We are in Accra. We arrived at 2:30 this afternoon without any problems. Steve is back to normal but then one always has to define “normal”. We stayed up late last night and got up extra early this morning in order to get everything done before we left Yendi. We feel pretty confident that we got the most important things done. Timothy Niligrini, the evangelist, called a couple times this morning to remind us of promises we had made to a couple of the churches in regard to their church building projects. We left the money for their cement in envelopes; they can pick the money up when they need it. Red drove us to Tamale. We left the mission house this morning at 9:30. We stopped at Timothy’s house on the way and dropped off the bicycle tires and tubes for the church leaders. Timothy will distribute at the class at the end of the month. Our thanks go out to all of you who help us with the evangelistic side of the work.
A couple of people rode with us to Tamale. Red’s teenage daughter Pa-naa goes to a boarding school in Tamale. She had been in Yendi on break and it was time for her to go back to school. Her mother made her some really good smelling Shito (sort of like a cooked salsa) to take with her. The reason we could smell it was because it got tipped over and some of it leaked out. It made us hungry! Divine, the evangelist also went with us. He is taking some distance learning classes through one of the universities. It was time for him to go back to school too. His classes are usually on the weekend. He also stopped by the registrar general’s office to check on the paper work he had turned in a couple weeks ago. Some of the church leaders’ tax ID numbers were ready to be picked up.
We got word from the social development officer last night about the 9 year old girl who was seriously burned on her private area by her mentally ill mother. He said that he was wrong about the amount it was going to cost for the surgery to do the necessary repairs. He was amazed to find out that the surgery was going to triple in cost. He said his department did not have enough money to cover the cost even though it is an emergency situation. He had already contacted the district assembly and they promised to help with about ¼ of the cost of the surgery. We had promised to help with the transportation and food for the family that accompanied her and stayed with her in Kumasi. The social development officer wanted to know if we cared if he used that money to put toward the surgery. We did not want to leave the family in a strange city with no money or means of getting food. Thanks to our generous donors we were able to give them enough money to pay for 1/3 of the surgery and still give the family the transport and food money. Her burns are so serious that it might take multiple surgeries to correct part of the problems she is having.
Thanks again for all you do to help us with the work!
In His Service,
Steve and Kandie
