2011 Mission to Ghana
from Hannah Peck
It’s been two days sense we’ve blogged because we have been traveling half way across the country to Kpando. We woke up early Tuesday morning for the exciting Tro-tro ride. We arrived in Kpando in the early afternoon to an extremely welcoming, Emmanuel, who gave us a tour and introduced us to all the departments of Margaret Marquart Catholic Hospital. He introduced us to a few of his patients and sat in on Emmanuel’s treatment session of a stroke patient. After the session, Emmanuel discussed with us the increase in stroke prevalence in Ghana, due to high blood pressure and poor diet. After the day at the hospital, Sarahann introduced us to some of her friends she met on her last visit to Ghana, who invited us over for dinner. We enjoyed a relaxing evening outside in the “cool” Ghana air, with 30 neighborhood children who were very excited to see some “yevos” (white people). We just happened to meet a fellow Tennessean who will also be joining us on our flight home on Sunday. What a small world!
The next morning we awoke early because it was market day in Kpando. After telling all of our new and old friends goodbye, we got back onto the Tro-tro for the long, fast, bumpy drive back to Accra. Upon arrival in Accra, we met up with Peter, the co-founder of Standing with Hope, at Ghana Health Services for a tour of the prosthetics and orthotics clinic (picture below). We met a patient that was extremely excited to see 5 young ladies who will be working with him tomorrow. On the walk home from Ghana Health services, we passed through the “bus stop”/market to find some delectable “Obama” (and family) cookies. After a long day of traveling, we had dinner at the hotel and decided to practice taping ankles for our upcoming 1st Responder course. As you can tell we are having a super exciting evening.