So spring break was absolutely incredible. Yeah....
Tuesday night, my first night back in Ghana, at dinner with the group, just as we were about to finish dinner, Tanesha stood up to address everyone and ask us if after being back from spring break we were happy to be back in Ghana or if we were ready to go home. It was so obvious that she was asking the group this because the table she was sitting at had a few girls that absolutely despise being in Ghana. It’s so sad and unfortunate because I really love it here. I happened to be sitting with a bunch of people who LOVE it here so that was good. But people were straight up saying that if they had the chance, they’d go home yesterday. When I was on spring break, I loved talking about Ghana with everyone and telling them about my new temporary home. I started to miss it so much so I was so happy to be back so hearing that people were so unhappy to be back made me sad. I just realized that you have to want to be happy where you are and if you’re not in that mindset, you’ll be just as happy or unhappy as you want to be – and for these girls, I think they’ve made up their minds to be unhappy here and don’t want to give Ghana another chance. I just wanted to say we still have two more months here, make the most of it! You’re going to regret it so much if you don’t. And thankfully little Gaby did just that. I don’t think the people who dislike it here were even listening but whatever. We all (the happy ones) aren’t going to let the downers bring us down, because we’re having so much fun and really enjoying it here. I actually bought a little notebook the other day to start writing all the things I’m going to miss about Ghana… even the annoying stuff haha, just because.
Wednesday, we had a very interesting photo class with a female Ghanaian photojournalist named Mardey who talked about how she’s trying to expose the slums of Ghana to show the government how things are getting better, but they’re still not good. Then we had recitation with none other than wonderful Auntie Busia, my new favorite person. She is so interesting. First of all, I had no idea she was so important in Ghanaian history… rather her father. I read the readings on the plane home from spring break and was just in awe of her writing. She gave us a history timeline of Ghana that she wrote, an essay about photography that she wrote, and a few other readings dealing with Kwame Nkrumah and other things from Ghana’s history. From the readings and from simply being in Ghana, I was getting mixed impressions of what people thought of Kwame Nkrumah. I also picked up from the readings that her father was the opposing party’s (United Party) party leader against Kwame Nkrumah. So, in class, when we first got there, Auntie Busia asked if anyone had any questions… my question for her was, “What do people actually think about Kwame Nkrumah? Is he good or bad?” Her answer to me basically took up 75 percent of the class. I had no idea how complicated the answer would be. And really, I’m not going to be able to do the answer justice that she gave me. But basically, to some he’s a hero, and to some, he’s a villain. She said, “Kwame Nkrumah is what is both wonderful and terrible about charismatic leadership.” Who talks like this? She’s just so well spoken and educated and incredible. She said I’d never get the same answer from two people about what they think of Nkrumah. She explained that the reason that her father was so important in the development of the country was because he “united all the fragmented all the opposition parties.” She said there are so many reasons why she should hate Nkrumah, but she still respected that he brought the country freedom, although he was directly and indirectly involved in the deaths of The Big Six. She said that what Kwame Nkrumah was doing was defining what Ghana is, just like our founding fathers did for the USA – “what I say is who we are” – Kwame Nkrumah. She talked about how there is no “rhyme or reason” why the United States should work. We all come from different backgrounds, countries, etc. but because of our founding fathers and the foundation they set, our country works. And because of this, she says she really understands the need for something like the Pledge of Allegiance. She explained how when in Ghana, Ghanaians refer to themselves as being from their specific region, but when abroad they are all simply Ghanaians. We also discussed how there are certain natural boundaries within Africa, like Lake Volta, but then the Europeans came in and arbitrarily divided the countries how they wanted to. They didn’t pay attention to the history or cultures that reside in these places, but rather just did what they wanted. She explained that this is why there are Ewes in both Ghana and in Togo, when really they should probably all be one nationality. This is about all I (/Tina) wrote down from the class, because Auntie Busia was literally talking TO ME the whole class and I didn’t want to be rude and start writing notes during her lecture. I have so much respect for this lady and I’m still so thankful that I’m in this recitation course. Sorry that was so scatterbrained and in general probably meant nothing to all of you unless you’ve read up on your Ghana history.
Thursday, I went to class as usual, then after class, Mike, Tina, and I went to La Enobal School, where Tina teaches, to help with the after school program that Gaby set up. Gaby wanted to implement the arts for these kids because all they are exposed to in class are subjects that are strictly academic. It’s a really great program and even after the one time that I helped, I felt so good about what I was doing, more so than I ever did while at AACT (which, by the way, I’m going to talk to the director and tell her I am not going to go back). For our after school program, Gaby told us to do something with music. So Mike brought his guitar and we decided that we’d sing them one American song, have them sing us a Ghanaian song, and then they’d write their own song and sing it for the group. We were kind of worried that they wouldn’t really go along with it, but these kids were so into it. It was so wonderful. We sang “Ring of Fire” by Johnny Cash for the kids, they sang a song for us, and then we got them into small groups to write a song. They were all so good! Three out of the four groups wrote about something religious, one of the groups rapped in Ga (another one of the traditional languages here), one of them sang about how they only wanted love from their family, not money, cars, or shoes, and one of them wrote a gospel song. When it was time to perform, they were all racing to go first. They all did so well and everyone was so into it. It was so great. On our way home we talked about how if you asked a bunch of American sixth to seventh graders to do what they did, they’d never do it because they’d be so self-conscious, unless it was all the theatre-ish kids… I mean, I know I probably wouldn’t have done it. Basically, I had a really good time and I’m going to go as much as I can.
