Ghana; Eyes to See

Hey guys! This week has flown by way too fast. Let me start with what we did last weekend. We generally have Saturdays and Sundays off which gives us some time to explore and relax. Last Saturday we were able to go to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park. Kwame Nkrumah was one of the most significant figures in Ghana's struggle for independence and became the nations first president. He was exiled from Ghana following a military coup and died out of the country, but his remains were later moved to this memorial. After that we went to the beach where we played some rugby. We tried to go swimming, but the lifeguards insisted that we couldn't go more than about five yards into the water.  A statue of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah This is fufu. It is a dumpling-like food they eat covered in soup. It is one of my favorites. Monday This week I got to work with the St. Thomas Eye Clinic based in Accra. On Monday we had an outreach in Dodowa, a beautiful place with a...

Hello folks! What a week! I will give you guy a quick walk through day by day. On Monday we had our first outreach. Most of our work here will be in outreaches where we travel to various parts of Ghana with a team of nurses and doctors to screen people's eyes. Each clinic has specific areas they visit monthly. This means that they are able to not only identify and treat eye problems, but they are also able to follow up each month with those who receive treatment of some kind. This week I was working with the Crystal Eye Clinic. Our first outreach was in Teshie, just down the road from an area I served in as a missionary called Nungua. People in the community gathered to a local church building (which has been the case in all of our outreaches thus far) to register for an eye screening. We arrived around 9am and finished around 6:30pm. Myself and three other volunteers helped out with visual acuity tests where the individual views a chart from a specified distance to assess how we...

I'm back. On Thursday I boarded a plane headed for New York and from there I flew to Ghana. Nearly two years ago I concluded two years of serving in Ghana as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. While here I fell in love this country and her people. Now I am back with a group of other BYU students to volunteer with the Unite For Sight organization. After enduring the long winter of Utah, it felt good to walk out of the airport and feel 90 degrees and high humidity. Our flight got in at about 1:30pm on Friday. Asante (a member who lives in the last area I served in on my mission) was there to meet. He has been my awesome driver the last couple of days. The rest of my Friday was spent with members in the Danfa ward. They fed me several delicious meals much as they used to do when I was a missionary. Man, these people take good care of me. I will include some pictures and stories of the people I saw later when I can. Benjamin...