Two year old Alma the Younger inspects Elder Markham's car!
I Hope They Call Me on a Mission
This young man with a Book of Mormon name seems ready to join the missionary force!
We checked and learned there is no Alma Sr., but his name is indeed "Alma the Younger."
Mom and Dad just wanted to use a Book of Mormon name---Bible names are common.
The Children Continue to Delight Us
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Amelia in Port Harcourt, Nigeria |
Moani, 3 months, with Elder Markham It was in the mid 70's in Nigeria The baby is bundled up, but notice the sweat on Elder Markham's face! |
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Giftie (remember her?) on a bad hair day retrieving her pet monkey. |
Fokar, an active child who stopped just long enough to pose for Sister Markham while Elder Markham was auditing with her Dad. |
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Kingsley with Mom, Helene Kingsley was blessed today. Helene makes her own clothes. |
Brother Baddoo and Ernest |
When Kingsley's Father brought him to the front of the chapel to bless him, he was not very happy. In fact, for being such a little guy, he can make a lot of noise! So Dad cut the blessing very short and took the crying baby back to Mom. After Kingsley had spent a few minutes eating, then strapped on Helene's back, he was peacefully asleep. The Bishop got up and announced the baby has calmed down so the blessing would be done again. So Dad brought up Kingsley and gave him a beautiful, full length blessing. The Ghanaians are practical!
A few weeks ago Elder Markham trained two auditors during a ward audit. One of them, Clement Baddoo, is an assistant to us and brought his six year old grandson, Ernest. Ernest is a typical six year old Ghanaian child, used to sitting still at meetings. Sister Markham was quietly sitting on a soft chair along the wall, naming photos on her lap top. She made a place for Ernest on the seat next to her. Ernest was very helpful, teaching Sister Markham that the man with the tall box on his head was selling frozen yogurt, and telling her that the nuts on the woman’s head were called ground nuts [not peanuts]. When the pictures were named, Sister Markham showed Ernest photos of her grandchildren during zoo trips in the past year. Ernest recognized most of the animals, although he did not recognize a bear. He had not seen a tattoo that showed up in one photo [tattoos are not popular in West Africa,] and Ernest had never seen a drinking fountain before.
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| Our neighbor, Marion | Louisa, Freda, and Patience |
Marion is the five year old granddaughter of the landlord and lives above Elder and Sister Markham. She is often outside chatting with Baba and occasionally regales Sister Markham with stories. She told Sister Markham about the two new baby kittens recently born to one of the feral cats. These kittens live at the base of the banana tree, under a stone. Marion taught Sister Markham that the Doberman’s name is Sport, not Port, as she had previously understood from Baba. Marion likes to tell tall tales, as any five year old does. One day Marion terrified Sister Markham with reports of snakes in the yard. Fortunately, Baba knew enough English to reassure Sister Markham that there were never any snakes. Marion goes to school during the day and likes to read books with her grandmother in the evenings. She also makes Sister Markham extremely homesick for Willie, who started Kindergarten in August.
At a Weavers' Shop
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This is an African weaver making Kente cloth which is used for ties, scripture covers, purses, etc. |
Another weaver at work with his son. School is out for one month in August. |
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The weaving setup is primitive, but it works well---this is typical. Ghanaians make do with what they have! |
The weaver needs constant tension on the warp strings, but also needs to roll up the finshed cloth. A weighted skid device in the dirt does the job! |
If you want to see a very short movie of these amazing weavers in action,
click the button below. This is about 500kb so it takes a while to load after you press play.
A New Bore Hole for Clean Water
In many African countries, clean drinking water is a critical need and a key to improved health of the people in villages. LDS Church Humanitarian Services supports bore hole projects throughout the world, and West Africa is one of the high activity areas. A bore hole is a well drilled through the top soil (often 10-20 meters) and then through a layer of rock to a depth of 30-100 meters where a clean aquafer can be found. Typically, deep well hand pumps are installed to allow people to get the clean water. Without bore holes, villagers resort to "hand dugs," which are just holes in the ground 2-3 meters deep. Since the water table is high, it is easy to reach water, but the water is almost aways contaminated from surface activities. However, many Ghanaians have no choice but to use this or river water to drink, clean, and cook.
