Today was a rough day! I made 5 or 6 trips back to the mission house for one thing or the other this morning. The last trip I made was to get more name tags for the guys that were registering the people. I gave them 500 and they had only registered 400 but they were afraid they were going to run out. We did not have any more of the “Hello” name tags but we had sticky shipping labels so that is what I took them. While I was at the mission house I picked up 3 benches and I had Mr. Iddrisu and Donkey load all the benches from the Child Center into the motor king and haul them out to Kulkpeni. We were in hopes that since we told them not to bring anyone under the age of 15 that the number of people would be less. Some still brought the children.
Near the end of Steve’s lesson this evening Timothy Kuma squatted down beside me and said that the bus the villages of Jakpumba and Niliyundo were coming on broke down and they were stranded on the side of the road. The way it is here when a bus breaks down the driver is responsible for continuing the trip after the vehicle is fixed but if you do not want to wait you are responsible for finding the means of getting to where you are going. If the people have no money they just sit on the side of the road and wait. Timothy wanted to know if I could go and pick them up. They were about 10 miles from Kulkpeni. When I asked how many people we were talking about he said that it could not be more than 20. I told him that we might squeeze 20 people in the van but I know that 20 might be a whole bunch more. I told him to call them back and see exactly how many people they had. They said that they had 30 people. I told him that we would try but that I did not want to put anyone on top of the van; the old van is a 15 passenger van with one of the seats removed. Timothy said that the people would not mind standing up in the van. As we were going to pick up the people I noticed that the tires were soft and really needed air before we picked up the people. We looked for a tire repair place but did not find one.
Timothy Kuma went with me because I had no idea where these people were and I needed an interpreter! As soon as I saw the bus I knew we were in trouble. It was a 36 passenger vehicle and there were people standing around everywhere. The luggage rack on top was filled. I asked Timothy how many of the people were going to the seminar and how much of the stuff on top belonged to them. He said that all the people were going and that all the stuff had to go too. Almost everyone had a rolled up mat or thin mattress, a bath bucket cloth and soap. They had bowls to eat in, backpacks, baby clothes, suitcases and everything that you could imagine. Timothy talked to them and they said that they would exercise patience while we packed everything. Timothy climbed on top of the van and I started throwing stuff up to him. He put the sleeping mats and light stuff on the bottom and heavier stuff on top. When he ran out of room we started stuffing stuff under the seats. Then we started cramming people into the van; there were 5-7 people on each seat with the older ladies and the mothers that had children. When the back seats were full we started filling the luggage area at the back of the van. The people in this area had to stand so we could accommodate more people. When we could fit no more people I told them to get their feet, arms and hands out of the way of the tail gate door because I had to slam it to get it to latch. We then locked the door. I looked around and there were 4 men that had nowhere to sit. Timothy said that three of the men could sit up front with me and that he would stand in the wheel well of the sliding door. I checked to make sure that no one had their fingers or feet in the door and then I slid it shut! They could not move! We even had a row of ladies riding backward; they were sitting on the motor that is behind the front seats. The three men got in the front with me! It was a tight squeeze; the church leader was straddling the gear shift.
I put the van in gear but it would not move; it did not even want to roll. I tried the reverse and nothing happened. I was afraid that I had lost my gears or clutch or something. I was about to panic but with all of us crowded in the front seat I was not even sure that I had it in 1st. I told the men to get out; I made sure that it was in 1st gear and then I tried again with the motor really revved up; the van moved! The men got back in and we crept out onto the main road. As soon as we got on the road I hollered at Timothy and told him to say a prayer for us! He immediately started praying. He prayed and prayed and prayed. He was not praying in English but the people obviously liked what he was saying because I could hear a few “Amens”. He kept praying. I started laughing to myself because I thought that he was going to pray us all the way to Kulkpeni which would have been fine with me.
The squishy tires made the van very hard to drive! I fought with the steering all the way! The van does not have power steering anyway! We had to travel on a dirt road that the road crews have been working on. They have bamboo barriers to keep the traffic off of the area they are working on. I clipped one of the bamboo barriers on the passenger side; the guy that had his arm hanging out the window quickly drew himself back into the van. I apologized but it was not very long before one of my tires slipped off into the soft gravel where they had been working. All the men in the front started leaning toward me trying to help me get the van back on the hard packed dirt. I guess they thought that they were on their motorcycles and leaning would help! I told Timothy that the men would never want to ride with Sister Kandie again! The rest of the passengers were so packed in that they probably could not see the road. I told Timothy that the people were too crowded and that they were not comfortable. He said they were fine; they only had to stay like that for a little while!
Since I had so little control of the van I decided to do like the Ghanaians do and take my half of the road out of the middle; that way I would not have to do so much steering. I never got out of 3rd gear; we were so loaded down that the van was struggling in 3rd gear. This would have been a good time to have a low gear!
I was so happy to get off the dirt road and onto pavement! The van was a little easier to handle on the pavement. I told Timothy that no one was allowed to get out of the van until he counted them. Steve was so happy to see us drive into the church property; he had tried to call several times but my purse was under my feet and there was no way I was going to stop to try to find my phone!
Timothy counted the people; there were 40 people in the van! Yes, I said 40 people! There were 31 grown people and 9 children! I think it is safe to say that the van was slightly overloaded! When we got back to the mission house Steve checked the tire pressure and a couple of the tires only had 20 pounds of pressure! No wonder the van was all over the road!
Please keep praying for the safety of the seminar!
In HIS Service,
Steve, Kandie and Skeeter
The Monkeyshines
I have nothing to report! Besides, Mom took up all the space on this email with her story! Today was another lonely day for me! I saw Mom drive in and out of the drive many times today but that did me no good because she did not get me out of my jail cell until 1:45 this afternoon and that was only time enough to eat lunch with them and then they were gone again at 3:30. We had a late supper! Mom says that tomorrow is going to be the same thing all over!
Poor Me!
Love, Skeeter
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