Somehow, going home really hit me with about a month to go. One month. It is going to fly. I think about what I was doing one month ago, compared to what I will be doing in one month (San Francisco), two months (Boston), three months (New Orleans), six months (graduating and moving home). It is kind of a lot to handle.
I have grown to know this country, love this country, be comfortable here. It would be presumptuous of me to say that this is now my home, but it feels like it a lot of the time.
Some of my favorite moments are just walking down the street on my way back from AMIS. It takes about forty minutes from where I get off the tro-tro coming from Nima, walking all the way back to my dorm. I smile at strangers and often surprise them. Obrunis aren't very friendly. It isn't necessarily our fault, it is just what we are used to in the US. When you pass people on the street, you ignore them unless you have a reason not to. Smiling is something done carefully, with a thought to the potential consequences of unwanted attention. Not so here. I smile at everyone. Every stranger is a person. Every person has the potential to change your world and blow your mind, alter your perspective and take your breath away. I have learned to try to see past each face into each story.
I think in Boston a little more than San Francisco, the different meaning of "stranger" will get to me. I can understand why stereotypes build based on cultural values. White people aren't rude, they just don't take the time or don't always recognize the need to ask how the person next to them is doing today.
Travelling to Ghana and being asked questions about the US has made me realize how little of the US I really know, and I think I been to a fair amount of places for my years. I have gone up and down the West Coast, I have road tripped through the Southwest, visited family in New York my whole life, vacationed in Alaska and Hawaii, seen Jeannette at University of Oregon, attended a funeral in Florida, attended a wedding in New Orleans, spent summers and winters in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, gone as far from home as possible for Northeastern in Boston.....and yet there is still so much more to see.
My friend Erin told me about an adventure her sister just went on. Some friends came together, bought a schoolbus, installed bunk beds in the back, and drove around the country for a month and a half. They picked some people up along the way, dropped some off elsewhere, and had some people there for the whole trip. So inspiring! I want to do something similar, and having people to visit from my semester here makes it so logical and possible.
Even within California, there is so much that I want to see, and this summer I hope to make a large dent in that on the John Muir trail. Dad questioned my ability to forego hot showers and varied food for the few weeks I would be backpacking, so clearly he hasn't fully comprehended what it is like to be in Ghana. I can more happily get by with the basics.
This Saturday, CIEE took us to the Volta region, which is the far East side of Ghana, on the other side of Lake Volta. We went to a monkey sanctuary first. We held bananas in our hands, the monkeys scurried over, peeled the banana, and ate a chunk before scurrying away again. Then we drove to Wli Falls, the tallest waterfall in West Africa. I can't even begin to describe the beauty, especially since we are usually surrounded by the less pristine city scape of Accra. But better than looking at the cascades of water coming down, was wading through the pool at the base, shielding our eyes from the stinging spray, and forcing our way under the falls itself. At first, I was led by a Ghanaian guy who was eager to show us few brave girls the way. He held on to me as we made our way step by step through the powerful waters. My sunglasses helped block the water from blinding me, but he had to walk backwards. While standing underneath some of the water towards the front of the falls, I asked if we could go all the way back and touch the rock wall behind us. We forced our way and the feeling was so incredible. I have never felt so cleansed. The power of the water prevented me from even thinking about anything else besides where I was, who I was, who I was sharing the experience with, and how lucky I am. Eventually we made our way out of the waterfall, emerging through the mist to the more timid bathers on the outside. Ezra had been trying to find his way in but couldn't, so I led him back to the wall, resisting the ripples pulling me out. The glasses were long gone, a casualty of a particular wall of water. While under, I thought to myself that I can honestly say it was the coolest thing I have ever done. Money can't buy you everything. Sometimes you just need a waterfall to make you happy.
One of this trip's surprises is that going to this dry, equatorial place has made me feel infinitely connected to water. The ocean is such a force in my spirit, and any body of water just puts me in a good place. I realized I will always need to live by the ocean to feel complete. My name coming true I guess.
Getting back to the original topic of this post, challenges going home:
1. Everything is going to be extravagantly expensive to me.
2. I won't legally be allowed to drink.
3. Fruit just won't be as good.
4. I have to quit my friends here cold turkey.
5. I have less of an excuse to travel every weekend.
6. It will be freezing to me.
7. I won't know any current music, movies, news, gossip, slang, or basically any pop culture.
8. Lily may not recognize me.
9. I will have real classes with real assignments and real expectations of me.
10. I will have a job. Could be a good thing and a bad thing.
11. The speed of the internet might give me ADD after adjusting to the way it is here.
12. I'm just going to want to go abroad again.
But, even so, I can't wait to return and share everything with everyone (pictures, stories, souvenirs, galore!).
Love from Ghana,
Mara
Monday, November 16, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
It's November Already?!?
October was incredible, but I can't believe it is over.
First weekend, Bojo beach. Reggae Night the first Wednesday. Thursday took off for Green Turtle (see last post) for the most relaxing weekend ever. The next weekend was the CIEE trip to Kumasi where we saw the Ashanti Manhyia Palace, Kejetia the largest market in West Africa,a Kente weaving village, and Lake Bosomtwe. While there, Ghana won the under 20 world cup, so we went out "jubilating." Working at Anani was improving and I started going more frequently, sometimes after class in the morning so that I was only there for the afternoons which are much more mellow.
Saturday the 24th, I went to Mr. Anani's sister's engagement party/wedding ceremony in Agboba. I went with Levi, the other CIEE student at AMIS, and we were the only ones there who were not family. We met Mr. Anani's mother, his many siblings from his father's many wives, a his many nephews. It was so nice to just sit on a couch in a real house and watch TV and talk to his family. Eventually the family of the groom arrived and the ceremony started. Brides family on one side of the room, groom's on the other, couches in the middle facing each other. Bride is hidden. Groom's family presents bride's family with a briefcase full of items requested in advance. He has had time to prepare, so really the engagement has been unofficial for a while. Representatives of both families went into another room to inspect, and eventually the bride's representative said that everything was in order and wonderful. Praying, singing, dancing. Then the presentation of the gifts. Fabric for the bride's mother. Something for the eldest brother since the father is deceased. A bible for the couple. A ring. With each gift, blessings were sang and prayers were shouted(almost all of this was in Twi, but I was able to understand the context of things. Finally, the bride came in and more singing and dancing, then blessings over the ring, blessings over the bible, blessings over some oil they poured on their hands, blessingblessingsblessings. Mr. Anani sat between Levi and myself explaining as we went along. My favorite part was Anani's mother getting up and dancing and people throwing money at her. She is ancient, but she was so happy and into the whole thing. On the way back we walked through the University of Ghana Botanical Gardens which are gorgeous and a little hidden hideaway right next to campus. I could easily and happily spend a whole day having a picnic there next to the pond under the trees. That night, we went out dancing at a nightclub and had a blast. We have been going to bars often, but it is more of an effort to rally people into going to nightclubs.
Tuesday the 27th, I went to drumming class and saw Treza and Lindsay(homestay girls) who were heading to Kokrobite Beach for the day with the sons of their basket weaving teacher (Paul and Dominic) and some of their friends (Kweku and one other). I was easily convinced to skip Xylophone in the afternoon and decided to join them for a relaxing day of sunshine and sand and sea. After a long tro tro ride there, we set up camp. Kokrobite is just past Bojo, but not as secluded. We pay 5 cedi to get into Bojo and it is clean and there are lifegaurds who watch people swim in a flagged off area. When people get pulled to one side by the current/undertoe, the lifeguards whistle and you get out of the water, walk along shore, and re-enter in the proper place. There was no such set up at Kokrobite unfortunately. You also have to be more careful at Kokrobite of people taking your stuff while you are in the water, so I volunteered to stay with the towels and bags while a bunch went to swim. A while later, I couldn't see my friends anymore because half my view was blocked by a fishing boat on the shore. I noticed people standing up on the beach and looking over in that direction, so I looked too. Everyone I was with except Dominic were in the water pretty far out. They had been swept sideways, without realizing that there was a ledge and suddenly they couldn't reach the bottom. That made it easier for them to be swept out away from shore. They all tried to head in, but Paul and the other friend got really flustered, panicked, and realized they couldn't make it on their own. They called to Lindsay and Treza to help, and not knowing any other option, they turned around. When each girl got to a guy, he did what any drowning person will do: try to climb on the person saving you. They realized that not only could they probably not save the guys, but they might go down with them. Kweku managed to alert people on shore and an off duty lifeguard ran out, saved the guys, then gave Treza the extra push she needed to get to shore after exhausting herself trying to save the others and herself. Such a close call. Terrifying. They all came back to our stuff and passed out on the sand for a while, catching their breath and thinking over what had (almost) just happened. After some much needed Italian food nearby, we went back to Legon.
