand" is the operative word.  Between scrubbing and wringing, your hands definitely get a workout.  But then, so does your back!  Second, do a little every day -- don't save it all for Saturday like I did!  And of course, if Saturday is cloudy like today, you're in trouble.  Since we have a lot of laundry today, if things don't dry before the end of the day, we will have no where to hang them.  And then I need major lessons in stain removal.  Hopefully the sweat is out and the clothes will smell better, but unfortunately some of the stains have taken up permanent residence.  Oh the things we take for granted!  Washers and dryers are a blessing, but today I'm just thanking God for soap and a bucket! 

We're trying to learn some new habits to be respectful of the Ghanaian culture.  One of the most challenging has been to learn not to cross our legs at the knees!  When we are in meetings or classes or at church with Ghanaians, we have discovered that they do not cross their legs, unless at the ankles.  Our PCUSA liaison Josh Heikkila pointed out to us that this is because the only person in a gathering who crosses their legs at the knees is the chief.  It was quite interesting that when we visited the village of Oduntia to dedicate the new school that the Chicago Presbytery and the Kaneshie Presbyterian Church are building there, the village chief and his family who have become Christians were in prominent attendance.  However, the  fetish priest of the village who has not become a Christian also came to the ceremony.  He sat in front of the congregation and crossed his legs at the knees - a not so subtle way of saying that he was the one really in charge.  Please pray for the new believers in Oduntia as they face challenges to their faith.

We have arrived in Ghana!  Our trip was one of "ups" and "downs."  Because our flight was overbooked in Economy class, part of our group received an unexpected upgrade to Business class at no extra cost.  So for an 11-hour flight it was quite a treat.  But it was also hard not to reflect on the inequities of life.  Why us and not all of the group?  And not just in relation to the flight, but in all the abundance we enjoy while so much of the world is starving?  Much to ponder as the trip began.

Then came the "down."  We arrived safely in Accra, but our luggage did not.  So we spent the first 3 days with no change of clothes, no hair blower, etc.  We were not a pretty sight, well some of us anyway.  I ended up being very glad however.  I think God wanted to make sure that we got off on the right foot, learning from day one not to depend on ourselves or our "stuff," but rather to depend on God.

We had a wonderful week with the mission group from First Pres and the Chicago Presbytery.  You can read all about it on the Knox Presbyterian Church website, www.knoxpres.org.  The group held a commissioning servicefor us before they left and their companionship for the first few days helped ease the transition to being here on our own.

We are now settled into our new "home" for the next few months in Akropong.  It is a yellow stucco guest house with a large coconut tree in the yard and some resident chickens.  (I am having trouble with the cord connecting my camera to my laptop, so I'm unable to send pictures yet.  Hope we can come up with a solution.)  The house is 150 years old and feels like "holy ground."  It is the house where both Akrofi and Christaller lived during their work at the first Basel Mission.  They are the missionaries who translated the Bible into the local language here (Twi). We have an office where we can meet with students, a bedroom, a screened porch, and bathroom.  No hot water but an electric pot to heat water if we get desperate.  We also have a kitchen with an eating area in a separate wing of the building.  We were welcomed there by a huge local roach.  Fortunately the kitchen came with a supply of bug spray.  It also comes with a rice cooker, a good thing since we have some variety of rice for virtually every meal!  We have buckets and a clothes line for laundry.  We will try that new (for us) adventure next weekend.

It is cooler here than we expected, since Akropong is at a higher elevation than Accra.  The mornings are hazy and misty, often with some rain, but there is usually some sun in the afternoon. They assure us that we will have plenty of hot weather coming up.  We are also surprised that it gets dark so early.  Daylight is from 6am to 6 pm year round.

The first weekend was quiet but the students began arriving this morning for registration.  They will have Orientation sessions all week and we will sit in on them to get oriented ourselves.  We are eager to get to know some of them and see how we can be of help.  We attended worship on Sunday at the only English language service in the area at Christ Church Akropong.  We understand that most of the students worship there.  Time -- 7:00 am!