Kentzou!

            After our long day of traveling, Geoff and I dropped our bags off at his house (where there was an adorable Welcome Steph poster colored in by children of Kentzou hanging in his living room). Geoff has a pretty sick spot for a peace corps volunteer. His house is concrete, with a tin roof and screened windows. He also has a smaller house in his compound for his chickens (he has 2). In addition to that, he has a large yard, a normal latrine and a bread oven.

            The following morning we went to the market where I met a zillion of Geoff’s friends and acquaintances. Kentzou is great because there is a market everyday. In most villages, the market only occurs one or two days a week, so you have to get all your shopping done that day. Kentzou is a border town (it is way closer to the Central African Republic than to Batouri), and a stop for logging trucks coming from the Congo in the CAR, so a market every day makes sense. On the flipside of that, Kentzou can be more dangerous for Peace Corps volunteers because of the amount of strangers that come through daily. The “village” is home to 15,000 people, with 3,000 of that number being refugees from the CAR. Geoff has never had a problem with his safety or anyone breaking into his house, but he takes the necessary precautions to prevent that. He walks around town with his machete frequently (I’m not joking), does not display his American wealth (computer, etc), and made friends with all the right people (police, army, political officials as well as informal leaders of the community like chiefs or businessmen). Most villages where PCVs are posted are small enough where the community looks out for the PCVs and those means are probably smart, but not necessary. That’s not the case with Kentzou because of its size and the transitory nature of the people living there. But don’t get me wrong, I never once felt unsafe while I was there. I merely aim to describe what its like for a white person (stereotype of white people in Africa is that they are all rich) to live in a Cameroonian border town.

            In the market I met my favorite family in Kentzou, headed by Douda and Ina (pronounced dow-DA and EE-na). Douda owns a very nice boutique in the market where his children sell the goods from their farm. He is also a prominent member of the Islamic community (which forms the majority of the people in Kentzou). Long story short, Douda is a boss. Ina was one of the nicest people I met in Cameroon. Despite our language barrier (she didn’t speak much French and hey, neither did I at that point), she was always wonderfully welcoming and kind, and for the most part, we made ourselves understood to one another. Ina ushered us into their house (which was right next to Douda’s shop) and immediately shoved a baby in my arms. This baby wasn’t as afraid of white people. She fed us (as is customary when receiving a guest) beans and rice as well as a drink called ‘gari’ in Fulfulde and ‘buie’ in French. Gari is a liquidy porridge made from fermented milk and oats. Definitely an acquired taste.

            While walking through Kentzou, I discovered that its inhabitants have a different name for white girl than I would’ve thought. In Kentzou, Julia means white girl. I would be walking down the street and have children rush up to me yelling “Julia! Julia! Julia! Saanu!” (Saanu is Fulfulde for hello). The first day, I told them all that no, I was not Julia. But after the eightieth time, I gave up. After that, I just smiled and said hello back. Julia is Geoff’s post mate and was the first girl to be posted in Kentzou. She was almost at the completion of her service, so had been living and working in Kentzou for about two years (she was an education volunteer and taught English in the schools). Its incredible the impression that she made on that community. Everybody knew who Julia was, which is a good and bad thing. Good, because she made such a positive impact on the community, and bad because she could never get a moment’s peace (also bad because if everyone knows where the white person lives, everyone knows where to steal from…especially in a town where the people in it changes frequently). Finally, at the end of my four days in Kentzou, some children called me Julia and their mother yelled at them, that is NOT Julia. I was thrilled she recognized me as not-Julia. 

Bertoua to Batouri to Kentzou

          There are a few wonderful things about African countries that I miss when I am back stateside. The first is the wide variety of items you can get at a market. Think of a Wal-Mart, but instead of aisles, you have individual vendors each selling a different item for a price that you can negotiate. Not to mention they already have all the add-ons that mega-marts are going for now (nail and hair places, food shops, pharmacies, etc). You can walk down one lane of a market and purchase anything from tomatoes to electronic sockets to fake hair to cloth. We spent the morning in the market, where Geoff bought a pair of pants that were the same color as the dirt (reddish brown) in Kentzou. The second thing I love is that you can get the clothes you buy tailored to fit you right there in the market for the equivalent of a dollar and the time commitment of ten minutes, as Geoff did with his pants. Amazing.

            It started raining while we were in the market and the effect on Cameroonians is immediate and pretty amusing. Cameroonians do NOT like the rain. Rain deranges (Peace corps French meaning: annoys, messes up, bothers, disturbs) everything. If you have a meeting with a Cameroonian and it’s raining, you can bet on the fact that they will not show up to the meeting. “It was raining” is as good a reason not to show up as any. So while it was raining in the market, Geoff and I stopped off under a stall to avoid the rain ourselves and watched the vendors and shoppers scramble to escape the rain as well as protect their goods from the offensive water. Fortunately, it was just a quick shower and we chose that opportunity to return to the case. Once we were back at the case, the real rain started. The road from the main road to the case is dirt and really, ridiculously bad. After the rain that day, the road got even worse, which I didn’t think was possible. Giant sinkholes of mud made traveling on any sort of vehicle a miserable experience.