The next night, my normal girls (Annie, Erin, Lissy) went to Reggae Night with one of our only Ghanaian friends from ISH. Lloyd drove us with a bunch of his friends, some who we had met before. We met up with my Rasta friend Sowah at the beach and all sat around hanging out for hours. It had been frustrating and disappointing for me that I didn't feel I had made Ghanaian friends, but talking to these guys just made us all so happy. Every person is a person, and it is nice to be nice.
Thursday night we went to Jerry's for Treza's early birthday and had a wonderful time. Friday, I went to AMIS during the day, then one of our favorite spots in Osu at night for Treza's real birthday. Of course the last stop was a chicken kebab before heading home.
Saturday we forced ourselves to wake up early, pack lunches, and hop on a trotro to Boti Falls. I have been wanting to go here since the very beginning and it is one of few day trips that you can take from Accra. We spent hours getting there, met some British volunteers on the last leg of the trip. Boti is inland from Accra and the mountains are gorgeous and lush. Accra is so much more developed, but it is a crowded bustling West African city, not a tranquil rural mountain feeling. Boti was amazing. There are two waterfalls right next to each other and trees all around. We weren't allowed to swim in the pool at the base, but we waded up to our knees and took pictures. Then one of the British guys walked around the edge to get to the back of one of the waterfalls, and I quickly convinced Ezra to come with me and do the same. It was slippery climbing on the rocks to get to it, but it was incredible. I literally was standing in a rainbow as the mist drenched us. Then actually behind the falls, looking up at the water coming down...so beautiful. Annie snapped some pictures and they came out really nicely. I am going to try to put some up soon, possibly on here. After eating on the shore, we wanted to leave and ended up hitching a ride in a flatbed truck with the British folks we had met earlier. It was so nice to be out in the open air, travelling through the mountains and the villages, everyone smiling at us (screaming "obruni" and waving excitedly). When we got back to ISH, time to prepare for Halloween Ghana style.
At first I had no costume ideas whatsoever, but Wednesday I had the idea to be FanIce. This is vanilla ice cream that comes in a small plastic bag/pouch about the size of a king sized pack of M&Ms. People sell them on the streets and in small shops. To eat, you tear a corner with your teeth and suck out the ice cream through the hole you made. It's cousins are FanYogo (frozen strawberry yogurt) and FanChoco (frozen chocolate milk). Part of why FanIce etc are so wonderful is that they are one of very few things that you can buy cold. And there just isn't creamy food in general here. So when at a market in the heat that swallows us or walking miles accross campus, it hits the spot. Problem is, just like with the pure water bags that fill the gutters and beaches and streets, no one throws the wrappers out. They are everywhere. On my walk back from AMIS on Thursday, I realized I could collect enough wrappers to make something out of them. So Friday, I did. I started walking from my dorm to Shangri La instead of taking a trotro because it took forever and I am just not pushy enough to force my way into the ones that pull up with one or two spots open. Then I take a trotro from Shangri La to Nima where the school is. It takes about 40 minutes to walk. During that walk, shielded by a plastic bag on my hand, I collected 46 FanIce wrappers and 38 FanYogo wrappers for Annie. After washing them in the launry room, we soaked them in a bucket of water over night. Saturday when we got back from Boti, we went to work assembling. They were surprisgly easy to tape together, so Annie made a Fanyogo belt for her pink dress, cuffs, and a headband. I made enough "material" to cover one of my skirts, then safety pinned it on. I used markers to draw the label onto a white shirt. Treza came over in all brown, ready for a FanChoco bowtie. Lissy was toilet paper/a mummy, Erin was a whiskey coke, Ezra was superman. The homestay girls were also in on the Ghanaian foods theme. We had banku, tilapia, and pepper. Levi and Kyle were schoolboys. We took off from ISH, went to Osu, started at Epos, ended at Mirage (same nightclub as last weekend). Everyone had tons of fun.
Sunday we slept in, barely left ISH. I did a hot compress and face mask with Annie and I am hooked. She has to do them daily because she has problems with her eyes, but I just want to do them all the time now because they feel so nice. She is leaving for London to visit her boyfriend so soon, and I will miss her a lot while she is gone.
When she gets back, it will be time for us to do all of our travelling around during the finals period. So far on our list of possibilities:
Togo and Benin
Cote d'Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Mole National Park in the very north
back to Green Turtle for at least a few days
Just a little about AMIS:
I have embraced my role and become more realistic with what I do there. I am not really a teacher. I play with the kids, stop them from beating each other, sing their songs, help them write on little slates, eat lunch with them, sit and read while they nap, then go home. I guess that is what being a preschool teacher is like here, but I don't feel very productive or helpful most of the time. Some kind of entertaining and kind of sad mistakes by the teachers:
Fisch=fish
Peer=pear
Sheep=ship
Brusch=brush
Octbre=october
The water pipe project is going to start soon hopefully, because fundraising has begun. I am hoping that Mr. Anani is right that it will be done before I leave, but this is Ghana time we are dealing with. We shall see.
Other news of the day: I just booked a flight with Ezra from Boston to New Orleans for Mardi Gras in February. We will visit Annie, Lissy, and Erin at Tulane and see the parades and everything. So excited.
Overall, Ghana is great!!! Everything is so wonderful. I am incredibly happy here. Genuinely truly content and enthusiastic and jubilating all the time. I think for a while I convinced myself that I liked it more than I did, but now I really really really do. It is going to be tough to leave, and not just the friends I have made, but the country. I keep half joking that I will need to be re-socialized. I think reverse culture shock might be more obvious and harder to push aside than culture shock.
The Aya Centre is closing, and Terrific Tuesday calls again, so I will stop writing this much too long post anyways.
Last thing: I lost my phone on Saturday and have a new number. You can reach me at +0233-27-216-0982.
First weekend, Bojo beach. Reggae Night the first Wednesday. Thursday took off for Green Turtle (see last post) for the most relaxing weekend ever. The next weekend was the CIEE trip to Kumasi where we saw the Ashanti Manhyia Palace, Kejetia the largest market in West Africa,a Kente weaving village, and Lake Bosomtwe. While there, Ghana won the under 20 world cup, so we went out "jubilating." Working at Anani was improving and I started going more frequently, sometimes after class in the morning so that I was only there for the afternoons which are much more mellow.
Saturday the 24th, I went to Mr. Anani's sister's engagement party/wedding ceremony in Agboba. I went with Levi, the other CIEE student at AMIS, and we were the only ones there who were not family. We met Mr. Anani's mother, his many siblings from his father's many wives, a his many nephews. It was so nice to just sit on a couch in a real house and watch TV and talk to his family. Eventually the family of the groom arrived and the ceremony started. Brides family on one side of the room, groom's on the other, couches in the middle facing each other. Bride is hidden. Groom's family presents bride's family with a briefcase full of items requested in advance. He has had time to prepare, so really the engagement has been unofficial for a while. Representatives of both families went into another room to inspect, and eventually the bride's representative said that everything was in order and wonderful. Praying, singing, dancing. Then the presentation of the gifts. Fabric for the bride's mother. Something for the eldest brother since the father is deceased. A bible for the couple. A ring. With each gift, blessings were sang and prayers were shouted(almost all of this was in Twi, but I was able to understand the context of things. Finally, the bride came in and more singing and dancing, then blessings over the ring, blessings over the bible, blessings over some oil they poured on their hands, blessingblessingsblessings. Mr. Anani sat between Levi and myself explaining as we went along. My favorite part was Anani's mother getting up and dancing and people throwing money at her. She is ancient, but she was so happy and into the whole thing. On the way back we walked through the University of Ghana Botanical Gardens which are gorgeous and a little hidden hideaway right next to campus. I could easily and happily spend a whole day having a picnic there next to the pond under the trees. That night, we went out dancing at a nightclub and had a blast. We have been going to bars often, but it is more of an effort to rally people into going to nightclubs.
