I miss having adventures every weekend, or even just staying around Accra on the weekend. Going to the night market for a snack- especially the egg sandwiches and pineapple. Jerry's and Tilapia. I miss cooking with my roommate and hand washing my clothes. Talking to the person sitting next to me on the tro. Being hassled and hustled at Circle, Kaneshie or Tema station (or just anywhere...). The children-I especially miss the children. "Oburuni!" Volunteering somewhere that truly needed my help. Limited choices for what I could eat instead of millions of choices. Simplicity. Bargaining. The heat and the dust. Twi. The wonderful friends that I made- Ghanaian, American, Libyan, and from any other country. People acknowledging you on the street, and not just because you're white and foreign but because you're a person. The music. Dancing. The LIFE.
But I guess missing it reminds me that it happened and that it was amazing. It reminds me that I am a changed person. It reminds me that I'm going back to school in 2 weeks to start new, or to pick off wherever life left off. I would say back to reality, but that would be to deny that Ghana was so. real.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
There's no place like home.
First, I love you all, thanks for reading and caring so much about me in all of this excitement. I'm back in Avon, CT for my summer "break" of 14 days. I never thought May 29 would come, and cannot believe my semester abroad has come and gone. I leave on June 11 for Belize and I'm feeling really excited and brave.
In my last few weeks in Ghana, I took a trip with one other girl to the amazing Northern regions. Went to an african traditionalist tribe where I had to meet the chief and ask permission to tour his palace and see the shrine. I also sat on/touched a live crocodile, and walked around a witches camp/refuge for women who have been accused of witchcraft in their villages. It is remarkably common for a woman to be labeled a witch in Africa. And in Northern Ghana there are multiple sanctuary villages for these women to live. It isn't optimal of course for them to be isolated from their families and forced to live somewhere else, but the real problem is that fact that people actually BELIEVE that the way a chicken's head lands on the ground after it's cut off can determine if a person is a witch. The village I went to was called Gambaga, and there is a documentary called The Witches of Gambaga that I'm about to watch to learn a lot more about it. The chief at that village let us walk around and say hi to the "witches" and see how they live, but he didn't allow us to have conversations with them or anything. You can see the pictures from that trip here: Northern Ghana Trip. And click the video below to see the Gamabaga witch camp that I went to.
Other than that, I really just hung around campus and Accra spending time with my wonderful Ghanaian and American, friends who I won't be seeing for who knows how long.
My trip home was a little frustrating, but if there is one thing I learned in Ghana, it is patience. The flight from Ghana to DC went by fast and I slept pretty well. I sat next to a woman who lives in CT actually and flies back and forth to Ghana to see her family and boyfriend a few times a year. Then when I got to DC, our flight to CT was cancelled. Luckily I was with two other girls from CIEE going to CT and we hurried to customer service. We got on the next flight to Connecticut, which left from Reagan airport in about 4 hours. This was just enough time to wait for our luggage, Taxi from Dulles to Reagan, and eat a giant double bacon cheeseburger with fries from Five Guys. Finally I made it home at 5pm, shed a few tears of happiness hugging my mom for the first time in months, and began to take in my new scenery.
I don't think I could possibly go to any two places more opposite than Avon and Accra. Driving through this suburban, AFFLUENT, clean, quiet, less populated, and green town was a big shock after coming from crowded, smelly, dirty, busy, Accra (which is actually wonderful in many other ways). I'm noticing little things that never would have occured to me. Like how many people wear jeans, and don't talk to each other, and how everyone really has money, the variety of choices everywhere you have to buy something. Just so many differences. But I have to say it's definitely comfortable. I've eaten sooo much. And it's beautiful and green and smells like flowers instead of sewage! Haha I'm really making Ghana sound like a shit hole, but in all honesty I feel a little empty at times without it. The first shower that I took at home was a cold shower because I didn't care about having a hot one. I've already noticed how I have changed, but everything here has stayed the same. I've already found myself being way more conversational and open to complete strangers. And driving gives me an amazing sense of freedom, but it's pretty challenging to listen to my Ghana tunes while driving without dancing. The hardest part of being here is NOT talking about Ghana because I want to compare and tell everyone here about little things there, but I need to not talk everyone's ear off.
Anyways, I'm really happy. And I feel like I got everything I wanted and more out of this experience. I read through my journal entries from the very first days and it's amazing how many of my hopes came true, even though I went into it with so few expectations. I feel like I can handle myself in almost any situation, and I feel like I've grown. Now on to the next big adventure, BELIZE!
In my last few weeks in Ghana, I took a trip with one other girl to the amazing Northern regions. Went to an african traditionalist tribe where I had to meet the chief and ask permission to tour his palace and see the shrine. I also sat on/touched a live crocodile, and walked around a witches camp/refuge for women who have been accused of witchcraft in their villages. It is remarkably common for a woman to be labeled a witch in Africa. And in Northern Ghana there are multiple sanctuary villages for these women to live. It isn't optimal of course for them to be isolated from their families and forced to live somewhere else, but the real problem is that fact that people actually BELIEVE that the way a chicken's head lands on the ground after it's cut off can determine if a person is a witch. The village I went to was called Gambaga, and there is a documentary called The Witches of Gambaga that I'm about to watch to learn a lot more about it. The chief at that village let us walk around and say hi to the "witches" and see how they live, but he didn't allow us to have conversations with them or anything. You can see the pictures from that trip here: Northern Ghana Trip. And click the video below to see the Gamabaga witch camp that I went to.
Other than that, I really just hung around campus and Accra spending time with my wonderful Ghanaian and American, friends who I won't be seeing for who knows how long.
My trip home was a little frustrating, but if there is one thing I learned in Ghana, it is patience. The flight from Ghana to DC went by fast and I slept pretty well. I sat next to a woman who lives in CT actually and flies back and forth to Ghana to see her family and boyfriend a few times a year. Then when I got to DC, our flight to CT was cancelled. Luckily I was with two other girls from CIEE going to CT and we hurried to customer service. We got on the next flight to Connecticut, which left from Reagan airport in about 4 hours. This was just enough time to wait for our luggage, Taxi from Dulles to Reagan, and eat a giant double bacon cheeseburger with fries from Five Guys. Finally I made it home at 5pm, shed a few tears of happiness hugging my mom for the first time in months, and began to take in my new scenery.
I don't think I could possibly go to any two places more opposite than Avon and Accra. Driving through this suburban, AFFLUENT, clean, quiet, less populated, and green town was a big shock after coming from crowded, smelly, dirty, busy, Accra (which is actually wonderful in many other ways). I'm noticing little things that never would have occured to me. Like how many people wear jeans, and don't talk to each other, and how everyone really has money, the variety of choices everywhere you have to buy something. Just so many differences. But I have to say it's definitely comfortable. I've eaten sooo much. And it's beautiful and green and smells like flowers instead of sewage! Haha I'm really making Ghana sound like a shit hole, but in all honesty I feel a little empty at times without it. The first shower that I took at home was a cold shower because I didn't care about having a hot one. I've already noticed how I have changed, but everything here has stayed the same. I've already found myself being way more conversational and open to complete strangers. And driving gives me an amazing sense of freedom, but it's pretty challenging to listen to my Ghana tunes while driving without dancing. The hardest part of being here is NOT talking about Ghana because I want to compare and tell everyone here about little things there, but I need to not talk everyone's ear off.
Anyways, I'm really happy. And I feel like I got everything I wanted and more out of this experience. I read through my journal entries from the very first days and it's amazing how many of my hopes came true, even though I went into it with so few expectations. I feel like I can handle myself in almost any situation, and I feel like I've grown. Now on to the next big adventure, BELIZE!
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Banku for dinner?! Sometimes I'm so Ghanaian I can't even handle it...
That's right, I ate banku *voluntarily* for dinner tonight. I've probably described it before but banku is just like fufu and kenkey and all the other heavy foods here. It's a ball of dough thats made of mashed up corn and slightly fermented in a bowl of groundnut (peanut) soup that you eat with your hands. I like it better when it's not in the soup and instead you eat it with grilled tilapia and a pepper sauce.
I've been at a loss of what to eat these days, but the most important criteria for me lately is that it's cheap. And what cheaper way is there to get really full than eating a 50 pesewes ($.30) ball of dough? I made sure to buy some pineapple and watermelon for dessert to try and balance my diet... Also, even though I'm not a huge fan of the heavy foods here, I might as well eat them while I can because there isn't anywhere in the states that's serving homemade banku or fufu, that's for sure.
I've been thinking more about my trip to Belize lately (I'll be there in exactly one month!) and I might try to keep up this blog and write about my research there. Though for at least 4 weeks I'll be completely without internet so I'll probably have to rely on my journal entries and field notes and then blog based on that.
I have an exam at 7:30am tomorrow (Friday the 13th...good thing I'm not too superstitious) that I've been studying for all week. Aside from the studying this week I haven't really been doing much of anything. It's making time go by slower and also making me want to be home even more. I've hardly been off campus in at least a week but today I went into town for a few errands and though I started out my excursion feeling irritated by the city and everyone around me, I met more than a few nice people along the way who brightened my day and reminded me why I'm going to miss Ghana.
I've been at a loss of what to eat these days, but the most important criteria for me lately is that it's cheap. And what cheaper way is there to get really full than eating a 50 pesewes ($.30) ball of dough? I made sure to buy some pineapple and watermelon for dessert to try and balance my diet... Also, even though I'm not a huge fan of the heavy foods here, I might as well eat them while I can because there isn't anywhere in the states that's serving homemade banku or fufu, that's for sure.
I've been thinking more about my trip to Belize lately (I'll be there in exactly one month!) and I might try to keep up this blog and write about my research there. Though for at least 4 weeks I'll be completely without internet so I'll probably have to rely on my journal entries and field notes and then blog based on that.
I have an exam at 7:30am tomorrow (Friday the 13th...good thing I'm not too superstitious) that I've been studying for all week. Aside from the studying this week I haven't really been doing much of anything. It's making time go by slower and also making me want to be home even more. I've hardly been off campus in at least a week but today I went into town for a few errands and though I started out my excursion feeling irritated by the city and everyone around me, I met more than a few nice people along the way who brightened my day and reminded me why I'm going to miss Ghana.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Beginning of the end?
The past few weeks have been fairly low-key, though most of my life here hasn't been overly stressful or fast-paced by any means. After Easter was our final week of classes. The Buddhist students I became friends with this semester put on a student forum that I felt was enormously successful. I spoke on "What is Happiness" and we also introduced some key philosophies and concepts in our Nichiren Buddhist practice. The turn-out was good, mostly Ghanaian students who had plenty of questions to ask and notions to challenge based on their Christian backgrounds. It sparked a lot of healthy discussion. During the forum, I peeked over the shoulder of one guy sitting in front of me who was writing in his notebook while listening to the forum "Jesus is my savior, I am redeemed through him. I can not choose any other path." Even though I know the forum probably didn't change anyone's religious views (which was not the aim anyways), we at least were able to open peoples' eyes to another world religion and encourage tolerance of different faiths. I think it also cleared up a lot of misconceptions about Buddhism that people in a predominately Christian society have never been educated about.