Friday, Mallory, Gaby and I went to Makola market to buy fabrics and gifts for our friends at home. We had so much fun. Most of the women at the market are so outgoing and fun and love to bargain with us. I bought a bunch of fabric, some beads, and some notebooks that I’d been looking for for a while. It was so nice, a bunch of the ladies in the market recognized me becase of my birthmark. They said, "Hey! You were here a couple months ago" and when I asked them how they remember, they'd point next to their eye. The best part of the afternoon was Mallory’s lesson to one of the lady’s we bought batik from. Initially, Mallory asked the woman if since she was buying a lot if she’d give her a discounted price. After Mallory had literally picked out like 6 fabrics and had her cut different amounts of each, the woman gave her a total of 35 Ghana Cedi… precisely the amount that it was worth. So Mallory tried to go down to 25 and she was having nothing of it. Mallory just kept saying, “You’re not even bargaining with me”… “You told me you’d lower the price”… and as we were leaving (Mallory ended up paying the 35 Cedi), she told her never to agree to lower the price if she wasn’t going to because it was rude and not good saleswomaning…basically. It was so funny. Hopefully she learned her lesson. On the tro tro ride home, the whole tro tro was enjoying our obruniness and basically laughing at us the whole time. It was so funny. They loved that we knew a little Twi and that we knew a little about Ghana. The guy sitting next to Mallory gave each of us a handwritten note saying, “Hi my name is Danny, I want to be your friend. This is my number …. And my email”. We asked him why he didn’t just talk to us and he said he didn’t want to interrupt which was nice, but how funny is that? I almost felt like he was one of those deaf people who pass out notes asking if I’d like to buy their stickers or candy… but really he was just trying to be polite. Men are so forward here it’s quite funny.
Some recent texts from my new Ghanaian male friends:
“A shining angel stands beside ur silky bed, pouring flowers on u, calling ur nice name n wishing u gud9t.” - From George
If someone could please interpret this, I’d be ever so thankful.
“I’m fine n u. I jux wanted to know if u were safe n back in Ghana. I hope u enjoyin ur stay here n I hop 2 see u again.Greetings 2 ur all.U luk pretty in my eyes.” - From Philip
So it seemed normal… until the end.
Andrea also had some incredibly funny texts… I’ll post those sometime…..
Anyway, that night we attended a funeral for a man we know nothing about… not even his name really. It was pretty bizarre. All we knew was that we should wear white, not black and red like most funerals, because he died over the age of 80. That he was a famous Ghanaian musician. That it was going from 6pm to 6am. And that it was at the State House. John Collins, our African Popular Music professor, told us about it yesterday during class. He told us there would be tons of people there and that there would be lots of music, dancing, and fun. It sounded like a party. Basically everyone in NYU in Ghana was going to attend. Seven of us left a little earlier than the rest to see what it was all about. Gaby, Tina, Mallory, Marlee, Jackie, Caroline, and I all dressed in our whites/pale yellows and grabbed a taxi for the State House. We asked Debbie and Chris (our CRAs) if they knew anything of this… they didn’t. We asked the taxi driver if he’d heard of it. Nope. Basically, we all looked quite silly in our all whites. (Kind of like we were going to Pi Phi Initiation… I just missed it by a few weeks and a continent away.) We got to the venue. Hundreds of chairs set up. Red and black awnings… we got worried that maybe we were inappropriately dressed. But then we saw a bunch of people in white attire so we knew we were in the right place. Just about right when we got there, a dancing group started. They were all dancing in front of this wax figure of the musician… or so we thought. The music and dancing was so upbeat, and they were all paying their respect to the dead. (We still didn’t really know his name at this point.) Some people even got pictures in front of it! After this dance was over, we saw Professor John Collins and asked him about the service. He said he was about to go on stage with his son and that the wax figure that was displayed in front was in fact Guy Warren (Kofi Ghanaba). Guy Warren was dressed in this white, iridescent traditional Ghanaian outfit and looked like he was playing drums. It was actually quite eerie. I’ve never seen a dead body… I don’t think. So Guy Warren was my first. Professor John Collins went on stage and I really enjoyed his music. Then after him came some other interesting musicians/dancers – playing Fur Elise in a very Mario Kart/Nokia ring tone type fashion, and interpretive dance to go along. We decided to go because the funeral wasn’t exactly what we had expected and we had How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days waiting for us at home. As we were leaving, we saw Christa, the director of the NYU in Ghana program, who told us a little bit about Guy. She said that his family was actually very upset about the funeral, especially having his body displayed, because they said Guy was a very shy man when all was said and done and that he would not have appreciated the way his death was dealt with. This was interesting to hear, and kind of sad, because here we are, knowing really nothing about this guy, and we’re attending a funeral that he probably wouldn’t have wanted us at. Oh well… it was an interesting experience and we got to hang out with a dead guy (no pun intended).
**Note: We just found out that Guy Warren actually died in December. So his body has been hanging out for over three months.
Saturday, Leah and I wanted to work on our documentary-making project. But yet again, the key to the editing room was nowhere to be found. So… we have to do the whole FESPACO project on Monday. After hanging out in the Academic Center for a while looking up classes to register for for my first semester of senior year, bahumbug… we made some yummy hummus and then headed off for the Togo vs Cameroon World Cup Qualifier game. We were told so many different times that the game was possibly starting at. We got to the stadium around 3:30 and had the taxi drop us at the ticketing office. INSANITY ENSUED. There were soooo many people outside of the ticket office. And people were basically moshing and pushing us around and everyone was trying to get to the front of the line. People reaching in our pockets, touching our legs, just craziness. Some guy kept rubbing Mallory’s legs. It was so weird. At one point, this guy seemed to be asking Mallory if he could pass by her so she moved out of the way and nodded, but really he was asking her for her water bottle… upon realizing this, she immediately exclaimed, “Oh, no this is my water bottle.” It was pretty funny. After waiting a pretty long time in the 3 Cedi line… we saw a VIP 10 Cedi line. We gave all of our money to Eric to get tickets. He was gripping our money in his hands so tight it looked like he was going to puncture his palms with his nails. We waited, and waited. Eric came back with no tickets. So that was a no go. We could hear the game starting. We heard the first goal scored. There was no way we were going to not get into this game. Mike and Danny tried bribing the police officers. People tried to knock down huge iron doors. We tried pushing our way in, until the police officer brought out a taser gun… then we were out of there. Tried buying from a scalper outside, he didn’t have enough for all of us. Then finally we found a door that was open with not too many people outside. Everyone paid off the police officer… and for some reason, I got in for free, so did Mallory. Finally we were in. It was half time, but it was so incredible to finally get inside the stadium. The energy in there was crazy! Everyone was decked out in yellow, green, and red… those are both Togo and Cameroon’s colors (and Ghana’s! They won their game on Sunday too! Yay!). We walked around for a while until we found seats half way up midfield. Perfect seats. Right in the middle of all the Togolese craziness! We were all rooting for Togo, since they are our neighbors, and most of us have been there (I’m planning to go in a couple of weekends). When we got to the game it was already 1 – 0 Togo winning. When I looked it up online Cameroon was predicted to win 2 – 0. So I was expecting someone to score… actually hoping someone would, from either time. But unfortunately, no one scored while we were there. The game ended and the Togolese were SO EXCITED. It was so cute. They were squirting their sashay waters as if they were champagne bottles and screaming and dancing and hugging us and just so funny. I got some great videos on my little camera of these people – they were hilarious. Oh, and we were a total tourist attractions. Everyone wanted a picture with us. They all wanted our phone numbers too. I feel kind of bad, except not at all, but I gave like three people a wrong number because well I don’t know them. One of them was spelling my name in his phone – Trefen. We left the game got some drinks, then went home, help pound some fufu and eat groundnut soup with fufu, and watched a movie. What a fun day! Oh and did I mention that there was a little person completely covered in red, yellow, and green body paint. What a sight.
