A YEAR IN SAN PEDRO......................

Visiting San Pedro, one might think that this is an African paradise - and in many ways it is.  Our house and guest house were on a hill overlooking the Bay of Guinea, blue and beautiful with the white waves rolling in. White sandy beach - all visible from our new home.  But we also found that San Pedro had a darker side, which we experienced during our year there.  We experienced near drownings, finding a dead body on the beach and news of a French woman being raped - also on the beach, a coup throughout the country of Côte d'Ivoire and a massive break-in to our compound with armed thieves.  It was an exciting year, that's for sure. And also a year of blessing for us as we were able to bless others who stayed in our guest houses and as we worked with the great Alliance churches there in town.  Fortunately, life is never just "downs" but also has its up side, and in thinking back to San Pedro and our ministry there, it is a happy memory now.

The Hanscomes were leaving for a year of home assigbment and we had been asked to fill in for them that year, so we did. We flew from Atlanta to Abidjan via Europe and had a good flight. We were met by Clousers and Bubnas in Abidjan, which was a blessing. Clousers had a car which we could use to get us to San Pedro, and so we piled in all of our baggage and supplies and took off for San Pedro early one morning. The car started acting up and we kept driving, but finally it clonked out totally right in a little village. The people helped to push it to the side of the road.  Knowing that it was something major,  Dad hopped a ride on a truck to the next village to get help, and I sat there among a crowd of inquisitive, jabbering children - who didn't speak any language I knew - and relaxed until Dad got back. He returned in a big old Rapide and we paid the driver to load our bags into his vehicle and take us to San Pedro.  On the way we ran into a fierce rainstorm, as is frequent in forest country. There were no windows to close - just open holes and we got soaked with the driving rain. But at least we got to our destination. (And the car was taken care of later and fixed.) 

The Hanscomes were waiting lunch for us and it was good to arrive in a dry place. They very graciously left out all their furniture - including a nice TV and video player - for us to use, as we had taken only our suitcases with our clothes and personal items.  Craig and Marilyn spent time to show us all around and to explain everything about running the guest house. They got so involved in this that we had to encourage them to leave for Bouaké as their son was graduating and they were going to miss his banquet if they did not leave right away!  We had taken care of guest houses before so we knew the ropes, and we had good house help there to inform us of things we did not know, so we settled right in.  And Hanscomes made it to Bouaké and Daniel's graduation festivities before leaving for home assignment for a year.

We had a host of guests that year - from forty different missions and churches. We did everything we could to make people feel welcome. For Alliance personnel, we gave them a hot meal their first evening in San Pedro. I did all the cooking but had a good right hand in the house help,  And we did what we could to make the guest rooms attractive, put in flowers, etc.  I had run guest houses in Burkina, so knew the drill, and we fit right in there. 

The house we lived in had a screened in porch facing the beach and the ocean, Dad had the floor tiled and it made an extra room for us where we could feed guests who came. I also loved to sit out there in the early morning, meditating and praying with my Bible. Very soothing.

One mission had about twelve people who wanted to have a retreat at our guest house and asked if I could board them, which I agreed to do. They loved having their meals ready each day and sitting on that beautiful front porch to eat them.  Our guests were for the most part very congenial - many of them we knew from our time as missionaries in West AFrica.  We also had some church guests who would come for a day or two just to have a rest and we liked having them also. Some of the pastors in the San Pedro area had been my students at Maranatha Bible Institute and it was a delight to visit with them again and entertain them in our home. 

Clousers and Bubnas came at different times to vacation with their children, and that was a special treat for us.  When Steve and Debbi were there one time, we were all down at the beach - Dad was in swimming and the rest of us were sitting talking on the beach. All of a sudden we became aware that Dad was strugging out there in the water and Steve swam out to help him and brought him back to shore. All he could do was lie there and get the water out of his system.  That was a close call!   Another time the Brauns were visiting and a lot of people were in the water. Chris got caught in the undertow and he had to be brought in as he was nearly drowned also. We got a car from the guest house and had to take him up as he was too weak to walk!  So those were some close calls!!

Soon after we arrived, we got the news that a French woman had been raped on the beach just the other side of our guest house.  I went down to the beach early one morning and as I walked up towards the city (we lived a couple of miles down the beach from the town) I saw something that looked like a body lying on the beach. And sure enough, it was a body. I turned around immediately and went quickly back home. That was the end of my beach walk that day. Dad thought it best not to report it since we would be questioned by the police - and we had nothing to do with it. But we watched from our front porch and finally saw the police arrive to take the body.  So we had some excitement during our year in San Pedro. 

Often when a gang came to stay at the guest house, we would all go out to Grand Bereby for an outing. That is a resort - a beautiful place with a great restaurant and white sandy beaches with clear water. A great place for a day off.  One time when we were there, an American yacht had docked there, from North Carolina.  The Americans were fishing for blue marlin and they had caught the biggest blue marlin ever captured in that area. The restaurant had it stuffed and put it up in their bar. The wealthy of the world flew in there to spend their vacations, and it was a beautiful and interesting place to visit!

