Baking Bread in the Village
While staying with missionary friends in Koforidua, a city north of Accra, we walked with another senior couple into a village to see the progress the young missionaries were making on a service project. On our way we passed a family baking bread and rolls in this large clay oven. We struggle to get our gas ovens at the right temperature for baking cakes and cookies. Imagine trying to maintain just the right temperature for baking delicious rolls and breads in an oven this size! We’re not sure how they manage the charcoal fuel to do it, but the results smell and taste delicious.
Baking Bread in the Village
Too bad we can't put the smell online!
The missionary couple in Koforidua has several coconut palms in their yard. A young man comes every month to harvest the coconuts. He pays them 30,000 cedis (a little over $3) for the coconuts and then sells them for a small profit on the street. In these photos you can see him climbing the tree and then throwing the coconuts to the ground. Look out below!
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| Walking Up the Tree! | Reaching the Fruit |
Harvesting Coconuts!
One outdoor fruit and vegetable store in Accra is very neatly arranged and organized. Often there are chickens pecking among the baskets. There are always several salesgirls bustling around to fill orders. They do an amazing job of keeping a running total in their minds for what is bought. The second photo is typical of what the marketplaces outside the city look like. This photo was taken on the way to Cape Coast, which is on the ocean about 120 miles west of Accra. Shopping is an interesting experience in Africa.
Market in Accra
Rural Street Market
We went to Nigeria in the middle of January so we could do family history training in some of the stakes and districts there. We were able to train in seven stakes and one district, and visited all five missions in the country.
Nigeria has more motorbikes (called okadas) on the roads than they do cars. These bikes are used as taxis to get people anywhere they need to go. We saw whole families riding on okada, and people carrying a variety of things in their arms or on their heads. People ride them in dress-up attire or casually dressed. Mothers even ride okadas with babies on their backs. They drive anywhere they want and don’t seem to follow any traffic laws. It is wild and crazy.
Okadas (motorcycles) in Nigeria
While driving in eastern Nigeria we passed the Niger River or one of its tributaries several times. This magnificent river is the 10th longest river in the world. On the small part of the river you see in this photo there are often men washing their okadas in the water. The senior missionaries we were traveling with had passed it many times and referred to it as the “car wash.” We stopped to ask permission to take a photo. We had to do some fast talking to the man “in charge” to get permission to take their picture. At first the men wanted a big sum of money and demanded to know what we wanted the pictures for (a permit may be required to haul the river sand away). When we told them we were humble missionaries with no money, and that we were going to use the photos to “put in our books to tell our families stories about Africa,” they finally gave permission for a photo. How do you explain scrapbooking to an African?
"Car Wash" on the Niger River
While traveling from Port Harcourt to Uyo we passed through Aba so that we could see the temple, which is under construction. The first picture was taken on the road leading up to the temple, which you can see up the road and to the left.. The church built this road at the cost of over a million dollars. In the second photo we are posed in front of the temple, which is very similar in appearance to the Ghana Accra Temple but smaller in size.
New Road for the Aba Nigeria Temple
In Front of the Soon to be Completed Temple
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