The following weekend I went to Togo with Stephen and Kelsey. Togo is the country bordering Ghana to the east, and also the only country bordering Ghana that isn't currently in political turmoil. Cote D'ivoire is seeing some serious political unrest- Ivorians are calling it a civil war, even if the rest of the world isn’t. And recently Burkina Faso has also been in conflict. But don’t worry, I’m perfectly safe in Ghana. Anyways, travelling to Togo was an adventure in itself. Once we got to the road close to Aflao, it became extremely dusty and bumpy for at least an hour of the trip. Our trotro driver also thought he was king of the road and passed and sped through every traffic situation that came our way. I feared for our safety a few times. When we got to the Togo border, this friendly “Ghanaian…?” said he would help us with the customs process and waited while we filled out our forms and got our passports stamped. Then he told us we had to take this special taxi across the border because we couldn’t walk over the next gate, and because motor taxis are not to be trusted. We were really frazzled and decided to just go with this taxi to our hotel. When we got in the car he got us all confused and flustered, trying to tell us to fold all of our Togo currency up in our Ghana currency so that the x-rays in the next gate couldn’t tell that we had CFA’s on us. This was complete bullshit and in the process of showing us how to fold up our money he was definitely trying to steal from us. I was unbelievably relieved when we actually arrived at our hotel, having not passed through a second gate, and not ending up in some vacant lot to be robbed at knife-point, which they easily could have done…sorry to alarm any family and friends reading this entry, I’m safe and sound and am learning through EVERY situation how to be more and more cautious. It’s such a hard balance here knowing who to trust and who not to trust.
Anyways, we arrived at Hotel Gallion to find out that they booked our reservation for May 29 instead of April 29 so we didn’t have a room there. We went around to a few other places which were too expensive, and then this nice woman told us to follow her and took us to the Lady Diana guest house or something. This ended up costing the same price as hotel gallion and was just as conveniently located. It was run by a really sweet couple. It should also be noted that while in Togo we spoke almost no English to any local people. It is a francophone country so my 7 years of French actually came back to me pretty fast. We ended up eating most of our meals at hotel gallion that weekend, walked around the central market of Lomé, rode moto-taxis (motorcycles!) to the voodoo fetish market, where people go to buy animal heads and skins and things of that nature for medicinal purposes. That was super interesting and we got to bless a few little souvenirs and rolled some shells on the floor for the gods to tell us how much we should pay. It was super interesting and if you want to see/read more about the voodoo market that we went to, here is the BBC link.
Anyways, we arrived at Hotel Gallion to find out that they booked our reservation for May 29 instead of April 29 so we didn’t have a room there. We went around to a few other places which were too expensive, and then this nice woman told us to follow her and took us to the Lady Diana guest house or something. This ended up costing the same price as hotel gallion and was just as conveniently located. It was run by a really sweet couple. It should also be noted that while in Togo we spoke almost no English to any local people. It is a francophone country so my 7 years of French actually came back to me pretty fast. We ended up eating most of our meals at hotel gallion that weekend, walked around the central market of Lomé, rode moto-taxis (motorcycles!) to the voodoo fetish market, where people go to buy animal heads and skins and things of that nature for medicinal purposes. That was super interesting and we got to bless a few little souvenirs and rolled some shells on the floor for the gods to tell us how much we should pay. It was super interesting and if you want to see/read more about the voodoo market that we went to, here is the BBC link.
Overall we loved Togo and wished we could stay longer. Although we only got to see the capital of Lomé, it was less populated, cleaner, friendlier, and had wayyyy better food (real coffee!!) than Ghana because of its French history.
The night after coming back from Togo we had our CIEE farewell dinner, which kind of marked the beginning of the end. In the slide show there were even pictures of us arriving at the airport in Accra, and of all the trips and things that we’ve been through in our 4 months here. It really reminded me how much we’ve all grown and experienced here. Orientation at the Coconut Grove hotel feels like the distant past now. This Sunday my best friend here is getting on a plane back to America because she finished finals early. I’m jealous, and sad because it is making it much more real to know that I’m leaving in less than 3 weeks now.
I’ve had 3 final exams so far, which have all gone pretty well. It’s much different than my exam period at Clark because usually I have about 50 pages worth of papers to write during a 2-week period at Clark. Here, I have 2-hour exam blocks spread through May for each class, mostly essay writing, and to study I’ve had to just re-teach myself all of the material from the semester for each class. I took my dance final, my Deviance final, and my Twi final. I just have my Medical Soc and Psychology of religion left on May 13 and May 24. With all this time in between I’ve been relaxing a lot and enjoying my friends before we all leave each other. One thing I’ve really wanted to do since being in Ghana is go to the North, where the Muslim influence is much stronger, and it is much more rural than southern Ghana. I’ve planned a trip up North for next week- May 16-21 for about 5 nights that I am suuuuuper excited for as a final trip before heading back to America.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Easter weekend: Kwahu festival paragliding and discovering that I like fufu!
Sorry I’ve been trying to keep my entries somewhat brief, but this one might end up being a little long.
Last weekend I went with my 3 closest friends back to Cape Coast for one night. I'm really glad I went back and got to see and walk around the town of Cape Coast, it's really beautiful and cute and "towny". And I got to see Cape Coast castle, which is where most of the slaves who ended up in the Americas were held to be shipped and traded in the Atlantic slave trade. Then on Sunday I went to Ester's wedding in the Eastern region. I'm glad I got the chance to experience a Ghanaian wedding.
Last weekend I went with my 3 closest friends back to Cape Coast for one night. I'm really glad I went back and got to see and walk around the town of Cape Coast, it's really beautiful and cute and "towny". And I got to see Cape Coast castle, which is where most of the slaves who ended up in the Americas were held to be shipped and traded in the Atlantic slave trade. Then on Sunday I went to Ester's wedding in the Eastern region. I'm glad I got the chance to experience a Ghanaian wedding.
I know I always talk about how refreshed and happy I am to be here after going away for the weekend, but this weekend especially felt that way. This is a 4-day weekend for us, and in the past few weeks I had really been feeling like the spark was gone from Ghana. It was getting to be the same old and I’ve been very frustrated with the gender views, food, inefficiency, and heat and just overall ready to ditch Africa and come back to good old America. But still I’ve been determined to make this last month amazing. I don’t want to be just biding my time until I go home, I need to be living it up!
So I went to the Kwahu festival that takes place every Easter weekend in the Eastern Region. It’s most famous for the paragliding part, but there’s also music and events and all the towns and villages are celebrating and partying. I travelled with a group of girls I haven’t travelled with before, but we live in the dorm together. 5 of us set off at 9am Friday and really hadn’t planned ANY part of this trip. We didn’t know exactly how we should get there, and definitely didn’t know where we would sleep; but if there’s one thing I’ve learned about travel in Africa, it’s that even if you have a plan it will NEVER go as planned, so it’s best not to have expectations. The most amazing thing is that everything just fell right into place and worked out so smoothly (by African standards). We took a bus up to Nkawkaw which is the main town in the Eastern region, took a trotro to Obo, some village we heard we should go to next. Then wandered around looking for accommodations and finally just hopped in a cab and stopped at the first hotel we saw. It was pretty high-end so luckily the rooms weren’t sold out. It was 80 Cedis for a room with a double bed and bathroom. Very pricey but the manager let the 5 of us sleep in there so it ended up being 16 cedis per person which is usually around what I pay when I stay other places. Two people had to sleep on the floor and 3 in the double bed, but we made it work. Next we wandered around town looking for food because we hadn’t eaten since breakfast and it was getting to be dinner time. Of course there wasn’t much for dinner in this village so we went to a bar that said it had “local and continental dishes”, but all the had was Fufu. That was fine with me and Elena, and the other girls went and got some small street food snacks for dinner.
I decided that now 3 months into my stay in Ghana I really had to give fufu a fair chance. So I ordered fufu in groundnut soup with beef. Of course it came with goat instead, which I gave to Elena. But I did really well with the fufu I thought and it filled me right up. Not sure if I have explained this before but fufu is boiled cassava (like yam) pounded into a dough and served in soup. It looks disgusting and is a little slimy (check out my Facebook album for a visual). You eat it with your hands and break off a ball of dough, dip it in soup, pop it in your mouth and swallow without chewing. The point is to taste the soup, but be filled up by the dough. It’s cheap and very filling. Also the most traditional of Ghanaian dishes. I’m really happy that I gave it a chance because I actually really enjoyed it and happily had my 2nd dose of fufu this weekend on Easter Sunday with my roommate.
The town was so alive by this time of night with people celebrating, and more drunk Ghanaians than I have seen since I’ve been here (drinking really isn’t a big part of the culture normally). This weekend we got an abnormally high number of “Oboruni” and “Akosua” hassling and cat-calls. So we went to the MTN “chill spot” in between our hotel and the town and got some ice cream and sat. There was a DJ here and like 20 young kids swarmed and bombarded us and we danced with them a bit. Then 5 Ghanaian men approached us and even though I’m so used to writing them off automatically, these ones seemed cool so we let them join us. Each of us was having an individual conversation with one of these guys, and somehow about 20 mins into the conversation I find out that the one guy I was talking to, named Wolfgang, or Solomon, is a Buddhist with SGI. I can’t even express how little the chances are of me randomly running into a Buddhist in Ghana, but it happened and it was awesome. We almost didn’t believe one another so we had to quiz each other a little on important people and history of Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism hah. He practices in Accra so he knows a lot of the students that I go to meetings with here and I invited him to the student forum we’re having on campus in a few weeks. (Side note is that I’ve been really involved with SGI activities here, which has been such a home away from home for me, and helped me make some really awesome friends.)
Overall, we had a very fun and smooth Friday at the festival, and woke up to go paragliding at 8am. This part of the festival was run really efficiently, and we noticed quickly that it was obviously because it was run entirely by Westerners. We signed up and were numbers 59-63 for paragliding so we had a few hours to watch others lift off and hang out. This was fine with me because the view was absolutely amazing at the top of the mountain. Right before we suited up to go gliding, the vice president of Ghana randomly showed up too for about 15 minutes just to watch and apparently to show his support for developing tourism in Ghana.