Tuesday the 27th, I went to drumming class and saw Treza and Lindsay(homestay girls) who were heading to Kokrobite Beach for the day with the sons of their basket weaving teacher (Paul and Dominic) and some of their friends (Kweku and one other). I was easily convinced to skip Xylophone in the afternoon and decided to join them for a relaxing day of sunshine and sand and sea. After a long tro tro ride there, we set up camp. Kokrobite is just past Bojo, but not as secluded. We pay 5 cedi to get into Bojo and it is clean and there are lifegaurds who watch people swim in a flagged off area. When people get pulled to one side by the current/undertoe, the lifeguards whistle and you get out of the water, walk along shore, and re-enter in the proper place. There was no such set up at Kokrobite unfortunately. You also have to be more careful at Kokrobite of people taking your stuff while you are in the water, so I volunteered to stay with the towels and bags while a bunch went to swim. A while later, I couldn't see my friends anymore because half my view was blocked by a fishing boat on the shore. I noticed people standing up on the beach and looking over in that direction, so I looked too. Everyone I was with except Dominic were in the water pretty far out. They had been swept sideways, without realizing that there was a ledge and suddenly they couldn't reach the bottom. That made it easier for them to be swept out away from shore. They all tried to head in, but Paul and the other friend got really flustered, panicked, and realized they couldn't make it on their own. They called to Lindsay and Treza to help, and not knowing any other option, they turned around. When each girl got to a guy, he did what any drowning person will do: try to climb on the person saving you. They realized that not only could they probably not save the guys, but they might go down with them. Kweku managed to alert people on shore and an off duty lifeguard ran out, saved the guys, then gave Treza the extra push she needed to get to shore after exhausting herself trying to save the others and herself. Such a close call. Terrifying. They all came back to our stuff and passed out on the sand for a while, catching their breath and thinking over what had (almost) just happened. After some much needed Italian food nearby, we went back to Legon.
The next night, my normal girls (Annie, Erin, Lissy) went to Reggae Night with one of our only Ghanaian friends from ISH. Lloyd drove us with a bunch of his friends, some who we had met before. We met up with my Rasta friend Sowah at the beach and all sat around hanging out for hours. It had been frustrating and disappointing for me that I didn't feel I had made Ghanaian friends, but talking to these guys just made us all so happy. Every person is a person, and it is nice to be nice.
Thursday night we went to Jerry's for Treza's early birthday and had a wonderful time. Friday, I went to AMIS during the day, then one of our favorite spots in Osu at night for Treza's real birthday. Of course the last stop was a chicken kebab before heading home.
Saturday we forced ourselves to wake up early, pack lunches, and hop on a trotro to Boti Falls. I have been wanting to go here since the very beginning and it is one of few day trips that you can take from Accra. We spent hours getting there, met some British volunteers on the last leg of the trip. Boti is inland from Accra and the mountains are gorgeous and lush. Accra is so much more developed, but it is a crowded bustling West African city, not a tranquil rural mountain feeling. Boti was amazing. There are two waterfalls right next to each other and trees all around. We weren't allowed to swim in the pool at the base, but we waded up to our knees and took pictures. Then one of the British guys walked around the edge to get to the back of one of the waterfalls, and I quickly convinced Ezra to come with me and do the same. It was slippery climbing on the rocks to get to it, but it was incredible. I literally was standing in a rainbow as the mist drenched us. Then actually behind the falls, looking up at the water coming down...so beautiful. Annie snapped some pictures and they came out really nicely. I am going to try to put some up soon, possibly on here. After eating on the shore, we wanted to leave and ended up hitching a ride in a flatbed truck with the British folks we had met earlier. It was so nice to be out in the open air, travelling through the mountains and the villages, everyone smiling at us (screaming "obruni" and waving excitedly). When we got back to ISH, time to prepare for Halloween Ghana style.
At first I had no costume ideas whatsoever, but Wednesday I had the idea to be FanIce. This is vanilla ice cream that comes in a small plastic bag/pouch about the size of a king sized pack of M&Ms. People sell them on the streets and in small shops. To eat, you tear a corner with your teeth and suck out the ice cream through the hole you made. It's cousins are FanYogo (frozen strawberry yogurt) and FanChoco (frozen chocolate milk). Part of why FanIce etc are so wonderful is that they are one of very few things that you can buy cold. And there just isn't creamy food in general here. So when at a market in the heat that swallows us or walking miles accross campus, it hits the spot. Problem is, just like with the pure water bags that fill the gutters and beaches and streets, no one throws the wrappers out. They are everywhere. On my walk back from AMIS on Thursday, I realized I could collect enough wrappers to make something out of them. So Friday, I did. I started walking from my dorm to Shangri La instead of taking a trotro because it took forever and I am just not pushy enough to force my way into the ones that pull up with one or two spots open. Then I take a trotro from Shangri La to Nima where the school is. It takes about 40 minutes to walk. During that walk, shielded by a plastic bag on my hand, I collected 46 FanIce wrappers and 38 FanYogo wrappers for Annie. After washing them in the launry room, we soaked them in a bucket of water over night. Saturday when we got back from Boti, we went to work assembling. They were surprisgly easy to tape together, so Annie made a Fanyogo belt for her pink dress, cuffs, and a headband. I made enough "material" to cover one of my skirts, then safety pinned it on. I used markers to draw the label onto a white shirt. Treza came over in all brown, ready for a FanChoco bowtie. Lissy was toilet paper/a mummy, Erin was a whiskey coke, Ezra was superman. The homestay girls were also in on the Ghanaian foods theme. We had banku, tilapia, and pepper. Levi and Kyle were schoolboys. We took off from ISH, went to Osu, started at Epos, ended at Mirage (same nightclub as last weekend). Everyone had tons of fun.
Sunday we slept in, barely left ISH. I did a hot compress and face mask with Annie and I am hooked. She has to do them daily because she has problems with her eyes, but I just want to do them all the time now because they feel so nice. She is leaving for London to visit her boyfriend so soon, and I will miss her a lot while she is gone.
When she gets back, it will be time for us to do all of our travelling around during the finals period. So far on our list of possibilities:
Togo and Benin
Cote d'Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Mole National Park in the very north
back to Green Turtle for at least a few days
Just a little about AMIS:
I have embraced my role and become more realistic with what I do there. I am not really a teacher. I play with the kids, stop them from beating each other, sing their songs, help them write on little slates, eat lunch with them, sit and read while they nap, then go home. I guess that is what being a preschool teacher is like here, but I don't feel very productive or helpful most of the time. Some kind of entertaining and kind of sad mistakes by the teachers:
Fisch=fish
Peer=pear
Sheep=ship
Brusch=brush
Octbre=october
The water pipe project is going to start soon hopefully, because fundraising has begun. I am hoping that Mr. Anani is right that it will be done before I leave, but this is Ghana time we are dealing with. We shall see.
Other news of the day: I just booked a flight with Ezra from Boston to New Orleans for Mardi Gras in February. We will visit Annie, Lissy, and Erin at Tulane and see the parades and everything. So excited.
Overall, Ghana is great!!! Everything is so wonderful. I am incredibly happy here. Genuinely truly content and enthusiastic and jubilating all the time. I think for a while I convinced myself that I liked it more than I did, but now I really really really do. It is going to be tough to leave, and not just the friends I have made, but the country. I keep half joking that I will need to be re-socialized. I think reverse culture shock might be more obvious and harder to push aside than culture shock.
The Aya Centre is closing, and Terrific Tuesday calls again, so I will stop writing this much too long post anyways.
Last thing: I lost my phone on Saturday and have a new number. You can reach me at +0233-27-216-0982.
It's November Already?!?
October was incredible, but I can't believe it is over.