Y2K also happened when we were in San Pedro that year!  Everyone was talking about it in the USA - and also in Côte d'Ivoire.  We were not convinced anything was going to happen and so we planned a big party. (I think Clousers were there at that time).  There were about seventy missionaries in the area and at the guest house and we invited everyone to come and bring pot luck dishes so we could have a meal together. Some of the men also bought a bunch of fireworks which they contributed to the evening's fun. We had a wonderful party and everyone stayed till midnight.  When nothing happened, everyone rushed into our house and used the computers to send messages to their families that all was well in RCI!  It was a fun evening and turned out well.  Just in case, we had stored huge amounts of filtered water and also had plenty of kerosene lanterns ready for use.  You can't be responsible for that many people in a guest house without making provisions, just in case..... 

We had a lot of personal guests that year also. Blaise, a friend of Dad's from BF, came with his little girl and spent a week. His hostess gift to us was a jar of fried flying ants, as he had heard the Bobos love those to eat!!  Prosper and Justine and their children came over from the FATEAC and spent a weekend with us. Abdoulaye and his wife, in radio work in Abidjan, also spent a weekend with us.  And of course we had the translators there from time to time as we worked on the finalizing of the Bobo Bible translation project. I was able to work on that during that year and we finished the manuscript before returning to the USA. 

That was the year Daniel was a senior at ICA, and his class planned their class reunion at San Pedro. Debs, you came and we worked on that great weekend together, providing all meals for the kids. They also had sponsors. It was really a fun time and the kids loved it and so did we. We fed them and they spent a lot of their time down at the beach.  The last night they were there we all went out to a restaurant in town and the school treated us to our meal in thanks for a fun weekend for the Seniors. 

On a more somber note, we had our massive break-in that year, towards the end of the year. We had packed our car and were ready to leave early the next morning for Abidjan to work on translation.  Dad parked the car out beside the storeroom instead of in the car port attached to our house. We were wakened during the night by a scared(and hurt) guard.  Dad went out and then came and got me up. We had a few people staying in our guest house out back, a new missionary couple from another mission. They had two children.  The thieves crawled over the wall, tackled the guard and hurt him and tied him up. They wanted into our house and he lied and said we were not there - that was obvious as our car was not there!  So the burglars went out back to the guest house and burst into the room of this young couple, turned on the lights, hauled the woman out of bed and hurt her, scared the kids to death and demanded money. The man had just taken thousands of francs out of the bank that day and he took them from their hiding place and gave them all to the men to get rid of them.  We spent the rest of the night doctoring the guard, going to get the police, comforting the poor new missionaries. It was really a nuit blanche.  They had also broken into our outside office and messed up things, stole some money and walked off with our movie camera and some other items.  It was a disastrous weekend - in this paradise of San Pedro.  Taking care of all these things with the police the next day delayed our trip to Abidjan until the afternoon. But we did go as we had appointments to meet there.  We felt so bad for the young couple - they had just begun their first term in Togo I think, and they never made it through that year but returned to the States. The trauma of that break in was just too much for them...and who could blame them?? 

One other big happening took place that year while we were in San Pedro.  There had been a lot of rumors and small fights going on around the country and we heard echos of them. Everyone was talking against the president and what would become of the Côte d'Ivoire. Dad was down at a store in town one day and a clerk was talking to him about the trouble in the country and Dad ventured the idea that it seemed like the threat of a coup to us - we had been through this in Burkina and knew the signs!  But the local people said this could never happen in this country.  The next day the coup happened. We followed the announcement on TV and then the military music that sounded so familiar. No one could travel. It was the week of Christmas.

Nevius's and Webbers were staying at the guest house that week. I had asked Marjorie what they were doing for Christmas and she said they had brought a cooked turkey and were going to have a family meal and so we did not make any big plans for a meal.  The Nevius's were to leave the next day when the announcement of the toppling of the president was announced and they could not travel so were stuck there with us. Nevius's had certain traditions about food and gifts and the girls were upset because they could not do those things. Wes was worried about his missionaries as he was field director.  So I took Corey downtown and we were able to buy all the favorite foods the kids liked for Christmas, plus other things, Webbers decided to contribute their turkey and join us all. And we had a good Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in spite of the coup!  We all stayed glued to the TV for any news coming through.  And finally travel was permitted and our guests were able to leave and other people came to fill their places.  One more event in our eventful year at San Pedro.  Being seasoned people from Burkina helped tremendously for us to minister to our guests. They were all so fearful. We were able to reassure and pray with people concerning the crisis and that was a ministry for us also that year.

The outstanding memories of that year, however, had to do with the church. But I will save that for another chapter......