Hanging out with friends & building relationships cross-culturally
As I reflect over the past week, I see what an incredible one it has been – full of rich relationships (there was only one night in seven when we were not with other people, and during that particular day we had several visitors and a 45 minute phone conversation!)
as well as the necessary/needed office type productivity. John has been busy arranging trip locations and leaders for 2008, answering e-mails of inquiry about our 2008 trips from prospective participants, and making arrangements for our transportation during debrief, while Shevawn has been putting the final touches on our debrief curriculum as well as revising our Orientation curriculum to incorporate our ideas of ways to improve from this years experiences. John and I are both so thankful to the Lord for good health and stamina each day so far of our time here!
OK, I've been promising to send you some Orientation stories, so here's one for you: I had mentioned in our prayer letter that we were making some changes to our Orientation curriculum…. one of the changes centered on trying to include some more interactive ways of engaging our team during sessions where we have to do a lot of information dispensing.) So…. Each year we have this session on cultural differences, where we discuss the different ways Ghanaian and Ex-pats interact in different situations. This year, instead of just talking about it, we "saw" it, by breaking our participants into small groups and asking them to act out a situation…..kind of like charades, only verbal. For example; we told a group of three Ghanaian young men and a different group of three expatriate young men that they should put together a 2-3 minute enactment of what it was like to hang out with their friends in their culture. Each group presented their sketch to the entire group; and it was quite revealing….as well as hysterical! The Ghanaian men enacted walking down the street, where they "bumped into" each other and immediately began talking about different friends and the events they had been at with their friends; weddings, funerals, etc. Then one invited the others to join him to go where he was going, and they all set off together. The expats sketch started very differently, with two young men coming to the home of the third and immediately sitting down to watch a sports event on TV together, and then progressing to playing X-box games together; quite a bit of cheering, excited shouting; an entirely different way of relating. After we all stopped laughing, we talked about what we had observed and things we could learn that would help us relate cross-culturally better. It was a lot of fun, and helped get the various points across in a much better way than the discussion mode we used to employ.
Well, that about wraps it up for today. Prayer requests for us include wisdom as we prioritize our time between now and our Discoverers return for debrief on Thursday July 19th….that we would get done the most important things and would be ok with letting the rest go…that the participants would continue to fully engage in their work and relationships in their various locations up until the time they depart…..and please continue to pray for John's computer, which is still hanging in there (which we thank God for so much!)
Thanks so much for your prayers!
Comments
Jeff and I went to visit William and CeCelia Addai today (7/15) at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena. If you haven't been able to access your email, here is what we received from Emmanuel this week. I immediately called and he said his Dad could see people. We had to wear masks but it was good to see that he could talk, he could feel us touching his hands but he can't move from the neck down. His blood is being washed through a machine, several hours a day, and will be done for 5 days. That is the only treatment they have going right now. Just being in the US, in a good hospital with good care, has made him feel and look better, according to him and Cecelia.
Cecelia wanted to be sure you knew why she would not be in Kumasi if you came by to see her. They will still be here when you get back since it will be a long time before he is healthy enough to return to Ghana.
We did "greet" them for you. Glad to hear all is well with you.
Love, Kelley
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Hello to you all,
This is Emmanuel (William's son) writing to update you my dad's medical condition.
As most of you know, he has been really sick since last November and this condition has been getting progressively worse. The Doctor's in Ghana came to point last week where they said they had exhausted all their medical resources and could not find what the cause of his illness or what the illness was for that matter. This forced him along as the rest of the family to try to get him to the States to see what the doctors here could do.
I am glad to say that we were able to fly him out to Huntington Hospital in Pasadena, CA last Friday. He has been admitted there ever since and they have run test after test (MRI's, Cat Scans, Biopsies) and as of now they also cannot find what the illness is or what the cause is also. One thing they confirmed today was that he nerves have shut down of him and are not functioning. They are running a lot of specific blood test to see if that will help point in any direction.
He is completely paralyzed (neck down) and so my mother is staying at the hospital with him for the 24hr care he needs despite the great medical staff. They both can be contacted on my wife's cell phone at 626-786-6024. If you try and don't get them for some reason, just keep trying because I don't think my mom has the code or password to retrieve messages. As you can imagine he is not in great shape to personally talk for too long or sometimes at all but you can talk to my mom at least who can pass messages along to him. You can also call me directly at 909-532-0189 and I will be able to relay any messages whether I am able to answer my phone or a voicemail is left.
Please pray that my dad would continue to hear God's voice in all this and continue to believe that God is in control eventhough all these doctors are still scrambling to find answers. Also pray that God would give the Doctors here at Huntington Hospital divine wisdom as the doctors in Ghana basically just wasted or passed precious time with no real clue where they were going. Pray that God would be with our whole family and be everything we need him to be in this tough season of our lives. Lastly that God would provide the finances (supernaturally) it is going to take to deal with the enormous medical cost that lie ahead since he has no medical insurance.
Feel free to contact me via email or phone for any further information.
Blessing in Christ Jesus our Savior.
Emmanuel Addai & Family
909-532-0189