Gbarnga Mission | Liberia – West Africa

It was a beautiful sunny day in Monrovia today.  I tried out the GPS coordinates on my iPhone and found it to be within 100′ of where I am actually sitting in my room (go to Google Earth and cut/paste this 6 17.23′ N, 10 46.58′ W and it will zoom right into the LCL compound). Surprise…I… Continue reading The Ministry of Finance cha-cha-cha

This evening’s sleep was punctuated by extreme bolts of lightning…followed of course by the rumble of thunder.  Ear plugs and functioning air conditioning after changing rooms helped me have a great sleep. Breakfast offered more conversation about sustainable development over rolls, hard boiled eggs, and PB&J. Around 10:30am I donned my yellow raincoat and walked… Continue reading Worship at St. Peter’s and lunch with Naomi

After breakfast, I was picked up by Albert who was tasked with driving me on my errands.  First stop was the fancy hotel across from St. Peter’s Lutheran Church where we got a new SIM card for my iPhone 5s that afforded me 24 minutes of international calls for 50¢, 2 gigs of internet data,… Continue reading Saturday errands and dinner at Rev. Dowah’s

The final leg of the flight to Monrovia went very quickly and we arrived 30 minutes early.  Upon landing and “deplaning” (I never understood that term…are we no longer “planing”?) we walked down the stairs and onto the rain-soaked tarmac, loaded into a bus, and drove to the terminal. Before entering, all passengers were greeted… Continue reading Arrival in Monrovia – Breakfast with Reinhard

I seem to find ice cream wherever I travel. Whether it’s Kimball’s at home, Dairy Queen in Appalachia, “gelato” in Italy or “helado” in Nicaragua … and now an ice cream bar at 38,000 feet over Africa has found me thanks to Brussels Airlines.  I hope my future posts will have more significance than my… Continue reading Ice cream in the sky.

The Chicago to Brussels flight was uneventful…which is what I like on an airplane at 35,000 feet. It’s a beautiful morning in Brussels as I wait 3 hours for my flight to Monrovia via Freetown, Sierra Leone. 

My baggage is oversized because I’m hand carrying the well pump with me so we can potentially have the bore hole well drilled this trip.  The baggage check-in attendant initially refused to take it because the pump box was taped to the luggage.     After three different luggage “experts” evaluated it, they still wanted to… Continue reading First hurdle…airport check-in!

Tomorrow is my departure for Liberia and I’m starting to change from excited to nervous. Thanks to Stan Reible from my church (Mt. Calvary http://www.mtcalvaryacton.org) who will be picking me up at noon to head to Logan Airport.  29 hours or so later I should be in Monrovia.  Unfortunately I don’t think I can bring… Continue reading Departure butterflies…

Phase 1 construction for the Gbarnga Lutheran Training Center begins October 2015! I’ll be in Liberia from October 8th to November 19th and will try to update with photos as the project progresses…and internet is available. If you’d like to support this school project, please visit our website http://www.gbarngamission.org…thanks!