The Humanitarian Services missionaries work to find local partners to leverage the efforts. Often it is very cost effective to repair existing bore holes. At a minimum, local villagers are trained to maintain their bore holes and a supply of spare parts is left for their use. The success rate is not great, but improving. The principle of self-reliance is the foundation of all LDS Church aid.
We watched the start of a new bore hole on the University of Ghana campus. The university will provide electric power for a pump and a pipe to a collection tank from this well. The site is a corn field on the edge of university property. Previous bore holes contributed by the church now supply the dorms with running, clean water. That project was very well received by administration and students alike!!
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The drilling rig was made in America. The church contracts for the drilling service. |
Sisters Markham and Armstrong viewing the action from a safe distance. |
Mouseover to see the drilling start!
The Humanitarian Missionaries in Ghana are Elder and Sister Walker from North Carolina. He is a farmer, she is a nurse, both are converts to the church, somewhat past retirement age, and FANTASTIC!!! They work hard, are fearless, and know how to get things done. What a privilege to be surrounded by people like this.
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Elders Walker and Markham tease the boss about not getting out of the way. Soft, wet top soil makes initial drilling messy. |
Corn stocks being stuffed around the well casing in an attempt to secure the casing through the top soil. |
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| 'Hand dug' near the new bore hole | "Does this meet OSHA standards?" |
Click the button below to see a video of the drilling rig in action.
(This is about 500kb so it takes a while to load after you press play.)
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| Elder Markham flirts with the mud! |
A local farmer on the university grounds uses water from the hand dug well for a new onion crop planeted at the edge of his corn. |
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The University of Ghana campus was established about 50 years ago by the British. They laid out an ambitiously large site with tree lined roads and beautiful gardens. Only a portion of the site is used today. Here we see Palm Avenue, near the new bore hole site. The original trees have grown majestically, but the expanded campus has not yet arrived. |
| Palm Avenue |
| That a corn field, or more appropriately a corn patch, existed on the site of the new bore hole is no surprise. Corn patches are all over. It grows nicely year around and is a food staple. Anywhere there is an open piece of land, a corn patch is planted. |
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A corn patch along the road near our apartment in Accra |
The Friut Bats Are Coming Back
The flying foxes are returning to the Accra area,
how many can you count in the tree?
We hear that by Novemebr the sky will get dark with thousands of these bats of unusual size. We are looking forward to getting some good pictures. This picture, like most of our candid shots, was taken through the car window as we drove by. You can see a raindrop or two from the windshield.
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| The five cats that live at our building | Two new kittens |
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This butterfly showed up in our apartment, we caught it and let it go outside. Elder Markham is so gentle. |
But when Elder Markham sees a rooster by the road in our neighborhood, he tries to run it down! This violent behavior is related to the crowing that starts every morning about 2:00 am! Most Senior Missionaries are thinking "rooster for Thanksgiving!!" |
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An old termite mound (or maybe ant hill, we don't look that closely). Termite mounds and giant ant hills are all over. Ernest told Sister Markham that there is a monster that lives in them. If you go too close, the monster will eat you. But sometimes big men pour poison on the hill to kill the monster. Clearly, Ernest's Mom wanted him to stay far away from ant hills. These ants are known as army ants, and can kill small animals. |
| Palm Avenue |
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These plastic looking flowers grow on a spine covered bush with hedge type leaves. |
This canna lily is beautiful! |
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Shrubs with these blue flowers surround the Accra Temple. |
This vivid red and yellow shrubbery grows along one of the walls of the Temple Compound. |
In an effort to allow our readers to balance beauty and boredom for themselves, we are only showing a few flowers on this main page. Click the button for a page of flowers, just flowers. Since we don't know anything about them, we provided no commentary.
Accra is located in a tropical forest. We see reminders of this everywhere.
