Well, it’s me again. Happy to volunteer for another round of recap of the day’s recording. The schedule for today was virtually the same as yesterday: child center in the morning and VBS in the afternoon at Yowando village. Today’s wakeup call was not a thunderstorm but a rooster crowing at 5:00 am. It does not start to get light here until 6:00 and interesting enough it becomes dark around 6:00. Yendi is around 9 degrees above the equator so the daylight and dark times are almost equal.
Today was a hot one. At 8:00 am it was 95 degrees. By one o’clock in the afternoon, it was 102 with a heat index of 121. Yes, 121 is not an exaggeration. Steve and Kandie have a weather system in their house that reads the outside conditions. The sky this morning was mostly sunny with very little breeze. You have to just smile and bear it because there is no place to run from it (except maybe indoors where there are three rooms being air conditioned). However, the Ghanaian power company is a cheeky lot. They will cut the power off whenever they think the grid will not withstand the load, so there goes the AC temporarily. Visiting here makes you thankful for the little things: cold drinking water, air conditioning, etc. Easy to take these things for granted back in the USA.
The child center saw many more babies and their moms today than yesterday. There was no rain today and the word got out about the clothes giveaway. There were over 40 babies to be seen today and 31 older kids who also received some type of clothing, especially knitted caps. It is mind-boggling to see a person wearing a woven toboggan on their head in the sun with the temperature closing in on 100 degrees. Makes you hot just to look at it. One child came into the child center today dressed in a snowsuit like someone would put on a baby in the dead of a blizzard. Kandie said that the parents see some outfit that they think is nice and get it for their child regardless of the heat. They are often complaining that they have a “hot body.” It is not a fever. The child is overdressed. Amazing!
After closing the child center at noon, Steve and Kandie were tending to the building of a large cage for Skeeter, the monkey, by some of the workers. To write anything about this monkey is to cover an entire Yendi note segment. Mischievous, energetic, suspicious, agile and a furball of surprises is just the short list. I have never been up close to such a creature outside of a zoo and this “resident” is getting a housing upgrade that is custom made. Kandie said that it was necessary to upsize the large sized cage so that the monkey could get more exercise when they were gone. The smaller one is not suitable for their being away for long periods of time. While they are here, she keeps the monkey on a leash tied to some structure so that it has free mobility for some distance. Skeeter is an African green monkey and the green tint of the fur on the back shines when in the sun.
This afternoon we all went back to Yowando for the VBS. Pam, Kandie, Zorash and another lady from the village taught 112 students for an hour outside in the shade of a tree on tarps. I taught the adults outside under the shade but with no breeze today on the problems of Samson and being strong where it counts. They knew much more about Samson than about Joshua. Steve, Timothy and I entertained their questions for about 30 minutes after the lesson. It is interesting to see what they are thinking in their questions and how eager they are to listen and learn. America could take some lessons about their willingness.
At the close of the drive back to Yendi, thunderstorms were growing to the east of the region. By the time we arrived back at the mission house it was dark and threatening. I took a video of the wind that came through the compound before the rain fell from the sky. The temperature has dropped at least 20 degrees and the rain is steadily coming down. There has only been one power outage so we are thankful for lights and air conditioning. May God bless all who are doing the Lord’s work. May God especially bless those who sacrifice much under difficult circumstances.
Jimmy Clark
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