Hope all is well...Ghana is treating us great, and filled with more surprises everyday.  Classes should finally start this coming week I guess! The system is so different here. I tried to go to my Human Rights in Africa class that was scheduled for 6:30 am on Friday.  The professor didn't show up (which is common the first few weeks of school).  So I walked around campus til 8:30 when my Wildlife Management class was supposed to start.  It got delayed 5 hours. So, we took off for the weekend, and we'll try classes again this next week! Patience is vital here, and if you don't have any, you learn in every situation that things probably won't go as planned, so be ready to adapt! they announced Friday, that Monday will be a holiday for some reason, and classes are canceled. So, Tuesday shall hopefully begging the semester.

 

We headed to Krokrobite for the weekend, the 8 in our group, our Ghanaian friends Yaw and John, our Australian friend Shane, and a bunch from London.  So, this little village place , Krokrobite, on the ocean was a great getaway from bustling Accra.  We slept in a loft/bungalow thingy, with a palm thatched roof, and no walls.  This included a piece of foam on the floor and a mosquito net hanging over your "bed".  No blanket or sheet necessary , as it is too hot.  The 6am wakeup call by the free ranging roosters was complimentary and came at the crack of dawn every morning.  we looked off the side of our loft and saw the sun rising over the ocean. This place was really great because, although, us as foreigners took up most of the accommodation at this place, all the local village people are everywhere, very friendly, and it wasn't obnoxious with people trying to sell us things.

 

The children of the villages were on the beach alllll day with us...this ranged from 2 year olds to 13 years olds just running around with us.... mostly all are naked, and they have gorgeous smiles.  They spoke Ga, which is different from the Twi we are learning. One boy spoke English, so he translated some for us.  But mostly all the kids just sat around climbing on our backs, grabbing our sunglasses, putting them on (usually upside down) and dancing around together. it was the funniest thing ever.  Some would make a pile of sand, stick their heads and face straight in it, look up and laugh at us, then do it again. 

 

Also ,,EVERY time we ran into the ocean, I would get trampled by all these kids , there would be one of my front, my back, each arm, and more reaching up wanting to go in with me, so I would take turns dunking them in the waves and listening to them laugh. they were gorgeous children.  Doing flips and tricks on the beach while we took photos, and playing soccer with us til the sunset behind the hills.  Some would just lay on our beach towels next to us, following every move we did.  Because of the language barrier, we came up with creative ways to play with them..thumb wars , drawing in the sand, throwing sand, splashing water.  When I couldn't walk anymore because I had too many naked little children climbing on me, I would start clapping my hands, then splashing them in the water, then clapping them on my head, and they all gathered around and followed whatever I did, it made me laugh so much, and them too. Then, I would bolt for the waves , as all my limbs were free, and try to get a quick swim in. 

 

The showers at this place consisted of a bucket that one would fill from the well, and take it into a 3-wall rock encasing in the palm trees, lighted by a candle at night, and you would conservatively use your water so not too get more.  it was quite interesting, and refreshing.  The villagers get up about 3am and start dropping the nets out at sea with their giant boats, then everyone on the beach helps to drag it in. 

 

Our friend Shane from Australia was here last semester also, so is watching over this bar a few doors down that is owned by this Ghanaian guy, so we hung out there for a while too, and some of his friends that are volunteer teaching at a school way out in the bush somewhere.  All had interesting stories to tell.

 

Friday the power went out in the village, which I guess is quite common, and this happened right when we were going to grab something to eat. but that was then out of the question, so we walked anyways and found a few people cooking on the side of the dirt road by candle light, so we all got egg sandwiches (I’m having to bend my vegetarianism a little to survive here) .  They were tasty, and worth it watching the teenage girls dance to beat of their clapping hands as they cooked the eggs.  Every bite had some sand in it, but was so hungry I swallowed it anyway.

 

The weekend was great, delicious food at our hostel, and live reggae music at night, the sunny days without clouds, the stars and almost full moon at night, and warm ocean was a perfect combo.  my legs are quite sore from jumping so many waves. And Nathan met a Danish guy who works at the Embassy here, and he has 2 surfboards.  Being quite excited about this, they're planning weekend getaways soon.