Since nothing too exciting since then besides writing my paper for Abnormal Psychology on eating disorders and working on our FESPACO documentary.. some thought provoking reading: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/28/pitts.black.america/index.html
Oh, and spring break update to come soon. That’ll probably be even longer. Geez, I better get writing.
Love love love love love.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
beeeee our guest!
This was an email to Lizzie and Allie from Tuesday but it describes my day: I was up at 5 to get the video camera for my documentary making class from the Academic Center where the cameras are kept. From there we went to Kokrobite where our project is. We're doing our documentary on this NGO that's based in Kokrobite, a beach town about 45 minutes from here. The NGO was started by an African-American woman who came to Ghana to help people through art. She built a school on the rocky beach and it was SO BEAUTIFUL. Literally one of the most stunning places I've ever been to. I feel like I say that a lot, but I was in serious awe of these school grounds. It was so nice to see how much work she put into this haven for learning the arts. To start off, she told us a little about herself, since this was our first time meeting her. She told us about why she started the program and about some of the kids, then we got a tour from Kofi. During the tour, we saw the glass bead making station, a brick making station, the sewing area where they make clothes and bags out of recyclables (oh yeah, everything the kids use in their artwork is sustainable and recyclable - so that's a plus!), and just around the place in general. After the tour, Renee (the lady I've been talking about) again talked to us more. I was taping at this point and seriously, she's a very very interesting woman and I taped her for about 45 minutes!! She's had a very wonderful life and she's so insightful, I think I'll learn a lot from her. After that, she had tea and bread for us. This tea was incredible! It was just lemongrass that she boiled but it was oh so delicious - you know how I loooove my tea. We also talked with this lady Yuko, a Japanese woman living in Ghana too. She told us she's going to make us homemade sushi soon and teach us how! Ah I'm so excited. I've missed sushi soooo much! After we were done at the Kokrobite school, Renee's driver took us home - I know, how posh haha. It's weird most people here have drivers because getting your driver's license is really difficult. We had to stop at Yuko's home first to drop her off... and she invited us in! She gave us like a five course snack that was so so good. Everyone here is just so hospitable. And we're really excited to do our documentary on Renee and the Kokrobite Institute! So, all in all, today was very fun! Oh and I'm really happy because I thought I got my phone stolen, but one of the girls I volunteer with actually had it so I got it back!
Wednesday, for my photography class, we went to the Jamestown Castle/Prison. It used to be a slave castle, but then turned into a prison, but then just last January (2008), it was turned into a 'museum'... we got to walk through it and see the old cells. It was pretty eerie. Their toothbrushes were still there, there were photos and magazine clippings up on the walls, old shoes, and lots of dust. It used to be a slave castle, so, just like Elmina castle, many people were tortured, held, and sent off to their slave life from here. These Rainbows that I've been wearing everyday while I've been here have walked on some very intense grounds that have been through a lot. Its weird to think about...
Then later on Wednesday, we had recitation. Really I'm not sure why I'm in recitation, because I don't need to have four credits for my University of Legon class - that's an NYU thing, not an LMU thing, but I'm so happy and thankful I am. Two weeks ago we watched Traces of the Trade. After we watched it, I seriously just wanted to go to my room and cry until I stopped crying. I don't know if it hit me so much because I'm here in Ghana where much of slave trading went down, but I would highly recommend this film to everyone. It was about this woman whose grandmother traced their roots back to however long ago - she found out that her family was descended from the biggest, most powerful, and prosperous slave trading family company in the United States, the DeWolf family. It was a really moving story about how she recruited 9 of her family members to go on a journey with her to trace their ancestors past and the past of the slaves. They went from Rhode Island (where most the slave trafficking occurred) to Ghana (to the slave castle that I visited) to Cuba and back to Rhode Island. And oh geez, it was just so good. It was so frustrating though because right after we watched the film, we went right to dinner, without any discussion on the film. Andrea and I just sat. Expressionless. And didn't really want to be at dinner with all 40 people from our group. Half of the group didn't see the film so they weren't affected at all, then some of the people who did see the film, just didn't seem moved at all. So going to recitation this week was so helpful and important for all of us. We talked about how the film was so hard to see and how it really did immobilize us for quite some time. After seeing it, you just want to know, what can I do now? But what is the first step to reconciling this horrible, horrible past? Acknowledgment, is the consensus we came to. That's the first step and then from there, there will come some good hopefully. It was just so hard to watch the film because just because of my mere skin color, I felt so terrible for all that had happened.. and I don't even know if my family was related to the slave trade directly, but everyone, and literally everyone - even if you had sugar in your tea, prospered or gained from the slave trade. I started wondering what I would've done if I had lived in the time of slavery. I feel like human beings are human beings no matter their skin color and I sincerely hope that I would've done something to stop it, or at least not have participated in it. But even that is hard to say, because even today there are forms of slavery or at least human rights are being violated. For example, every time I buy something from Forever 21, I have to wonder, at whose expense am I getting this very cute, somewhat nice piece of clothing for very cheap at? But then we discussed how there is a difference between owning Forever 21 clothes and actually having shares in the company and running it the way it is run. It just makes you wonder. We also talked about how there is so little education on slavery/African history in US schools. We all know that there was slavery and that it was abolished when Abraham Lincoln made the Emancipation Proclamation, but really... we don't know anything! Acknowledgment and education. That is where we can start. Oh and that brings up another very interesting point about wealth and the slave trade. From those 9 relatives who went on the trip, 8 of them went to Ivy Leagues and have a ton of money. One of them went to University of Oregon, his family doesn't have a lot of money. Then when they looked at their family roots, Tom, the guy who went to U of Oregon, was the ONLY one who descended from a DeWolf who wasn't directly involved in the slave trade. The ONLY one. All the other DeWolf descendants (i.e. the rich, Ivy League ones) descended directly from DeWolfs who had their hands in the slave trade. Interesting.. and very telling! Tom also wrote a book that we read an excerpt from called "Inheriting the Trade"... also very moving and interesting.
