Before we had even gotten dressed to go for our walk this morning Divine, the evangelist / farmer called. He wanted us to meet him at the Zoomlion office and pick up the reports he had finished last night. Zoomlion is actually Yendi’s garbage / sanitation department. They send men out on bicycles that have a small garbage reciprocal attached to the back to pick up garbage. They also have a couple larger trucks. They are the ones that hire the women to sweep the streets. Divine was at their office waiting on the manager to come in because this week they got a new thrashing machine. The machine is going to be hired out to go from village to village thrashing, rice, millet and soybeans. Divine had a bumper crop of soybeans this year. The soybeans are harvested by hand; they are pulled up by the roots and allowed to dry until they can be thrashed. If the harvest is not too big the ladies will get together with long sticks and beat the seeds out of the shells. Divine said that his harvest was too big to thrash without a machine. He hopes to be the first to get to use the machine. The Zoomlion office is not too far from the mission house so we decided to walk there. We are not sure that Divine had any luck today contracting them to come to his village because late this afternoon when we passed by the thrasher was still sitting there.
We sent Mr. Iddrisu back to the bank this morning to get the payroll for February. He spent several hours counting it and making up the pay packets. We were so pleased when everything tallied out correctly! We are trying to get him used to going to the bank and making the payroll.
Meri did not come to work today because she burned herself when she spilled boiling soup on her hand. We are not sure how badly she is burned but it must be significant for her not to come to work.
Did I tell you that a mother brought her 3 month old son that has a hair lip to see us? The little guy seems to be doing very well. She did not know where to go or how to get the surgery to correct the hair lip. We sent her to the hospital to get an order for formula and then on to the office to register for the surgery. We told her we would help her when she gets an appointment to have the surgery. The surgery is free; a team comes from outside the country and does the surgery but the family must bear the burden of food, disposable diapers, health insurance while they are staying at the hospital in the southern part of Ghana.
Please keep us in your prayers. Also please pray for Roger, he is one of the elders at Mt. Carmel in Athens, Al. He has the Covid; is in the hospital and is not doing very well.
In His Service,
Steve and Kandie
