Monday, June 28, 2004
Life here should be slowing down for awhile. After a week of traveling, and with the possible exception of a trip back to Budruburam on Wednesday, I'm in Accra all week -- with no appointment calendar full of things to do and see.

The official use of my time is to start to edit all the video I've taken the past three weeks down into the form I'll use for the video about CENCOSAD's work (which we'll use for education and fund-raising). I'll be doing a lot of that and spent a lot of time today on it. Good news -- so far, the video looks pretty good (thanks, Ian!), the audio comes across well (which I had been concerned about), and I can get about an hour of tape into MPEG files on my computer that only take up about 600MB of space ... so I won't have the problem Steve had with the video files eating up all my memory. Bad news -- because of various factors, it takes about 3.5 hours to convert one hour of video to the MPEG format and put it on my computer. It's SLOOOOOOOW going.

But, as I was contemplating what to do with the downtime while the computer is working, I realized that I can do editing but this is also a good time to remember that I AM ON SABBATICAL. So I did some reading and then a whole bunch of writing as I try to start to figure out how all the different streams of thought I've had over the past six months come together. All in all, it's been a really good day.

Yesterday was bittersweet. The tough part was that it was Robin's and my 12th wedding anniversary and the first one we've spent apart. I did get to talk with her on the phone for about 8 minutes last night, so that was great. I can't wait for her to get here (10 days!).

I preached and concelebrated with Immanuel at St. Luke's. It was a wonderful experience. The service was hugely long because in the middle of it (right after the sermon), they stopped and had what they call a mini-harvest ... basically a fundraiser for some special cause (this time it was the building fund). They solicited donations from everyone there, then auctioned off a few things and then had an altar call for more offerings. They wanted to raise 15 million cedis (about $1600), and ended up raising alomst 19 million (about $2000) ... so that was great.

After the service, Immanuel and I went with most of the congregation to the house of a woman whose husband had died the night before. It's a wonderful tradition they have -- everyone comes over and just hangs out with the family outside the house praying and singing some hymns and letting the family feel supported ... for about 20 minutes ... and then people close to the family stay and everyone else leaves -- so there's no hassle of having to feed everyone and no details to worry about. Just everyone showing up and showing that they love and care.

After that, Immanuel and I drove to Kokrobite - this really great beach resort area -- where we met up with Mackinnon, Ann, Nie Aboe and Nie Otuo. The Ghanians thought the water was freezing, but we thought it was great. You can also rent a little shelter at the top of the beach for the afternoon for about 10,000c (about a dollar), so we hung out there for awhile. Very relaxing and just a good time with friends.

I just got an invitation from All Souls church in Budruburam to come preach and celebrate on Sunday, July 11 ... but that's Robin's Sunday in town and we're already promised to St. Luke's. I'm going to write them back and see if I can come to one of their Wednesday night services instead (and make sure they've cleared it with their bishop. Given the state of things, I don't want trouble from or to offend the Bp. of the Diocese of Cape Coast).

That's all for now. Hope you all are well. Congratulations and blesings to Teresa Mithen and Jon Erdman, ordained priests last Saturday. And also to Erin and Windy, married in L.A. last Saturday. I wish I could trilocate so I could have been with you all.
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Mike at 6/28/2004 11:23:00 AM