            That night I had my first (and worst) reaction to food. I got food poisoning from one of Geoff’s favorite places to eat in Bertoua, “Beef Tec”. It wasn’t fun but it wasn’t the worst that could’ve happened. Plus my sickness didn’t mess up any of our traveling plans, which was a bonus. The next day we began our trek to Kentzou. We took a private car from Bertoua to Batouri, which is a faster but more expensive means of transportation. Africans tend to pack as many people as will fit in a vehicle and this was no exception. There were four adults and one baby in the back and two adults in the passenger seat in the front of a 1990 Honda. For 3 hours. On a pockmarked dirt road. We reached Bartouri just in time to catch the last prison bus to Kentzou (I was glad, at this point I was anxious to get to Geoff’s village). In typical African travel fashion, we bought our bus tickets, saved our seats and then had to wait about an hour for the bus to leave Batouri. The bus took about 4 hours to get to Kentzou due to numerous stops for Muslims to pray and to load and unload passengers. Despite the longer time, I preferred a prison bus to a private car. A prison bus is a tank. If we hit anything or if any car/truck/moto hit us, I doubt the bus would even gain a dent. There are speed limits posted on the roads but no one follows or enforces them. (Overall, I think Cameroonians drive too fast for the quality of roads and cars that they use.) And Geoff and I had our own seat that I didn’t have to share with another Cameroonian and her baby.

            One funny story from the bus. A big, happy Cameroonian mama gets on with a giggling, smiley baby girl. As the mama boards the bus, the baby is happily whacking the mama’s gigantic cleavage. I’ve never seen a happier baby. The woman settles in on the seat in front and diagonal from Geoff and I. Her baby continues her game until she catches sight of me. Her eyes get wide, her mouth falls open, and I do the thing that comes natural to me when I see a baby: I smile. The happiest-baby-in-Cameroon’s face takes on a look of horror and then crumples. She starts screaming and the mama looks to see what caused the abrupt change in attitude. When she realizes it was my offensive white face, she turns into the happiest-mama-in-Cameroon and all her friends join in. The white person scares the baby game continued for about an hour until I gave up and wrapped my head in my shawl. 

First Day in Bertoua

The morning was spent repacking and Geoff organizing his peace corps things to return to the East (where Kentzou is). We left for the bus station around 11, the bus was scheduled to leave Yaounde at 12. The bus didn't leave until 1. We spent a lot of time on the old, run down coach bus. It took about 6 hours to get to Bertoua and the ride was pretty uneventful. Geoff said that this leg of the journey is the easiest because the roads are paved and we each get our own seat. Drivers in Africa don't really abide by many laws...lanes are more of a suggestion than a rule and if someone is driving to slow, you honk and go around them. I was definitely more comfortable in the city in a vehicle but the ride was not bad. In the city, drivers cannot get their speed up very high as they can on the country roads. I think that Africans drive the way they speak, which is very vocal and involved. When one tells a story, everyone else is a part of the story telling. Listeners are active, responding and asking questions. Cars or taxis are also very vocal, constantly honking at each other saying things like "I'm here" "get out of my way" "speed up or let me pass". Without the honking, there would be many more crashes I think.

In Bertoua, we are staying at the "case" (pronounced COZ) or the peace corps station. We met his post-mate (the other PCV who is stationed in Kentzou), Julia. She is very nice and accommodating. I can tell that she is ready to get back to the US, however. Her patience with Cameroonians is nonexistent. She has had a very challenging stay I think, teaching difficult children in a difficult region of Cameroon. We went to a shack called Secret Fish for dinner. We each got a whole fish (the type of fish the Cameroonians didn't even know...some kind of white meat fish) which were delicious. Fortunately, I have experience eating whole fish from Ghana so I did not spear my esophagus with any fish bones. The fins were really good, crispy from the fire. I ventured to eat the fish eye, since I'd never done that before. The worst part is the pop of the eye in your mouth, but I accidentally popped it in my hand when I was removing it from the fish head so I missed out. The eye tasted very oily without much flavor. Probably not something I'll do again soon. From Secret Fish, we went to a bar to watch the Germany vs. Greece game. I love that every time I come to Africa some sort of big soccer tournament is happening. Africans love soccer just as much (probably more) than I do.

Last Night in Yaounde

I met the US Ambassador to Cameroon. How cool is that? So last night after Geoff was done with his meetings, his fellow peace corps volunteers invited us to the US Embassy to play some ultimate frisbee with the "embassy kids". The taxi was not allowed to let us out in front of the Embassy, only up the street. We were not allowed to bring in any phones or cameras and had to walk through a metal detector, show our id's AND in order to have even been allowed inside, we had to have been previously invited by someone inside the embassy. Luckily, one of the PCVs (peace corps volunteer) had a friend who invited us all. Frisbee was fun, intense and sweaty. I had to play in jeans because all of the shorts I brought to the country are too short to wear in public and we had to travel a ways to get to the embassy from our hotel. Behind the embassy was a beautiful hotel and absolutely stunning manicured landscape. We weren't allowed to play frisbee on that lawn.. The embassy certainly was a reprieve from Cameroon, nothing looked anything like the rest of the country, which I think is the point. During our game, the Ambassador rolled up in his Tahoe complete with US and Cameroonian mini flags on the hood. He waved to us and we waved back, hence, I met the US Ambassador to Cameroon.

