Tonight at 9:00 pm Joel flew out of Sat Lake International Airport to Accra Ghana via a one hour layover in Amsterdam. He will spend three weeks in the Ghana MTC (Mission Training Center) in Accra. He will than spend the remainder of his two year mission in the Cape Coast Ghana Mission. Send e-mails to joel.emmett@missionary.org.
If you would like to receive his weekly e-mail back to friends and family let me know and I wil add you to the list: chad_emmett@byu.edu
No suits are required. Just white (mostly short sleeve) shirts and slacks. Last night when packing we discovered that he was under his 50 pound weight limit for his two checked bags. So today we added more things including staples like peanut butter (three jars) and jelly (two jars); Swedish fish, spiced almonds, dried mangoes and apricots (from Trader Joe's); and Cliff bars; plus more toothpaste and other toiletries. When we checked in both big bags were at the 50 lb limit
As we were walking through the parking garage we passed a missionary (and his family) who had just returned from his mission. The two missionaries, one leaving and one returning, locked eyes, smiled and gave a nod of the head and that was the beginning of Marie's tears. In the airport there were about 12 elders (three can be seen in the photo above) checking in for the same flight to Ghana. Joel already had met two of them via social media connections and getting together for lunch a few weeks ago. There were also an equal number of missionaries waiting with welcoming families congregated around at the luggage carousels. It was a missionary fest. Amazing to think of all of these families who have all just spend much money and many hours of preparation getting ready for the missionary to depart and all of these families who have just spent two years praying daily, writing weekly emails, and paying monthly expenses to support their missionaries and of the missionaries who have just spent two years focused on helping and teaching people. It was interesting to note the crisp white shirts and new shoes of the departing missionaries compared to the well worn attire of the returning missionaries.
Driving home, we got a call from Joel. While waiting at the gate with the other missionaries he discovered that they had all brought their immunization cards. All he had was a print out of all of his immunizations that he submitted to the missionary portal. When we got home we did some checking and then called the Church travel office and found out that he does need proof of Yellow Fever immunization to enter Ghana. Yikes. Major mistake on our part. I hate to think of Joel on the flight wondering what will happen. Tomorrow morning we will take the certificate up to Church Offices for them to send over in a reliable/speedy daily shipment and we will send a scan of the document to the Ghana MTC and hope that they can use that to get Joel into the country with a promise that the actual certificate will be there in a few days. Stay tuned. We hope he doesn't have to fly back.