Anyways, so the paragliding was obviously a tandem flight with a professional. My paragliding pilot was Loren from Utah and he’s been doing this for over 6 years. He told me about all of his experience and also schooled me on the science behind flying (clouds and air streams and leaning and wind, lots of meteorology, actually) while we were in the air for about 30 minutes. To lift off you run down this cliff at the edge of a mountain, and as the parachute thing picks up the wind, you lift in the air and you’re suddenly flying thousands of feet in the air over the jungle and African villages. It was the most amazing thing I’ve ever done. I was in the air at the same time as my other 4 friends, and Loren was really good friends with the other pilots so they trusted eachother enough for fly pretty close to each other. There wasn’t one moment in the air that I felt unsafe, which was probably the best part. At one point we followed this eagle really close behind because they know where the best air stream is, they’re the real professionals at flying and I literally felt like a bird. As we went down I asked if we could do some tricks, and we did a bunch of 180s and twists and turns in the air which felt way crazier than any amusement park ride I’ve ever been on. We landed in a field, and rode on the back of a pickup back up the mountain. Loren took some pictures while we were in the air that he’s emailing and then I’ll upload them. All in all I know this was not my last time paragliding, I have to experience that again.
After all of that excitement we had to head back to Accra, and endured a long uncomfortable tro ride through a rainstorm, next to some very irritating man named Richard who stared at us every 5 minutes, woke us up a lot and told me I shouldn’t sleep on the bus in case some accident happened and I needed to act fast to protect myself. Even though I was really ready for some private space after being around so many people this weekend, everyone was really happy and nice and accepting and it helped remind me why Ghanaians have a reputation for actually being so pleasant and welcoming.
Today was Easter and while I was sad not to be at the beach house with my family like usual, I got to spend the day with my roommate Naa at her house in Accra and with her family. I took a tro to her place after she got out of church and had a yam and stew lunch at her house. We walked around the block and she showed me her neighborhood and told me how nice it used to be but that no one ever keeps up with any maintenance of parks or buildings or roads, so now it’s al little dumpy. I loved being home with her. It made me feel very reconnected to this place. I went with her to get her hair done, and when we got back to the house her auntie and cousin were pounding some fufu in the back while the family goats grazed on some shrubs just hangin out, no big deal. This time I had fufu with palm nut stew and tuna fish. I loved it even more the second time, and after dinner took a bumpy tro ride back to campus with a stomach full of fufu. Naa and I have built up such a great friendship and it’s going to be so hard to leave her in just 5 weeks…
But wait! The fun hasn’t stopped yet. It’s only Sunday and we still have tomorrow off, so my friends and I are gonna check out the art center in town and hopefully buy some gifts to bring home. Then we’re going to Stephen’s home stay and cooking Mexican food for ourselves!
Finals start in a week, so this past weekend was a perfect way to unwind before studying for exams. I now feel so refreshed and happy to be here again, and it’s funny but I’m really glad that I came to like fufu...it’s so much a part of Ghanaian life and I just feel that much more immersed now. I think the next month is going to be the best one yet.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Monkeys and waterfalls....and school?
I'm sure you might be wondering how the "study" part of this study abroad experience has been. Well, it's been pretty minimal. For starters, my professor who showed up an hour late for almost every Psychology of Religion class, had copied and pasted our course literature from Wikipedia, and taught sexists lessons, has pretty much stopped coming to class. We found out that he was actually just the TA and we have no idea who the real prof is. I've learned absolutely nothing in what could have been a really good class.
My Medical Sociology class that was super interesting, though really only glossed over some very broad topics, has finished. The prof is traveling to Europe and Brazil so our last lecture was on March 30. I now have over one month to study for that exam on Friday the 13th of May, which covers only 8 class lectures.
My Medical Sociology class that was super interesting, though really only glossed over some very broad topics, has finished. The prof is traveling to Europe and Brazil so our last lecture was on March 30. I now have over one month to study for that exam on Friday the 13th of May, which covers only 8 class lectures.
Deviant Behavior has been going pretty well. I actually started doing the reading for this class in my spare time and it made me feel like a student again. A lot of it is review of what I've learned in past Sociology classes, but I really like the professor for this class so that's a plus.
As for Twi and Dance, they're kind of both jokes as well. Although, Twi can be fun because if I pick up any phrases in class and use them out in the real world people laugh and seem to have a softer side towards me. Dance is fun to do something somewhat active and creative, but being in a class of over 100 students makes learning the technique pretty challenging and fruitless.
Over the weekend of April 1st, I went with Kelsey, Genna, and Stephen to the Volta region of Ghana. I have to say that transportation and travel were among the most interesting parts of this trip. Getting there took 5 hours of travel (3 different trotros after the first one broke down, and walking for over an hour). This weekend also consisted of about only one substantial meal and many small snacks. We stayed one night at the Tafi Atome Monkey Sanctuary, which is part of the Tafi Atome village. This is considered eco-tourism, where some of the profits from the tourism goes towards feeding and keeping up the monkeys’ habitat, and also towards the village. In the morning we got to feed bananas to the little monks and some were even brave enough to have the monkeys climb on them (I was a little skittish and usually just dropped the banana and ran when the monkeys got close enough to me).
As for Twi and Dance, they're kind of both jokes as well. Although, Twi can be fun because if I pick up any phrases in class and use them out in the real world people laugh and seem to have a softer side towards me. Dance is fun to do something somewhat active and creative, but being in a class of over 100 students makes learning the technique pretty challenging and fruitless.
Over the weekend of April 1st, I went with Kelsey, Genna, and Stephen to the Volta region of Ghana. I have to say that transportation and travel were among the most interesting parts of this trip. Getting there took 5 hours of travel (3 different trotros after the first one broke down, and walking for over an hour). This weekend also consisted of about only one substantial meal and many small snacks. We stayed one night at the Tafi Atome Monkey Sanctuary, which is part of the Tafi Atome village. This is considered eco-tourism, where some of the profits from the tourism goes towards feeding and keeping up the monkeys’ habitat, and also towards the village. In the morning we got to feed bananas to the little monks and some were even brave enough to have the monkeys climb on them (I was a little skittish and usually just dropped the banana and ran when the monkeys got close enough to me).
On Saturday we made our way to the Waterfall Lodge at the base of the mountain where the Wli falls are located. By this time we had actually ran into some other CIEE kids we knew who had a similar itinerary to ours that weekend. After figuring out the rooms (good thing we called ahead, even though we ended up allowing two German students to squat in one of our reserved rooms), we went to the visitors center and paid our fees to climb the mountain. We decided to hike to the upper falls, which was about 2 ½ hours. The last two hours were on the steepest “trail” I’ve ever seen. Even some experienced hikers in our group said it was the hardest thing they’ve ever done. I can safely say it was the most challenging physical activity I have ever done. And it felt SO good to accomplish it. Our guide rushed us up the mountain, so when we got to the top at the Waterfalls we tipped him and said we would head down on our own. We stayed at the falls for a while and swam and had a snack. then when it looked like it might rain we decided to descend the steep trail once again. The views were beautiful all along the way and it helped to stop and look around when I was struggling so much. Going down was just as difficult as coming up because you had to concentrate so hard on where to place each foot. We decided to check out the lower falls when we got back down, which were just as beautiful as the upper falls but not quite as rewarding, having struggled so much to get to see the upper falls. We were sweaty, dirty and exhausted, so we went back to the lodge, did a little stretching and showered and had a delicious meal outside as a thunderstorm came in and passed out around 9pm.
We made it back to campus by 1:30pm on Sunday after taking a cramped bus that was showing videos of almost scary charismatic Christian services, and reggae music videos. I know that at least I was just a little grumpy to be back in the city after being in the beautiful Volta region. It all went by too fast.
Now in the past week, I have registered for fall classes at Clark, started volunteering with street children at a daycare/pre-school (I stopped interning at Tot-to-Teen a few weeks ago), helped out with arts & crafts at an orphanage, and discovered an amazing non-profit project that helps street children go to school and get regular meals in the slums of Jamestown. I also saw more of Ghana’s beautiful nature and waterfalls on our CIEE trip to the Eastern region.
I think I’ll leave it at that for now, but I’ll definitely need to devote an entire blog entry to the children of Ghana that have touched my heart so deeply in just a few days.
Friday, April 1, 2011
A weekend in the mountains is just what I need!
Having started my day with a fried egg and avocado sandwich, I am about to embark on a weekend trip to the Volta region of Ghana! I'm going with 3 of my friends and I think it will be a good group of us. Tonight we'll be staying in a village at the monkey sanctuary, and tomorrow at the waterfall lodge. After our morning tour of feeding monkeys tomorrow, we'll ascend the hills to Wli falls, the tallest waterfall in Ghana (and all of West Africa?). We've had to postpone this trip twice, so this is our third attempt and I could not be more excited to get on our way!
I've been on two beach trips and spent a night in the rainforest, but those have all been really spread out so I'm just very ready to get out of bustling Accra and off campus.
I can't believe it's April 1st! I'm more than half way through my stay here, and the final exam schedule has been released. I have three exams pretty spread out in May, so I think I'll be able to do more traveling then. Upcoming trips I hope to take in the next two months are: Togo+Benin, Northern Ghana, and Mole National Park. I also want to get to Cape Coast once more, which is an easy weekend trip. And there will be plenty of time for day trips to the beach. I just really want to make the most of my time here. I'm going to work harder at budgeting out my everyday expenses to spend less so that I have money for travel. And traveling here is really not that expensive, our travel cost and accommodations for this whole weekend shouldn't cost more than 30 cedis. But I also have to keep in mind that I'm going to Belize in June so I have to save up for that, and also try not to be totally broke by September.
Being here has made me feel so so fortunate for the opportunities I have to travel and see the world. And it has really put my life in perspective; realizing that for some people, all they know is the 30-mile radius around where they grew up.
I've been on two beach trips and spent a night in the rainforest, but those have all been really spread out so I'm just very ready to get out of bustling Accra and off campus.
I can't believe it's April 1st! I'm more than half way through my stay here, and the final exam schedule has been released. I have three exams pretty spread out in May, so I think I'll be able to do more traveling then. Upcoming trips I hope to take in the next two months are: Togo+Benin, Northern Ghana, and Mole National Park. I also want to get to Cape Coast once more, which is an easy weekend trip. And there will be plenty of time for day trips to the beach. I just really want to make the most of my time here. I'm going to work harder at budgeting out my everyday expenses to spend less so that I have money for travel. And traveling here is really not that expensive, our travel cost and accommodations for this whole weekend shouldn't cost more than 30 cedis. But I also have to keep in mind that I'm going to Belize in June so I have to save up for that, and also try not to be totally broke by September.
Being here has made me feel so so fortunate for the opportunities I have to travel and see the world. And it has really put my life in perspective; realizing that for some people, all they know is the 30-mile radius around where they grew up.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Africa needs FEMINISM!!!
That's about all I have to say about that, but I suppose I could, and should, elaborate at a later date.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Paradise, Kumasi, and big summer plans!