After the game, we (about 10 of us le blancs) went back to Bastos for smoothies and shwarme (sh-waar-may). The smoothies were amazing, fruit in Africa is indescribably better than whats imported to the US. Especially pineapple. Shwarme is similar to a gyro, with meat and vegetables wrapped in a thick pita. It was reallly delicious. We took our goods to a bar to watch the Czech vs. Portugal EuroCup game. The bar was really nice, cushioned seats, flat screen TVs, liter sized beer and a pool table. I feel lucky that Geoff's peace corps friends were in Yaounde at the same time as us. They all had to come into the city for their "mid-service" which is their half way point of service in the peace corps. They had to fill out paperwork, have a psych eval and get medical check ups. It is very interesting to see the different types of people who join the peace corps. I hadn't really thought about it prior to meeting the PCVs; I'd just assumed they would all be similar to Geoff. Three stuck out to me as different. Jack, is 27 and married. He and his wife joined the peace corps together. I learned that you can apply as a married couple and be stationed at the same post. His wife was waiting for him back at his post while he was in the city. Jake (25 maybe?) was very put together. He wore a suit to the bar and was easily the nicest dressed out of all of us. He said to me, when I asked him why he was dressed like that, that people treated him with more respect when he dressed nicer and he didn't get hassled as much from children and people begging. There is a secure social hierarchy here, as in all African countries (and all countries really) and Jake wanted to be on the top of it. He's been trying to get a job at an American electric company here who has a monopoly. He seemed to me to be the type of person who would stay in a less developed nation so that he could be one of the elite. I had never expected to find a personality like that in the peace corps. The final anomaly was Christine, who cared so much about how she looked that we had to wait an hour for her to get ready to play frisbee. She was very particular about her make up, clothes and how her hair looked. For me, if I'm going to be in an African country for 2 years, I don't think I could care about that. What you see is what you get. But I do respect her ability to preserve her American nature while in Cameroon.

Yaounde, Cameroon

Bonjour, mes amis! I have finally arrived in Cameroon. I was a little nervous getting here; I'd never traveled internationally before by myself completely. My flights were fine, I slept all the way to Paris and then got to watch movies from Paris to Cameroon. On the second flight I got my reintroduction to an oh-so-missed aspect of African culture: no personal space. Africans love to touch each other, it is a big part of communication. What results from this is no regard for personal space. The older gentleman to my left on the flight took up (or attempted to...I have elbows too) half of my seat with his arm/elbow. It didn't really bother me except for when I fell asleep for two minutes before his elbow kindly reminded me of his presence. Geoff was waiting for me with a taxi driver friend at the airport (I was so relieved to see him) and we went to our hotel. After dropping of all my stuff and giving Geoff his presents, we went to the peace corps headquarters (next door to the hotel) so that his friends who were there could meet me. They were drinking beer and watching office space. Not a bad night on the job I'd say. We then took a taxi to Bastos, a neighborhood in Yaounde, for some street food and beer. We ate pork with some spicy sauce on a baguette. The food was really good, albeit very spicy (which Geoff informed me is mild). I forgot how much Africans love their spice. My stomach hasn't spontaneously combusted yet, thankfully, but really its too soon to tell.

This morning we indulged in spaghetti omelets (yes, spaghetti omelets) which were amazing. The little shop (and I say shop loosely, this was more akin to a picnic table with the table portion replaced by the cook and his stove) was clearly a local hangout and I felt for the first time at a loss for my limited French. I can remember being bothered by not speaking the main language when I was in Ecuador, something I never had to contend with in Ghana. Here, it is not so bad because I can speak French but I am rusty. Cameroonians also speak an African version of French, which fortunately is focused less on grammar than French French. My vocab is pretty good and solely coming back to me but I would be lost without Geoff. It takes me too long to process what someone said and then formulate a response. I've been letting him speak for me, but I know I won't have that luxury in his village (or the "vil" as cool peace corps volunteers call it). In the vil they speak fulfulde, which is similar to Swahili (again, fortunately I can speak a mild Swahili).

We walked Yaounde today for a few hours and then decided it was nap time. I'm not really feeling the effects of jet lag just yet, I think because my adrenaline has been pretty high since I've got here. At lunch, I had plantains and chicken, which I haven't has since the last time I was in Africa. Change is hard to come by, at lunch we waited about 30 minutes for it. Africans run on their own time and since there is no tipping, servers give you what they want to give you and will and do take their time about it. C'est d'accord.

I can't stop comparing Cameroon to Ghana. They are very very similar. Everything looks pretty much the same in the city: bumpy streets, insane driving, stray dogs, vendors, make shift houses. The mannerisms and way people speak is the same, accounting for the obvious language difference. Geoff says that the tourist industry suffers because Cameroonians (especially men) bother white people so much. We didn't get bothered that much on our walk, a few cat calls and winks. One boy, attempting to impress/amuse his friends I assume, latched himself to us but Geoff shooed him. The call the white people LeBlanc, which is funny since that is my name. Geoff's peace corps friends didn't believe me until they saw my passport. There is no end to their amusement of me being legally dubbed "the white". This afternoon we are going to the US Embassy to play frisbee with some of his friends and then possibly meet up with his host family brothers (when he was still in training he lived with a host family, now he has his own compound). I'm excited to go to Bertoua tomorrow, the halfway point between here and Kentzou (Geoff's vil). I think Geoff is too, he is more comfortable in Bertoua as he knows more people and it is smaller. I'm going to get clothes made while we are there and do a little shopping. The next day is to travel to Kentzou (its about an 11 hour total trip from Yaounde to Kentzou) and finally see his vil. I'm realllyy excited for the vil since many of the villagers are awaiting my arrival (and throwing me a party...awesome). I'll have internet in Bertoua but not in Kentzou. The plan is to be in Kentzou for a week and then go back to Bertoua. I'll try to update as much as I can while I have internet.

cape coast and leaving ghana

i have only a few more hours left in ghana and it is down right depressing.

