15-December-2014 I love Christmas

Wow has this year ever gone by fast. We are on the door step of Christmas and not sure what we are going to do to celebrate. We see very little in the way of decorations. I suppose it's because most of the locals don't have a lot to spend on extras. We have people ask us all the time for a Christmas present, so we are passing out a lot of pamphlets. Our new truck got backed into the other day by a teenage (20) driver, minimal damage, and he and his mom were both very sorry. We and Brother Prosper, the FM Representative here in our area, told them not to worry about it. The young man was extremely relieved. While we were waiting for Bro. Prosper to arrive, we explained that we were missionaries and told him about the three big questions. "Where did we come from? Why are we here? and Where are we going after? He ran back to his vehicle and brought back a paper that he has been writing on, and guess what he had written on the paper? You guessed it...Why...Why...Where...
We gave him a couple of pamphlets and said that we were going to give his name and contact information to the missionaries and hopefully something will come from it. The Lord works in mysterious ways some times. A small dent in a truck door is a small price to pay for a "golden contact"...and possibly bringing the Restored Gospel into someones life. Well I hope you enjoy these few pics. I'll try to post more often. We have been very busy with the training in all of the branches.

 Sister Barney looking down from one of the Elders apartments that

we are going to inspect.

 One of these Elders girlfriends made, decorated, folded, and sent this Christmas tree

all the way from the states so these Elders have a place to put their stash of gifts.

 A very cute girl on the top floor giving me "Cat Calls"

(see the first pic)

 A sweet reward for having a nice apartment.

I really have seen some dramatic improvement in apartment cleanliness

now that we are doing inspections/training.

 Amazing what brownies can do for a sick missionary.

 "Hold on, those are for all 6 of you in this apartment"

 This is called a "Local Apple" I mentioned them previously.

Well here is what they look like inside. They are very sweet, but I 

dont care for the texture. "Pure Slime"

 Local Apple

 Big sisters are so helpful!

 This little girl is wearing an inside out dress from a young lady that she puked all over

while riding in our truck to a baptism. "Car Sick"! Her cloths were really trashed, so Sister Barney

turned the young ladies dress inside-out and put it on her, it was only slightly messed up.

It was a good thing that the young lady had an extra dress in her bag that she could change 

into after the Baptism

 Baptism at Asamong. The Elders are on the ends, and the young lady that 

got puked on is the third from the left.

 This is called a "Champion Bug" or a "Blister Beetle", depending where your from.

If it crawls in you, or you mess with it, it releases acid that reacts with the skin.

There is no pain at the time, so you don't even know that it's on you.

It's about the size of an ant.

 This is what it does. This Elder must have pinched it in his arm

when he folded it.

 This one must have gotten inside his shirt...

We have had several cases in the past few weeks.

We even killed one in our vehicle the other day.

 This is one of only two trees that we have seen for sale. It was Melcom's and Sister Barney

just had to get a snap of it.

 Taken at "LaPatite Pharmacy" where we purchase a lot of supplies for the mission.

 Come on, you can give me a little smile...

 This is a local remedy for who knows what...

It says anti-everything

 See....

 I sure wish I would have taken my Doxy.

We kept this Elder with us for a day or so.

His temp hit 105 and he gave us quite a scare. Malaria can be nasty.

 These are 4 of the staff members at a small hospital between Agona and Mampong

where Sister Barney has visited a couple of times. We delivered a Christmas card to them

and they indicated that they want to know more about our church.   "What"

Well I guess we can have someone come back and tell you a little bit.

 This is the first ever Primary Program in the Mampong Branch.

It came off without a hitch, and they had their best attendance ever.

 The Primary teacher and Presidency went around and invited

all of the inactive children and they all came with parents in tow.

It was great.

 Future Primary President

 Looks like Becca is expanding here business.

 Buying tomatoes at a roadside stand.

 These guys were just too curious why an Obruni (white-man) was

in their town. I talked to them about missionary work and bought a small

noise maker from them for way more than it was worth, but I couldn't resist.

They were way too friendly.

 Branch training at the Agona chapel.

The Obruni's are Elder and Sister Dever, the Humanitarian couple that are

helping us with the training.

 I'll be darned...the first Library that I've seen in 8 months.

These two young men from the Agona branch want to learn the Keyboard in the worst way.

Sister Barney has been helping them, and they are really catching on.