Finally!

Well, I took my first steps in a country that I imagined might only be a dream for me to ever actually get to visit! My heart was so full when I stepped off the plane and I got a bit teary eyed. I took in my surroundings and then realized very quickly that my body was soaking wet within 3.2 seconds. IT'S SO HOT and HUMID HERE!!! It's okay though because I fit right in and I don't need to tell everyone that I have a thyroid problem. The sweat marks all over my shirt are completely the norm here!

Rewind...

After sitting on the runway on November 10th for three hours we were informed that we would not be flying out that night due to a hydraulic issue with the plane. At about 2:00am our full plane of foreigners were told to get a hotel and to be back at the airport by noon the following day. So, what any Shelton who thinks they need to take charge does, I decided to be the last person to leave the airport from our plane to make sure everyone had a place to stay. There were a few Ghanaians who only spoke French who had no idea what was going on. They were given a pink voucher and told to call the number on the front to get a room for the night. They had no idea what was being said to them and most of them didn't have a phone that worked in the US anyway. I'm sure the Flight Attendants deal with this all of the time so they didn't bother to help out much. I immediately put myself in their shoes and wasn't about to walk away because the same thing could happen to me at the airport in Ghana; only I would pretend to know what I was doing which usually doesn't end well.

By the time we left the airport I had two French speaking Africans, a girl who speaks mainly Twi but can understand a few English words and a guy who's originally from Ghana but has lived in the US for most of his life all walking behind me like I was the only thing they had at that moment (other than the guy who speaks English. He came in very valuable as a translator). We were quite the bunch but it was okay because we stuck together. I think if I would've allowed it, all five of us would've shared a hotel room but I opted out of that and shared with one of the French speaking girls. The funny thing about it was none of us even exchanged names until we were all going our separate ways in Ghana. We didn't need to because we all had the same goal in mind and that was to get some rest before we had to be back to the airport. Well, at about 4:30am my head finally hit my pillow!

The next day we made it back to Dulles International at about 11:30ish and no one from United Airlines seemed to know that a bunch of black people and about four white people would be coming in for a special flight. Boarding was supposed to start at 2:15pm but that didn't happen. I overheard one of the flight attendants on the phone stating that he didn't think there was a pilot there to fly our special crew on our special plane. So, we waited once again. Finally, we were able to board the plane at about 3:15pm but only so we could sit on the runway for another 2 hours before taking off. Apparently this time the plane had passed all of the legal inspections but the light in the cockpit was not indicating so. We inched our way slowly to the runway and the pilot came on over the speaker and said, "We appreciate your patience with us both last night and today. I wish I could blame the delay on the maintenance crew or the boarding crew but I can't. United messed this one up!" And that was it. He was not happy but by his statement he calmed a lot of angry customers down just by hearing that United was taking the blame on this one.

Almost everything that I've heard about Ghanaians being on their own time table has come true so far. When we arrived at the Accra airport it didn't matter much to anyone around me that we were pretty much the only flight to land for quite some while but had to wait about an hour for our luggage to be pulled from the plane and put on the belt. I will learn patience here that's for sure. I will also learn to be okay with the smell of BO...whoa!

Lydia, however, was on time to pick me up and she has been great from the start. I feel like I've known her for far longer than a day already. She is so generous and won't let me lift a finger; which I'm not sure how I feel about that. She took me to see the Temple and the church office buildings. It never ceases to amaze me how no matter where in the world you are, if there is an LDS church or Temple around, they all look like the one right out my own backdoor. A sense of peace comes about that's for sure! She then drove me to her school where I got to meet a couple of the kids who immediately started calling me "Auntie Sydnee". I got to see the eyes of such beautiful and innocent orphans that I've only seen in movies and magazines. They truly have a spirit about them like no other. One little girl ran over to me and gave me a little purple flower and said, "Here you go Auntie Sydnee, this is for you."