Parts of the African bush are always burning.\u00a0 As we bounced along the red dusty roads of the Komba people, we passed blackened trees, gray-white columns of ash where logs once lay, and that dry-hot smell of smoke. Beth and I are not strangers to damaging fires.\u00a0 We watched 200 homes be consumed by fire when we lived in Los Alamos.\u00a0 With Komba homes constructed of thatched roofs and mud walls, I imagined fires would be particularly destructive and abhorred by all.\u00a0 Not universally true!\u00a0 While the majority of bush inhabitants hate the fires, and struggle to keep their compounds safe, there are a group of men who purposefully set the dry grasses and trees alight. They are hunting bush game. We watched as Komba men drug a flaming branch along a bank of golden knee-high grass.\u00a0 In the dry season, the light breeze and brittle grasses quickly burn.\u00a0 Waiting at the end of the field are groups of men hoping to catch wild bush meat — small rodents, snakes, or possibly something larger.\u00a0 It is hard for us to understand this practice, but seems to be quite widespread.\u00a0 We don’t know how the local ecosystem has changed from this practice.\u00a0 We will have to ask Emily when we get home.<\/p>\n A day off at Mole National Park<\/strong><\/p>\n Ray had to head back to Accra a day early to attend the funeral of his wife’s brother-in-law.\u00a0 Beth and I had not planned any break days in Ghana, we had come to work, but we thought attending the funeral would be more distracting than helpful, so we suggested Ray travel ahead to Accra via his 4×4, while we stayed an extra day in Tamale and hired a 4×4 and driver to take us to Mole National Park.<\/p>\n The southern parts of Ghana are humid and lush.\u00a0 On our last trip to Ghana we took a 1\/2 day off for a rain forest canopy walk.\u00a0 The northern reaches of Ghana are more savannah like, with the warm browns and tans of the dry season interrupted by clumps of green trees near watering holes.<\/p>\n Our driver picked us up in a modern version of our Toyota LandCruiser early on Friday morning.\u00a0 We tossed in our camera bag, water, snacks, laptops (so we didn’t have to leave them in the hotel) and sun protection and let Hadi know we were ready for adventure.\u00a0 He smiled, revved up the diesel, and we once again started bouncing along 1\/2 pavement, 1\/2 dirt roads.\u00a0 After a few minutes I noticed Hadi’s car stereo had a USB stick protruding.\u00a0 Hadi nodded after I asked him if it had music.\u00a0 Several minutes later I handed him a USB stick of my own… that I had just crafted with my laptop.\u00a0 He gave me a somewhat puzzled look and pulled his USB stick out and put mine in.\u00a0 Within moments we were bouncing down the backroads of Ghana to Michael Thompson, Big Daddy Weave, Toby Mac, and Casting Crowns :-)\u00a0 It was hard to tell if Hadi liked the music, but at times Beth and I sang along and he smiled.<\/p>\n Three hours later we were in Mole.\u00a0 It is required that all visitors hire a guide with a gun.\u00a0 Of course, I would have rather been on our own, and even having a driver was difficult for me.\u00a0 When Emily and I were in Botswana we not only drove ourselves, we fell asleep in a tent atop our 4×4 while listening to lions roar.\u00a0 Lions have not been seen in Mole for years, although rangers do occasionally see the remains of a kill.\u00a0 Anyway, our guide Yakum was pleasant, and after initially insisting he sit in the front seat of our 4×4, gave in when I laughed and explained he must have the park memorized, and could navigate for our driver with his eyes closed.\u00a0 Yakum returned my smile, covered his eyes and said “let me try… Hmmmm”, then he pointed to me and said “Pete!”.\u00a0 I laughed and thanked him for climbing in the back seat to protect my wife.\u00a0 With the front passenger window rolled down, it was easy for me to climb out of the window and take pictures across the roof of the car.<\/p>\n Yakum pointed out hartabeest, wildebeest, monkeys, antelope, etc., as we idled our way deep into the park.\u00a0 Near a watering hole, Yakum lead us down a path looking for elephants and crocodiles.\u00a0 We were not disappointed :-)<\/p>\n After 5 hours of driving, we payed our guide and Hadi started driving us back to Tamale.\u00a0 In the morning, we flew to Accra.<\/p>\n The Korums Home<\/strong><\/p>\n I apologize for not taking any pictures of the Korums!\u00a0 Jeff and Laurie are missionaries in Accra and kindly let us stay with them.