First weekend, Bojo beach. Reggae Night the first Wednesday. Thursday took off for Green Turtle (see last post) for the most relaxing weekend ever. The next weekend was the CIEE trip to Kumasi where we saw the Ashanti Manhyia Palace, Kejetia the largest market in West Africa,a Kente weaving village, and Lake Bosomtwe. While there, Ghana won the under 20 world cup, so we went out "jubilating." Working at Anani was improving and I started going more frequently, sometimes after class in the morning so that I was only there for the afternoons which are much more mellow.
Saturday the 24th, I went to Mr. Anani's sister's engagement party/wedding ceremony in Agboba. I went with Levi, the other CIEE student at AMIS, and we were the only ones there who were not family. We met Mr. Anani's mother, his many siblings from his father's many wives, a his many nephews. It was so nice to just sit on a couch in a real house and watch TV and talk to his family. Eventually the family of the groom arrived and the ceremony started. Brides family on one side of the room, groom's on the other, couches in the middle facing each other. Bride is hidden. Groom's family presents bride's family with a briefcase full of items requested in advance. He has had time to prepare, so really the engagement has been unofficial for a while. Representatives of both families went into another room to inspect, and eventually the bride's representative said that everything was in order and wonderful. Praying, singing, dancing. Then the presentation of the gifts. Fabric for the bride's mother. Something for the eldest brother since the father is deceased. A bible for the couple. A ring. With each gift, blessings were sang and prayers were shouted(almost all of this was in Twi, but I was able to understand the context of things. Finally, the bride came in and more singing and dancing, then blessings over the ring, blessings over the bible, blessings over some oil they poured on their hands, blessingblessingsblessings. Mr. Anani sat between Levi and myself explaining as we went along. My favorite part was Anani's mother getting up and dancing and people throwing money at her. She is ancient, but she was so happy and into the whole thing. On the way back we walked through the University of Ghana Botanical Gardens which are gorgeous and a little hidden hideaway right next to campus. I could easily and happily spend a whole day having a picnic there next to the pond under the trees. That night, we went out dancing at a nightclub and had a blast. We have been going to bars often, but it is more of an effort to rally people into going to nightclubs.
Tuesday the 27th, I went to drumming class and saw Treza and Lindsay(homestay girls) who were heading to Kokrobite Beach for the day with the sons of their basket weaving teacher (Paul and Dominic) and some of their friends (Kweku and one other). I was easily convinced to skip Xylophone in the afternoon and decided to join them for a relaxing day of sunshine and sand and sea. After a long tro tro ride there, we set up camp. Kokrobite is just past Bojo, but not as secluded. We pay 5 cedi to get into Bojo and it is clean and there are lifegaurds who watch people swim in a flagged off area. When people get pulled to one side by the current/undertoe, the lifeguards whistle and you get out of the water, walk along shore, and re-enter in the proper place. There was no such set up at Kokrobite unfortunately. You also have to be more careful at Kokrobite of people taking your stuff while you are in the water, so I volunteered to stay with the towels and bags while a bunch went to swim. A while later, I couldn't see my friends anymore because half my view was blocked by a fishing boat on the shore. I noticed people standing up on the beach and looking over in that direction, so I looked too. Everyone I was with except Dominic were in the water pretty far out. They had been swept sideways, without realizing that there was a ledge and suddenly they couldn't reach the bottom. That made it easier for them to be swept out away from shore. They all tried to head in, but Paul and the other friend got really flustered, panicked, and realized they couldn't make it on their own. They called to Lindsay and Treza to help, and not knowing any other option, they turned around. When each girl got to a guy, he did what any drowning person will do: try to climb on the person saving you. They realized that not only could they probably not save the guys, but they might go down with them. Kweku managed to alert people on shore and an off duty lifeguard ran out, saved the guys, then gave Treza the extra push she needed to get to shore after exhausting herself trying to save the others and herself. Such a close call. Terrifying. They all came back to our stuff and passed out on the sand for a while, catching their breath and thinking over what had (almost) just happened. After some much needed Italian food nearby, we went back to Legon.
The next night, my normal girls (Annie, Erin, Lissy) went to Reggae Night with one of our only Ghanaian friends from ISH. Lloyd drove us with a bunch of his friends, some who we had met before. We met up with my Rasta friend Sowah at the beach and all sat around hanging out for hours. It had been frustrating and disappointing for me that I didn't feel I had made Ghanaian friends, but talking to these guys just made us all so happy. Every person is a person, and it is nice to be nice.
Thursday night we went to Jerry's for Treza's early birthday and had a wonderful time. Friday, I went to AMIS during the day, then one of our favorite spots in Osu at night for Treza's real birthday. Of course the last stop was a chicken kebab before heading home.
Saturday we forced ourselves to wake up early, pack lunches, and hop on a trotro to Boti Falls. I have been wanting to go here since the very beginning and it is one of few day trips that you can take from Accra. We spent hours getting there, met some British volunteers on the last leg of the trip. Boti is inland from Accra and the mountains are gorgeous and lush. Accra is so much more developed, but it is a crowded bustling West African city, not a tranquil rural mountain feeling. Boti was amazing. There are two waterfalls right next to each other and trees all around. We weren't allowed to swim in the pool at the base, but we waded up to our knees and took pictures. Then one of the British guys walked around the edge to get to the back of one of the waterfalls, and I quickly convinced Ezra to come with me and do the same. It was slippery climbing on the rocks to get to it, but it was incredible. I literally was standing in a rainbow as the mist drenched us. Then actually behind the falls, looking up at the water coming down...so beautiful. Annie snapped some pictures and they came out really nicely. I am going to try to put some up soon, possibly on here. After eating on the shore, we wanted to leave and ended up hitching a ride in a flatbed truck with the British folks we had met earlier. It was so nice to be out in the open air, travelling through the mountains and the villages, everyone smiling at us (screaming "obruni" and waving excitedly). When we got back to ISH, time to prepare for Halloween Ghana style.
At first I had no costume ideas whatsoever, but Wednesday I had the idea to be FanIce. This is vanilla ice cream that comes in a small plastic bag/pouch about the size of a king sized pack of M&Ms. People sell them on the streets and in small shops. To eat, you tear a corner with your teeth and suck out the ice cream through the hole you made. It's cousins are FanYogo (frozen strawberry yogurt) and FanChoco (frozen chocolate milk). Part of why FanIce etc are so wonderful is that they are one of very few things that you can buy cold. And there just isn't creamy food in general here. So when at a market in the heat that swallows us or walking miles accross campus, it hits the spot. Problem is, just like with the pure water bags that fill the gutters and beaches and streets, no one throws the wrappers out. They are everywhere. On my walk back from AMIS on Thursday, I realized I could collect enough wrappers to make something out of them. So Friday, I did. I started walking from my dorm to Shangri La instead of taking a trotro because it took forever and I am just not pushy enough to force my way into the ones that pull up with one or two spots open. Then I take a trotro from Shangri La to Nima where the school is. It takes about 40 minutes to walk. During that walk, shielded by a plastic bag on my hand, I collected 46 FanIce wrappers and 38 FanYogo wrappers for Annie. After washing them in the launry room, we soaked them in a bucket of water over night. Saturday when we got back from Boti, we went to work assembling. They were surprisgly easy to tape together, so Annie made a Fanyogo belt for her pink dress, cuffs, and a headband. I made enough "material" to cover one of my skirts, then safety pinned it on. I used markers to draw the label onto a white shirt. Treza came over in all brown, ready for a FanChoco bowtie. Lissy was toilet paper/a mummy, Erin was a whiskey coke, Ezra was superman. The homestay girls were also in on the Ghanaian foods theme. We had banku, tilapia, and pepper. Levi and Kyle were schoolboys. We took off from ISH, went to Osu, started at Epos, ended at Mirage (same nightclub as last weekend). Everyone had tons of fun.
Sunday we slept in, barely left ISH. I did a hot compress and face mask with Annie and I am hooked. She has to do them daily because she has problems with her eyes, but I just want to do them all the time now because they feel so nice. She is leaving for London to visit her boyfriend so soon, and I will miss her a lot while she is gone.