So basically, just watch/read one of those. ...transition to happy stuff.
Last night, Gaby, Tina, Mallory, Mallory’s mom and I went to the production of Beauty and the Beast at the University of Ghana, Legon. A couple of weeks ago, I went with Leah and Andrea to see the Vagina Monologues, which was really good – so I was really excited to see Beauty and the Beast. I was looking forward to seeing how they would make Beauty and the Beast with a Ghanaian twist, because that was one of my favorite parts of the Vagina Monologues. In Vagina Monologues, there is one part where they are all saying different words for ‘vagina’ and they added all the local languages, like Twi, Ga, and Asante, and how they say vagina and the audience went CRAZY because they thought it was so funny. And they also added some other Ghanaian aspects to it. So going into Beauty and the Beast I knew they’d add at least a little bit of Ghanaian culture. And they sure did. During the scene where Belle is walking through town, and everyone is singing “Belle,” instead of having people selling stuff like they would in France, they had women carrying the goods on their heads and they had little street vendors like you’d see on the side of the street in Ghana. They also used Ghanaian dance in so many of the scenes… even a little of Soulja Boy was incorporated into the Be Our Guest scene, so hilarious. One of the best aspects of seeing a play at Legon is the ‘participation’ of the audience. People get extremely into the play. They yell at the actors and when Belle and Beast were about to kiss they’d say stuff like, “JUST KISS HER!” And then there were about 20 guys in the back dancing and high fiving and just sooooo excited. I dont know if they were really that into the play or just being silly, but it was so funny. Also, they may have been hooting and Belle and Beast because they had a seriously intense on stage kiss, they weren't joking around. Oh baby baby.
Well, today, I'm just hanging out, packing for South Africa and Namibia (apparently I've been told this is a 'trendy' trip?), and getting very excited! I'll actually have to wear jeans I think.... and maybe a sweatshirt? Brr... We have a ton of stuff planned - kayaking to see Penguins, wine lands tours, sandboarding in the sand dunes in Namibia, hanging out at the beach, and a Soussuvlei dunes and Swakopmund safari. I just put a new memory card in my camera, so that means probably too many pictures I'll take.
Other stuff that has been keeping me busy and away from my blog: learning how to make Kente cloth... learning how to play the televi (these little shakers, I'll put up a picture or something sometime), African maracas, drums, and bell, studying for my African Popular Music midterm, which I think I did okay on, ...and um hanging out with friends!
I'll have so much to update on after my trip! ....be back 23 March 2009.
love love love peace!
Oh also, some pictures!
Homestay pictures (even though I haven't written about it...)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2113973&id=10808707&l=3b326
Green Turtle Lodge
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2114081&id=10808707&l=a5f5e
Wednesday, for my photography class, we went to the Jamestown Castle/Prison. It used to be a slave castle, but then turned into a prison, but then just last January (2008), it was turned into a 'museum'... we got to walk through it and see the old cells. It was pretty eerie. Their toothbrushes were still there, there were photos and magazine clippings up on the walls, old shoes, and lots of dust. It used to be a slave castle, so, just like Elmina castle, many people were tortured, held, and sent off to their slave life from here. These Rainbows that I've been wearing everyday while I've been here have walked on some very intense grounds that have been through a lot. Its weird to think about...
Then later on Wednesday, we had recitation. Really I'm not sure why I'm in recitation, because I don't need to have four credits for my University of Legon class - that's an NYU thing, not an LMU thing, but I'm so happy and thankful I am. Two weeks ago we watched Traces of the Trade. After we watched it, I seriously just wanted to go to my room and cry until I stopped crying. I don't know if it hit me so much because I'm here in Ghana where much of slave trading went down, but I would highly recommend this film to everyone. It was about this woman whose grandmother traced their roots back to however long ago - she found out that her family was descended from the biggest, most powerful, and prosperous slave trading family company in the United States, the DeWolf family. It was a really moving story about how she recruited 9 of her family members to go on a journey with her to trace their ancestors past and the past of the slaves. They went from Rhode Island (where most the slave trafficking occurred) to Ghana (to the slave castle that I visited) to Cuba and back to Rhode Island. And oh geez, it was just so good. It was so frustrating though because right after we watched the film, we went right to dinner, without any discussion on the film. Andrea and I just sat. Expressionless. And didn't really want to be at dinner with all 40 people from our group. Half of the group didn't see the film so they weren't affected at all, then some of the people who did see the film, just didn't seem moved at all. So going to recitation this week was so helpful and important for all of us. We talked about how the film was so hard to see and how it really did immobilize us for quite some time. After seeing it, you just want to know, what can I do now? But what is the first step to reconciling this horrible, horrible past? Acknowledgment, is the consensus we came to. That's the first step and then from there, there will come some good hopefully. It was just so hard to watch the film because just because of my mere skin color, I felt so terrible for all that had happened.. and I don't even know if my family was related to the slave trade directly, but everyone, and literally everyone - even if you had sugar in your tea, prospered or gained from the slave trade. I started wondering what I would've done if I had lived in the time of slavery. I feel like human beings are human beings no matter their skin color and I sincerely hope that I would've done something to stop it, or at least not have participated in it. But even that is hard to say, because even today there are forms of slavery or at least human rights are being violated. For example, every time I buy something from Forever 21, I have to wonder, at whose expense am I getting this very cute, somewhat nice piece of clothing for very cheap at? But then we discussed how there is a difference between owning Forever 21 clothes and actually having shares in the company and running it the way it is run. It just makes you wonder. We also talked about how there is so little education on slavery/African history in US schools. We all know that there was slavery and that it was abolished when Abraham Lincoln made the Emancipation Proclamation, but really... we don't know anything! Acknowledgment and education. That is where we can start. Oh and that brings up another very interesting point about wealth and the slave trade. From those 9 relatives who went on the trip, 8 of them went to Ivy Leagues and have a ton of money. One of them went to University of Oregon, his family doesn't have a lot of money. Then when they looked at their family roots, Tom, the guy who went to U of Oregon, was the ONLY one who descended from a DeWolf who wasn't directly involved in the slave trade. The ONLY one. All the other DeWolf descendants (i.e. the rich, Ivy League ones) descended directly from DeWolfs who had their hands in the slave trade. Interesting.. and very telling! Tom also wrote a book that we read an excerpt from called "Inheriting the Trade"... also very moving and interesting.