Hello all! On the weekend of March 4th I traveled with 6 other friends to Ada Foah, a little peninsula where the Volta river flows into the Atlantic ocean. If I could describe this place in one word, it would be "Paradise". We drove just under two hours east of Accra to Ada Foah, where we had to take a boat on the Volta to get to our isolated beach resort. We stayed one night in a hut with sand floors right on the beach for 10 Ghana cedis a night per person. This was the weekend of Ghana's independence day so it was a big beach weekend for Ghanaian families who all brought quite the party to the peaceful beach. It was absolutely beautiful and very relaxing. A few things that threw me off: (1)Ghanaian (and Indian!) men taking pictures of us white women in our bikinis with their camera phones, without asking us. (2) Later finding out that swimming in the Volta is not healthy because it's fresh water and there are parasites that go through your skin and live in your liver. But we spoke to our travel doctors and they said to wait and see if we have symptoms of worms, and if we do to just take a deworming pill. Lovely.
Right when I got home from Ada I accidentally deleted all of my amazing pictures from this beautiful place. But I'll be sure to steal the photos my friends took to show you all.
This past weekend I went on our CIEE trip to Kumasi, one of the other major cities in Ghana. It was a 5-hour bus ride away. The first day we went to a traditional Ashanti village and saw the home of a very important woman Ashanti warrior. Then we went to the Kente Weaving village and I got hassled into buying some authentic Kente cloth. I think it will make great gifts and serve as a wonderful souvenir. We also got the chance to stamp our own Kente with Ashanti symbols that mean things like unity, peace, family, and wisdom. That was pretty cool. The next day we went to the Manhyia Palace (pronounced Man-chyeah) museum where the Ashanti kings have lived, followed by the Kejetia Market, which is the biggest (and probably smelliest) open market in all of West Africa. We went there for two hours, wandering through a labyrinth of beads and cloth and shoes and pig heads and cow legs and pretty much anything else you can think of. It was surprisingly less "grabby" than I expected. The vendors were all actually very nice and just happy to see us and try to speak Twi with us. I didn't buy anything at this market because I was really overwhelmed, and if you know me as a shopper- I tend to get easily overwhelmed in Kohl's, let alone a bustling African market place. Needless to say, it was an awesome cultural experience and probably one of the coolest places I've ever seen.
That night we were taken to a "fancy" Chinese restaurant that was very overpriced, but CIEE had given us each 15 cedis which pretty much covered my meal (of the least delicious chinese food i've eaten in a while). Though it didn't cover the 38 Cedi ($25) bottle of South African Cabernet Sauvingon that Kelsey and I split. It was worth it. We had a free morning until noon on Sunday so instead of rushing back to the market, Kelsey and I walked around the neighborhood of our hotel, and spoke with children walking to church in the villages nearby. I also chased some baby goats, which I find as cute and exciting as little puppies or kittens. I'm also sorry to say that I've probably accidentally eaten goat once or twice here when I thought it was beef.
My final point in this entry is to announce my summer plans. I had been applying to some internships and jobs back in Worcester for the summer, but at the same time I applied to a program through Indiana University to participate in an Ethnographic Field School in Belize. I was accepted to the IU program and have decided to go! I will be working with a professor and a few other students to research food anthropology in the Mayan region of Belize, and also research the tourist restaurant industry. So i have three weeks in a village home stay cooking and seeing what the farmers grow, and then three weeks in a rented house with other students on the main strip of the tourist district conducting interviews of tourists and restaurant owners. It was really hard for me to make the decision to be abroad for ANOTHER 7 weeks this summer. But I realized that I won't have many other good times in my life to take up an opportunity like this, and I will also get some amazing research experience in food anthropology, which I am really interested in! I will also have all of August to come home, decompress, and process the past seven months outside of the US before I start my senior year of college. I will be home from May 29 to June 11 before I leave for Central America, so I hope in those two weeks that I can see as many of you wonderful people as possible.
Right when I got home from Ada I accidentally deleted all of my amazing pictures from this beautiful place. But I'll be sure to steal the photos my friends took to show you all.
This past weekend I went on our CIEE trip to Kumasi, one of the other major cities in Ghana. It was a 5-hour bus ride away. The first day we went to a traditional Ashanti village and saw the home of a very important woman Ashanti warrior. Then we went to the Kente Weaving village and I got hassled into buying some authentic Kente cloth. I think it will make great gifts and serve as a wonderful souvenir. We also got the chance to stamp our own Kente with Ashanti symbols that mean things like unity, peace, family, and wisdom. That was pretty cool. The next day we went to the Manhyia Palace (pronounced Man-chyeah) museum where the Ashanti kings have lived, followed by the Kejetia Market, which is the biggest (and probably smelliest) open market in all of West Africa. We went there for two hours, wandering through a labyrinth of beads and cloth and shoes and pig heads and cow legs and pretty much anything else you can think of. It was surprisingly less "grabby" than I expected. The vendors were all actually very nice and just happy to see us and try to speak Twi with us. I didn't buy anything at this market because I was really overwhelmed, and if you know me as a shopper- I tend to get easily overwhelmed in Kohl's, let alone a bustling African market place. Needless to say, it was an awesome cultural experience and probably one of the coolest places I've ever seen.
That night we were taken to a "fancy" Chinese restaurant that was very overpriced, but CIEE had given us each 15 cedis which pretty much covered my meal (of the least delicious chinese food i've eaten in a while). Though it didn't cover the 38 Cedi ($25) bottle of South African Cabernet Sauvingon that Kelsey and I split. It was worth it. We had a free morning until noon on Sunday so instead of rushing back to the market, Kelsey and I walked around the neighborhood of our hotel, and spoke with children walking to church in the villages nearby. I also chased some baby goats, which I find as cute and exciting as little puppies or kittens. I'm also sorry to say that I've probably accidentally eaten goat once or twice here when I thought it was beef.
My final point in this entry is to announce my summer plans. I had been applying to some internships and jobs back in Worcester for the summer, but at the same time I applied to a program through Indiana University to participate in an Ethnographic Field School in Belize. I was accepted to the IU program and have decided to go! I will be working with a professor and a few other students to research food anthropology in the Mayan region of Belize, and also research the tourist restaurant industry. So i have three weeks in a village home stay cooking and seeing what the farmers grow, and then three weeks in a rented house with other students on the main strip of the tourist district conducting interviews of tourists and restaurant owners. It was really hard for me to make the decision to be abroad for ANOTHER 7 weeks this summer. But I realized that I won't have many other good times in my life to take up an opportunity like this, and I will also get some amazing research experience in food anthropology, which I am really interested in! I will also have all of August to come home, decompress, and process the past seven months outside of the US before I start my senior year of college. I will be home from May 29 to June 11 before I leave for Central America, so I hope in those two weeks that I can see as many of you wonderful people as possible.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Simple daily life and a rude awakening at the internship
I think I'd like to start this post with a summary of my ridiculous Mefloquine-induced dreams from last night. First, I was back in the states and meeting my boyfriend's parents, who turned out to be Barack and Michelle Obama. I remember being pretty excited that I was finally 21 and enjoying the open bar in the White House. In my dream I even finished Barack's white wine because I thought it was mine and Michelle called me out on it. I was also told that they would grill me on my plans for the future and I wasn't even nervous telling the president that I had great plans and expectations for myself.
-My second strange dream was about my wedding, taking place a few years in the future. And I guess I was having this wedding as a pre-planned event, like I had no say in how any of it was unfolding. It was at a venue I had never seen before, with music from a random playlist on my iTunes, the photographer was doing everything all wrong and I hated all the decorations and food. I remember being really angry and selfish in the dream and mad that nothing was right. I never saw who my fiance or husband would be in that dream. But all of my close friends and family were there. And my best friends and sister were wearing bright differently colored dresses in the wedding party. One thing I remember though is telling the DJ to play the song that I actually have picked out (in real life) for the dance with my father at the reception. That's about the only thing I've thought about for my real wedding actually, so it's kind of cool that that came out in my dream wedding that was all crazy and malfunctioning.
Okay, back to reality now. And this week I got quite a few reality checks. The first was on Tuesday when the electricity was very shifty on campus and in my dorm, and the running water was out for about 24 hours. I took my first bucket bath since being in Ghana, which I actually really enjoyed. It saved so much water as opposed to sitting under a running shower for fifteen minutes a day. It's something I might try to do more at home. That day I also decided to do laundry by hand, as I've been doing the whole time here, but my Ghanaian roommate said that I wasn't doing it right so she showed me the correct way and ended up doing all my laundry for me even though I insisted that I could take over. It was really sweet of her and we had some good conversation while she washed my sweat and dust-stained clothes. They also came out to be the cleanest that my clothes have been since I've been here.
After that she showed me how to make stew! It was delicious- and spicy- but really easy and I'm definitely going to cook it back home. She made a lot and we split the ingredients so it's been in our fridge and we eat it over yams or rice throughout the week.
I have a lot of free time on Tuesdays before my classes so this was all a great way to spend the morning and a good bonding time for me and Naa (whose real name is actually Gifty, I learned- a common female Ghanaian name). After my three classes on Tuesday, my friend Darou from Togo invited me to hang out so I drank togolese apple-flavored soda (ew) in his room and danced while watching music videos from Nigeria and Togo. He's such a positive energy and genuinely cares about his friends. I really value his friendship, and he even treated me to go see a play on campus and I learned a lot about African culture through watching this theater production.
I also spent my morning making my lesson plan for my internship which really discouraged me. I struggle with it because I don't know the best learning style for these kids, and I don't even have the material in front of me so a lot of times I feel like I'm preparing blindly. But despite being discouraged by this, I was really uplifted my Naa and Darou this week. Naa told me I've hit a new level in my African-ness with the bucket bath, handwashing, and cooking all in one day. This week she also gave me two bracelets of African beads after I said I wanted to visit a bead market. They are beautiful and I will cherish them. We've started to get very close and her friendship really means a lot to me as well.
The biggest shock and reality check came for me on Thursday though, when I went to my internship. I was feeling pretty confident about my lesson plan because Wednesday had gone so well there. But at the beginning of class Pascal asked a few students to stand at the front, asked them why they didn't do their homework and proceeded to lash them with a stick in front of the whole class. This is how they discipline students in schools here, and it's really not uncommon. I knew that the stick was for intimidation, but I didn't know that he would actually use it. This made me sick and really through me off for the whole lesson afterwards. When I gave the kids some exercises for practice, none got more than 3 out of 5 correct. Those who got 0 or 1 correct were assigned to sweep the classroom that day. But when we went next door and I taught the same lesson with the same exercises, he separated them according to their scores and the students who got 0 correct got two lashes and the students who got 1 correct got one lash. The rest were "home free", but about half the class got hit that day with this wooden stick on their bottoms. I couldn't watch him do it, but I watched the kids run back to their seats and put their heads on their desk to hide in embarrassment that they might have been crying as well. They also looked at me to gauge my reaction, which obviously was of shock and sadness.