i'm sorry i haven't been posting as much, but i don't get internet access in cape coast. the days have gone by much too quickly. the two weeks of the internship flew by. on friday i said goodbye to my students and it got me thinking. those poor children come from difficult homes with little or no money. they get to come to a school, which is great, but their teachers never stay. the foreign teachers come in, make a big impression on the students, give them someone to look up to, but then they leave. they always leave. that must be so sad for those children. they need teachers that they can count on. teachers that will stay with them to help them through school. it makes me want to come back and make a bigger and more lasting impact on the ghanaian school system.

saturday we spent most of the day at the art center. we've made some good friends at that giant market. its funny now because when they see the usual tourists, the shop keepers rush forward to ask them to come to their shops to buy things. when they see us, they welcome back friends. the market is a great place to go when you know the people more then them just trying to sell you their things. i'm really going to miss those friends that i've made. i think during this last two week period, i've made better and more quality ghanaian friends than i did during the whole of the study abroad. its really sad to leave them, and i don't know if i will ever see them again.

sunday, monday and tuesday were either hectic or incredibly relaxing. we travelled to cape coast on sunday and then just relaxed at the hotel while the two girls who hadn't seen the el mina castle went there. on monday we did the canopy walk again. then we visited an old professor of our professor. that visit was really cool. the man was 82 years old but looked like he was 60. he was so full of life. it was interesting to see someone who had mentored the man that we all look up to so much (dr. owusu-ansah, or as we call him O-A). after the visit, we returned to the hotel yet again while the other girls toured the cape coast castle. on tuesday, we travelled home.

now it is wednesday and tonight i'm leaving. i really can't believe that i'm actually leaving. the reality of it hasn't sunk in yet and i don't think it will until i'm on the plane. i spent all day trying to find everyone in accra that i had become friends with to say goodbye. we spent alot of time at the art center (again), buying and saying our last goodbyes. then i visited the family that i always play with and said goodbye to them. it's so strange saying bye but knowing that i won't visit them tomorrow like i always do. tomorrow i'm going to be in the usa. my good friend, david, and i were standing at the ocean (behind the art market) today and he looked across the water and told me, tomorrow you're going to be on the other side of that ocean.

i have to make it back to ghana sometime. this country is an amazing place. it is the people of ghana that make it so unforgettable. i'm going to really reallly miss all of them.

sad.

mhairi and i have been taking the tro-tro everywhere lately, which is ALOT cheaper than taxis and more fun. we squish into these barely-running vans with all the other africans and travel wherever we want for about 50 pesewas. i'm not sure if i mentioned it before, but tro-tro's are like the ghanaian bus system. we took it to the beach today during our 3 hour break.

we said goodbye to the glona children today. it was the saddest thing i've done here and it makes me realize how soon i'm going to be going home. i'll be happy to go home, but i REALLY don't want to leave here. i'm going to miss everything about ghana so much. i wasn't expecting to cry, but when we were walking out the door some of the students rushed into my arms crying very hard. i couldn't help but cry with them. i'm reallllllly going to miss those kids. i can't imagine how sad the germans must be after teaching at glona for a whole year.

last few days of teaching

we're only teaching until friday, and i'm not sure we'll actually teach much on friday because we'll want to play with the children. on saturday (i think) we travel to cape coast again so the new girls can see what it's like in the central region. teaching has been getting a little easier. i realized i'm expecting too much from them and once i realized that, i became more patient. they are trying to learn a language that isn't native to them, and they are being expected to learn it in two weeks. the students assigned to me have grown alot since i first saw them during the study abroad and i'm happy with that progress. today in the morning session, we ended early so we could go play football. the students have end of the year exams this week, so alot of our learning has changed to focus on their tests. this is a little frustrating because it encourages them to keep memorizing particular words, so that they can do well on the exams. they can all read and spell cat, dog, bed, pot, etc. but they cant pronounced phonetically the sounds po, be, do, etc. it's a very backwards system.

i have only a week left in ghana as of today and that reality is hitting me hard. i'm slightly surprised at how much i don't want to leave. i absolutely love this country. i'm going to miss so much about it. i'll be happy to go home, of course, but i'm going to have to figure out a way for me to come back.

new hair

welp, i finally got my hair braided last night. mhairi had hers done the night before. i spent the whole time laughing at her pain (because i didn't think it would be so bad) and chatting with the ladies. they made me braid some too. but then when i got mine done, holy crap, it hurt so much. mine took 4 and a half hours and mhairi's only took 3. i have like 50 braids more than her though, because my hair is so thick but also i wanted mine smaller than she got. it is supposed to keep for about two weeks, so i'll probably wear it until i get home and then take it out. it still hurts today, especially when the braids are moving around. it's especially annoying to sleep on. we probably look like such idiots with the two of us abroni's and our braided hair. it looks different than caribbean braiding: they use fake hair to make the braids hold and the braids come straight out from my head in the "rasta" style, not cornrows. one of the german women at glona has had hers done seven times! she's crazy.

more questions from dad and teaching today

i'm about to go get my hair braided (which is probably going to take 5 or so hours) so i'm not sure if i will finish this post.

today was full of good and bad. the morning was incredibly frustrating. i'm not sure if i was just over tired or impatient, but i had a really hard time teaching the kids. at first it was only gifty, and i realized that it is too hard for me to teach her to speak, write AND read english all at once. i'm focused on just trying to teach her to speak. but then the other children came, and for whatever reason, they did not feel like learning today. we slowly worked our way up to small sounds but they kept guessing. it drives me crazy that they see the letter p and yell any word that starts with p. they've been taught backwards: they taught themselves to just remember words by sight of the first letter so that they can do well on tests, but now i have to teach them that is bad and THEN teach them how they should have learned in the first place. they were all about guessing today and it was frustrating. i know that me being angry or annoyed doesn't help their learning so i'm trying to be patient but this morning was rough.