So basically, just watch/read one of those. ...transition to happy stuff.
Last night, Gaby, Tina, Mallory, Mallory’s mom and I went to the production of Beauty and the Beast at the University of Ghana, Legon. A couple of weeks ago, I went with Leah and Andrea to see the Vagina Monologues, which was really good – so I was really excited to see Beauty and the Beast. I was looking forward to seeing how they would make Beauty and the Beast with a Ghanaian twist, because that was one of my favorite parts of the Vagina Monologues. In Vagina Monologues, there is one part where they are all saying different words for ‘vagina’ and they added all the local languages, like Twi, Ga, and Asante, and how they say vagina and the audience went CRAZY because they thought it was so funny. And they also added some other Ghanaian aspects to it. So going into Beauty and the Beast I knew they’d add at least a little bit of Ghanaian culture. And they sure did. During the scene where Belle is walking through town, and everyone is singing “Belle,” instead of having people selling stuff like they would in France, they had women carrying the goods on their heads and they had little street vendors like you’d see on the side of the street in Ghana. They also used Ghanaian dance in so many of the scenes… even a little of Soulja Boy was incorporated into the Be Our Guest scene, so hilarious. One of the best aspects of seeing a play at Legon is the ‘participation’ of the audience. People get extremely into the play. They yell at the actors and when Belle and Beast were about to kiss they’d say stuff like, “JUST KISS HER!” And then there were about 20 guys in the back dancing and high fiving and just sooooo excited. I dont know if they were really that into the play or just being silly, but it was so funny. Also, they may have been hooting and Belle and Beast because they had a seriously intense on stage kiss, they weren't joking around. Oh baby baby.
Well, today, I'm just hanging out, packing for South Africa and Namibia (apparently I've been told this is a 'trendy' trip?), and getting very excited! I'll actually have to wear jeans I think.... and maybe a sweatshirt? Brr... We have a ton of stuff planned - kayaking to see Penguins, wine lands tours, sandboarding in the sand dunes in Namibia, hanging out at the beach, and a Soussuvlei dunes and Swakopmund safari. I just put a new memory card in my camera, so that means probably too many pictures I'll take.
Other stuff that has been keeping me busy and away from my blog: learning how to make Kente cloth... learning how to play the televi (these little shakers, I'll put up a picture or something sometime), African maracas, drums, and bell, studying for my African Popular Music midterm, which I think I did okay on, ...and um hanging out with friends!
I'll have so much to update on after my trip! ....be back 23 March 2009.
love love love peace!
Oh also, some pictures!
Homestay pictures (even though I haven't written about it...)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2113973&id=10808707&l=3b326
Green Turtle Lodge
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2114081&id=10808707&l=a5f5e
Monday, March 9, 2009
BURKINA FASO - Country of Honest Men
Driving through Ghana, whether on long road trips or just in a short ride on the tro tro is just so magnificent. Unlike in American, where everyone is indoors in the A/C, people live their lives on their streets. Every time I’m in car and drive by villages or little markets, I feel like I get a peek into these peoples’ lives. People live and actually live outdoors. I get to see children dancing, boys playing soccer, women cooking, men doing their crafts, their hanging laundry… essentially, their everyday life. It’s just so unbelievable. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it. Just seeing the happy babies and the working adults just makes me so happy every time I see it. So driving to Burkina Faso, although I was sleeping for about seventy five percent of the car trip, I got to see so much of people’s lives.
Each way, the trip was twenty hours total. Fifteen hours to Bolgatanga, a city in northern Ghana, then five hours the next day to cross the border to get to Ouagadougou (waga-doo-goo). The trip was mostly all of us sleeping, a little bit of filming by our TA Yao for his documentary on our trip to FESPACO (mostly while we were sleepy or just groggy because of lack of sleep or just waking from sleep), and occasionally stopping for food. The soundtrack for our trip: Christian Pop, Bob Marley, and Celine Dion. Thank you Immanuel and George (our drivers).
The drive up through Ghana was so gorgeous. Just seeing the change in scenery from dense rainforest close to Accra and the coast, but as we moved north, it got drier and drier and we saw more desert. The humidity literally disappears and all the trees are gone. I don’t know if its less humid because there are fewer trees or if there are fewer trees because its less humid, but either way – as we went north, there were fewer trees and it was less humid. There was a lot of wildlife too. No.. no elephants or tigers or anything. Mostly livestock. Lots of cows, pigs, goats – mostly animals that the families have to live off of. The architecture too changed as we got more north. In the north, it has much more of an Islamic influence and a lot of the architecture revealed that. I’m not really sure how to explain how except for the architecture of the mosques was so beautiful. And a lot of the houses were circular and painted with really cool designs. We could also tell the difference because of the way of transportation. Many more people ride bikes and motos in Burkina – it’s so cute, and way more eco-friendly.