I began to tear up and left right after this class to go home, because it occurred to me that I had given them these exercises for practice. I gave them problems that were challenging but doable because I knew that they had the skills and knowledge, it just took some application. But I thought, "If I had only given them five problems that they could do perfectly, these children wouldn't have been hit." There was no way for me to know that these were the consequences. But it now makes me question my teaching style. Do I give them more challenging questions so that they learn and gain more out of it- with the risk that they'll be lashed for getting it wrong- or do I give them simple problems that I know they can solve so that they won't get hit that day. It's a conflict that I'm struggling with. And I just do not support this type of education. How is a child learning from his academic mistakes by being hit? But I am in no position to challenge the doctrines of the school. I talked to my roommate and African friends, they said they all got hit in school. It's just the culture, but something I don't think I'll every adjust to.
One thing I have pretty much adjusted to is the stares and being hassled to buy things just because we're white. Of course we have money, we can afford a plane ticket from America to Africa. They know this, and I've gotten pretty good at avoiding eye contact and walking straight past the nagging vendors. One thing I haven't ignored though is the day to day struggles of people here. Today we went into town, and I admit I splurged on a great lunch and snacks. On the tro tro back, I sat next to a 10 year old girl and her 6 year old brother going home from school. The girl asked me if I could pay for them, and my initial reaction was to say I didn't have enough money. In the states I'm all too used to passing by people begging me for spare change. But who am I kidding, why should I be greedy about paying their fare equal to 50 cents when these children need every "dime" they have. This wasn't the first time I paid someone's fare on the trotro who asked me to. When it seems hard to part with 50 pesewas, I think about how they can barely afford to get to where they're going, even though getting there is probably for work to support their livelihood.
I'm sure I could think of more to write about, but those were the major events of my week I suppose. Sunday is Independence Day and I can't wait to see how an African country celebrates its 54th year free of colonial rule!
-My second strange dream was about my wedding, taking place a few years in the future. And I guess I was having this wedding as a pre-planned event, like I had no say in how any of it was unfolding. It was at a venue I had never seen before, with music from a random playlist on my iTunes, the photographer was doing everything all wrong and I hated all the decorations and food. I remember being really angry and selfish in the dream and mad that nothing was right. I never saw who my fiance or husband would be in that dream. But all of my close friends and family were there. And my best friends and sister were wearing bright differently colored dresses in the wedding party. One thing I remember though is telling the DJ to play the song that I actually have picked out (in real life) for the dance with my father at the reception. That's about the only thing I've thought about for my real wedding actually, so it's kind of cool that that came out in my dream wedding that was all crazy and malfunctioning.
Okay, back to reality now. And this week I got quite a few reality checks. The first was on Tuesday when the electricity was very shifty on campus and in my dorm, and the running water was out for about 24 hours. I took my first bucket bath since being in Ghana, which I actually really enjoyed. It saved so much water as opposed to sitting under a running shower for fifteen minutes a day. It's something I might try to do more at home. That day I also decided to do laundry by hand, as I've been doing the whole time here, but my Ghanaian roommate said that I wasn't doing it right so she showed me the correct way and ended up doing all my laundry for me even though I insisted that I could take over. It was really sweet of her and we had some good conversation while she washed my sweat and dust-stained clothes. They also came out to be the cleanest that my clothes have been since I've been here.
After that she showed me how to make stew! It was delicious- and spicy- but really easy and I'm definitely going to cook it back home. She made a lot and we split the ingredients so it's been in our fridge and we eat it over yams or rice throughout the week.
I have a lot of free time on Tuesdays before my classes so this was all a great way to spend the morning and a good bonding time for me and Naa (whose real name is actually Gifty, I learned- a common female Ghanaian name). After my three classes on Tuesday, my friend Darou from Togo invited me to hang out so I drank togolese apple-flavored soda (ew) in his room and danced while watching music videos from Nigeria and Togo. He's such a positive energy and genuinely cares about his friends. I really value his friendship, and he even treated me to go see a play on campus and I learned a lot about African culture through watching this theater production.
I also spent my morning making my lesson plan for my internship which really discouraged me. I struggle with it because I don't know the best learning style for these kids, and I don't even have the material in front of me so a lot of times I feel like I'm preparing blindly. But despite being discouraged by this, I was really uplifted my Naa and Darou this week. Naa told me I've hit a new level in my African-ness with the bucket bath, handwashing, and cooking all in one day. This week she also gave me two bracelets of African beads after I said I wanted to visit a bead market. They are beautiful and I will cherish them. We've started to get very close and her friendship really means a lot to me as well.
The biggest shock and reality check came for me on Thursday though, when I went to my internship. I was feeling pretty confident about my lesson plan because Wednesday had gone so well there. But at the beginning of class Pascal asked a few students to stand at the front, asked them why they didn't do their homework and proceeded to lash them with a stick in front of the whole class. This is how they discipline students in schools here, and it's really not uncommon. I knew that the stick was for intimidation, but I didn't know that he would actually use it. This made me sick and really through me off for the whole lesson afterwards. When I gave the kids some exercises for practice, none got more than 3 out of 5 correct. Those who got 0 or 1 correct were assigned to sweep the classroom that day. But when we went next door and I taught the same lesson with the same exercises, he separated them according to their scores and the students who got 0 correct got two lashes and the students who got 1 correct got one lash. The rest were "home free", but about half the class got hit that day with this wooden stick on their bottoms. I couldn't watch him do it, but I watched the kids run back to their seats and put their heads on their desk to hide in embarrassment that they might have been crying as well. They also looked at me to gauge my reaction, which obviously was of shock and sadness.
I began to tear up and left right after this class to go home, because it occurred to me that I had given them these exercises for practice. I gave them problems that were challenging but doable because I knew that they had the skills and knowledge, it just took some application. But I thought, "If I had only given them five problems that they could do perfectly, these children wouldn't have been hit." There was no way for me to know that these were the consequences. But it now makes me question my teaching style. Do I give them more challenging questions so that they learn and gain more out of it- with the risk that they'll be lashed for getting it wrong- or do I give them simple problems that I know they can solve so that they won't get hit that day. It's a conflict that I'm struggling with. And I just do not support this type of education. How is a child learning from his academic mistakes by being hit? But I am in no position to challenge the doctrines of the school. I talked to my roommate and African friends, they said they all got hit in school. It's just the culture, but something I don't think I'll every adjust to.
One thing I have pretty much adjusted to is the stares and being hassled to buy things just because we're white. Of course we have money, we can afford a plane ticket from America to Africa. They know this, and I've gotten pretty good at avoiding eye contact and walking straight past the nagging vendors. One thing I haven't ignored though is the day to day struggles of people here. Today we went into town, and I admit I splurged on a great lunch and snacks. On the tro tro back, I sat next to a 10 year old girl and her 6 year old brother going home from school. The girl asked me if I could pay for them, and my initial reaction was to say I didn't have enough money. In the states I'm all too used to passing by people begging me for spare change. But who am I kidding, why should I be greedy about paying their fare equal to 50 cents when these children need every "dime" they have. This wasn't the first time I paid someone's fare on the trotro who asked me to. When it seems hard to part with 50 pesewas, I think about how they can barely afford to get to where they're going, even though getting there is probably for work to support their livelihood.
I'm sure I could think of more to write about, but those were the major events of my week I suppose. Sunday is Independence Day and I can't wait to see how an African country celebrates its 54th year free of colonial rule!
Monday, February 28, 2011
Cape Coast, Kakum National Park
For our first CIEE-sponsored trip within Ghana, we went to Cape Coast on Feb 19. It is a small fishing city about 3 hours west of Accra. Right when we got there we checked into the hotel and had lunch, then head off to the slave castles. Half of us went to Elmina Castle, and the other half went to Cape Coast castle. I went to Elmina, which is the oldest European building in existence in all of Sub-Saharan Africa. The architecture was very beautiful and it is located right on the water with amazing views of the ocean and the lagoon where the fishermen keep their boats. We went on a tour through the castle, and felt the intense realness of the Atlantic Slave Trade as we walked dungeon to dungeon and learned about how the slaves were treated. After touring the castles, we went back to the hotel and had a reflection discussion and "difficult dialogue" about our reaction to the castles and what we learned. We talked about how sad it is that this happened in our history, but that we have to accept that it happened and all that we can do now is make sure nothing like this happens again. Yet some one brought up that there are still terrible human rights violations going on all over the world that people don't even know about. Visiting these castles and our discussions afterward was definitely a sobering experience.
After dinner I hung out in the hotel with my friends Kelsey and Virginia and had some good girl talk and began planning when we're going to take our own independent trips around Ghana!
On Sunday we put on our hiking gear and boarded the buses again to go to Kakum National Park. There we did the canopy walk, which is a series of wooden bridges held up with rope over 40 meters (130 ft) off the ground in some parts. We were walking above the rain forest! I couldn't look down or else vertigo would get me and I would freeze, I'm not really afraid of heights and this was very very stable, but it was definitely a little scary! The views were amazing and I took tons of pictures. I also felt very accomplished making it over these bridges without freaking out too much. After hiking a bit to get out of the rain forest, we went for a delicious lunch at the Hans Cottage Botel which is a restaurant built on stilts over water of a crocodile sanctuary. Some people got to touch the crocs, I wasn't too interested.
A group of 8 of us decided we wanted to stay at Kakum to take in more of its beauty and stray away from the group. We paid 30 cedis each to stay in a tree house in the middle of the rainforest. We were told we wouldn't be given food or water so we scraped together some snacks of cookies and crackers, peanuts and rice to sustain us. Our park guide was supposed to meet us at 4 oclock, but he didn't show up until 6:30. We were getting pretty fed up and were going to ask for our money back if he didn't show up before dark. Finally Sampson and Robert, our guides, arrived. We got out our flashlights and hiked abut 45 minutes into the forest in the dark, through vines and steep hills until we got to the tree fort. It was about 100 feet up this giant tree and it already had bedding with mattresses, sheets, and mosquito nets. It was completely open and we really were sleeping outside in the rain forest. We loaded on the deet and chatted, drinking a bit of palm wine and playing an African drum. We went down and Robert showed us some of the awesome species that were around. We saw a millipede which was disgusting, a giant moth, a giant snail, and a few other weird bugs. Luckily there was an out house with a toilet, and we had remembered to bring toilet paper.
When it was time to go to bed, we were amazed at all of the sounds. Even though we didnt SEE that many cool animals while we were there, we heard some amazing things. The crickets and other millions of insects chirped and were a constant while we could hear monkeys and tree hyraxes (giant rodents that live in the trees and scream like theyre being tortured) in the distance. I felt like I was hearing a symphony, I laid awake listening to it for hours just smiling and was completely blown away by what I was hearing and experiencing. Finally I fell asleep and we woke up at 5am to do a morning nature hike. We didn't see much, but it was cool to walk through the forest while the sun came up.
