Ghana Day

In Ghana we sometimes make the joke, 'In the west they have a clock, but we do have the time.' Well that 'time' does not seem to be on our side at the moment.  At the beginning of our four-month furlough we thought we would have so much time, but now our return to Ghana is fast approaching.  This has not, however, stopped us from fully enjoying our time here. A recent highlight was the 'Ghana Day' that we held. With help from many people, we brought a little bit of Ghana to the Netherlands with presentations about our work, a literacy class, Ghana made goods, African music, dressing up in traditional Ghanaian clothes, children making African masks and Ghanaian flags, tasting of traditional Ghanaian food, etc. The day was very special to us and we want to thank everybody who joined with us and took part. For those who missed it - well, you will just have to travel all the way to Ghana to experience it instead!!

Football Fever 2010!

It is almost a year ago that Ghana won the world championship football under 20. Again, the whole world is captured by football and Ghana is no exception. Within our house we all have our favourites. With the connections Abukari has with Germany, through his work, it becomes even more complicated. Up until now we have not had any 'internal confrontations'.

Ghana, The Netherlands or Germany?

However, in Samuel's school all the support goes to Ghana. Every Friday I make some crafts with the children of KG1 and 2 and last week we made Ghana flags. This was an enormous success, so much so that the children of the other classes came to ask me for materials to make their own flags. With the flags in their hands, the children cheered the Ghanaian national team, the Black Stars. Whether that had any influence on the outcome of the match Ghana played against the US we don’t know........ or maybe it’s the result of the many prayers being said in both churches and Mosques for the national team, as here in Ghana you cannot separate religion from football!

Samuel's class waving their flags

hard at work creating the Ghana flag

Micah always joins me when I go to Samuel's school on Friday, although it was not easy for him to get the flag the colours in the right order

Ghana ‘World Champions’

Just like most other people in the world, Ghanaians love football. Not surprisingly the whole of Ghana was celebrating when Ghana won the FIFA U-20 World Cup by defeating Brazil in a sudden death penalty shootout after the two teams failed to break the deadlock in 120 minutes of football. It’s a very special victory – Ghana is the first African country to win the U-20World Cup Championship!

At the moment, in our house, we also have two famous football players; Van Nistelrooy and Essien, who regularly play against each other.

Fortunately, most of the matches they play against each other are friendly!

Thank God for:

• Health, we have all been sick over the past period.

Pray for:

• A good time with visitors we are welcoming from the Netherlands this month: Friends of Tahima Yili (7-11 November), Bram van Grootheest and Frans Davelaar from Wycliffe Bible Translators, Netherlands (3-12 November) and Joke’s father (19-30 November).
• Continuous good health.
• Training and meetings which have been planned during the next few weeks whilst our visitors are with us.