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| Bananas right out our kitchen window | Fugative Ficus Plant |
This ficus tree was once a potted plant growing inside our apartment. When it grew too big, it was placed outside, where it broke the pot with its roots and and is now growing firmly in place.
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| The next door neighbor's vegetable garden |
North of Accra is hill country. This one reminded us of Cumorah. |
The more we interact with the people, the more fun we have!
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Though slightly north of the equator, Accra's "cool" season is June through September (go figure.) At 73 degrees on an August afternoon Baba needs a sweater to keep warm! |
The yard man, Williams, uses a cutlass to mow, edge, and trim. While his work is excellent, would you complain if it were not? |
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| A close up of a ground nut (peanut) vendor | This women has a pastry case on her head. |
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Lawn care service expert, complete with non-mulching blade (left hand side) and bagging attachment! |
Hawkers at work on the street. Most anything is available! |
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| A shop keeper on the way to work | Delivery service |
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| Driveway Sweeper | Sunday at the Tro Tro Stop |
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| Taking brooms to the shop |
The box on his head is waterproofed with plastic and insulated inside. He is selling frozen yogurt bars on the street. |
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The mate on a tro tro handles all the business while the driver drives. (which Elder Markham believes is a full time job in Ghana!) This one is making room for one more passenger! |
Diane Bailey and Sister Markham |
Ghana Airways (GA) is having problems. First, it was prohited from the United States pending security improvements, leaving hundreds of passengers stranded there. If that weren’t enough, Sierra Leone banned it after an airliner broke down while landing on the runway there. Now Nigeria has asked it to stop flying there. Diane Bailey is a student from California who studied at the University of Ghana this summer. Having flown here on GA, she suddenly found herself stranded. She managed to get a ticket from GA on another airline and got back to California in time for the Fall semester. GA is the airline the Markham’s are planning to take to Sierra Leone in September. Sister Markham, sometimes faith-challenged, is not praying for them to get back into business anytime soon.
What you have all been waiting for--
The Sign/Shop of the Month Contest!
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| Public health is a priority in Ghana | He that hath clean hands.... |
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| A good cause | An ad for taxes bumper sticker |
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| Elder Markham likes this one! | For the brethren back in Fairfax! |
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| Religious names... | ...and slogans abound |
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Tro Tros are often "by the (hi)way," broken down |
Ever try to pass a Ghanaian Taxi??? |
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| Would you try this health drink? | Appropriately named repair shop (fitter) |
A Tie for the Bronze
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| Ghanaian Street Wisdom at its Best | What can I say! |
A Solid Performance for the Silver
Praise the Gospel of Sewing...Machines
Solid Gold---This Month's Winner
The President, VP, and Secretary of State?
These signs were actually in front of a sign making shop. The arrangement caught our eye. On the left is the President of Ghana, John Kufuor. He is an active Catholic, shows friendship to the LDS Church, has traveled to Salt Lake, and he asked President Hinckley to offer a prayer with all the Ghanaian government ministers on national TV. In the center is Alhaji Aliu Mahama, the Vice President. He is Muslim, and was a staunch ally of the LDS Church during the process to get permits for the temple construction, which he refered to as "my project" on more than one occasion. Both attended the temple openhouse. These men are running for re-election in December, so these signs were likely ordered for the campaign. The far right shows the shop owner's sense of humor---or maybe he thinks Colin Powell is doing a great job for the US and Ghana would benefit from a similar Secretary of State!
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Elder Markham with Brother Paul Arko, an auditor in Christiansborg Stake |
Edward Wallace and Abbot Kwei, clerks in two wards being audited. Note the sweat--Markham is tough! |
Have you ever wondered what the Markhams are doing on their mission? Here is Elder Markham and Paul Arko, a stake auditor for the Christiansborg Stake, auditing the Cantonments Ward financial records. Elder Markham teaches stake auditors to focus on the entire process, not just the numbers. The process of handling funds in the church is designed not only to protect the sacred funds of the church, but to protect Priesthood leaders, also.