It was Monday morning and we wanted to make it back for our afternoon classes so we head on our way, with Robert's help we caught a bus going to Cape Coast from a nearby village. Figuring out transportation back to Accra went much smoother than we were anticipating, and we made it back at 1:30 in time for classes. In the final leg of our trip, we caught a tro-tro from the main station in Accra back to campus. We were stuck in traffic and one man at the front of the car must have seen this as a good opportunity to spread the word of God to the 8 "oburuni's" sitting in the back. (I don't think I've explained the term Oburuni yet. It is just a labeling term for any foreigner. It isn't derogatory or anything, and it's mostly just the little children that yell OBURUNI OBURUNI and smile and wait for us to wave. I've actually come to enjoy being called it). Anyways, so this man preached to us for at least 25 minutes while we were exhausted, hungry, and dirty after sleeping outside and stuck in traffic sweating in this trotro. It made for an interesting final leg of the trek back home.
Taking this trip really made me want to travel so much more. This coming weekend I think a few of us are going to go to the Volta region to do some hiking and see the waterfalls. I'm really excited because I've started to get a little antsy being on campus all the time.
I wish you all could have experienced this weekend with me, it was absolutely breathtaking and indescribably wonderful. Be sure to check out the photo links above to see pictures in the "central region" album.
This past Saturday we did community service as a group with all 60 of us. It was fun, we were at a rehab center/village for special needs people, and kids from an orphanage were there too. It made me sure that I want to adopt a child, along with having my own. We helped repaint their facilities and cleaned up a lot, then played games and danced! My roommate went home for the weekend so last night I'm actually cooked for myself! I made ramen noodles, and i bought cabbage, onion, a pepper, and carrot to stir fry and mix in with the noodles. It wasn't much, but it feels pretty exciting for me to be able to cook for myself since that's something I really miss about home. It was also nice because it was something I knew was 100% Vegetarian and I was in control of how my ingredients were prepared. Hopefully I'll be motivated enough to cook for myself some more, at least once or twice a week or more.
After dinner I hung out in the hotel with my friends Kelsey and Virginia and had some good girl talk and began planning when we're going to take our own independent trips around Ghana!
On Sunday we put on our hiking gear and boarded the buses again to go to Kakum National Park. There we did the canopy walk, which is a series of wooden bridges held up with rope over 40 meters (130 ft) off the ground in some parts. We were walking above the rain forest! I couldn't look down or else vertigo would get me and I would freeze, I'm not really afraid of heights and this was very very stable, but it was definitely a little scary! The views were amazing and I took tons of pictures. I also felt very accomplished making it over these bridges without freaking out too much. After hiking a bit to get out of the rain forest, we went for a delicious lunch at the Hans Cottage Botel which is a restaurant built on stilts over water of a crocodile sanctuary. Some people got to touch the crocs, I wasn't too interested.
A group of 8 of us decided we wanted to stay at Kakum to take in more of its beauty and stray away from the group. We paid 30 cedis each to stay in a tree house in the middle of the rainforest. We were told we wouldn't be given food or water so we scraped together some snacks of cookies and crackers, peanuts and rice to sustain us. Our park guide was supposed to meet us at 4 oclock, but he didn't show up until 6:30. We were getting pretty fed up and were going to ask for our money back if he didn't show up before dark. Finally Sampson and Robert, our guides, arrived. We got out our flashlights and hiked abut 45 minutes into the forest in the dark, through vines and steep hills until we got to the tree fort. It was about 100 feet up this giant tree and it already had bedding with mattresses, sheets, and mosquito nets. It was completely open and we really were sleeping outside in the rain forest. We loaded on the deet and chatted, drinking a bit of palm wine and playing an African drum. We went down and Robert showed us some of the awesome species that were around. We saw a millipede which was disgusting, a giant moth, a giant snail, and a few other weird bugs. Luckily there was an out house with a toilet, and we had remembered to bring toilet paper.
When it was time to go to bed, we were amazed at all of the sounds. Even though we didnt SEE that many cool animals while we were there, we heard some amazing things. The crickets and other millions of insects chirped and were a constant while we could hear monkeys and tree hyraxes (giant rodents that live in the trees and scream like theyre being tortured) in the distance. I felt like I was hearing a symphony, I laid awake listening to it for hours just smiling and was completely blown away by what I was hearing and experiencing. Finally I fell asleep and we woke up at 5am to do a morning nature hike. We didn't see much, but it was cool to walk through the forest while the sun came up.
It was Monday morning and we wanted to make it back for our afternoon classes so we head on our way, with Robert's help we caught a bus going to Cape Coast from a nearby village. Figuring out transportation back to Accra went much smoother than we were anticipating, and we made it back at 1:30 in time for classes. In the final leg of our trip, we caught a tro-tro from the main station in Accra back to campus. We were stuck in traffic and one man at the front of the car must have seen this as a good opportunity to spread the word of God to the 8 "oburuni's" sitting in the back. (I don't think I've explained the term Oburuni yet. It is just a labeling term for any foreigner. It isn't derogatory or anything, and it's mostly just the little children that yell OBURUNI OBURUNI and smile and wait for us to wave. I've actually come to enjoy being called it). Anyways, so this man preached to us for at least 25 minutes while we were exhausted, hungry, and dirty after sleeping outside and stuck in traffic sweating in this trotro. It made for an interesting final leg of the trek back home.
Taking this trip really made me want to travel so much more. This coming weekend I think a few of us are going to go to the Volta region to do some hiking and see the waterfalls. I'm really excited because I've started to get a little antsy being on campus all the time.
I wish you all could have experienced this weekend with me, it was absolutely breathtaking and indescribably wonderful. Be sure to check out the photo links above to see pictures in the "central region" album.
This past Saturday we did community service as a group with all 60 of us. It was fun, we were at a rehab center/village for special needs people, and kids from an orphanage were there too. It made me sure that I want to adopt a child, along with having my own. We helped repaint their facilities and cleaned up a lot, then played games and danced! My roommate went home for the weekend so last night I'm actually cooked for myself! I made ramen noodles, and i bought cabbage, onion, a pepper, and carrot to stir fry and mix in with the noodles. It wasn't much, but it feels pretty exciting for me to be able to cook for myself since that's something I really miss about home. It was also nice because it was something I knew was 100% Vegetarian and I was in control of how my ingredients were prepared. Hopefully I'll be motivated enough to cook for myself some more, at least once or twice a week or more.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Slowing down to enjoy the simple things in life
I have lots to write about my weekend in the Central Region at Cape Coast and Kakum National Park. It was an amazing experience, of which I wish I could describe every little detail! More on that to come, but for now I'm just posting because we are having a CRAZY monsoon-like storm and I'm alone in my room. I assume my roommate is taking shelter somewhere else and waiting it out. I was a little scared, but I'm taking advantage of the opportunity to bundle up a bit (it gets "cold" here when it rains), drink some hot tea, and write in my journal.
I'm also putting together a lesson plan about the days of the week and months of the year because tomorrow is my first day of student-teaching! Pascal and I will go over my lesson plan in the morning. I'm going to plan extra activities in case one teaching method doesn't work so well, or in case I have more time left. I've never had to do this before, but it will be fun and I'm excited. Here goes nothin'!
Update: 30 minutes after posting this, the power has gone out. It was also out for most of today (pretty typical even if there isn't a rain storm). The thunder has also been loud enough to set off a nearby car alarm a few times. Thanks Mom and Dad for the battery-operated reading light and great flashlight!
I'm also putting together a lesson plan about the days of the week and months of the year because tomorrow is my first day of student-teaching! Pascal and I will go over my lesson plan in the morning. I'm going to plan extra activities in case one teaching method doesn't work so well, or in case I have more time left. I've never had to do this before, but it will be fun and I'm excited. Here goes nothin'!
Update: 30 minutes after posting this, the power has gone out. It was also out for most of today (pretty typical even if there isn't a rain storm). The thunder has also been loud enough to set off a nearby car alarm a few times. Thanks Mom and Dad for the battery-operated reading light and great flashlight!
Thursday, February 17, 2011
One month here and my internship!
I arrived in Ghana exactly four weeks ago! I can’t believe how fast this has been going. When I think back to how unsure and new this all felt in the beginning, I feel like I’ve grown so much! And I’m still looking forward to learning so so much more about Africa in the next three months.
I woke up at 5:50am this morning from a very strange Mefloquine dream. I almost forgot to take it last night, which would put me at risk for Malaria! But don’t worry, no signs of the sickness yet. For those of you who don’t know, Mefloquine is the generic form of Larium, an anti-malaria prophylaxis that has mostly psychological side effects. I take it once a week. I haven’t had any trouble with it at all except for very vivid and weird dreams. They are just extra intense, usually relating to something that was on my mind already. The majority of my dreams from it have been about food, and the people in the dreams usually people close to me in my life. So that’s nice. None of them have really been scary, and when they are- I am usually aware in the dream and think “oh this is just a cool dream, go with it”. They are the most intense the first night that I take the pill, then slowly decrease in vividness as the days go on. I’ll try to write about one or two really interesting ones sometime.
It worked out well that I was woken up by that dream, because I had to leave at 6:30 today to get to the first day of my internship by 7:30am. I’m working at Tot-to-Teen, a private pre-school through junior high in Adenta. Between walking from my dorm to the tro-tro, and then the actual ride it takes me about 45 minutes to get there, and costs me $0.65 round trip. Yesterday I went there by tro-tro with another girl in my group to find the place. When we got there they told us that they only wanted to take one more intern/volunteer, and that it would have to be in math. Since I am doing a for-credit internship, I got priority. The headmaster of the school gave me a curriculum syllabus to take home for the night and told me to come back at 7:30 this morning before school starts at 8. Since math isn’t my favorite or strongest subject, I wanted to make sure I was teaching it to primary school students.
Today I was placed with third graders. There are two third grade classes and both teachers handle half of the subjects so they both teach both classes. I am working under Pascal, who teaches creative art, math, and writing. When I walked into the classroom 32 students right away stood up and said in unison, “Good morning, Madame you are welcome!” It was very sweet. They couldn’t keep their eyes off me and I couldn’t stop smiling. Pascal introduced me as “Auntie” or “Madame Katherine//Kate” and said that I would be the assistant teacher on Wednesdays and Thursdays for Math. He also reminded them that I should be treated with the same respect that they give him and that we would be teaching together. Today I just wanted to observe to better understand how the class is taught. They are learning measurement of time and weight. I remembered back to third grade when my math teacher, Mrs. Willis, told me that I was a time-telling wizard. The kids were pretty attentive but very very energetic and excitable. They raise their hands to answer, but all yell out “Sir! Sir!” to be called on. They are also expected to stand up any time they speak individually. I am going to need to work on using my biggest voice possible because even the headmaster asked how the students were going to be able to hear me over their chattering. I have a feeling respect is something I will need to learn early on by being stern with them. Right now it looks like I’ll be there in the mornings on Wednesday and Thursdays. Today I was only there for three hours, so I hope to get more hours as time goes on. Even though this is a private school where I don’t feel like they really even need my help, I’m thankful for the opportunity and I think that working with kids is going to make my days so joyful.
