Church in the Bush

I must acknowledge, I did not take this video, nor was I even present. My roommate took the video, so I thank her. I only learned how to use my video camera on my digital camera during Damba. BUT this captures what church was like under a tree. This one is larger than the three services I attended with Tommy.

Another thing I love in the video is seeing a guy on his cell phone. Cell phones are HUGE in Ghana, mainly because they are a novelty. Within only the last 2 or so years, you could only make land line phone calls, which were very sporadic, horrible connections. So when cell phone towers started going up, it was a much better connection. It's gone on like wildfire, and because it's so new there is absolutely no manners regarding answering cell phones.

This circle singing/dancing can go on for hours before you get to the sermon. What was nice is either Tommy or an interpreter would tell us what they were singing.

My African Family

This is Bowa and Comfort. Bowa was one of our cooks, and Comfort worked in the OR. Bowa is a man of few words, but when you asked he would tell us girls we talked too much. He makes the world's BEST bread and tortillas! His wife, Comfort, was a bit opposite of him, she loved to chat it up with us. Technically Christy claimed her as her African mother, but somehow I still consider her family too. This picture was taken the night they invited us over for dinner at their house. Bowa is wearing a traditional smock.
This is Zaato, my African father. He is responsible for making my souped up slingshot. He had 7 of his own children. He was the master of the OR, maybe not formally trained master, but Christy would tell everyone that she would let Zaato operate by himself on her if the need arouse. By the way that's my roommate Christy. I love her, but she doesn't like her "business" to be on the internet, so because I respect her she doesn't make my blog often.
This is Grace's mother. Grace is the girl who had the pathologic fracture and was in traction for months. Her mother is soooo sweet. She speaks no English, and I speak very little Mampruli, but she did adapt me as her daughter--her naughty daughter that is (I loved to tickle her, she would jump so high and send me out of the room). In this photo, she made me teazet one night, and we are enjoying the feast! I got high marks for eating it just the way the Ghanaians would eat it. She slept under her daughter's bed almost every night.

Wards

I actually have some better pictures of the wards, but for whatever reason my computer doesn't want to load them. Two of the three pictures are in the male ward, which was the ward I mainly took care of. I took the photos at night, so that I wouldn't have people mugging for the camera. The only thing was my ward wasn't very full (I'm serious, full would mean ALOT more people on the floors). I miss the wards!

Around Nalerigu

This is right across the street from the hospital.
Pretty flowers outside someone's home.
A typical little shop on the street.
Nalerigu has a library. I have no idea what kind of books are in there. Caroline had taken us to the library at NASS (the high school) and it had a pitiful number of old books.

I'm back from cruising!

Hey if anyone is still around to read this....now that I'm back, I'm going to post some pictures I couldn't in Nalerigu.

Enjoy!