\u00a0 Thank you!\u00a0 All day Saturday I edited audio with Logic (Apple’s sound editing software… kind of a Photoshop for audio).\u00a0 A wide range of transformations can be applied to the audio files, and I experimented for several hours trying to find the best combination to transform the audio we had and the audio others had given us into bright, clean sound when being played by a 1.5″ solar powered music player.<\/p>\n While I sat under a ceiling fan at the Korum’s house with ear buds and wrinkled forehead, adjusting and tweaking sound tracks, Beth worked on cataloging all the files, documenting the speakers, songs, Bible stories, and writing our trip report for OWM, etc.\u00a0 It was a long day, but by 10:00pm, we had 470 audio files including the Komba New Testament, the Komba songs and stories we recorded, the health information from nurse Suzie, etc.\u00a0 I started a batch job transcoding it all so in the morning we could load up the audio players we were leaving with Ray.\u00a0 Whoohoo!\u00a0 It is really nice to totally complete the work you had only vaguely sketched and wondered about from the USA.<\/p>\n Sunday Church<\/strong><\/p>\n In the morning we attended Victory Bible Church with Ray, his wife and kids, and the family and friends mourning Cynthia’s brother-in-law.\u00a0 It was a very colorful service… except for the mourners, who were still wearing the traditional black and white of memorial services.\u00a0 However, everyone was celebrating his life, and near the end of the service, roughly 50 people in black and white African clothes (and 2 white folks who didn’t know what to wear) went to the front of the church and the pastor prayed for the family left behind.<\/p>\n \u00a0Superbowl!<\/strong><\/p>\n Yes, we mostly watched the Superbowl.\u00a0 The kickoff was at 11:30pm, and Jeff Korum had arranged an NFL web-pass so he could project the game on a screen in his house, streaming the video from his good Internet connection.\u00a0 We enjoyed cookies and popcorn with their family and a few men from the church who had heard Jeff had a plan to watch the game.\u00a0 The 49ers fans were disappointed however, and by about 3:15am, I was beat, and headed to bed.\u00a0 It was fun imagining our kids watching the game from friends’ homes while we watched from Ghana.<\/p>\n The Mensah Family<\/strong><\/p>\n On Monday we had just enough time to meet with Ray’s OneWay Africa management team and spend some time with Cynthia and the kids, Joseph and Esi.\u00a0 We had brought some clothes, toys, books, and letters from the friends back at OneWay Church, and we had the pleasure of showing the kids how to play with a barrel of monkeys and trying to explain silly putty (which in the heat, was pretty gooey).\u00a0 The kids REALLY had fun playing Go Fish.\u00a0 In fact, by 8:00pm, they wanted to drive with us to the airport so Beth and Esi and Joseph could continue asking each other if they had Jelly Fish, Dolphins, Sea Turtles, or Angler Fish.\u00a0 Beth was not successful at teaching them how to shuffle, but I’m not so sure Beth is that good at it either.\u00a0 :-)<\/p>\n So… we are now in Lisbon, Portugal.\u00a0 What?\u00a0 Well, the free tickets (via frequent flier) had a particularly convoluted path home… Accra -> Lisbon -> Frankfurt -> Chicago.\u00a0 To give us a chance to relax and walk and catch up, we decided to spend 24 hrs in Lisbon.\u00a0 We arrived this morning at 4:30am and we leave tomorrow on the flight to Frankfurt and then United to Chicago at 7:30am.\u00a0 We may head out tonight to hear some Fado music.<\/p>\n We look forward to getting home and hugging our kids!\u00a0 Emily and Paul, we love you!\u00a0 OneWay family, thanks for your prayers and you will get more information when we return.\u00a0 See you then!\u00a0 We may post one more time from Frankfurt or when we land in Chicago, just to let folks know we are safe.\u00a0 John Mac, see ya at the airport!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is probably our last post before we board the final flights back to hug our kids and then I will dive in full time on a large DOE proposal that several labs and universities have been writing the last few weeks. Today, we have a potpourri… about a dozen different topics: observations, pictures, and … Continue reading Potpourri<\/span> ![\"Every](\"https:\/\/leopardshark.com\/ghana-trips\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/DSC_9855.jpg\")
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