Anyways, now I’m just sitting on my porch listening to the Beatles (good for the soul) and munching on ground nuts (the same as regular peanuts). I don’t have dance class until 6. So I’m going to get an iced coffee with some friends. Tomorrow my only class is Psychology of Religion. I was kind of put off by my professor in that class last week by his sexist undertones and distracted lecture, so I hope tomorrow is better.
This weekend I’m off to Cape Coast on a CIEE trip. We’ll be touring the castles and staying in a hotel. On Sunday we’re going to the Kakum National Park to do the canopy walk through the rain forest! Can’t wait to update on that.
"I've got to admit, it's getting better; a little better all the time."
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Rain, market, new friends, classes, food and water.
It rained today! It was very unexpected because rainy season doesn’t start until after March. Think of one of the most severe thunderstorms in the States, and that’s what we experienced here today. That’s pretty typical later in the spring though here. The sky got so dark and ominous, and the thunder and lightning were crazy. It poured buckets for an hour, then stopped, and it’s now continuing. I live on the first floor and a bit of water came in through the bottom of my door. I think the wind blew it in, but it wasn’t too much.
This morning Genna and I went back to Madina Market. This time we were on a mission to find pretty material to have clothes made. It was a little overwhelming. Everyone at the market targets us as customers most aggressively because we’re white. We finally came across these two women selling very nice, pretty cheap fabric so we didn’t even have to bargain with them. I got a total of 7 yards of different patterns to make a skirt, a dress, and a top. It cost me about 18 GHC (cedis, pronounced like CDs). Genna’s host sister is a seamstress so I’ll probably go over tomorrow to get measured. She said it will cost around 15 GHC for dresses and skirts.
Kelsey (another Clarkie) and I have become close with Ester and Agnes at the night market. Ester must be just a few years older than us, and her daughter Agnes is 9 years old and goes to the primary school on my university campus. My first night on campus I got an egg sandwich from Ester and she invited me to sit down and join them. Now it’s wonderful to stop by their stall every day for a sandwich or just to stop and say hi and see how Agnes’ school day went. Their village is in the Eastern region, a few hours north of us, and they live and work at the little market here. It is these connections that have made my stay in Ghana so meaningful so far. Kelsey has had malaria and has been recovering for the past week so last night I went to Ester to get dinner for us. Ester asked for Kelsey’s number and called to say hi and that she hopes she feels better. Agnes also got to visit Kelsey in her room. Anyways, last night Ester saw the ring I wear on my left hand and asked if I’m married. I told her I’m not and that I’m not ready to be and a little too young. She said I’m plenty old enough since at 18 I became an adult. She said that she’s getting married on April 2nd and that Kelsey and I are invited! I can’t wait to go to a Ghanaian wedding.
At least a few times a week, men who talk to me trying to be friends or something more will then notice my rings and ask if I’m married. It has definitely helped thwart any unwanted advances from the opposite sex, who are very forward towards American girls. In other cases, I’ve had very good, genuinely friendly conversations with the men here; more so than with the women. I am still learning about the gender roles in Ghana and Africa in general, but the women seem much more guarded and less outwardly friendly. I usually feel like they’re just staring at me or judging my outfit. This has not been the case with every woman of course, it’s just been my experience so far.
I have another new great friend named Daro. He is from Togo and is studying in Ghana for graduate school. We have the type of relationship that I guess you could call a “cultural partnership”. He is trying to be a diplomat so he wants to practice his American-English with me, rather than the more Ghanaian English that he speaks here. He also hopes to come to America one day so he is learning about the culture and what to expect from me. Meanwhile, he has explained lots of things about the world economy and African culture to me.
The second week of classes is almost over. I am in Deviant Behavior, Medical Sociology, Twi (the most spoken language in Ghana), Psychology of Religion, and traditional dance. I’m auditing Culture and Reproductive Health which is also really interesting. So far I really like everything, especially Medical Sociology, the professor is great. As for Twi, it’s difficult so that just means putting in the extra effort both in and out of class. Hopefully my roommate will help and we’ll speak to each other so that I can get practice.
I'm sure some people are wondering what I do about water. You definitely can't drink the water here unless you boil or purify it. So you have the choice between bottled water, which is expensive (1GHC) or buying water sachets. They are little pouches with 500mL of water in them. They cost 5 pesewes, which is less than five cents. I buy a pack of 25 sachets for 1 cedi. So instead of buying one bottle of water to last me an hour, I buy 25 sachets to last me a week!
Side note about food: tonight my roommates' friend had brought over Banku. It is starchy dough made out of corn that you break off, dip in a peppery salsa-type sauce and swallow whole. I liked this a lot more than fufu, which is usually in an okra soup. They also had delicious tilapia. It was a whole fish right on the bone that i just pulled off pieces and ate with my hand. this meal was the best tasting authentic Ghanaian food that i've had so far!
Overall, things are going great. I feel more settled in every day!
Monday, February 7, 2011
Back to basics
So I guess I haven't really described my living situation that in-depth, and I feel like that's pretty important to all of you understanding my new life in Ghana. I'm now in the CIEE office using their fast wireless internet and sitting in the air conditioning. It's quite lovely.
I live on campus in ISH (as described in the Jan 24 entry). For food, I eat mostly on campus as well. We have the night market. There I usually get egg sandwhiches for less than 2 cedis or $1.30. It's an omelet with onions, tomatoes and peppers, with Laughing Cow cheese spread on bread. The bread for the egg sandwich is literally a loaf of bread cut horizontal, not sliced vertically. I'm trying to limit my egg sandwich intake because eating eggs this much is great for protein, but not so great for my cholesterol.
At the night market I also get beef or chicken kabobs, or the usual is some kind of rice with a piece of meat, plantains and noodles. I ate that twice yesterday, so I ended up spending about $4 on three meals yesterday including fruit in the morning. I've gotten used to the lack of variety, and lack of vegetables or nutrition. Cheese is something I really miss. At least I've gotten into the habit of taking my vitamins every day! If I eat elsewhere on campus it's usually more expensive. I've also tried Fufu which is just a ball of uncooked doughy-ness in a spicy soup. You pinch off a ball of the dough, dip it in the soup and swallow it whole. You aren't supposed to chew the dough because they just want you to taste the soup part. And you eat it with your hands! But only your right hand of course. Just another way to fill up on starches. There are a few other dishes like this with different flavor soups and doughs.
My roommate came on Friday night! Her name is Naa and she lives in Accra. She's a little quiet sometimes but mostly really friendly! I have to ask her to speak a little slower so that I can understand her English through her accent. I also need to keep up with my cleaning and tidiness. Naa swept the floor before we went to bed last night, and again at 7am when she woke up this morning. I hope to have some good conversations with her about Ghanaian life and culture, and meet some of her other African friends.
I've gotten used to only being able to take cold showers, but who would really want to take a warm shower here anyways? It's helped me take much quicker showers too. And I do my laundry by hand in buckets. When I waited to wash a weeks worth of clothes, it took me almost two hours. So now I'm trying to do it more frequently. I'll probably donate about half of my clothes before I leave here to come home anyways to make room for new things to bring home, and to dump the clothes that have gotten just too sweaty and dirty to wear again. I've also accepted that my whites will never be white again. There is too much dust and dirt. This also applies to the keyboard on my white MacBook, unfortunately.
Sometimes I think my feet have gotten really tan, and then I scrub them extra hard and realize they're just dirt-stained. Speaking of tan, I really need to get to the pool and try to even out my t-shirt tan.
I wish I had packed more of my summer clothes that I wear at home, because on campus I really don't need to dress as modest as the clothes that I brought. And Ghanaians actually dress quite nicely, so I get a lot of looks in my super-casual tees and Birkenstocks. Luckily, there are many seamstresses here. So I can get a beautiful African-print dress or skirt in any style that I want for about $7.50 US. I'm going to be coming home with lots of pretty new clothes.
I have visited the SGI center (my Buddhist organization) twice now. The meeting I went to yesterday was a little different than the meetings I'm used to back home. It was almost three hours long! At the end of the meeting they had a contribution/donation period where everyone who attended put an envelope in a tray one at a time. Some aspects of it reminded me of a church service, very formal. This was surprising to me because it was a Buddhist meeting, but realized that it makes sense. Christianity is at the base of all of Ghanaian life it seems, so some Ghanaian culture has been incorporated even into Buddhist meetings. One part I did like was getting up twice to sing and clap during the meeting. Despite some of these structural differences (each time someone got up to speak, there was a call-and-response of "SGI: United! SGI: United! SGI: United, Strong, and Free forever!"), the philosophies of Nichiren Buddhism were the same of course. Remembering this has helped keep me centered and positive throughout the emotional ups and downs of this experience!
This was one of my less exciting blog entries, but it's important to share just the basics as well as the adventures.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Gaining perspective
Hello! It’s about time that I fill you in some more on my exciting new life in Ghana.
Student life
The past 10 days that I have lived on campus have mainly been spent figuring out what classes to take and, even more so, how to take them! It’s funny because for the last month that I was home before coming here, I had almost forgotten completely that I was coming here as a student to study and go to school. But now I feel relieved. Because in a place where I am so out of place and at times very confused, being a student is a role I know. It is so familiar to me because that is my primary role at home and it is no different here. Having so much down time in the first few weeks, I had becoming very scattered and lost. Getting into a routine and realizing my purpose and that I AM in fact building a life here is so grounding.
I’ve learned that I most definitely take for granted the easy online registration that I am so accustomed to at Clark. Here, I flipped through the course handbook to find what I wanted to take. Then I walked around campus for days on end to all the departments to see if the classes I wanted are actually offered. If that information was even posted, then I would have to find the time tables for when the classes are offered and plan my schedule accordingly. But apparently no one really gets the ball rolling early here. Many students don’t attend classes or even register for sometimes two weeks after the semester begins. (Example: Through much confusion, my Ghanaian roommate still has not arrived. Who can she be!? I can't wait to not be alone in this room anymore!) It is very bizarre to me, but this results in the departments being very delayed in putting out time tables. So once I see what I want is offered, I register for the classes at their respective departments. I registered for about 16 classes on the first day. While I’m only planning to take 4 academic electives, plus Twi language, and dance or drumming, I needed to make sure that I’ll have enough credits so that if any of the 16 overlap, I can decide what to drop. I can also audit any classes that are of interest to me. This basically means I just sit in on lecture and do the readings if I want to, but don’t take the exam or receive any credit. This is a new, and awesome, concept to me. After this add/drop period that lasts until February 25, I submit my final concrete schedule to the registrar. Talk about a process!!! So this week I’m attending any and all classes that I registered for or want to take, and next week I’ll drop what I don’t like, and solidify my schedule. This needs to be solid and figured out so that my internship can be set up.