this afternoon was much much better. for lunch, mhairi and i went to a chinese restaurant that we'd been to before. then we went to go visit our drummer friend. he was so excited to see us. we hung out on the beach behind the market for the few hours that we had free. it was nice to be able to hang out somewhere i felt comfortable; we hadn't yet found a place like that for us and it's too expensive to take a cab back to our hotel and then back again to teach. we stumbled upon some really cute little kids playing soccer. they were about 3-6 years old. they yelled at me: abroni! (oh-bro-knee, it means white person) snap my picture! so i got some really cute pictures of them playing soccer and falling all over themselves to be the only one in the picture. it's sad that the beaches here are used for trash dumps (the ones that aren't touristy). the beach was a mess and the sewage line emptied into the ocean along this particular beach. for the afternoon session i had to teach the special class again. we spent the whole time reading. i'm really impressed with how well they can read. i didn't really see that when i was volunteering during the study abroad part of the trip. i was most proud of Hannah (a girl who comes for the morning lessons) because she was leading the whole class in reading today. this is a girl who was sent for extra treatment because she can't read, and she was reading better than anyone else. i was so so soo proud of her. it was a really great moment that i could literally see that the frustrations i face in the morning really do pay off in the afternoon.

so, speaking of beaches, my dad had some questions about them. the water is really warm. its very comfortable to go swimming but the waters are dangerous so i've only gone in once. they have markers that show people where they are allowed to swim and i only swim if Brad (a really good swimmer slash lifeguard friend) is with us so he can save me. i haven't seen anyone build any sand castles the way kids in america do. usually boys are playing football (soccer) on the sand and girls are watching. people don't really lay out the way americans do, obviously because they don't need to get any more tan. most people who live on the beach or who hang out at the beach alot are rastafari men. it depends on the beach that you go to whether or not the sand is soft. mostly yes, but i've been to one little rock beach. also, i've never seen anyone boogie board or surf. the waves are usually too big and i hear that the undertoe is really bad. actually, almost all of the africans i have encountered don't know how to swim.

weekend things

our friends who are staying in apam at the hospital came back on friday night to stay for the weekend. they were sooo happy to be in accra where there is running water and where they can choose what they want to eat for meals. we took them out on friday night to a bar that we frequent and then to a club where there was dancing. it was really fun and i think that the new girls really enjoyed being back in the city.

on saturday we all travelled to aburi for a conference. scholars from england, the US and different parts of africa were present. the conference was held high up on the mountain with a beautiful view of the Ghana plains. the scholars had each written papers and then they would present their topic and leave time for discussion. we caught the tail end of the first morning discussion, but stayed for the second morning discussion and the longer discussion held after lunch. the topics were generally about economics, and the afternoon discussion was focus on the gendered idea that women in ghana are more poor than men. we ate lunch with two professors from harvard, no big deal. it was really cool to hear idea from these big names, even if we didn't fully understand everything that was going on.

today we brought the new girls shopping at the market and in osu. i got a lot of good presents (michelle, i got you two presents youre going to loveeee) and i finally got a jersey of Gyan that i'd wanted but didn't see a nice one. they finally had nice ones and i bought mine for 15 cedi less than another kid who had bought one during the study abroad (sucker). i didn't realize how much of the culture i've absorbed until i watched the girls at the market today. i'm very comfortable now telling a pushy vendor that i don't want their product and i'm getting really good at bargaining. i've realized that a story comes with the price, the vendor tells how something about how long it took him to make the product or the quality of the wood, etc. i respond with telling him that i'm a student and a volunteer so i don't have much money. it's like a play that is put on every time you go to buy something. it's really fun once you get the hang of it.

when we went to the art market, we found a friend that mhairi had made the first time we went there. he had given her and her roommate a drum lesson. we were welcomed into his show with open arms. he (and three of his friends) proceded to play us a welcome song. their music was so beautiful, a lot of people passing by stopped to dance. he then gave us all a drum lesson (for free). we weren't pressured to buy anything and he seemed genuinely happy just to teach us african music. he runs his shop very differently than most other vendors at the market. i hope we can go back for another lesson.

friday morning lesson

friday is a funny day for ghanaians. the least amount of students come to school that day but we've been told thats okay because its friday. i assume its because the children like to start their weekends early, but maybe the roots are deeper in tradition, because most adults are okay with it too. so i had only 3 students show up friday (and one came an hour late) and mhairi had one. i'm having a hard time teaching Gifty. i end up just giving her writing exercises that i know she doesn't benefit from but if i can't communicate with her it's pretty impossible for me to teach her, especially if i have other students to teach as well. it really frustrates me that i can't do more for her. i just don't have enough time and my reasoning in my head is that i want to make the greatest impact i can in two weeks so i know the other students (who can speak english) will benefit from me more. it's really unfair but i don't know what else to do with the situation. she needs someone who can speak both english and twi or she needs full attention from one teacher. on the other hand, Moses made big progress on friday. he now knows all the letters and most of the phonetic sounds. we had just started the concept of vowels when it was time for lunch. i'm really getting to see the ups and downs of teaching. i know that i'm gaining a ton of experience and knowledge from this internship, more than i ever imagined i could.

