Today is my last day in
Ghana....
The last month has been
quite crazy, random and full of good times.
After Nathan left , May 16th,
I went up to a small place called Tafo, its in the rainforest , and mountainous
tropical part. I lived in a house with 4 other volunteers. Rahel,
from India, Maureen and Matt from Scotland, and Chris
from Ireland. They've been teaching at a school for the past 9
months, so I came in to help a little. The school is preschool- grade 3.
I taught 16 kindergarteners for 2 weeks. it was a blast! they had
not had a "obruni" teacher before, so it was a little
hard for them to understand my English at first, and vice-versa, but
it went so well. I taught math, English, and creative learning.
for the rest of the day we would help with other subjects, or play with the nursery
kids. the school was just build on donations from a women from the U.K,
so it just opened in August. they all were uniforms, and they're
sooo adorable. However, when it rains, its impossible to teach,
because we have to close the shutters, and their is no electricity,
so its completely dark, and the roofs are just tin, so the rain
is sooo loud! it just turns into screaming kids until the
rain stops! also, there is no water at the school, so the grade 3 class
has to fetch water everyday with buckets on their heads, it takes about an
hour. The school was about a mile or so walk from our house down a dirt
road, it was so beautiful in the mornings with the fog rising over the tall
rainforest trees and the mountains in the distance. The house was quite
nice, however we didn't have water either, so we really learned how to conserve
the buckets of water with cooking, washing and bucket
showers. My time there was so relaxing, such a difference
from living close to the city for the past months.
I've been in Accra the last
week now, staying at a hostel, Salvation Army Hostel, with some friends.
its only costing about $15 for the whole week to stay there. Definitely not
preparing me for Western prices on things! I’ve spent a lot of time at the orphanage,
the special ed school, visiting with friends that are still here, hanging
around the beach and the glorious hot sun and getting my last taste in of my
favourite Ghanaian dishes, mangos and dilapidated tro-tros .
I feel quite sad about
leaving Ghana, there are many things I’ll miss about this culture and the
people here. Its just hit me the last week, driving around and really looking
at the way things are here, and how they've become normal to me now. Normal
to wait for half and hour for a tro-tro to get transport somewhere. Normal
to eat at chop bars, to buy things out the window. Normal to be the only white
person. How its odd to see other white people around. Normal now to speak
Twi here. How it’s normal for 5 people a day that want my address, and want to
be my friend. Normal for everything to be on top of heads, and babies tied on
backs of the women.... I could go on and on.
I leave this
afternoon, spending my last few hours at the orphanage with the
babies.
From Ghana, I’ll fly to Frankfurt
Germany where I will meet my little sister Leah, who’s actually a not so little
age of 16!. We'll travel through Germany, Switzerland, and Italy until
the 17th of June, when we'll fly home together.
Hope everything is going
well with all of you! Hope to hear from you and meet up soon! love Kathleen