Back to Reality... Kind of

January 30, 2011

Classes are supposed to begin tomorrow, so I guess it’s back to real life.  But all the adventuring we’ve been doing has been great, so I have a funny suspicion I’ll find ways to continue doing so, even though I do have class.

On Friday we went to the beach for the first time and it was great.  Of course, that’s not saying much, since I’m happy on any beach at any time, but regardless, it was fantastic.  It was kind of an episode getting there and back, but that’s all part of the fun.  We had a big group all trying to get tro-tros, and that wasn’t working, so we ended up taking cabs to the next tro-tro station and then getting a tro-tro there, but the station we were at, called 37, is one of the main hubs, so basically there are 8 hundred tro-tros and 12 hundred people all pointing in different directions to direct you where to go. Even though it was chaotic, it was fun trying to hunt one down and make sure both that the driver understood where we wanted to go and that we understood where he was taking us. You can never really be sure, but it’s nice to feel like you kind of know what you’re doing.

The water was beautiful and waves were great, so of course I was happy.  It’s really interesting, though, because tons of people here don’t know how to swim.  I noticed at the beach we were out further into the ocean, while everyone else was staying pretty shallow, and then yesterday I went to the pool and when we went into the deep end, everyone was really impressed and asked us to teach them how to swim.   It’s surprising given we’re right at the water, but I guess it’s just not something everyone does here.  I also met a Ghanaian named Salasi at the pool, and he told me he wanted to follow me home and then join the U.S. Army, but I don't think that's quite correlated to his swimming abilities. 

There were also big traditional-looking canoes at the beach with rows of people fishing and people drumming and singing and performing all along the beach.  Then there were guys trying to get you to ride their horses, claiming it’s free and later charging you 10 cedis, but considering I’m not exactly horse-friendly at home, I wasn’t about to hop on one here.

Yesterday we took a trip to another market called Madina.  It’s a 20ish minute tro-tro ride from campus but it was so different than what we had seen so far.  I guess the difference was probably that it’s an actual Ghanaian market, for Ghanaians, whereas the art market we’ve been to and the ones on campus are used to and/or sometimes catered towards tourists.  Madina was clearly not, which was cool, because we got to see more of daily life.

We could tell we were particularly out of place based on the way the kids reacted to us.  At one point, we were walking in the outskirts of the market closer to neighborhoods just as a school on the corner let out.  Literally every pair of eyes was staring at us.  Some were all smiles and waves, but some were actually afraid.  We stopped to talk to a couple groups, and most were happy to say hello and tell us their names, but at one point, the girls actually stepped back because they were scared and didn’t know how to react to us.  We had been talking to their friends earlier, so we had already proven we weren’t harmful creatures, but to them, we seemed like aliens.  Quite fascinating. 

Our mishap with the coconut didn’t help our case, either.  We bought one because we wanted to try the milk, but we didn’t know we were supposed to drink it right there and then they would cut it so we could eat the meat. Instead, they chopped off the top, we took it, and walked about 50 feet trying to each take sips from it.  It was rather messy, and none of us actually knew how to do it, so we looked back and literally eight people from the stand were laughing at us.  We went back and asked them what to do, but they just said keep going, so we did. Down the road, X-pidon, a “famous Ghanaian musician who we should look up on Facebook” told us we were doing it wrong.  After chatting for a bit he asked each of us if we had boyfriends and we left both X-pidon and the coconut behind.

Today CIEE took us on a tour of the city so we got to see more of the different neighborhoods and then we went to Atsu’s house for a wood-carving and drumming demonstration.  

Drums

Atsu and twin sister Atsupi dancing

Uncle whose name I forget showing us how to carve

Atsu (sounds like “achoo,” as in sneezing) is a u-pal whose family lives in Accra and his uncle is the director for the National Arts Association (or something.. I don’t actually remember what) and some fancy drummer/drum-maker.  He showed us how they carve the drums, paint them, put the tops on, and then how they play them.  Pretty cool! It kind of took me back to my days with Mr. Buckridge at Doherty, but unfortunately I’m not sure my skills have improved too much since 7^th grade.  Shucks.