answers to dad's questions/school friday

i haven't tried incorporating dancing into the lessons. in a class setting, it might be harder, especially with no music and their tendency to not pay attention as it is. i'm not sure how i would work it in on an individual level, but i could try. you gave a good suggestion of including things that are in their daily life into their learning. i actually did that on friday, for the first time. before, during the study abroad portion of the program, i was just finding my feet and pretty much mimicking what the teachers were doing. i've realized that everything they are learning comes from western school books and aren't relevant to their lives. dad, it was a really good idea to include things that they sell and daily activites. i'm going to do that tomorrow i think.

so on friday i started the class with simple sounds and letters. we worked our way up to bigger sounds like ba, mo, etc. then to small words. i tried to pick the words that they might not have seen before. this is because they can all read cat, but they don't know that the letter "c" can make the sound of a 'k' and the sound of an 's'. i tried to think of words that they could read easily and would be interesting for them. words like banku, rasta, and football worked well. at the end of the day they read two big sentences: Rasta-men live at the beach, and, Asamoah Gyan is a good footballer. they were so proud of themselves that they read such big words. i was proud of them too. that class session made me feel much more accomplished then i had before. even the kids that couldn't really keep up with what was going on benefitted by seeing the process that is behind reading and that if they keep working hard at learning the phonetic sounds, than they will be able to read anything. even one of the german teachers, who has been at glona for a year, came into the class and told the children how impressed he was with their progress.

i'm not sure what makes ghanaian food so spicy. i think it is some kind of pepper. i can try to buy some, i've seen women selling spices. are you allowed to bring food products from other countries back into the US on commercial flights? i thought the answer was no, but i'm not sure if it applies to spices. i'm definitely cooking us peanut soup and rice balls. its soooo good. and maybe red-red if i can get the ingredients.

most ghanaians start their days around 4 or 5am. i'm not sure if they take breaks. since so much of the economy is informal, like street vendors, they create their own hours. i'm sure they would take a break around noon or so to have lunch. but the more dedicated workers may not stop at all. vendors are busiest during rush hour times, like 6am-about 9am and then from 3pm-6pm. dinner is served at our hotel at 7pm-9pm but i think that most families eat earlier, between 6 and 7pm. it gets dark here by 6:30pm so also, i think that most families go to bed around 9pm.

drinks are generally not served with ice. we are supposed to avoid ice anyway, because we don't know what water it has been made out of. glass bottles are everywhere; all sodas and most juices come like that.

sick

i have been struggling with a cold since about wednesday. then when i showed up to glona on friday, no teacher was there to teach the special class. i was really upset that no one showed up to teach the children but excited because i got to teach them again. they worked so hard and i'll write about it more later. i proceded to lose my voice which is just about the most frustrating experience of my life. NO ONE can understand me and/or hear me. so, i'm still voiceless and sick and probably won't post a long entry until tomorrow. i'm possibly getting my hair braided tomorrow also. excited.

Food

i'm not sure if i've mentioned food already but i'm trying to write more about daily things i forget to write about because i take them for granted. if anyone wants me to write about something specific, just comment or email me.

tonight for dinner i had banku and fish stew. it was SO good. banku is fermented corn and it tastes very salty but also sweet because of the corn. its mashed into a dough and you use the banku to pick up the stew. the fish stew was great because it was only a little bit spicy and the fish was off the bone so i didn't have to worry about my esphogus being speared when i accidentally swallow a hidden bone.

last night i had peanut soup and rice balls. peanut soup is hard to describe, but obviously, tastes a little like peanuts and comes with chicken in it. i get nervous eating the chicken because i can't tell what meat is what, and ghanaian chicken is served white and dark meat all mixed up. i forgot to ask for the peanut soup to be non-spicy so it was reallllly hot. i had to suffer through the fake milk to ease the stinging in my mouth.

food in ghana generally is really really spicy. i eat alot of fried rice, plain white rice, french fries, and plantains. my favorite favorite food here is red-red, a bean mix served over plaintains. for breakfast i always have scrambled eggs and baked beans. the baked beans are a little bit sweeter than the ones in the US and are served in a sauce that is less thick (if that makes sense).

for lunch today mhairi and i went to a chinese restaurant. surprisingly, ghana has the best spring rolls in the entire world. they serve them alot in kumasi and they are amazing. we both got dumpling soup and that was really good too.

beginning of the internship

first of all, HAPPYYYYY (late) 21ST BIRTHDAY MEEESHAAAA :) i'm so excited you can finally come out with us and not have to drive everyone else around. i'm sad that i couldn't celebrate your birthday with you but obviously i'll bring you back something grrrreat from africa.

second of all, some good news i received today, a professor from California State University emailed me today asking for my permission to publish one of my essays in his textbook on how to write college essays! he found it because it was published after it came in second in an essay contest at JMU.

so mhairi (it's pronouced marie, she's irish) and i began our internship on tuesday. we met with the man who will be overseeing our project, which we named Supplimentary English Lessons at Glona Academy. at the meeting, we created a questionnaire to administer to the students' families and we discussed what we want the internship to be like. we're the first students to have an internship with Glona, so we have a lot of wiggle room with our project. essentially, we're each assigned 3 children to teach how to read and write by the time we leave. obviously, that is a pretty lofty goal, so we're going to see how far we can advance them before we go. i'm frustrated and sad that the internship is only two weeks long, and since we didnt even really begin it until wednesday, it's more like a week and a half. that is not nearly long enough to teach them what we're supposed to, but i know we are making a small difference at least.

