We made 2 trips out to Divine’s house this morning to check on the pigs. We got there shortly before 8:00 but the pigs had gone out for the day. They sleep in a pen at night but the pen is not pig proof so they crawl under the fence and roam around the neighborhood with the rest of the free range pigs, sheep, goats, chickens, ducks and guinea fowl. It always cracks us up when we go through customs to enter the United States because one of the questions they ask is, “Have you been on a farm.” Well, technically we have not been on a “farm” but the whole of Ghana is like a farm. I digress! Divine called and called the pigs but they would not come back to their house. Pigs are very smart; they knew there were strangers wandering around looking for them. Divine even tried calling them up with their slop bucket but they were having none of that! We waited around as long as we could then left.
We had an appointment with Zorash to go to the market and buy the bulk of the food stuff for the seminar. We had barely gotten to the market before Divine called and said that the pigs were back in their house and that we could come back and look at them so we could settle on a price. Steve told him that we could not come until we finished in the market and off loaded the stuff at Kulkpeni.
Last week we bought Divine’s children’s soybeans. We thought we would pick them up this morning but they were full of stones and sticks from sweeping them up after they were thrashed. There was no way that we wanted them in that condition.
Divine’s wife, Gladys ,said she would make Shea butter for us; the Shea butter was a sad disappointment. As soon as we saw it we knew that we did not want her to make any more for us. It was a ugly dark grey color and the bucket was only ¾ full. We asked if she had already bought more Shea nuts (we had originally thought that we wanted her to make 4 batches). We were relieved when Divine told us that she was still looking for more Shea nuts. We told her to stop looking because we wanted to cancel the order. We paid her for the pitiful Shea butter but we did not want anymore!
After we finished in the market we drove back to Divine’s house to check on the pigs. We saw and purchased 3; there is a 4th pig in a neighboring village that we bought sight unseen! That is not something that we like to do but we did not want to have to chase around in another village hunting for a pig. Divine said, “You don’t worry, I will go to the village and arrest the pig for you!” So there you have it, Divine is now the pig police with the power to arrest pigs!
As we were going out to Kulkpeni with the first truck load of food Kwabena called and said the masons had run out of sand and that there was none in the village. As soon as we offloaded the food we headed back to town to buy a truck load of sand. Later in the afternoon we went back to Kulkpeni with another load of food. When we checked the last bathhouse we discovered that the walls were too low and it was easy to see over the walls into the stalls where they will be taking baths. Timothy is going to alert the mason so he can fix the problem before the cement gets too hard.
Take care and have a great day!
In HIS Service,
Steve, Kandie and Skeeter
The Monkeyshines
This monkey did not do much shining today! Mom and Dad left early and I did not see themuntil noon time. The only redeeming factor today was that as soon as lunch was over Dad took me out of my cage and I got to take a nap with Mom. She was not napping, she was sewing but I was curled up inside of her dress and life was so good!
I have decided that I like to chase birds. Mom wishes I was chasing bats but maybe that will come later. The bats are hanging at the tip top of the big mango tree and I have not been adventuresome enough to climb that high yet. Dad has a bird bath in the front yard. I sit in the tree and wait for the birds to come to get a drink of water and then I pounce out of the tree; it works every time! As soon as I jump they scatter; I climb back in the tree and start the game all over. I never get tired of chasing off the birds!
Love, Skeeter
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