That’s it for now! Thanks for reading.

The Case of the Missing Roommate/ The Case of the Missing Classes

Trying to keep things short so they're actually readable!

January 28

My roommate was supposed to come today, but alas, I’m still alone.  By this point I know she is definitely Ghanaian, but now she can pop up any moment.  Hannah and I were walking back into our dorm tonight and got really excited because we thought the lights were on in both of our rooms, meaning each of our roommates had moved in, but after slowly knocking and preparing for the big moment, we were both let down. Womp.

I guess it’s because of Ghanaian timing.  Rumor has it the professors don’t show up the first week of classes, so a lot of the students don’t come back until the following week.  Registration itself is really chaotic: first you look through the course catalogue to pick out classes, then you walk to all the departments to write down the times of the classes that are being offered, if they’re listed (often they’re not actually posted), then you find that the majority you picked are not actually offered, so you pick new ones, or wander to other departments to find replacements, and eventually, if there is anyone around, you register individually at each department.  At some point, which hasn’t happened yet, you also register online. But you don’t actually know what’s going on at any point, because all of the departments do it differently and they don’t all post the times, so it’s quite possible you could sign up for two classes at the same time and not even know it.  Or, in the case of the Geography department, you could be registered, but because they don’t post the timetables until Monday, when classes start, it’s quite possible you could miss class simply because they didn’t choose to tell you that you had class until the scheduled time had already passed.  It’s certainly different…

But anyway, maybe that’s why my roommate’s not here! Who knows?

Abrunee Abrunee Abrunee

January 27

The heat has caused my feet to swell so much that they don’t exactly fit into my sandals anymore, but besides that minor inconvenience, life is dandy!

Orientation slowed a bit this week so we got to explore more.  Early in the week a group of 10 or so of us wandered to the art market that’s about 30 minutes from our dorm and there we got our bargain on.  It was nine white kids and one Nigerian, so I’m sure the bargains were actually huge rip-offs (Ghanaians and Nigerians have a bit of a rivalry, it seems), but I felt accomplished nonetheless.  There were 30 or so little booths full of wood carvings, paintings, bags, dresses, jewelry, and all sorts of other little trinkets and gifts you would probably describe as stereotypically African.  The shop owners were rather generous in that they all invited us to “come and look for free.”  Then they didn’t understand why we were still looking when we told them we were out of money. Hm.

Later that day when I was getting an egg sandwich for dinner (I think they’ll be a rather big staple of mine this semester… at least until I become more of a pro at banku and fufu) I met the most adorable little girl.  Her name is Agnes and when I came up to the stand she asked me my name and invited me to sit.  I sat while her mom made my eggs and she asked where I was from.  When I said the U.S., she asked if I was from Hollywood.  I had to disappoint her and tell her I lived on the opposite side of the country where the temperatures are in the negatives, but then she wondered if I lived near Jamaica.  I told her no, but she couldn’t grasp the cold I tried to explain.  She just told me she was cold in Ghana right now, where it’s 87.  She was working on her vocab homework so I asked about school and she told me she went to the one right across the street.  I told her I always see the kids walking there in the morning and she asked if I saw her and her friends, and then started telling me their names and a bit about them.  Precious.  We sat and chatted for 10 minutes or so after my sandwich was done just because she was the greatest little girl ever.

That night we decided to go to salsa night in the city.  Somehow I guess I’ve become a big dancer in my African ways.  Don’t really know how I’ve been convinced.  Despite my obvious lack of rhythm, it was actually really fun and I was pleasantly surprised that it was mostly Ghanaians and not all abrunees (pronunciation correction: ah-brew-knees) like I had expected.  I was clearly a rookie, but Leon the Ghanaian taught me, or tried to, anyway.