When she gets back, it will be time for us to do all of our travelling around during the finals period. So far on our list of possibilities:
Togo and Benin
Cote d'Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Mole National Park in the very north
back to Green Turtle for at least a few days
Just a little about AMIS:
I have embraced my role and become more realistic with what I do there. I am not really a teacher. I play with the kids, stop them from beating each other, sing their songs, help them write on little slates, eat lunch with them, sit and read while they nap, then go home. I guess that is what being a preschool teacher is like here, but I don't feel very productive or helpful most of the time. Some kind of entertaining and kind of sad mistakes by the teachers:
Fisch=fish
Peer=pear
Sheep=ship
Brusch=brush
Octbre=october
The water pipe project is going to start soon hopefully, because fundraising has begun. I am hoping that Mr. Anani is right that it will be done before I leave, but this is Ghana time we are dealing with. We shall see.
Other news of the day: I just booked a flight with Ezra from Boston to New Orleans for Mardi Gras in February. We will visit Annie, Lissy, and Erin at Tulane and see the parades and everything. So excited.
Overall, Ghana is great!!! Everything is so wonderful. I am incredibly happy here. Genuinely truly content and enthusiastic and jubilating all the time. I think for a while I convinced myself that I liked it more than I did, but now I really really really do. It is going to be tough to leave, and not just the friends I have made, but the country. I keep half joking that I will need to be re-socialized. I think reverse culture shock might be more obvious and harder to push aside than culture shock.
The Aya Centre is closing, and Terrific Tuesday calls again, so I will stop writing this much too long post anyways.
First weekend, Bojo beach. Reggae Night the first Wednesday. Thursday took off for Green Turtle (see last post) for the most relaxing weekend ever. The next weekend was the CIEE trip to Kumasi where we saw the Ashanti Manhyia Palace, Kejetia the largest market in West Africa,a Kente weaving village, and Lake Bosomtwe. While there, Ghana won the under 20 world cup, so we went out "jubilating." Working at Anani was improving and I started going more frequently, sometimes after class in the morning so that I was only there for the afternoons which are much more mellow.
Saturday the 24th, I went to Mr. Anani's sister's engagement party/wedding ceremony in Agboba. I went with Levi, the other CIEE student at AMIS, and we were the only ones there who were not family. We met Mr. Anani's mother, his many siblings from his father's many wives, a his many nephews. It was so nice to just sit on a couch in a real house and watch TV and talk to his family. Eventually the family of the groom arrived and the ceremony started. Brides family on one side of the room, groom's on the other, couches in the middle facing each other. Bride is hidden. Groom's family presents bride's family with a briefcase full of items requested in advance. He has had time to prepare, so really the engagement has been unofficial for a while. Representatives of both families went into another room to inspect, and eventually the bride's representative said that everything was in order and wonderful. Praying, singing, dancing. Then the presentation of the gifts. Fabric for the bride's mother. Something for the eldest brother since the father is deceased. A bible for the couple. A ring. With each gift, blessings were sang and prayers were shouted(almost all of this was in Twi, but I was able to understand the context of things. Finally, the bride came in and more singing and dancing, then blessings over the ring, blessings over the bible, blessings over some oil they poured on their hands, blessingblessingsblessings. Mr. Anani sat between Levi and myself explaining as we went along. My favorite part was Anani's mother getting up and dancing and people throwing money at her. She is ancient, but she was so happy and into the whole thing. On the way back we walked through the University of Ghana Botanical Gardens which are gorgeous and a little hidden hideaway right next to campus. I could easily and happily spend a whole day having a picnic there next to the pond under the trees. That night, we went out dancing at a nightclub and had a blast. We have been going to bars often, but it is more of an effort to rally people into going to nightclubs.
Tuesday the 27th, I went to drumming class and saw Treza and Lindsay(homestay girls) who were heading to Kokrobite Beach for the day with the sons of their basket weaving teacher (Paul and Dominic) and some of their friends (Kweku and one other). I was easily convinced to skip Xylophone in the afternoon and decided to join them for a relaxing day of sunshine and sand and sea. After a long tro tro ride there, we set up camp. Kokrobite is just past Bojo, but not as secluded. We pay 5 cedi to get into Bojo and it is clean and there are lifegaurds who watch people swim in a flagged off area. When people get pulled to one side by the current/undertoe, the lifeguards whistle and you get out of the water, walk along shore, and re-enter in the proper place. There was no such set up at Kokrobite unfortunately. You also have to be more careful at Kokrobite of people taking your stuff while you are in the water, so I volunteered to stay with the towels and bags while a bunch went to swim. A while later, I couldn't see my friends anymore because half my view was blocked by a fishing boat on the shore. I noticed people standing up on the beach and looking over in that direction, so I looked too. Everyone I was with except Dominic were in the water pretty far out. They had been swept sideways, without realizing that there was a ledge and suddenly they couldn't reach the bottom. That made it easier for them to be swept out away from shore. They all tried to head in, but Paul and the other friend got really flustered, panicked, and realized they couldn't make it on their own. They called to Lindsay and Treza to help, and not knowing any other option, they turned around. When each girl got to a guy, he did what any drowning person will do: try to climb on the person saving you. They realized that not only could they probably not save the guys, but they might go down with them. Kweku managed to alert people on shore and an off duty lifeguard ran out, saved the guys, then gave Treza the extra push she needed to get to shore after exhausting herself trying to save the others and herself. Such a close call. Terrifying. They all came back to our stuff and passed out on the sand for a while, catching their breath and thinking over what had (almost) just happened. After some much needed Italian food nearby, we went back to Legon.
The next night, my normal girls (Annie, Erin, Lissy) went to Reggae Night with one of our only Ghanaian friends from ISH. Lloyd drove us with a bunch of his friends, some who we had met before. We met up with my Rasta friend Sowah at the beach and all sat around hanging out for hours. It had been frustrating and disappointing for me that I didn't feel I had made Ghanaian friends, but talking to these guys just made us all so happy. Every person is a person, and it is nice to be nice.
Thursday night we went to Jerry's for Treza's early birthday and had a wonderful time. Friday, I went to AMIS during the day, then one of our favorite spots in Osu at night for Treza's real birthday. Of course the last stop was a chicken kebab before heading home.
Saturday we forced ourselves to wake up early, pack lunches, and hop on a trotro to Boti Falls. I have been wanting to go here since the very beginning and it is one of few day trips that you can take from Accra. We spent hours getting there, met some British volunteers on the last leg of the trip. Boti is inland from Accra and the mountains are gorgeous and lush. Accra is so much more developed, but it is a crowded bustling West African city, not a tranquil rural mountain feeling. Boti was amazing. There are two waterfalls right next to each other and trees all around. We weren't allowed to swim in the pool at the base, but we waded up to our knees and took pictures. Then one of the British guys walked around the edge to get to the back of one of the waterfalls, and I quickly convinced Ezra to come with me and do the same. It was slippery climbing on the rocks to get to it, but it was incredible. I literally was standing in a rainbow as the mist drenched us. Then actually behind the falls, looking up at the water coming down...so beautiful. Annie snapped some pictures and they came out really nicely. I am going to try to put some up soon, possibly on here. After eating on the shore, we wanted to leave and ended up hitching a ride in a flatbed truck with the British folks we had met earlier. It was so nice to be out in the open air, travelling through the mountains and the villages, everyone smiling at us (screaming "obruni" and waving excitedly). When we got back to ISH, time to prepare for Halloween Ghana style.
At first I had no costume ideas whatsoever, but Wednesday I had the idea to be FanIce. This is vanilla ice cream that comes in a small plastic bag/pouch about the size of a king sized pack of M&Ms. People sell them on the streets and in small shops. To eat, you tear a corner with your teeth and suck out the ice cream through the hole you made. It's cousins are FanYogo (frozen strawberry yogurt) and FanChoco (frozen chocolate milk). Part of why FanIce etc are so wonderful is that they are one of very few things that you can buy cold. And there just isn't creamy food in general here. So when at a market in the heat that swallows us or walking miles accross campus, it hits the spot. Problem is, just like with the pure water bags that fill the gutters and beaches and streets, no one throws the wrappers out. They are everywhere. On my walk back from AMIS on Thursday, I realized I could collect enough wrappers to make something out of them. So Friday, I did. I started walking from my dorm to Shangri La instead of taking a trotro because it took forever and I am just not pushy enough to force my way into the ones that pull up with one or two spots open. Then I take a trotro from Shangri La to Nima where the school is. It takes about 40 minutes to walk. During that walk, shielded by a plastic bag on my hand, I collected 46 FanIce wrappers and 38 FanYogo wrappers for Annie. After washing them in the launry room, we soaked them in a bucket of water over night. Saturday when we got back from Boti, we went to work assembling. They were surprisgly easy to tape together, so Annie made a Fanyogo belt for her pink dress, cuffs, and a headband. I made enough "material" to cover one of my skirts, then safety pinned it on. I used markers to draw the label onto a white shirt. Treza came over in all brown, ready for a FanChoco bowtie. Lissy was toilet paper/a mummy, Erin was a whiskey coke, Ezra was superman. The homestay girls were also in on the Ghanaian foods theme. We had banku, tilapia, and pepper. Levi and Kyle were schoolboys. We took off from ISH, went to Osu, started at Epos, ended at Mirage (same nightclub as last weekend). Everyone had tons of fun.