 

A huge soccer match was today (or football as they call it everywhere but America), so a few of us went.  It was Accra vs. Kumasi (the other big city in Ghana).  They have been huge rivals for quite some time.  It was quite crazy and we were definitely the ones sticking out of the crowd. the only white people, and there were no other women there! Cheering for Kumasi, we accidentally went on the wrong side at first and I think that was the first time in Ghana were I have seen an angry face! this was a huge game here, and last time these teams played heaps of chairs got broken and were set on fire. and the time before that last year , 150 died in a trample towards the field. So, we left early to miss all the chaos! and to catch a taxi! 

 

After our visit to the orphanage last week, we'll be going there more often and I’m enthused to start doing something meaningful. Those kids are wonderful and it is sad to see so many without parents. Their smiles and hugs are addicting to say the least.

 

love, Kathleen

 

 

I'm enjoying Ghana, and smile more when I realize something more about this land and culture. 

 

Cleaning my room today, I was trying to organize my clothing shelves and spray bug spray or lysol to get ride of the ants on all of our stuff.  Well, I didn't find too many on them and was quite pleased with that, HOWEVER, I then pulled out my sock drawer, only to find millions of ants, and ant nests.  it was very disgusting, and I just began laughing because if I didn't I might have thrown up at seeing how many there were. I could not even see the wood on the bottom of the drawer in parts because there were sooo many.  I have washed those items about 3 times now, remember in the bucket too. and sprayed the drawers with soapy water, and lysol, and the RAID that I bought, and they still keep appearing, so I’ve decided to ditch the drawers, because they obviously have something so strong that these pesky ants are attracted too. The ants are everywhere around here to a point, but I don't want to share a room with that many for 4 more months!

 

When in my batik fabric class on Tuesday, at the end of class a boy raised his hand and said another class he was taking in they psych department is conflicting with the time this class meets on Wednesdays. So, he was wondering if we could switch the day and time we are supposed to meet.  There are about 30 of us in the class. so the discussion and argument of finding a different day and time to meet seemed quite hilarious to me because the time and day were already posted on the registering board, and that’s why we took the class, because it fit with our schedules. But schedules seem to be different here, and convincing a professor to change the time or day of the class seems to be quite normal infact!  So the prof just finally said, "well, you all figure out when you want to meet, and let me know when we're having class!"  Other classes that I’ve gone to say, well, I think we're going to add another hour of meeting time to this, or other such things. This is hard for us Americans to get used to doing because our home university's follow the book so closely, but after hearing so many of the same stories at the end of the day, we are getting used to the Ghanaian schedule style.

 

Tonight venturing to the "bush canteen" for dinner with Nathan and our friends Marina and Shaun.  We hear this place has more to offer than the famous -chicken and rice- that is everywhere.  The air was humid today as usual, probably about 100 degrees or so I’m guessing.  As it is 6 o'clock in the evening when we start our trek, I realize that for once today I am not sweating profusely because of the heat, and I’m simply wearing a tank top and skirt.

 

We take a shortcut, on a dirt path through some fields and past people living in tiny places, they are lighting fires to cook their dinners.  Few people are on this trail, some women walking behind us with stacks of heavy things piled on their heads, as all do here.  (Everything is carried on ones head, in fact I have yet to see something carried with the hands here.  Even a television I saw put on someone’s head and carried around. Although becoming more common to my eyes, I wonder if this talent is learned, or just natural?)  Lost on this trail, we ask some men sitting around chatting.  They are staring at us, as we are 4 'obruni' (as they call us here frequently; meaning foreigner) and look slightly out of place.  When we greet them, as you must do here with everyone, they are friendly, and appoint one of them to lead us there.  Charles, about 17 or so, takes us almost all the way there, through a few fields with the weeds past our heads, we almost are there when some of his friends are on another path, and he runs off with them and points us in the right direction.