The most exciting part was probably the tro-tro ride there.  We thought we knew what we were doing but it turns out we had no idea.  Tro-tros are basically 12 or 15 passenger vans operated by two people: a driver, and an assistant who thrusts himself out the door while the car is moving and says “ACCRAACCRAACCRA!” or “CIRCLECIRCLECIRCLE!” and based on what he says, you know what direction they’re traveling.  About five passed us, none going the right way, until one stopped, backed up, and decided actually it was going where we wanted.  That’s the glory of the system: there’s actually no order, and it can change at any point.

We scoped it out, noticed there were two other women in the tro-tro, so we decided it was probably safe and we hopped on in.  I told him the stop and he said 70 pesewas ($.55ish), which seemed a bit steep, but we weren’t sure how far we were going so we paid compliantly.  Red flag.  Fifteen minutes later, when all of the original passengers had gotten out and been replaced by a new round, who had also cycled through, they asked where we were going.  We repeated again, this time spelling out the stop because I had clearly mispronounced it, and they laughed, then told us we were lost.  Oops.

We tried to communicate again where we were going, and ask what we had done wrong, but they didn’t understand our English, and we certainly didn’t understand their Twi. Somehow, after a personal nighttime tour of Accra, we ended up roughly near our destination.  I was the only one who vaguely recognized the area, so when he asked where to stop, we kind of had to guess.  So he dropped us and off we went!

Turns out in my head I was turned around 180 degrees. Not helpful.  We walked a while and didn’t come across anything, so we asked a woman who was walking with children (strategic here) and she led us back where we had come from, across the street and 10 minutes away to where we wanted to go.  Very kind!  Her daughter, Peace, also followed along, which was fun, because the kids always get giddy when they see us.  It was nice because she went totally out of her way just to help us even though she easily could have pointed us in the right direction and we could have helplessly scrambled some more.  Friendliness is Ghana’s claim to fame, and I guess this is why!

Food, Fun, and Fear (I like alliteration)

January 24, 2011


Waking up under my mosquito net yesterday morning I wasn't quite surew what to do or think.  I was on my own because we didn't have anything with CIEE until 4 PM, and I woke up at 9ish.  So I wandered! And eventually the u-pals took us on a tour of campus, which was really helpful because a 30,000-person campus at home is unthinkable to me, let alone here in Ghana where I know no one, have no iea where I am, and am constantly dodging open gutters.  Quite different than the Bucknell brick.

I had y first major bits of culture, too.  I shopped at the market across the street from my dorm and bought some water, a bucket for laundry/showering when necessary and toilet paper.  The girl who sold it to me was named Vivian and she isa dorable.  She introduced herself and shook my hand and wants to be my friend.  Well, me, and every other international kid who will give her money.  But she was wearing an anchor shirt, so clearly she's my girl.  Go ahead, judge me.

For breakfast, I had the most delicious pineapple and mango ever, and for lunch I tried my first Ghanaian staple: Banku.  It's basically this hot but uncooked dough that you dip into a spicy groundnut sou and swallow without chewing.  You don't use utensils but you are expected to work around the bone of the meat in tehs oup, and bankuy is also the stickiest substance ever.  It's kind of like the dough they used to give little kid at Bertucci's, but they had to stop because kids wre eating it.  Except the Bertucci's dough tasted better.  Hm.  I was also sitting next to a Ghanaian eating fufu (same idea), which didn't help my ase.  He was nice and showed me how to eat it, but he finished three times as much in half the time, and was quite a pro.

Then we had a traditional dance workshop which was so fun! That doesn't mean I was good at it, but I didn't care.  I got placed next to the one Black CIEE girl who has been to Ghana before so her moves accentuated my whole "white girl can't dance" syndrome pretty entirely.  Music majors were playing the drums and dance majors were teaching us the moves.  We started with basics and then played a way cooler version of trust falls (you sing and clap and dance while throwing each other around in a circle) and then they taught us two traditional dances, the names of which I don't remember nor would I be able to spell if I could.