Driving into Ouaga was captivating. I loved it. We saw hundreds of people on bikes and motos. Many of which were beautiful Burkinabe (Burkina-bay) women fully clothed in their traditional fabrics, carrying pounds of goods on their heads, with babies wrapped to their backs. African women, from what I can tell from Ghana and Burkina, are SO coordinated and postured, its beautiful. It was also SO dry. It was just like home. Being in a desert was just what I needed. I’ve been so suffocated by the humidity here in Ghana, and being in Burkina was heavenly. Everything in Burkina was just so clean too. In Ghana there is a lot of trash (and no I’m not trash talking it, its just a reality), but Burkina, and I don’t know if it was just for FESPACO or what, but it was SO clean. The food in Ouaga was so delicious also. We had baguettes for almost every meal with eggs or avocados and this wonderful spicy pepper stuff that I ended buying a bottle of because it was so so good. Ouaga also had STRAWBERRIES! Strawberries in Ghana can cost around 20 cedi for a little crate, whereas in Burkina its 1000 CFA (Francophone West African money) for a kilo of strawberries. Yeah – get our your conversion chart because that means nothing to me either. It was a lot of strawberries though and they were so ripe and so delicious. One of my only complaints about Burkina was… my BIGGEST PET PEAVE EVER. Smoking. Being a Francophone country, most of the country smoked. And they didn’t just smoke, they literally had cigarettes in their mouths most of the time and it just killed me. But that was its only flaw. I loved Ouaga – it was so relaxing, even though a huge film festival was ensuing and everyone was quite nice… as far as I was concerned, not knowing French, almost at all.
Not speaking French was quite frustrating for me. I really understand now how difficult it is for people who come to the US or really anywhere not knowing a language. Its hard to find your way around. It hard to know what anything is. Its hard to order food. Its hard to shop. Its hard to have any sort of relationship with the people. Its just plain hard. Thank goodness Andrea and Katja had taken French in high school because without them I literally think I wouldn’t have been able to do anything. Andrea helped me get my new ring and my FESPACO shirt for a good price. Really Andrea just helped me with everything. I was so thankful for Andrea and Katja on this trip and realized how essential it is to be with a French speaker if I go to Togo, another Francophone country neighboring Ghana.
Okay so the reason I was in Burkina Faso: FESPACO! It’s the Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou – guess that acronym is FESPACO is French? So being in a Francophone country means - most of the films are going to be in French. This was a problem for me because I don’t speak French. Even though that was a little frustrating, I did see a few great movies in the short time we were at FESPACO. I saw a really great short documentary on the public transportation in Algeria – it was about the corruption in the system and how there are children drivers/operators and it was just really good – AND IN ENGLISH! I saw another South African film which was in… English some of it and then in Afrikaans – with all French subtitles. So I could half understand that film, what I did see and understand I liked though. Unfortunately the name is escaping me right now. Most of the other films, being in French, I slept through. I guess that’s not too surprising because that’s what I do in most movies haha. The best movie though was Parine Jaddo’s. Parine is my documenting professor and her movie was in the festival. It was so good and I was so proud of her! It was called Rasta’s Paradise and it was all about the Rastafarian culture in Ethiopia where Rasta life is huge. She interviewed so many Rastas about their life, their views, their habits, and showed a really in depth and sincere side of Rastafarian culture. I love Parine. She is so amazing, so nice, and has our best interest always in mind. She’s an awesome professor.
Our last day in Ouaga, we filmed a lot of our group documentaries on FESPACO. We interviewed some locals, some filmmakers, some other NYU students, and just the festival in general. Hopefully we’ll be able to make something wonderful from our footage.. and if not, the experience was still well worth the forty hours of travel.
Twice in one day I know. I’m going to try to make this a routine. Like I take malarone everyday, I’ll try to update every….more. I still have to talk about my homestay, learning to play some traditional Ghanaian instruments, and how to make Kente cloth, a traditional Ghanaian fabric! And everything else going on. I wish I didn’t procrastinate always.
more love and peace because there’s never too much!
.......................................................................................
For you Daddy... just a taste =)
Out of order assortment of pictures from FESPACO and Green Turtle
FESPACO!
See what I mean? She has a child strapped to her back, you just can't see it
You know... we're filmmakers now.
Beautiful architecture of Ouagadougou
VIPs... not really.
Our class after Parine (our professor's) documentary was shown at FESPACO - "Rasta's Paradise"
My feet after a day in dusty dusty Ouaga
Fespaco opening ceremonies
HEY! There are even Suns fans in Burkina... yet another reason why I love Burkina
Yep. Lots of bikes.
Driving through the Northern part of Ghana
The southern part of Ghana - obviously more green
Crossing the border with our Documentary making class - Danny, Caroline, Marlee, Amanda, Katja, me, Yao, Leah, and Laurene
Horses lining up before the FESPACO opening ceremonies
Yao got did with a Malian head wrap
The 'green' self-composting toilet woo hoo!
Me before I got taken down by those monster waves at Green Turtle
This was taken when it was pitch black - long shutter speed at Green Turtle Lodge
Each way, the trip was twenty hours total. Fifteen hours to Bolgatanga, a city in northern Ghana, then five hours the next day to cross the border to get to Ouagadougou (waga-doo-goo). The trip was mostly all of us sleeping, a little bit of filming by our TA Yao for his documentary on our trip to FESPACO (mostly while we were sleepy or just groggy because of lack of sleep or just waking from sleep), and occasionally stopping for food. The soundtrack for our trip: Christian Pop, Bob Marley, and Celine Dion. Thank you Immanuel and George (our drivers).
The drive up through Ghana was so gorgeous. Just seeing the change in scenery from dense rainforest close to Accra and the coast, but as we moved north, it got drier and drier and we saw more desert. The humidity literally disappears and all the trees are gone. I don’t know if its less humid because there are fewer trees or if there are fewer trees because its less humid, but either way – as we went north, there were fewer trees and it was less humid. There was a lot of wildlife too. No.. no elephants or tigers or anything. Mostly livestock. Lots of cows, pigs, goats – mostly animals that the families have to live off of. The architecture too changed as we got more north. In the north, it has much more of an Islamic influence and a lot of the architecture revealed that. I’m not really sure how to explain how except for the architecture of the mosques was so beautiful. And a lot of the houses were circular and painted with really cool designs. We could also tell the difference because of the way of transportation. Many more people ride bikes and motos in Burkina – it’s so cute, and way more eco-friendly.