Sunday we slept in, barely left ISH. I did a hot compress and face mask with Annie and I am hooked. She has to do them daily because she has problems with her eyes, but I just want to do them all the time now because they feel so nice. She is leaving for London to visit her boyfriend so soon, and I will miss her a lot while she is gone.
When she gets back, it will be time for us to do all of our travelling around during the finals period. So far on our list of possibilities:
Togo and Benin
Cote d'Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Mole National Park in the very north
back to Green Turtle for at least a few days
Just a little about AMIS:
I have embraced my role and become more realistic with what I do there. I am not really a teacher. I play with the kids, stop them from beating each other, sing their songs, help them write on little slates, eat lunch with them, sit and read while they nap, then go home. I guess that is what being a preschool teacher is like here, but I don't feel very productive or helpful most of the time. Some kind of entertaining and kind of sad mistakes by the teachers:
Fisch=fish
Peer=pear
Sheep=ship
Brusch=brush
Octbre=october
The water pipe project is going to start soon hopefully, because fundraising has begun. I am hoping that Mr. Anani is right that it will be done before I leave, but this is Ghana time we are dealing with. We shall see.
Other news of the day: I just booked a flight with Ezra from Boston to New Orleans for Mardi Gras in February. We will visit Annie, Lissy, and Erin at Tulane and see the parades and everything. So excited.
Overall, Ghana is great!!! Everything is so wonderful. I am incredibly happy here. Genuinely truly content and enthusiastic and jubilating all the time. I think for a while I convinced myself that I liked it more than I did, but now I really really really do. It is going to be tough to leave, and not just the friends I have made, but the country. I keep half joking that I will need to be re-socialized. I think reverse culture shock might be more obvious and harder to push aside than culture shock.
The Aya Centre is closing, and Terrific Tuesday calls again, so I will stop writing this much too long post anyways.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
I Found Paradise
It has been a while, but I wanted to gush about Green Turtle Lodge, where I spent this weekend.
On Thursday after Drumming, we (the usual Annie, Ezra, Lissy, Erin plus Kype and Levi. Others from CIEE were meeting us there, so we were going to have quite a group) took an STC bus for 5 hours to Takoradi, then a trotro to Agona, then a taxi to Green Turtle. We arrived after dark, so we couldn't see much, but immediately started our tabs. They served us dinner (the best omelette and toast I have had in Ghana, and I have had A LOT of omelettes and toast), coktails, showed us our tents (on the sand but inside of a big wooden structure. we had small mattress pads inside the tents, we brought our own sheets. we were literallly on the beach, next to the waves, listenening to the sounds of the ocean but protected from the winds), then we relaxed on the beach for the rest of the night. there are straw mats to bring onto the sand, lanterns to give light. the stars were absolutely incredible. the waves were huge and perfect pipes. i easily could have passed out on the beach, but eventually i went back to my tent.
friday morning, i greeted the day with the first real coffee i have had in ghana (poured myself from a french press) and the house special breakfast: french toast made with bread they bake themselves and served with caramelized bananas and local honey. of course everything is added to the tab, so i literally don't walk around with anything but my bathing suit and sunglasses. no keys, no phone, no money, so refreshing. then to the beach to boogie board, body surf, and relax in the sun. i skipped lunch because i was still full from breakfast, but started cocktails around that time. we played a game of volleyball, then red rover, then back to the beach. dinner was stir fried vegetables with chicken and steamed rice (some others had marsala), more drinking, more relaxing. at the main bar/restaurant area there is a pool table, a fooseball table, ping pong, scrabble, uno, and trivial pursuit. of course more wave watching and star gazing, card playing, then bed.
saturday, i woke up early to go an a canoe tour with Lissy. We walked on the beach for a while, eventually reaching the small fishing village of Akwidaa. We walked through to a river, got on a canoe, then toured the mangrove forests growing out of the mud on either side. We saw a salamander probably 2 feet long, lots of crabs, but not much wildlife. I think you can see monkeys if you go even earlier or right at dusk. When we finished the canoe tour, our guide asked if we wanted to see the village and of course we did. He is from the village and took us around, then took us through a plantain, banana, and pineapple farm, up to an old abandoned fort. It was really cool, and the branches growing in the stone walls made it easy to climb all the way up to the top. When we got back to Green Turtle, we joined others for breakfast (home-made granola with banana), then back to the beach all day. reading, listening to music, etc. eventually dinner time and it was the best food i have had in a really long time. sometimes i tell myself that certain meals are really good. usually they are good on Ghana standards, meaning they are kind of similar and good and spicy but not extraordinary. my coconut chicken curry with rice was incredible on any standards. then i split banana fritters with annie and again, amazing. after dinner, back to the sand and the stars and the waves.
Sunday we decided not to leave early as planned. I had my first scrambled eggs of Ghana for breakfast, then an amazing tomato cheese panini for lunch (again on bread they bake themselves). We left around 2 with a South African who drove us to Takoradi, then caught a Metro Mass bus back to Accra.
About green turtle: www.greenturtlelodge.com
If I ever get married, I want it to be here. No joke.
On a completely different note, the school I am working at has a website also: http://www.ananimemorialschool.org/
That was rough for a while, but has been looking up recently. I stay in the nursery classroom with the teacher instead of being alone with the kindergarten class the whole day. More materials have been popping up (construction paper!!! pencils!!! notebooks!!!) and the younger kids are easier to manage. Mom decided that we should fundraise for the school and has recruited Dad and Grandma to the cause. Some possible uses for money: install a running water pipe (GH1200), toilets, desks (GH50), sponsor a child's tuition for a year (GH90), fix the roof which has holes in it, pay the teachers (who haven't been paid in 4 months), a polytank to collect rain water (GH600). Mr. Anani (the principle) has already blessed my whole family for their consideration of the children. Almost direct quote.
Aya centre is closing up, so I have to run to Terrific Tuesday with Ezra (buy one pizza get one free!). Peri Peri here I come.
Love to everyone!
On Thursday after Drumming, we (the usual Annie, Ezra, Lissy, Erin plus Kype and Levi. Others from CIEE were meeting us there, so we were going to have quite a group) took an STC bus for 5 hours to Takoradi, then a trotro to Agona, then a taxi to Green Turtle. We arrived after dark, so we couldn't see much, but immediately started our tabs. They served us dinner (the best omelette and toast I have had in Ghana, and I have had A LOT of omelettes and toast), coktails, showed us our tents (on the sand but inside of a big wooden structure. we had small mattress pads inside the tents, we brought our own sheets. we were literallly on the beach, next to the waves, listenening to the sounds of the ocean but protected from the winds), then we relaxed on the beach for the rest of the night. there are straw mats to bring onto the sand, lanterns to give light. the stars were absolutely incredible. the waves were huge and perfect pipes. i easily could have passed out on the beach, but eventually i went back to my tent.
friday morning, i greeted the day with the first real coffee i have had in ghana (poured myself from a french press) and the house special breakfast: french toast made with bread they bake themselves and served with caramelized bananas and local honey. of course everything is added to the tab, so i literally don't walk around with anything but my bathing suit and sunglasses. no keys, no phone, no money, so refreshing. then to the beach to boogie board, body surf, and relax in the sun. i skipped lunch because i was still full from breakfast, but started cocktails around that time. we played a game of volleyball, then red rover, then back to the beach. dinner was stir fried vegetables with chicken and steamed rice (some others had marsala), more drinking, more relaxing. at the main bar/restaurant area there is a pool table, a fooseball table, ping pong, scrabble, uno, and trivial pursuit. of course more wave watching and star gazing, card playing, then bed.
