"i feel like one of those dolls..."

"Where when you put them on their side, they close their eyes" - Marlee. And this is how we're all feeling right now.

Yesterday - registration at U Ghana. This is like a million day process. It started in November when I applied. Had to make THREE hand-written copies of the same form, then get accepted. We got our acceptance letters dated November 18th, on January 14th. Hmm. Once accepted, we literally had to wait in line to get into the internet cafe (? apparently that's where they register international students) for an hour to get a man to put us in the online system. We waited for another hour for who knows what. From there we took our bus to the other side of campus to wait yet another hour for ID cards. In order to register for classes, the department has to put up physical time-tables and if they're not up, well then you have no idea what time or day your class is on. Finally today I found out the times of the two potential psychology classes that I might take - abnormal and environmental. We have to go back, again, Monday morning to paper register at the office.

We also went to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial and Artists Alliance Gallery. Both of these were very interesting and beautiful. The memorial had lots of fountains and we learned a lot about when Ghana became independent and A LOT about Kwame Nkrumah. The Artists Alliance Gallery had a lot of Ghanaian art and other African art. We learned about the evolution of African art and about how its all based on the aesthetics and functionality of it - like fabric if better when used for wearing a dress not as a wall-hanging. There seemed to be a lot of western influence on some of the more modern art, but it was all very unique at the same time. We could not take pictures but there was quite a variety - very realistic paintings and other abstract. There were a lot of mancala boards too - some shaped like alligators, others very traditional looking. Here are a few pictures - it took like an hour for these to go up, so um... these'll be the only ones for now. But the first one is of the Memorial, the next one is a mancala board, then the last is of a sign at the memorial that I really loved.
























Today we went to yet ANOTHER orientation at U Ghana. It was five hours long. And pretty informative and at times HILARIOUS. we got more instruction on how to avoid diseases, such as cholera. "When you have cholera, stools are coming uncontrollably" (said in a very Ghanaian accent) - my friend Andrea and I were in the front row when the guy said this and we literally almost peed our pants we were laughing so hard. And on top of that, while we were drinking cans of soda, he advised us to wipe off the top of the soda can because when the cans are in storage, "rats urinate on the cans" and you could drink the rat urine.

From there, we went to a marketplace. Holy cow, soooo many sights, sounds, colors, smells, .... I'll try to post pictures soon but it was just so crazy. Kaneshi marketplace: roasting pig on the sidewalk, ghanaian children running around, women selling dead, smelly! fish on their heads, beautiful fabrics, so many fresh fruits and vegetables, and just wow. It was something else. I still can't really believe I'm here. The apartment we live in is so nice that it all seems so unreal when we see what we see during the day and come back to this at night. It's like huts next door to mansions - such a monetary gap. Of course, I took a lot of pictures. In fact, one picture actually got me in trouble! We've been told that it's okay to take pictures of huge groups of people without having to ask for permission, but when it's like just a few people, it's polite to ask if you can take their picture. So today at the marketplace, I took a picture of literally the WHOLE market from a staircase, and a man started yelling at me telling me I was rude for not asking permission, blah blah blah. When I asked our Ghanaian guide if what I did was rude by their standards she said absolutely not and that the guy was probably startled because the flash went off and he probably thought I was taking it of him only. I told him I was sorry but that was about all I could do and then we left the market and everyone else was SUPER friendly. I also bought some fabric at the marketplace so I can take it to a dressmaker to get a dress made sometime this week. It's only 5 Ghana Cedi (pronounced kind of like c.d. but like see-dee) to get a dress made here (plus the 8 Cedi I spent on the fabric)!! And they are so beautiful! While we were waiting to leave the marketplace on our very touristy African safari bus (though there are no safaris in Accra), like ten beautiful Ghanaian children jumped on the bus and were playing with us and dancing and just so, so full of life. Another billion pictures were taken. We then went to another art market, which I was in love with but I had no money, so I wasn't able to get anything. Maybe next time!

Still hot as heck here... and lucky us, February and March are supposed to be the hottest months here. Here we go...

Twi lesson: Medasse = Thank you!

love love