 

The bush canteen is about 5 "isles" of little store shops/restaurants set up, selling various market items one can bargain for.  We find a place and order groundnut soup and rice balls.  (groundnuts are peanuts here).  This is perhaps my favourite meal I have had in Ghana in these past 3 weeks!  it has a slight peanut taste, but the consistency of tomato soup, and is quite spicy.  apparently it is cooked with fish? so I picked the fish skin out and put the firmly packed and gooey rice ball, which is the size of a baseball or so, into the soup, and devoured all of it.  It is quite filling and also very inexpensive.  For the 4 of us to eat it was 10,000 cedis.  About $1.10 total for all of us.  This surely will become a regular place for us. Many other Ghanaian dishes are here, and I’m looking forward to getting brave and trying more of them.

 

Walking back on the regular road, the moon is now full and the air is perfect.  Women are still passing by with everything imaginable on their heads, taxis flying by at speeds too high, and I realize that I’m enjoying these simple days in Ghana. 

 

Tomorrow is our first day of dance class, so we shall see what kind of rhythm these obruni have!

 

love Kathleen

 

 

Another glorious weekend...our mission last weekend was to see the monkey
sanctuary, some waterfalls, find transportation to all of this, and find enough
food to eat.

Nathan and I, and 3 of our friends: Jessica (Indiana), Sarah (Bahamas), &
Kristen (Canada) departed on Friday for our somewhat unorganized trip out of
the bustling city. To many we met it appeared that Nathan was the husband and
the 4 of us girls were his wives. Sometimes in Ghana in certain areas it is
looked upon highly if a man has more than I wife. If the wife looks prosperous
(a little bit on the large side), it means that man is taking good care of her
and feeding her well, so for that he should have another wife! Many said "how
do you take care of so many!!" and others asking if they "could please have
one!"

Arriving 4 hours later to the town of Ho, in the Volta Region of Ghana, we
realized we didn't know where we were going to stay, so as everyone had vacated
the bus at one of the 10 stops, except us obrunis. The sun had already set
behind the mountains, so it was dark and everything was unfamiliar. We're
asking ourselves "where do we go now? This is one of the moments that I
reminded me of why I enjoy traveling so much, its getting to someplace and
realizing you don't know anybody here, and don't know much about the place
except what you've read in your travel book, so its this whole exciting
adventure setting foot on this new ground.

Our bus driver, as nice as all the people in Ghana are, drove us to a really
nice new hotel in this area, and we met our first friend Karl who runs the
hotel. Starving, we told him we were going to find something to eat. I should
mention that eating in Ghana is not as simple as eating other places. There
are not many restaurants, and not really ANY grocery stores. Everything is
market like. Vendors sell food on the street, so he took us to his favorite
women, and we had plain noodles with a really spicy sauce. The whole dinner
for the 5 of us costs $2. We had taken a STC, state bus, to this town, and we
would only be able to return on it Monday 4am. All other transportation had to
be done by taxi, but mostly by the famous Tro-tro. (The 15 passenger van type
thing) Anybody can be a tro-tro. They just pull up on the road, yell where
they are going and you all pile in. But they never leave until they are full,
so its always squashed full of families, children, us travelers, the driver and
money collector. These are much cheaper, about 20cents, than taking taxis
which are about $2-3 . It's been said that Ghana would come to a grinding halt
without tro-tros.  

Karl walks us to the tro-tro station at 6am, for our hope to find a tro-tro
heading to Tafi-Atome the monkey sanctuary. He finally says get in, so we pile
in, and tell him we'll be back on Sunday night. I should mention that their
are no other white people around in this area, so once again we are noticed by
all of the hospitable people, yelling "welcome!" and "hello, hello, how are
you!" everyone waving and smiling at us. we feel like we are celebrities, but
have no reason to be treated like one. People will come and walk with us, and
want to know so much about us, and we are equally interested in them. Some
say, "look are skins are different, but we are one people, and we are
friends." its a wonderful way to look at diversity, they welcome it. The
smiles on everyone make you feel very comfortable and happy to be with them.

We are driving through beautiful mountainous areas, and rainforest, the morning
haze is slowly lifting off the from the valleys. The music in the tro-tro is
some Christian radio station, as everyone here is Christian. Many ask quite
soon in conversation if we are, and if we'd like to join them for church
sometime. The symbol called Gye-Nyame (spelling?) means God is the Almighty,
and is on everything from hair salons, to cars, to plastic chairs. There are
pictures of Jesus in sticker form, on the back of most cars, tro-tros or buses.

