It was a beautiful day here in Ghana. It started with a short 4 hour service at St. Andrew’s Anglican Church. Luckily it was not hot. I had a new dress and they sang my favorite hymn, “It is hard to work for God”. I am sure I will have a great comment on this hymn over the next few days but for now, on to the awards.
Last December we shipped a 40′ container to Ghana with medical equipment for our health center, books for the school and various other things that had collected in my garage for Ghana. However, in the midst of the “other things” there was evidently a box of assorted candies destined for the preschool. Last week Mercia found the box in with the books we are using for the reading clinic next month.
Just imagine a 1×2′ box filled with bags 15 to 20 bags of candies that have been sitting in a room at the village in 95 to 100 degree temperatures. We emptied each bag carefully into a bowl and began the assessment on eatability.
There are two categories: Hard Candy and Chewy Candy.
Each candy was judged in the following area:
Stickiness
Wrapper desolvement
Smell
Squishiness
and in some cases taste (there have to be some perks to this job)
The results were very, very clear and definitely not sticky.
In the Hard Candy Category – Life Savors are the definite winners. They still smell good. The individual wrappers did not get sticky or burst in the heat and the flavor is delicious. Unfortunately, the net will not let me download the photo tonight, so I will try posting it to facebook. Ghanaian Mothers’ Hope, Inc.
The Chewy candy category was quite a sticky situation. Definitely do not send Tootsie Roll chews to Africa. The chocolate ones were not too bad but the fruit chews were a mess. I mean a real mess. The wrappers had split, the candies had melted and infected even the good candies. We had to throw away most of the bag. Jolly Ranchers are another disaster–though they were judged in the Hard Candy category–they were a giant sticky mess.
The winner of the Chewy Candy and undisputed champion is Starburst Fruit Chews. All the papers were intact. Not oone of the bags was sticky. They looked fresh and brand new.
Congratulations Life Savors and Starburst. You are the champions of sending candy to Ghana.
Blessings to all from Ghana, Debi
Ghanaian Mothers' Hope 
4 responses to “Day 2 – Ghana And the winners are:”
Debi! Just opened my email and saw your Blog! I wish you a wonderful trip and send special greetings to Mercia. Stay well and enjoy your visit! Karen
Starbursts have always been one of my favorite candies. Really excited about Wed. See you then
Dear Debi et al:
In conducting your stress tests on the candies (probably called lollies in Ghana) did you find any correlation between endurance and the number of strange chemicals in them?
regards,
Peter
Dear Peter,
I didn’t check the chemicals but found that in lollies the cheaper ones held up the best. I will have to check the chemical nature of the candies. Mostly, we were looking at which candies could we save and actually had out to the children next week.
Thanks for the idea.
Blessings,
Debi