our days are going to be split into two parts: a morning session and an afternoon session. the morning session is dedicated to children who need extra help with their english in addition to their afternoon classes. a few students from my old class are coming to the morning session. the afternoon one is dedicated to students who don't fit into any afternoon class. for example, two of mhairi and i's students are 23 years old. they are too old to join Glona officially but they need to learn. tuesday afternoon we spent getting to know the children we'll be teaching. two of the girls are supposed to come to the morning session, Gifty and Ellen, but they sell (street vendors) in the mornings so sometimes they come and sometimes they won't.

wednesday morning we visited each of the houses of the children that showed up for the morning session. the first house we went to was a very traditional and formal meeting. we sat down, and the family had a spokesperson who welcomed us and asked us the reason for our visit. we nominated a spokesperson and he told them our reason for visiting. then we were allowed to ask the questions on our questionnaire. the rest of the houses were much less formal, we said hi and then asked the questions. the purpose of the questionnaire was to assess the student's home life (number of people living in the household, household duties, etc) and to find out their reason for coming to Glona, and if they'd been to school before. we were walking all over La (the area the school is in and where most of the students live) and it was the first really sunny day in a while, so it was hotter and drier than usual. (on a side note, my dad asked me what the weather is like. it's almost always cloudy, most of the time it looks like its going to rain but it rarely does. the humidity isn't too bad, and the temperature is usually high 80s).

wednesday afternoon was our first real lesson. we started by giving the kids a test to see how much they know. the questions were simple and the test was oral: write the letter b, write the letter of the phonetic sound, etc. surprisingly the children did really well with the test, but once we started teaching them we realized they had learned how to fake knowledge to get good grades on the tests given to them. they can all spell apple or cat or sun, but only a few of them knew the sound that 'p' is supposed to make. mhairi and i then split the class into two groups of three. i had the ones who knew less (michael, who's probably 15; david, who is 23; and gifty who is probably 13 or 14). Gifty doesn't speak ANY english. she only speaks twi. i don't know how i'm expected to teach her when i can't even communicate with her. i've found that i'm learning just as much from her as she is from me, but that took a few days.

thursday morning was difficult. unlike the children in the afternoon session, the morning kids don't quite understand why they are with us or want to be there. it's alot harder to keep them interested in what i'm teaching. mhairi and i tried to play phonetic bingo with them, but they didn't know the phonetics to even play. i had 3 children again: Gifty, Moses, and Hannah. hannah and moses i'd had in my special class when i was volunteering with before. i think its amazing that they've both been at glona almost a year and still don't know the letters or the sounds that they make. it's a comment on them as students but also the teaching that goes on there. but it also makes me suspicious of their ability to learn. i think moses might have some form of ADD and hannah might have dyslexia. teaching them this morning was really hard and EXHAUSTING. i had no idea it could be so hard, or how completely drained i am after. the four of us struggled for a while, until i finally devised a method where they write the letter and at the same time say the letter outloud. i make them do this over and over again. this finally seemed to make an impression on them and i was so happy when they remembered. for some reason they had alot of fun while doing it too, they got a kick out of yelling the letter while writing it. go figure. they all just guess at what the letters are because they know that eventually they'll get it right. i have to teach them to recognized the letters for what they are, not just the order that the alphabet is in.

thankfully, the afternoon was much easier. the german teachers at glona are leaving this weekend, so they threw a party for all the kids. everyone was so excited about the party. they brought in sodas and food and even a dj. the kids were hilarious, dancing and tackling each other and throwing things and generally wreaking havoc. each class had prepared a song to sing to the germans and then each class sent up a soloist to sing another song. there was a dance contest, too. the children think mhairi and i are so funny when we try to dance. they love our cameras and the fact that they can see the pictures right after we take them.

i'm exhausted now and its only 9pm and i've got a lesson to plan for tomorrow, so good night.

monday trip to apam

the students of the internship are split three ways: four went to apam (about 2-3 hours from accra) to work at a hospital, two (me and mhairi, pronounced like marie) are working with glona, and one (emily) is working at new horizons. mhairi and i were supposed to meet with the director of glona yesterday to set up our internship (we already had one meeting about what we were going to do) but he cancelled and we are to meet with him today. emily went to new horizons yesterday and since mhairi and i had the day free, we tagged along with the hospital students to apam. first we went to the planGhana (the program the hospital students are interning with) headquarters in Accra for a brief orientation. then we got on the tro-tro and travelled two hours to bawjiase (baw-gee-ah-see) for a more indepth orientation and lunch. we had lunch at a chop bar, or a really small restaurant. i had fu-fu and light soup. the problem with light soup is that it is SO SPICY. i don't think i'm ever going to get used to how spicy the food is here, but i'm much better off than the two poor girls who just arrived sunday and only had that spicy, unfamiliar food on monday.

after bawjiase, mhairi and i went to apam (another at least hour drive) with dr. owusu-ansah to drop off supplies for the internship students for when they arrive today (they stayed overnight in bawjiase, at a hotel with no running water...we're very lucky to be staying in accra). the hospital there shocked me. i think i was more overwhelmed by the desolate looking people in the waiting room than i was by the actual facility. it seemed like a very nice hospital, and a pretty advanced one at that, but it was obviously like no hospital i've ever seen. i'm not a big fan of hospitals in general, and seeing apam made me thankful that i'm doing my internship with glona. the pre-med and nursing students who are doing the hospital internship are excited and i hope they can make a difference and provide help where its needed. after touring apam hospital, mhairi and i travelled the three or so hours back to accra. it was a long day in a tro-tro. we got to try grilled corn, Dr. O-A bought us some from a street vendor. it was really good, it kind of tasted just like popcorn. i love being able to buy food (or anything i could imagine, really) from the window of the tro-tro. i'm going to miss that when i'm back in the US.