Driving into Ouaga was captivating. I loved it. We saw hundreds of people on bikes and motos. Many of which were beautiful Burkinabe (Burkina-bay) women fully clothed in their traditional fabrics, carrying pounds of goods on their heads, with babies wrapped to their backs. African women, from what I can tell from Ghana and Burkina, are SO coordinated and postured, its beautiful. It was also SO dry. It was just like home. Being in a desert was just what I needed. I’ve been so suffocated by the humidity here in Ghana, and being in Burkina was heavenly. Everything in Burkina was just so clean too. In Ghana there is a lot of trash (and no I’m not trash talking it, its just a reality), but Burkina, and I don’t know if it was just for FESPACO or what, but it was SO clean. The food in Ouaga was so delicious also. We had baguettes for almost every meal with eggs or avocados and this wonderful spicy pepper stuff that I ended buying a bottle of because it was so so good. Ouaga also had STRAWBERRIES! Strawberries in Ghana can cost around 20 cedi for a little crate, whereas in Burkina its 1000 CFA (Francophone West African money) for a kilo of strawberries. Yeah – get our your conversion chart because that means nothing to me either. It was a lot of strawberries though and they were so ripe and so delicious. One of my only complaints about Burkina was… my BIGGEST PET PEAVE EVER. Smoking. Being a Francophone country, most of the country smoked. And they didn’t just smoke, they literally had cigarettes in their mouths most of the time and it just killed me. But that was its only flaw. I loved Ouaga – it was so relaxing, even though a huge film festival was ensuing and everyone was quite nice… as far as I was concerned, not knowing French, almost at all.
Not speaking French was quite frustrating for me. I really understand now how difficult it is for people who come to the US or really anywhere not knowing a language. Its hard to find your way around. It hard to know what anything is. Its hard to order food. Its hard to shop. Its hard to have any sort of relationship with the people. Its just plain hard. Thank goodness Andrea and Katja had taken French in high school because without them I literally think I wouldn’t have been able to do anything. Andrea helped me get my new ring and my FESPACO shirt for a good price. Really Andrea just helped me with everything. I was so thankful for Andrea and Katja on this trip and realized how essential it is to be with a French speaker if I go to Togo, another Francophone country neighboring Ghana.
Okay so the reason I was in Burkina Faso: FESPACO! It’s the Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou – guess that acronym is FESPACO is French? So being in a Francophone country means - most of the films are going to be in French. This was a problem for me because I don’t speak French. Even though that was a little frustrating, I did see a few great movies in the short time we were at FESPACO. I saw a really great short documentary on the public transportation in Algeria – it was about the corruption in the system and how there are children drivers/operators and it was just really good – AND IN ENGLISH! I saw another South African film which was in… English some of it and then in Afrikaans – with all French subtitles. So I could half understand that film, what I did see and understand I liked though. Unfortunately the name is escaping me right now. Most of the other films, being in French, I slept through. I guess that’s not too surprising because that’s what I do in most movies haha. The best movie though was Parine Jaddo’s. Parine is my documenting professor and her movie was in the festival. It was so good and I was so proud of her! It was called Rasta’s Paradise and it was all about the Rastafarian culture in Ethiopia where Rasta life is huge. She interviewed so many Rastas about their life, their views, their habits, and showed a really in depth and sincere side of Rastafarian culture. I love Parine. She is so amazing, so nice, and has our best interest always in mind. She’s an awesome professor.
Our last day in Ouaga, we filmed a lot of our group documentaries on FESPACO. We interviewed some locals, some filmmakers, some other NYU students, and just the festival in general. Hopefully we’ll be able to make something wonderful from our footage.. and if not, the experience was still well worth the forty hours of travel.
Twice in one day I know. I’m going to try to make this a routine. Like I take malarone everyday, I’ll try to update every….more. I still have to talk about my homestay, learning to play some traditional Ghanaian instruments, and how to make Kente cloth, a traditional Ghanaian fabric! And everything else going on. I wish I didn’t procrastinate always.
more love and peace because there’s never too much!
.......................................................................................
For you Daddy... just a taste =)
Out of order assortment of pictures from FESPACO and Green Turtle
FESPACO!
See what I mean? She has a child strapped to her back, you just can't see it
You know... we're filmmakers now.
Beautiful architecture of Ouagadougou
VIPs... not really.
Our class after Parine (our professor's) documentary was shown at FESPACO - "Rasta's Paradise"
My feet after a day in dusty dusty Ouaga
Fespaco opening ceremonies
HEY! There are even Suns fans in Burkina... yet another reason why I love Burkina
Yep. Lots of bikes.
Driving through the Northern part of Ghana
The southern part of Ghana - obviously more green
Crossing the border with our Documentary making class - Danny, Caroline, Marlee, Amanda, Katja, me, Yao, Leah, and Laurene
Horses lining up before the FESPACO opening ceremonies
Yao got did with a Malian head wrap
The 'green' self-composting toilet woo hoo!