I am participating in a for-credit internship at a local school. I requested to work with kids ages 5-12, elementary school aged. So they are placing me with the Tot-to-Teen program. Two other girls on CIEE are also interning there. Those are really the only details I have about my internship, but I can’t wait to work with kids!
This past weekend was fun-filled and exciting. On Friday after registration, I walked with three of my friends to my friend Genna’s homestay in East Legon. This was about a 30 minute walk from campus. The neighborhood where she lives is fairly well off. Much bigger houses than the one I live in at home, and they have their own security gate keepers. It was awesome to walk there. Getting out of the campus bubble is so exhilarating! One of the reasons why I initially wanted a small program NOT at a university was to get more cultural immersion. Doing the homestay option of this program would have probably been the best of both the student and non-student lifestyles. So Friday we had our welcome dinner for CIEE kids at Chez Afrique, the bar/restaurant we went to for my birthday. Before going to the dinner, we met up with the other home stay kids at their favorite hang out, Jerry’s and had a few drinks. It was nice to catch up with them and trade stories about living on or off campus. We then went to Chez Afrique for a spicy yet delicious dinner of rice (duh), plantains, chicken, beans, etc. We finished it off with cake and ice cream and fruit! After digesting, many of us went to the dance floor and boogied to the live music. It was a blast and none of us could stop smiling.
Adventures!
Saturday I went to Medina Market, about a 20-minute TroTro ride away. The tro tro is a shared taxi. It’s like a van or small bus that picks you up at a stop. They yell out the direction and destination of where they’re heading, you tell them where you’re going, and rush to get a seat on this crowded van. It is VERY chaotic the first few times you take it. But trotros are great because they’re so cheap! A 4GHC (Ghana Cedi) charter cab ride to the mall would cost .25GHC (Pesewes) on the tro tro. Our tro tro ride round trip to Medina cost 60 pesewes, or about $.40. The first thing we did at Medina was get a fresh coconut off the side of the road. Our UPals assured us that this was safe to eat. The funniest part about this experience was figuring out how to eat this coconut. They chop the top off with a machete, and you are supposed to drink the juice. Then they cut it in half and you eat the inside meat of it. We did not realize this so when they cut off the top we said thanks and walked away. Medina is not a touristy market at all. It’s where all the smaller shopkeepers go to stop up for the week for their shops. Being white, anywhere you go in Ghana you will get looks. This I’ve gotten used to, but especially in a non-touristy area when you’re consuming a coconut in a completely wrong way, people were laughing at us and staring like we were aliens. We got a kick out of this and I’m glad I now know how to eat a coconut. Little experiences like this are what make it so worth it to go out and endure the craziness of a marketplace or township. You really must be adventurous when you travel to a new place. That is how you learn the customs and can begin to be a part of the culture.
Sunday we had the city tour of Accra and woodcarving/drum-making workshop. This was a particularly nice day because we got to sit in an air-conditioned bus and have our UPals show us the city. It helped so much with understanding our surrounding Greater Accra region. I took a lot of pictures on this day. The link to my Facebook photo album is:http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2073617&id=1082700030&l=802ab0fef3 I have made it public so hopefully you non-facebook users can see… While it was great to see the football (soccer) stadium and American embassy, the most powerful and humbling part of the tour for me was when we drove past (not even near) the largest slum in Ghana, Fadama. It is on government land and consists of mainly refugees and expatriates. When you look at the area, all you see is trash and waste everywhere. The shacks stretch as far as you can see. Our UPal told us that the government has been trying to move them for many many years, but until there is a better solution where them to settle, they are unmoveable. There was an extremely somber mood as we drove past and we listened to the problem of rape and disease in Fadama. Read more about Fadoma from Amnesty International here: http://www.slumstories.org/episode/ghana-–-uncertainty-fadama. Sometimes I can’t even describe how unbelievably privileged and secure I feel. Some things that I’ve seen in just two weeks here have reminded me of how different life is for so much of the world.
Thanks for reading! I promise to start writing more often so that I don’t have to write so much at once, and so that you don’t have to read so much at once. My next shorter entry will hopefully be describing the simple way of life that I have adopted, and to tell you about the awesome interactions with the locals that I’ve experienced!!
I love and miss you alllll. And again, please please check out my first Ghana photo album!!!
Monday, January 24, 2011
Akwaaba!!!
Akwaaba means welcome!
So, because this is my first entry, and I’ve been here for five days, I have a whole lot to write about. I am also going to work on making my blogging more concise. So I apologize in advance for any rambling. My flight to Ghana went very well. The flight from D.C. to Accra was 10 hours, and many other American students were on the same flight. One girl asked if I sleep well and planes and I said I would definitely try. She offered me a benedryl, which was much appreciated. It knocked me out for about 6 hours out of the 10; not that sleeping sitting up on a plane is very restful anyways.
Arrival: So we arrived in Accra at 2:30 Thursday. CIEE staff met about 30 of us at the airport and took us to the Coconut Grove hotel where we would stay for two nights. I roomed with a girl named Genna from Seattle who goes to Occidental college. The other kids on my program (about 60 of us) are from all over the US. There are 5 of us from Clark. Everyone is friendly and open to new things.
First days: Staying in the hotel was a great way to ease us in very gradually. The culture shock I experienced in just 5 hours outside of the hotel for those two days was huge. Everywhere we went in Accra we were stared at. We stand out so much for being white, and then there’s the fact that we travel in a huge pack. The only time we really left the hotel was to go to the mall. We split off into groups of 3, with UPal chaperones. UPals are University of Ghana students who remain with us throughout the program for support. Basically our camp counselors for the semester. At the mall we bought cell phones (you can call me at +233 054043 3279, but not for free of course) and a wireless internet modem which works pretty decently in my dorm.
New culture to take in: At the hotel we had two full days of orientation. Our Program Director, Mr. Gyasi, has been doing this since 2006, so he loves his job and is very good at orienting new students to Ghana and to our program. Our first day was spent talking about Ghana today. We talked about its development challenges and accomplishments. It produces what it doesn’t consume (gold and cocoa) and consumes what it doesn’t produce. I’ve learned that so many amenities we take for granted exist but are very unreliable and underdeveloped here. For example, it is never guaranteed that water will come out of the faucet when you turn it on (so far I’ve been lucky). And the electricity goes out often. The internet is almost non-existent, and where it is, it is slower than you could imagine.
Ghana is very stable and rich in not only mineral wealth, but it is rich in culture and heritage. We learned that you are given a day name according to which day you are born. If you are born on a Tuesday, like I was, and you live through every day until the next Tuesday, you have lived spiritually and when you are exactly one week old you are given your day name at a naming ceremony. My day name is Abena because I am a female born on a Tuesday. This is just one example of how important family ties are in Ghana. Family (nuclear and extended) is everything. While we value individualism so much in America, family and that group support are of utmost importance, and respect is vital.
During orientation we were told many things about Ghanaian customs, etiquette and social protocol. I have to say, it’s one thing to learn about these customs, and another thing to put it into practice in real life interactions.
Okay, I already feel like I’m rambling too much so I’ll try to be less wordy.
Campus life:
Saturday we moved into our dorms. I live in the International Students Hostel, or “ISH”. There are mostly international students, with a few Ghanaians and West Africans also residing here. It is like freshman year living. Communal bathrooms (with no toilet paper or soap ever), and living with a new roommate. My roommate hasn’t arrived yet, so it’s safe to assume that I’ll be living with a Ghanaian, whereas many other CIEE students live with each other. 13 students are doing Homestays, and the rest live in another on-campus dorm. The University of Ghana has 30,000 students and the campus take at least an hour to walk all the way around, probably more. This is a huge change from Clark campus.
It is HOT here. About 90 degrees at least every day. That’s why people wake up so early and do things before it gets too hot. I’ve woken up at 8 or earlier every day, except Sunday when I slept until 10. And today I hand-washed my first load of laundry!
Abena turns 21: Saturday was the 22nd, which meant that at 12 midnight on the 23rd I would turn 21! I celebrated by going to a bar called Chez Afrique with about 20 other students. It is a small outdoor bar and restaurant with live music most nights. We took cabs for 5 Cedis (about $4) from campus. I ordered a rum and coke. But the bartender couldn’t understand me and thought I said “Remy coke”. I just went with it and said sure, why not. Anyways, they didn’t have rum. So my first drink as a 21 year old was 2 shots of Remy Martin, an expensive French Cognac, with a bottle of Coke on the side. It was quite enjoyable. Some CIEE girls got the Hip-life band to play happy birthday for me. It was very embarrassing but fun to be the only white people looking very silly dancing to happy birthday. Hip-life is the music of Ghana. It is traditional almost reggae music mixed with American hip hop. The band also played a final song for me that I later found out a British-ghanaian man paid extra for me. It was Paul Simon’s “Diamonds on the Souls of her Shoes” which happens to be one of my favorite songs. It was a very fun and memorable birthday.
On Sunday, my actual birthday, we had a traditional African dance workshop that worked up 3 hours worth of profuse sweating but it was so much fun. And afterwards, I was sung happy birthday again and “Ponded”. Ponding is a birthday tradition that apparently indicates that you have a lot of friends. Basically they just poured a lot of water all over me, but usually they pour something crazier than water like champagne or something sticky.
While it was a little sad that I couldn’t spend my birthday with my friends and family back home, my CIEE and Ghanaian family welcomed me so much and gave me one of the most memorable birthdays ever.
I apologize for the length of this entry. I want to finally express my feelings thus far:
Being with a lot of people makes it hard to stop and think about being away from home. When I’m alone I get a little homesick. I’ve had only one breakdown and that was when I was unpacking, realizing that I’m in another continent on the other side of the world with no way out. I felt very small and alone. But when I’m with everyone else I realize that we’re all going through the same rollercoaster of emotions so the best way to cope is to live moment by moment. It’s okay to be overcome with homesickness sometimes, because it forces me to remind myself why I’m truly here. In reality, I’ve had just a handful of moments where I feel scared and unsure, but I feel overwhelmingly blessed and excited to be here.
Any sadness that I occasionally feel is balanced out when I interact with the Ghanaians. Even though we all speak English, I usually feel like I’m having two completely separate conversations with anyone I interact with. It is difficult to communicate even when I’m buying food at the night market next to my dorm. The pace of life is slow here, and very simple. It values being happy and accepting every human being. These are things I forget about in America sometimes with the fast pace and high expectations. I’ve definitely been humbled by this experience so far.
My next post will be shorter, I promise! And I have pictures to come.
Soon I'll update you on food and lifestyle adjustments.
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