As our tro-tro stops in a tiny little town, they tell us this is our stop. We
laugh again as we get out as we see the sign to our destination
"tafi-atome" reads as "5 km west" . With no taxis on this dirt road, we watch
the tro-tro continue on its journey, and see the kids gathering to stare at
us. We began to think that maybe its not that common to get dropped off here.
Its now 8am, and are glad the air is cooler in this region of Ghana. We start
walking and immediately 4 kids start following us asking "how are you?!" and
they always respond by "I am fine" when we ask them. We talk for a moment, and
give them each a crayon to take back with them, they are quite excited, but
have no paper, so we tear pages out of our journal for them, watch as they run
back down the road. Our journey down the dirt road is amazing because of the
villages we pass through; I can't wait to get the pictures to you to see.

We stayed with a family in the village, because the 2 person guesthouse was
occupied.  There are Mona monkeys all over the place!! We fed them bananas and
stared at them in aww, and if they could smile, I think they would of at us!
There is a lady in the village that will cook for visitors, so the guy rode his
bike to tell her we wanted some food, and we waited for about 45 minutes will
our "breakfast" was ready.  We walked pass many little bamboo walled and
thatched palm roofs, some had mud walls.  that was all this village was made
out of. many people farm here. kids running everywhere and everyone saying
welcome to us.  Our meal was a bowl of rice, 5 boiled eggs, and some sort of
red sauce.  we devoured all of it, as we sat next to the coal fire that was
cooking the huge rat that her husband had caught that morning.  she kindly
showed us how he catches them with his hands then puts a rubber like noose
around its neck til its dead.  We were hoping our dinner would not include any
sort of meat in it.  We were right; it was a bowl of rice, 5 boiled eggs, and
some red sauce.  There wasn't anything else to eat, I tried to go to what I
thought was a "snack" bar in front of someone’s hut, but it only had some Raid
ant coils, an old few cookies in a baggie, and a pair of flip flops for sale.
we appreciate food now when we get it!

That night when the sun set we gathered under one of the two street lights in
the village where a women had a radio playing French music from Togo (we were
close to the border of this neighboring country).  We danced with the kids for
about an hour.  First it was just a few, then they all became running from
every vein of dirt trail leading to the light, and soon the adults were
watching and laughing also.  it was beautiful, and especially because even the
toddlers have more rhythm than we do.  I’m fully convinced they are born with
it, and we are not. 

Soon, a 'chief' looking elder with a cane came to the other streetlight, and we
all gathered around as he told 3 ancient legends in his native language, and
they translated it into English for us.  The kids were on all our laps, and sat
so attentively through the whole thing, even though I’m sure they had heard it
over and over.  The level of respect was awing to see.  Soon afterwards 4
drummers came out and 8 dancers, and we watched this traditional African
dancing, we were so impressed, and it made us realize how we must look like
fools in our African dance class! 

The day, Sunday we ventured to Wli falls, the highest in West Africa we here,
gorgeous luscious rainforest walk back to an amazingly high and gushing
waterfall around really jagged and dramatic mountains with sharp cliffs.  it
reminds me of how mountains in Peru have looked in pictures, and I didn't
realize Ghana had peaks like this! Actually if we would have walked over it, we
would have been in Togo, that’s how close we were.  I shall mention that the
tro-tro ride there included having 28 people crammed in a vehicle that holds 15
normally.  But it was Sunday, and they were all going to church, and wanted to
fit us "oburuni" so were so kind to make room for us. 

The village stay was absolutely the best part of the weekend, and in a nutshell
is what I had pictured "Africa" to be like, although I know this continent is
filled with many countries and cultural differences.  It strengthen our theory
that getting out of the city and into the "real stuff" is the best and you
leave feeling like you discovered a very unique place.

So this weekend, Nathan and I are traveling along the coast to the far west,
for Valentines Day and 2 year anniversary.  We are talking about shaving our
heads actually.  its really hot here, and if we are ever going to do it, this
would be the place and time!  I just got my hair cut pretty short this evening
in preparation!  We’ll see if we have the guts to go through with the rest of
it.

Soon to be a hairless head,  Kathleen