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Ekpo Family |
Idongesit, Mbuotidem and Edidiong Ekpo |
Recently, as we were leaving the office building, we saw three beautiful young girls. Sister Markham is getting bolder about taking pictures and asked if she could take their picture. They were happy to pose. While she took their pictures, Elder Markham chatted with their parents across the room. They had traveled from Nigeria by rented car (12 hours, across three borders on rough roads) so the family could be sealed in the temple. He is a Branch President near the Nigerian Capital of Abuja.
Elder Markham with Joseph Okoronkwo and Charles Adebayo
In mid August we were invited to accompany the Area President and his wife to Nigeria for a leadership training session with the two stakes in Port Harcourt. After landing in Lagos, we visited the local service center, where church employees work who handle the temporal affairs of the church in Nigeria. Joseph Okoronkwo and Charles Adebayo handle membership and statistical records. We work closely with these two brethren and their counterparts in Accra. Elder Markham showed them the training he has been giving to Priesthood leaders in Ghana. They also talked about the Church in Nigeria and how it’s growing. There are currently 29 stakes, districts and missions in Nigeria, with 60,000+ members. A temple is under construction in Aba. Lagos is about eight hours by car west of Aba, and 8 hours east of Accra, Ghana. Both Charles and Joseph were sealed to their wives in the Johannesburg Temple. Charles couldn’t afford to take his three children to South Africa, so he is saving money to take them to either the Accra or the Aba Temple as soon as possible. Charles was attending college in Yugoslavia where he first met Mormons and joined the Church. Joseph was also a university student when he joined the church. Typically in West Africa, men are the first to be interested in the church. The wife or girlfriend is often converted after the man has been baptized. Friday evening we flew to Port Harcourt, spending the night in the Port Harcourt Mission Home. Saturday we taught clerks and stake auditors in the Port Harcourt and Port Harcourt West Stakes.
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Temple Trip Buses from Ivory Coast |
Some Saints from Ivory Coast |
In mid August four huge chartered buses came from the Ivory Coast with youth and adults to attend the temple, the first time for most of them. They stayed four days. The group overfilled the ancillary building which has small rooms with three bunk beds in each room. Many slept on the floor of the stake center that is also part of the temple complex. Many had to bathe in the hose behind the ancillary building. Food was very simple--rice, bread. But they were smiling and laughing, taking turns caring for kids to let each other do temple sessions all week. It was fun to watch.
A Tro Tro from Buduburam Branch
Late one afternoon, Elder Markham saw a tro tro pull up. We had never seen a tro tro on the temple grounds before. A tro tro is a 12 passenger van that is used for public transportation. We started counting the people that got out of the tro tro. We lost count, though. Sister Markham started taking pictures, and from the pictures we could count 25 people, plus the driver, who had climbed out of the van. Maybe a handful were children, but still, 25!! We learned they had come from a refugee camp in Ghana for Liberians. There is a branch of the church at the camp. In fact, we are going to that camp on August 22 to attend church and audit the branch records. You know, sometimes people think everything has to be going great in their lives before they can take the time to attend the temple. We have a feeling that these Saints from the refugee camp weren’t waiting.
How fast can an African Mom attach a baby to her back?
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| The pews in Adenta Ward are very hard. | Victoria on the Adenta Ward benches |
The benches we sit on for church are hard and not comfortable. The room is hot and humid, no A/C, just ceiling fans. The windows are open so the noise from the street can drown out the speakers at times. But the perspective one gets from the faithful saints here takes away any right to complain about such trivial temporal matters!
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Our grandson, Will, started kindergarten this week. |
Rebecca and Aba stayed at our apartment Aba was baptized for her mother who died a year ago. Two sons (one an RM and one on a mission) were also able to see their mother's temple work be done. |
There are some things we really miss, but also some things we are so happy to be able to experience. Most of all we know the Lord is mindful of us. Your support and prayers are appreciated.
The soon to be completed Aba Nigeria Temple
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