saturday, i woke up early to go an a canoe tour with Lissy. We walked on the beach for a while, eventually reaching the small fishing village of Akwidaa. We walked through to a river, got on a canoe, then toured the mangrove forests growing out of the mud on either side. We saw a salamander probably 2 feet long, lots of crabs, but not much wildlife. I think you can see monkeys if you go even earlier or right at dusk. When we finished the canoe tour, our guide asked if we wanted to see the village and of course we did. He is from the village and took us around, then took us through a plantain, banana, and pineapple farm, up to an old abandoned fort. It was really cool, and the branches growing in the stone walls made it easy to climb all the way up to the top. When we got back to Green Turtle, we joined others for breakfast (home-made granola with banana), then back to the beach all day. reading, listening to music, etc. eventually dinner time and it was the best food i have had in a really long time. sometimes i tell myself that certain meals are really good. usually they are good on Ghana standards, meaning they are kind of similar and good and spicy but not extraordinary. my coconut chicken curry with rice was incredible on any standards. then i split banana fritters with annie and again, amazing. after dinner, back to the sand and the stars and the waves.
Sunday we decided not to leave early as planned. I had my first scrambled eggs of Ghana for breakfast, then an amazing tomato cheese panini for lunch (again on bread they bake themselves). We left around 2 with a South African who drove us to Takoradi, then caught a Metro Mass bus back to Accra.
About green turtle: www.greenturtlelodge.com
If I ever get married, I want it to be here. No joke.
On a completely different note, the school I am working at has a website also: http://www.ananimemorialschool.org/
That was rough for a while, but has been looking up recently. I stay in the nursery classroom with the teacher instead of being alone with the kindergarten class the whole day. More materials have been popping up (construction paper!!! pencils!!! notebooks!!!) and the younger kids are easier to manage. Mom decided that we should fundraise for the school and has recruited Dad and Grandma to the cause. Some possible uses for money: install a running water pipe (GH1200), toilets, desks (GH50), sponsor a child's tuition for a year (GH90), fix the roof which has holes in it, pay the teachers (who haven't been paid in 4 months), a polytank to collect rain water (GH600). Mr. Anani (the principle) has already blessed my whole family for their consideration of the children. Almost direct quote.
Aya centre is closing up, so I have to run to Terrific Tuesday with Ezra (buy one pizza get one free!). Peri Peri here I come.
Love to everyone!
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Settling In
I finally have time for another update. I am currently waiting to take my first Twi test, and although I feel I am able to use certain phrases in real life, it certainly isn't an easy language to be tested on.
Classes have started, and I like what I am taking so far. I need to make sure I am not overloading and won't get in trouble at Northeaster, but I am taking Xylophone, Drumming, Music of West and Central Africa, Sociolinguistics, Development Studies, and Twi. My internship will start any day now, so I am just waiting for the call.
I have been a little sick, but nothing out of the ordinary given my surroundings and diet. It is getting hotter and walking outside everywhere makes me tired during the day. Soon (hopefully) the school pool will open and it is right by my dorm. Currently there are tadpoles living in it, but apparently when the dry season starts and the weather gets "nice" they will open it to Legon students.
Tomorrow I might skip Music class to go to the funeral of one of the UPALS from last year. He took me and my friends to the beach a couple weeks ago. His father was a chief, and many of the students are going. Funerals are supposed to be big parties. Saturday I think we will go to another beach, hopefully a lot cleaner than the last one. Sunday we are going to the Ghana Blackstars football game against Sudan, which should be really fun.
CIEE has all of these trips planned for us for the semester. Last weekend we went to the Aburi botanical gardens, the Tetteh Queshie Cocoa Farm, and a wood carving village. Next weekend we have an overnight trip to the Central Region.
Except for the UPALS, who are supposed to be our friends, I still haven't made any Ghanaian friends. I talk to people when I am on tro-tros or at bars or in class, but I dont want to give out my number because people end up getting harrassed. Pretty soon into a conversation with a guy, he inevitably asks for your dorm and your room number and your phone number, which is much faster than the way I am used to things happening. Some people this year and others from the past have been followed, called every hour for weeks, etc so we are kind of set up to be isolated simply by protecting ourselves and our privacy.
I have been writing a lot in my private journal (that Rael got my for my birthday). It is crazy how much ends up coming out once the pencil hits the paper. I am remembering things that I had forgotten about when I was a youngster in San Francisco. Stepping away from the environment that I have almost always been in helps me see it differently. I had similar times in Boston, but since I didn't write anything down, a lot of my realizations just came and went.
Things I miss (not in any particular order):
hot showers
burritos
family and zoe
sleeping in without the sounds of chickens
sunsets over the ocean
somewhat reliably scheduled buses
Weeds
having an oven to bake
the shade of being in a forest
Things I know I will miss when I get home:
mango
pineapple
kelewele
chicken
not having to be anywhere on time
taking classes just for fun (Xylophone!)
having lots of time for recreational reading (I've read 5 books since leaving home, 4 in Ghana)
I am going to switch to a laptop for my skype date. maybe more later.
Classes have started, and I like what I am taking so far. I need to make sure I am not overloading and won't get in trouble at Northeaster, but I am taking Xylophone, Drumming, Music of West and Central Africa, Sociolinguistics, Development Studies, and Twi. My internship will start any day now, so I am just waiting for the call.
I have been a little sick, but nothing out of the ordinary given my surroundings and diet. It is getting hotter and walking outside everywhere makes me tired during the day. Soon (hopefully) the school pool will open and it is right by my dorm. Currently there are tadpoles living in it, but apparently when the dry season starts and the weather gets "nice" they will open it to Legon students.
Tomorrow I might skip Music class to go to the funeral of one of the UPALS from last year. He took me and my friends to the beach a couple weeks ago. His father was a chief, and many of the students are going. Funerals are supposed to be big parties. Saturday I think we will go to another beach, hopefully a lot cleaner than the last one. Sunday we are going to the Ghana Blackstars football game against Sudan, which should be really fun.
CIEE has all of these trips planned for us for the semester. Last weekend we went to the Aburi botanical gardens, the Tetteh Queshie Cocoa Farm, and a wood carving village. Next weekend we have an overnight trip to the Central Region.
Except for the UPALS, who are supposed to be our friends, I still haven't made any Ghanaian friends. I talk to people when I am on tro-tros or at bars or in class, but I dont want to give out my number because people end up getting harrassed. Pretty soon into a conversation with a guy, he inevitably asks for your dorm and your room number and your phone number, which is much faster than the way I am used to things happening. Some people this year and others from the past have been followed, called every hour for weeks, etc so we are kind of set up to be isolated simply by protecting ourselves and our privacy.
I have been writing a lot in my private journal (that Rael got my for my birthday). It is crazy how much ends up coming out once the pencil hits the paper. I am remembering things that I had forgotten about when I was a youngster in San Francisco. Stepping away from the environment that I have almost always been in helps me see it differently. I had similar times in Boston, but since I didn't write anything down, a lot of my realizations just came and went.
Things I miss (not in any particular order):
hot showers
burritos
family and zoe
sleeping in without the sounds of chickens
sunsets over the ocean
somewhat reliably scheduled buses
Weeds
having an oven to bake
the shade of being in a forest
Things I know I will miss when I get home:
mango
pineapple
kelewele
chicken
not having to be anywhere on time
taking classes just for fun (Xylophone!)
having lots of time for recreational reading (I've read 5 books since leaving home, 4 in Ghana)
I am going to switch to a laptop for my skype date. maybe more later.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Finally Here and Finally Writing
I have been in Ghana for a little over a week now, and although I have been writing in my personal journal almost every day, I haven't shared anything on here.
I arrived in Accra, the capital, where our orientation took place at a nice hotel. After a couple days of lectures on things we already (were supposed to) read in the program handbook, we ventured out into the city in small groups, accompanied by U-PALs (Ghanaian students who show international students around and are somewhat responsible for them). Accra is pretty intimidating, busy, kind of smelly, and a lot to take in all at once. We walked around, noticing some important buidings, but more just getting a feel for the city.
