back to school

Seriously long post....just thought you should know from the get go.

As previously mentioned, I spent all last week (and this Monday) at Michael's school (where he's getting his PhD in African Theology). I was there to sit in on class for Michael while he was in California at a mission conference. I had a fantastic week!

First of all, the obvious part: class. The class I was auditing was "The Gospel and Culture"...lots of seriously fascinating stuff! Kinda made me want to go to seminary or something...we'll see. We learned about how the Gospel related to the culture of the Old Testament and the culture of the New Testament. And also the different ways that the Gospel can relate to cultures today. Awesome. The professor is a man named Kwame Bediako. From what I hear, he's the leading West African Theologian. Which is cool. He's a sweet old man. My classmates were 4 older Ghanaian pastors. Yep, 4 old Ghanaian men and me. It was pretty funny. But they loved asking my opinion and hearing my input. So that was fun! They are great fellows...I had fun getting to know them...and they took good care of me and were so encouraging to me! On Monday, we had a different professor...Professor Andrew Walls from Scotland. Yep, I got to listen to a brilliant, sweet, old Scottish man all day. He is seriously amazing. He has to use a cane to walk and a magnifying glass to read the Bible, but he comes down to Ghana about 3-4 times a year to teach at Michael's school. He even studies Greek with the students in the afternoon. He's so good.

Here is the campus, the classroom, and me with Professor Bediako (whom they all call "Prof"--which is sorta weird to me...its just a strange word, especially to call someone, regardless I was calling him Prof by like Wednesday) and then my dorm room and the view from there.

I stayed in Michael's dorm room. It was so nice...great breeze...COLD at night! I spent a bunch of time in the room...studying, writing, reading. It was wonderful! And right out my door was a fabulous view! Pictures don't really do it justice...but here is one example.

We had devotions every morning before class with all the staff and students at the school. They're studying Kings. And I love that book! The things God says and does in it are mind-blowing. So I really enjoyed it. And it made me miss my School of Biblical Studies that I did last year...we read a chapter out loud each morning. After we studied Kings, we prayed, then everyone stood up and went down the line greeting each other--right to left (the Asante Ghanaian way). A great way to say hi to everyone every morning.

Another cool part of my week was being in that little town--Akropong. It was fun to walk around and just explore. Sometimes its annoying that I'm white and stick out like crazy. But other than that it was so fun! There is a lot of the colonial architecture that I love in Akropong (but I didn't get any good pictures of it really). Monday afternoon I just strolled around and explored...got a pedicure girl to remove my chipped nail polish for 30 cents...walked through the local market...went to the pharmacy...sweated profusely. Then Monday night while I was reading in my room, I heard singing coming from the Presbyterian church next to campus (pictured below), so I went to see if they were having a service or something. It was just choir practice...but I stayed and listened for a while. It was beautiful. A full choir singing in an old church...you know how awesome that sounds? The acoustics were incredible.

On Tuesday, I was able to go visit a friend that I taught with, Auntie Jean. She lives up on the mountain about 30 minutes away from the school. She has a childrens' ministry on Tuesdays and she invited me to come help. It was so fun to see her world. And the kids were so cute. She's doing great things with them! They do Bible lessons and work on academic stuff. The schools that these kids go to are terrible...one 12 year old reads like a 1st grader...its so sad. But she's helping them so much! I got to read with a few of them. It was so fun.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I rode sweet public transportation the whole time. They have 15 passenger vans that they call a tro-tro. They're so cheap! And all the Ghanaians are so sweet and helpful. They told me where to get on and where to get off cause I don't really know the mountain well. On that Tuesday, I sat next to an old drunk Ghanaian man. It was hilarious. He assumed that I was here in Ghana to teach and kept asking me what I thought about schools in Ghana...I guess he never understood me when I said I wasn't a teacher. He had just come from a funeral...everybody gets wasted after funerals...they celebrate or jubilate as they say. And he was in traditional funeral clothes--a black cloth wrapped around him. Anyway, I was glad to get down cause he became pretty annoying and his breath smelled awful. Too many details for you? :)

Something that really blessed me this week was the generosity of Ghanaians. Twice while riding in a tro-tro or a taxi a friend paid for my ride and wouldn't let me pay them back! That wouldn't surprise me as much in the US, but here they see me as a rich westerner cause I'm white...they know I can afford my tro-tro ride. And who knows what kind of money they make...probably not a bunch. It was such a huge blessing to me! Seriously. Oh, and then one of the pastors in the class drove me home to Accra for free! (Saved me the whole dollar it costs on the tro-tro...that's right, one hour for one dollar...crazy.)

Here's some shots of the drive on the mountain (the big van in the front is a tro-tro):

I also got to practice my Twi a lot since I was one of the few white folks in town. That's always fun and humiliating all at the same time. (Cause I know pretty much the absolute minimal amount of Twi.)

The week was awesome because I had so much time to rest and relax and just spend time with God...reading my Bible, praying, listening to sermons...it was incredible to have the time to do all that. I'm so thankful for it!

This week is exciting too! We had a team from Marietta High School arrive last Friday. It's been so fun having them here! They're up in Kumasi now with Claire and Anna, so I'm "mom" for the week. So far so good...only one snafoo--apparently the electricity company didn't think we paid our bill cause they came and cut our line on Monday! Thank the Lord that we have a powerful generator that can run everything in the house...we ran it all night. And then we got the electricity nonsense worked out on Tuesday, so all is well.

We made Big Tom's famous chicken and dumplings last night. It was so fun and they were delicious! Comfort (on the far left in the first picture) LOVED IT! She came in this morning talking about how good it was. She called it "oburoni soup" = "white man's soup". She wants me to teach her how to make it. :) So Dad...your chicken and dumplings has gone international, congrats.