pre-internship, post study abroad

this weekend was kind of a limbo between programs. we spent saturday sleeping; i hadn't realized how tired i was until that point, once i stopped doing things. during the study abroad i usually got about 5 or 6 hours of sleep a night and now that we've stopped running around, we were exhausted. we went to the african regent (a really nice resort) to watch the germany vs. uruguay consolation game. (i was happy to see uruguay lose AGAIN). sunday the two new girls for the hospital internship came in and we went for a walk with them and tried to give them all of the advice that we've accumulated over the past month. needless to say, they were overwhelmed. later in the afternoon, i was reading in my room and i got a phone call from the front desk saying there were children here to see me. the little kids that lauren (my old roommate) and i used to play with all the time came to the hotel because i hadn't seen them in over a week because we'd been travelling. i showed them all the pictures from my trip. they are always so excited about the pictures because they learn about all these places in school but don't always get to travel to see them. i wish i could have taken them with me. Annie keeps asking me to come with me to the US and it breaks my heart every time. i'm going to have to do something nice for them before i leave. oh, they also wear the bracelets i bought for them in the Volta region all the time. its adorable.

sunday night we went to watch the final at celsbridge again, where we had watched the ghana vs. germany game. it wasn't nearly as crowded this time and i was pretty disappointed in the game itself. plus i wanted the netherlands to win. whatever, ghana should've won the whole thing. ha. after celsbridge we went out to a bar we'd been to before called epo's, and met some people who work for the peace corps and who have been in ghana for between one and two years. it was crazy to hear their ghanaian-english accents: people here respond best if they are spoken to with the same fluctuations in voice as themselves (which is a much different emphasis on different syllables than a native english speaker). it was also really refreshing to meet (white) people who we havent been seeing 24/7 for the past month. i absolutely love ghanaians, but the cultural divide gets tiring. it's so much easier to speak with someone when you can inherently understand their body language and non-verbal clues, without worrying about offending them or not understanding their meaning. but i think that divide will come down with time, if i ever did spend more time here (as i hope to).

end of the study abroad

thursday was a pretty hectic day. we woke up early so that we could be on the road for accra by nine. it was so nice to be back in accra. i didn't realize how much i missed that city. i really enjoyed the other parts of ghana, but accra is still my favorite. i missed the little familiarity that i had gained from being in accra for three weeks. when we returned we unloaded our things in our rooms and took off for osu. everyone who was leaving on saturday wanted to buy last minute presents and things for their families and friends. i didn't buy much, just some earrings and another carving. (for only 20 cedi total, i love shopping here). we went to dinner at a five star resort called the golden tulip. the resort was GORGEOUS. i got a cheeseburger (god, i miss american food) and a pina colada! it was way too expensive, obviously: five star resort, but it was so worth it. on the way back from elmina we tortured ourselves by talking about all the american foods that we take for granted at home. mainly i miss dairy products, like milk and cheese. the potatoes also taste different here, even though we get french fries with almost every meal. and snacks, like potato chips or tortilla chips and salsa. when i do get to eat at home, however, the fruit is not nearly as good as it is here. the pineapple is amaziingggg.

on friday we had a party planned for us on a private beach with everyone from the hotel and us. the beach was about an hour away, but it took us longer because of that wonderful ghanaian traffic. i went swimming in the ocean for the first time. it was such a nice day too, everyone got sunburned since we're so used to it being cloudy. i'm surprised, i didnt get burnt, only my face a little. i played frisbee and soccer with our friends and then some local boys (probably between ten and twelve) wanted to learn frisbee. it was so nice to just relax and have fun. after tiring myself out on the beach, we were served wine and food. the meal was great but as always, there was too much food! i can't believe i acutally thought i was going to loose weight coming here. i'm positive the opposite is happening. it's rude not to try a little of everything, and it's a compliment to have seconds, so we all end up eating way more than we should. also, we're never quite sure when our next meal will be (since our schedule changes alot and sometimes we'll have breakfast at 8am then not eat again until 3pm) we always stuff ourselves. after the food there was a lot of dancing. we danced for hours. i absolutely love this aspect of ghanaian culture. EVERYONE dances. i mean everyone. little kids barely walking, babies on their mother's backs, old people bent with age, everyone. and they are all so good at it. i was sad to leave the party because it signified the end of our study abroad.

most of my friends left this morning at around six. breakfast was depressing, there were five of us still here. soon its only going to be three left in our hotel, because the students doing the hospital internship will be an hour away in Apom, staying on site.

dinner at dr. nkunu akyea's

our group has been very lucky to have been led by the former president and founder of the ghana tourism association, nkunu akyea (nkoo-noo ah-chee-ah) (ky is pronounced as ch in twi). he is responsible for many of the activities that we were able to complete, like the slave river park and the canopy walk. he has accomplished so much in preserving ghana's natural beauty, but also using that natural beauty as a source of economic gain for the country. he has been with us for our excursions to the various parts of the country and spent the entire week with us when we went to kumasi and then cape coast and elmina.

wednesday night he invited us to have dinner at his house on cape coast university's campus. prior to being head of the tour guide association, he taught geography at cape coast u. and his wife currently is a professor of languages there. it was such an honor to be invited to eat with his family in his personal home. when we arrived, we were offered soda and water. then we sat and talked until the food was ready. his granddaughter was there (she's 2 years old) and provided great entertainment for everyone. it was a delicious meal and i was sad to leave. i can't believe how much time and knowledge that dr. akyea has given us and then on top of that, he welcomed us into his home and shared his food with us.