Tuesday August 11, we moved into our dorms in Legon at the University campus. I am in the International Hostel, but some others are in regular housing or in homestays. Rooms are very nice, shared with one other person. Most of us are in rooms with others on our programs, but others are sharing with people from UCs, other internationals, or Ghanaians. Generally speaking, the dorms are great. However, running water has been less than reliable, and the kitchens we have available are really just rooms with counters and a hotplate.
The campus is huge, beautiful, and getting easier to navigate. When we leave the gates, there is a tro-tro (unofficial mini-bus taxis that get crammed with people) station, where we can fight our way to catch a ride to Accra, the beach, the mall, or other places around the area.
During our first few days here, we had more orientation and guest lectures about Ghanaian politics, history, etc. Then, registration was completely backwards, with students running around for 3 days to each department building to see what courses are offered, paying dues, but not knowing when classes will be. We were constantly told that the times would be up later that day, or by Friday at the latest, but they weren't. The first day of instruction was supposed to be Monday and we were not to miss the first class, so again we circled campus, figuring out where to go. Nothing was posted for my classes, and for those whose classes were that day, no teachers showed up. Tuesday afternoon, I finally found out that times worked out for the classes I wanted, and so I will be taking:
Sociolinguistics
Children's Literature
African Drumming
Sociological Foundations for Development Studies
Introduction to Twi Language
I am also doing an internship at a bilingual school as part of the Development Studies Track.
Food here is very good, spicy, cheap, but not much variation. I eat a lot of jollof rice (spicy fried rice), beans, fried plantains (kelewele), cole slaw, grilled chicken, and egg sandwiches. Right next to the International Hostel is a large outdoor market with many little stands that sell fresh fruit that the sellers cut into little pieces, and all of the other foods mentioned. I can usually eat for less than 2 cedi per meal, and there are 1.45 cedi to the dollar. I went in with some friends in my dorm, so we now have a pot, plates, and spaghetti that we can make for ourselves. I also have bread, crackers, and ground nut paste (like peanut butter) in my room. I definitely never go hungry, but it is a lot of starch. There is more variety in Accra, but on campus it is pretty limited.
I have gotten pretty used to being called obroni, especially by kids. It translates to white person, but isn't really an insult. It is just fact.
I just had my first Twi class yesterday, and I am enjoying it more than most because of my Lingusitics interest and background. It will be good to be able to communicate with locals in their own language, even if just a little bit. They will appreciate the effort. I just finished my first Development Studies class, and it will be very hard, but interesting. We are going to be reading a lot, and comparing what we learn in class to what we experience in our various internships at schools, afterschool programs, hospitals, orphanages, NGOs, AIDS clinics, women's right organizations, refugee camps, autism clinics, etc. It is a small group of people (much smaller than the regular University classes, which can be as big as 700) all on my CIEE program, but from colleges all over the US.
I have been spending almost all of my time with four people in the international hostel, Annie, Lissy, Erin, and Ezra. We are all Development Studies and we seem to work well as a group. The three girls are from Tulane and Ezra goes to BU. I made other friends during orientation, but unfortunately the homestays tend to socialize with themselves and same thing with people on campus. Homsetays are in East Legon, and range from walking distance to a 2 hour tro-tro ride away. They also range from mansions with pools to unfinished houses without running water. I am glad I chose to be on campus. I am hoping that once people have their class schedules set, I will be able to see the homestays during the day when they are on campus and have breaks.
This post was pretty dry and more just logisitcs, but I still don't feel that much has happened. I am feeling more settled and am glad that classes are starting, and I am happy with my group of friends. As the internship starts in the beginning of September, and as I go into Accra more, I will get more of a sense of life here, because people on campus tend to be pretty well off and it is kind of sheltered. Now that I have access to free (and pretty fast) internet at the AYA center, where I have Development Studies and Twi, I will be able to post more as things progress.
Love to all at home,
Mara
I arrived in Accra, the capital, where our orientation took place at a nice hotel. After a couple days of lectures on things we already (were supposed to) read in the program handbook, we ventured out into the city in small groups, accompanied by U-PALs (Ghanaian students who show international students around and are somewhat responsible for them). Accra is pretty intimidating, busy, kind of smelly, and a lot to take in all at once. We walked around, noticing some important buidings, but more just getting a feel for the city.
Tuesday August 11, we moved into our dorms in Legon at the University campus. I am in the International Hostel, but some others are in regular housing or in homestays. Rooms are very nice, shared with one other person. Most of us are in rooms with others on our programs, but others are sharing with people from UCs, other internationals, or Ghanaians. Generally speaking, the dorms are great. However, running water has been less than reliable, and the kitchens we have available are really just rooms with counters and a hotplate.
The campus is huge, beautiful, and getting easier to navigate. When we leave the gates, there is a tro-tro (unofficial mini-bus taxis that get crammed with people) station, where we can fight our way to catch a ride to Accra, the beach, the mall, or other places around the area.
During our first few days here, we had more orientation and guest lectures about Ghanaian politics, history, etc. Then, registration was completely backwards, with students running around for 3 days to each department building to see what courses are offered, paying dues, but not knowing when classes will be. We were constantly told that the times would be up later that day, or by Friday at the latest, but they weren't. The first day of instruction was supposed to be Monday and we were not to miss the first class, so again we circled campus, figuring out where to go. Nothing was posted for my classes, and for those whose classes were that day, no teachers showed up. Tuesday afternoon, I finally found out that times worked out for the classes I wanted, and so I will be taking:
Sociolinguistics
Children's Literature
African Drumming
Sociological Foundations for Development Studies
Introduction to Twi Language
I am also doing an internship at a bilingual school as part of the Development Studies Track.
Food here is very good, spicy, cheap, but not much variation. I eat a lot of jollof rice (spicy fried rice), beans, fried plantains (kelewele), cole slaw, grilled chicken, and egg sandwiches. Right next to the International Hostel is a large outdoor market with many little stands that sell fresh fruit that the sellers cut into little pieces, and all of the other foods mentioned. I can usually eat for less than 2 cedi per meal, and there are 1.45 cedi to the dollar. I went in with some friends in my dorm, so we now have a pot, plates, and spaghetti that we can make for ourselves. I also have bread, crackers, and ground nut paste (like peanut butter) in my room. I definitely never go hungry, but it is a lot of starch. There is more variety in Accra, but on campus it is pretty limited.
I have gotten pretty used to being called obroni, especially by kids. It translates to white person, but isn't really an insult. It is just fact.
I just had my first Twi class yesterday, and I am enjoying it more than most because of my Lingusitics interest and background. It will be good to be able to communicate with locals in their own language, even if just a little bit. They will appreciate the effort. I just finished my first Development Studies class, and it will be very hard, but interesting. We are going to be reading a lot, and comparing what we learn in class to what we experience in our various internships at schools, afterschool programs, hospitals, orphanages, NGOs, AIDS clinics, women's right organizations, refugee camps, autism clinics, etc. It is a small group of people (much smaller than the regular University classes, which can be as big as 700) all on my CIEE program, but from colleges all over the US.
I have been spending almost all of my time with four people in the international hostel, Annie, Lissy, Erin, and Ezra. We are all Development Studies and we seem to work well as a group. The three girls are from Tulane and Ezra goes to BU. I made other friends during orientation, but unfortunately the homestays tend to socialize with themselves and same thing with people on campus. Homsetays are in East Legon, and range from walking distance to a 2 hour tro-tro ride away. They also range from mansions with pools to unfinished houses without running water. I am glad I chose to be on campus. I am hoping that once people have their class schedules set, I will be able to see the homestays during the day when they are on campus and have breaks.
This post was pretty dry and more just logisitcs, but I still don't feel that much has happened. I am feeling more settled and am glad that classes are starting, and I am happy with my group of friends. As the internship starts in the beginning of September, and as I go into Accra more, I will get more of a sense of life here, because people on campus tend to be pretty well off and it is kind of sheltered. Now that I have access to free (and pretty fast) internet at the AYA center, where I have Development Studies and Twi, I will be able to post more as things progress.
Love to all at home,
Mara
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