For where your heart is, there also is your treasure.

by Bruce Neumann

In 2004 God called me to Ghana to be a part of Cursillo Team. This makes my 7^th trip; why do I keep coming back? Like our son, Zach, said, “Once you have African soil on your feet, you will always have a piece of Africa in your heart.”

This year I had a totally new and unplanned

experience. On a Tuesday evening Becki+ and Ronny needed MTN minutes for the internet (Think prepaid mobile phones and you’ll have the idea). The front desk of the Hansonic Hotel (where we stay) told us to go out of the parking lot and turn left. It was very dark out there as the power was out in the whole section, but Ronny and I started off anyway, our eyes fixed on the yellow MTN umbrella in the distance. (This was an outside “stall,” meaning table, where the man sold the cards out of his wallet.)

To call the thing we walked on a sidewalk would be a misnomer. They really don’t exist, except in some places where a concrete slab or blocks covers the open sewer. Otherwise, you are walking on a dirt path. The” sidewalk” began at the “trotro” (bus – think 9 passenger van) stop just up from the yellow MTN umbrella. I started walking on the sidewalk and the next thing I knew I was flat on my face and my left leg hurt like crazy! I had found the spot of one of the missing pieces of sidewalk. Ronny tried so hard not to laugh! Two gentlemen walking past kept saying, “So sorry, so sorry.” I had managed to step right into the sewer!!

I put sand on my “wet” foot to dry it, quickly bought the MTN cards, and hurried back to the Hansonic, thankful my leg was only “wet,” and not broken. Becki was waiting and couldn’t understand why I was in such a rush to get into the shower. All I could say was, “I have to have a shower NOW!” As I rushed upstairs leaving her in the lobby Ronny explained what had happened; I had REALLY put my foot in it!

I could have broken my leg. I could have gotten an infection (I was pretty scraped up). But I didn’t. Would I come back again? Yes, I would, in a minute. Why? Because God calls me here to use my hands to help those children. And because of the African soil on my shoes I will always carry a piece of Africa in my heart.