Akwaaba!

This is how you say "welcome" in Ghana. The language is called Twi, and I have not mastered it yet.

It has been one week since we flew out of the Minneapolis airport and began the journey to Ghana, Africa. Things got exciting when I, Katie, got a call from one of our teammates saying that the first group that was assigned to fly out was incorrect, and we needed to get the right six people there ASAP. Though everyone had gone to the Mall of America for lunch, they made it back in record time to get to the airport. We thought that would be our main stress for the day. After two delayed flights, one missed, and poor communication at the Frankfurt airport, we found ourselves on a bus heading an hour outside of Frankfurt to a hotel in the hills for our troubles. (see photo). We didn't quite get the view as we arrived after sunset and left at 3am, but we knew it was something special.



Breakfast at 3am: Sandwiches, whole tomatoes, sausage patties, and Coke. This was the start of crossing cultures for sure!

Upon check-in in Brussels our names were not on the passenger list. 30 names--nowhere to be found. Thankfully there was room! Sitting among French, Ghanaian, and Belgian passengers we finally landed in Accra a full day later than planned. We were greeted by the rest of our team that went on the flight before us, along with Richard, the CCC staff member we would be working with while there, and three Stinters who had been there all year.

The first 24 hours brought a big learning curve. Ben and I felt inadequate as we navigated a new city and dealt with issues like no running water, cell phones to call home, or much knowledge about how to solve these problems. We are now in another region of Ghana for the week, and until we left to come here Friday we were never able to shower in our room. Once I used the one girls' room that had running water, and once I used an open room in the bottom of our large hostel that allowed only a partial shower. (I wasn't willing to stand in the inch deep pool of dirty water).

Something else we learned is that people in Ghana don't sleep in. At 5am people were roaming the halls chatting with each other, and across the courtyard in another room a group was having a loud praise and worship gathering. 5AM!! Between that and the bullfrogs ribbiting into the night, it's a miracle I slept as well as I did.

We had two days on campus before the semester ended and we left for the Volta Region (where we are now) so we wanted to make that time count. We held some trainings to prepare our students for the types of conversations they might have, walked across the red dirt parking lot, and down the road to campus. We had heard that Ghanaians are so friendly and that it is really easy to talk with them about the gospel, and it couldn't have been more true. I talked to five girls that day, and it was so different than in America where you sometimes have to dance around in conversation for a while before you get to share the gospel. These people have grown up in such a Christian culture, they have a vast wealth of knowledge of the scriptures. Literally, there are signs everywhere that say things like "Blessings Beauty Salon", or "Lord and Savior Gas". Everything is marketed in a Christian way.

Despite this upbringing, something is missing in the common Ghanaian theology, and that is knowing that they can be assured of their salvation through Christ. A lot of our conversations center around this topic as we help them grow into the men and women God has called them to be.

I have taken some awesome pictures and had many more experiences I hope to share in the days to come...but this is a bit long and I can't get my pictures on my computer until we get back to Accra, so ciao!