We tried to go to a bar last night to watch the Packers game (me? watch football? I know.  When in Ghana...) but they didn't have the channel, so there went that plan.

Today we started international orientation for all the study abroad kids, not just CIEE, so we met our fellow abranees (ah-bra-knees, that's what they call us).  I was standing in line for the bathroom and the girl next to me forgot to bring toilet paper with her, so I tore mine in half and gave her some, and it turns out she's from Brockton.  Bostonians unite, I suppose.

We had the afternoon free so a bunch of us wandered.  Rode our first tro-tro without the u-pals' help, bargained our way, ate some rice.  Those sorts of things.  I guess we're on our own!

Thanks for bearing with me.  Sorry for double-posting.  Thanks for reading!

Akaaba!

The good thing is, I've arrived.  The bad thing is, I haven't had internet, so I had to write entries in word and now copy them over, because I don't have a flash drive.  I know you all have a life, so you're less likely to read now, but here goes.


January 22, 2011

I stepped off the plane to a sign that read "Welcome to Ghana: the Gateway to Africa," followed by one that explained "We don't accept pedophiles or sexual deviants." Luckily, I passed the bar.

It was cooler than expected- and when I say cool, I mean it was probably only 88, but less overwhelming than for what I had prepared myself.  The winds come down from the Sahara this time of year, bringing along dust and sand, which clouds the air with teh harmattan winds.  I went through customs, easier than any other country, ever, exchanged money, and claimed luggage.  I looked around and found another girl who also looked somewhat helpless, and we simultaneously (and silently) agreed we both must be CIEE kids, and decided to hunt for the exit together.

When we all gathered- there were about thirty or forty total- we were shuffled into two buses to be taken tot he hotel for orientation.  The first day we had an introductory dinner and hopelessly tried to befriend one another, pretty much exactly like freshman orientation all over again.  We all know that was a thrilling time in my life.  Luckily, this time \, the fact that I am in Africa has ruled out wahtever angst I had during Bucknell orientation.

The second day they told us lots of things we need to know: smoking weed in Ghana can score you ten years in prison, 88 degrees and sticky is particularly chilly for the locals, and not taking malaria pills can lead to discomfort, sickness, oh, and death.  Those sorts of things.

At lunch, I accidentally requested octopi.  Backing myself out of that situation was interesting.  I'm not sure fear of octopi is something that crosses cultural boundaries.

I'm also afraid of my left hand.  I feel like an amputee.  Ghanaians don't use it because it's the "personal" hand, which means you only use it for wiping, and it's insulting to wave, motion, or give anything to another person or pay with the left hand.  I assumed this meant no left-handed perople.  Wrong.  Writing with the left is perfectly accetable.  I crossed that one off as cultural incomprehension, and didn't ask any further questions.

After dinner we all went swimming at the hotel pool and then some of us went out to a bar/club in Accra.  By some of us, I mean a group of 20 white kids all trying helplessly to find our way.  Luckily, we had our trusty U-pals (CIEE studeent volunteers who go to UGhana and basically lead us around and teach us things about the university, since we know nothing and nobody) to help us out.  They pretty much herded ust o and from the club, but it was all quite fun.  We bounced in to Ke$ha, so at least I'm not missing out on the boppin' tunes at home.  On the way back, the cab driver offered us weed.  Looks like that whole 10-year thing is pretty serious.

Now we're moved into the university dorms.  I don't have a roommate yet.  I know nothing about her besides that she could be either Ghanaian or international.  That covers a lot of ground.  Quite literally.  I suppose I'll see.  And let you all know.  I know you must be on the edge of your seats.

Until then!

Snow and Slush

24 hours 'til go-time, and I won't miss it.

More importantly, 24 hours 'til go time!