Me before I got taken down by those monster waves at Green Turtle
This was taken when it was pitch black - long shutter speed at Green Turtle Lodge
seriously i need to update more - aact, green turtle, and more
This is going to be a bit of a rant, then I'll cut to the good stuff. I’m really frustrated with my community service placement. And it’s not because I haven’t had experience working with Autistic children in the past. This is mostly to do the with center and the fact that there is really nothing for us to do. I don’t feel appreciated and I don’t feel like there is really anything that I can do to make the program any better since I’m only there one to two times a week. Victor, our community service placement advisor, came into AACT today to talk to Marta and I about our experience there. Not only was that awkward and the worst environment to do it in, but it wasn’t very helpful either. To frankly talk about my experience somewhere where I’m not necessarily happy, I shouldn’t be in that place talking about my frustrations around the people/staff that I’m frustrated with. But Marta and I still got a little bit in about how we felt. We talked to him about how the directors never really gave us any direction and the most help we’ve had since we’ve been there are the other foreign volunteers who are sometimes just as lost as we are. The Ghanaian staff seem to really dislike our presence there and never talk to us and when they do its very unfriendly. The organization of the whole program isn’t very conducive to the children’s learning. Half of the time the children don’t even do anything productive. For instance a few weeks ago we went in on a Friday morning, their arts and crafts/”fun” day. I was really looking forward to doing art with the kids because I think that it is so therapeutic and helpful for them. When we got there, they had US, the VOLUNTEERS, doing the art project. It was a tedious task where we make beads out of magazines, so the children wouldn’t have been able to help, so they should’ve given the kids something to do, right? Well, no they just sat around and did nothing while we made these beads. The only thing that was redeeming about making the beads is that they are going to make them into necklaces, etc. for fundraising, but still, they should’ve had some activity… anything! for the kids to do while we were doing this. So I’ve concluded that the only thing I enjoy about the program is the kids. I’m pretty certain I’m going to ask Victor if I can move my placement elsewhere after spring break, because I really want to do something that is helpful, where I actually feel like I am doing something. Somewhere like maybe an orphanage. Even Emily, a volunteer/intern that has been there everyday for the past couple of months, has said that the program is a lacking and that they definitely don’t need manpower – they have plenty of people working there; they need people who actually know what they’re doing and that can help the other workers to make a difference in these children’s lives. So after hearing Emily say that today, I really think that my ‘help’ there isn’t needed and I will get experience with Autistic children in the future, somewhere where my help can be put to better use. Emily also mentioned that a lot of orphanages in Ghana aren’t doing so well so they could probably use the help more anyway. So I’ll see how that goes.
Another thing that made me angry today is that when we were saying bye to the director, Marta and I were explaining to her that we wouldn’t be in for a while because it was our spring break and we weren’t going to be in Ghana. So she said that was fine, but then out of nowhere she asked us “How do you do laundry?” So we told her we have washers and driers at our hostel/house/dorm/whatever you want to call it. And to that she said you guys aren’t getting the real Ghanaian experience. You need to be doing things like Emily and Sophia and living with families and doing the real thing here. And this just really frustrated me. I know that we are especially spoiled living in this beautiful complex in a developing country, and when people say stuff like that its really annoying. Like don’t you realize that we know that we are fortunate and that really do appreciate everything about this experience. And just because we’re not hand washing our clothes, making fufu every week, living without A/C, and “living the real Ghanaian way” (whatever that means) with Ghanaians, doesn’t mean that we’re not getting any less of a great experience as anyone living with a Ghanaian family or any of the like. This is where NYU houses us and we pay for it, so this is where we’re going to live. Also, we’re here studying abroad just like anyone in Paris or Rome. We’re here just as much to immerse ourselves in the community and to learn about the way people do things just as much as anyone else in any other country, if not more, because coming here is SO different than the US whereas in some other countries, the lifestyle is more similar. People don’t make snide comments to other students studying abroad and living in resident halls, just because they’re not living with families and getting the “real” experience. We’re living just as much of a “real” experience in A/C and with wireless internet is just playing into the stereotype that Ghana and even Africa are not developed. “Real Ghanaians” live this way too, it just doesn’t happen to be the way that stereotypical Ghanaians live. If anything its wonderful to be living this lifestyle in a place that most people wouldn’t expect it because it shows how advanced this country is and how much its growing. Like Tina just said, “I think its demeaning to limit yourself to thinking that the African experience is just some primitive way of living, especially after all they’ve come through to get to where they are now.” Ugh, I don’t even know if I’m making any sense any more, I just really don’t appreciate it when people say that kind of stuff to me. It’ll be nice to be on spring break and have time to just relax and reflect on the past couple of months. I’m very happy here. So don’t let this post make you think otherwise, I just think that some people are very close minded and don’t see all sides of the situation.
Phew, back to the exciting, fun stuff that I’ve been up to. This weekend was absolutely wonderful. We got off to a bumpy (literally) start, but it ended up being just so marvelous.
Thursday night, Gaby and I went to get a drink with her friend David from Ashesi University. She met him in her dance class. We were originally going to go to his friend's birthday at some club, and he was going to pick us up but he ended up being stopped by the police because his car wasn't registered and he was like 3 hours late, so we just said, um... no club, let's just go talk. And he said he'd much prefer that, he only wanted to take us to the club to not let us down. At the bar, we just talked and it was so nice. He is very educated and quite privileged too and he had a lot to say about Ghana and America and life in general. He's been to the US a bunch to visit some family that he has there and says that one day he'd like to move there. But not for his whole life - just for a bit. He had many observations about that US... most of which were very true. He said that when in America, people don't really have the time of day for you. And that's true. Here in Ghana people are SO willing to help you out, to talk to you, to spend time with you - they simply like your company. Whereas in the US if you were to ask someone in passing "How are you?" it's expected that its a short answer, "Good", and you both go on with your day. Here, to some extent, that's true, but people also just LOVE to talk to you also. So if you were to walk by a stranger and say "Ete sen?" (How are you?) and they reply "Eye." (fine) (hopefully you remember this all from the earlier Twi lessons)... you might actually have a full conversation with them about their day, their family, their life/your day, your family, etc. That's somewhat frustrating about the US... but I guess I'm used to it, and I might be irritated if everyone I said hi to in passing actually wanted to have a full conversation with me about my day. David also observed that people just looove to eat and watch t.v., i.e. obesity in America. It's too bad that we have that reputation. We then talked about how many people have an expectation that when they get to America... their life is made. That they are set for the rest of their life. When no, that is not true at all. People have problems in the US too. They have to sacrifice a lot also. There are a lot of opportunities in America, but it's not necessarily easy to achieve. So that was nice talking to David. It was also nice to get approached by the waiter saying that this creepy, thuggish Ghanaian man wanted to give me his number. Ew. So I took the piece of paper with 'Charles'' number on it and asked David if I should do anything - he said basically to just acknowledge that I got it. And then when Charles was on his way out he came over to our table bent down by me and said "I'll be expecting your call soon" yucckkkkk. Charles and I haven't hung out yet, I'm going to call him tomorrow.
The next day was Ghana’s Independence Day! Happy Ghana Independence Day – March 6, 1957! Fifty two years of independence and peace – how exciting. That morning, we were off to Green Turtle Lodge, a little beach resort outside of Takoradi for Gillian's 21st birthday. To get to Takoradi, we took the intercity bus. It was 6.5 cedi. We met at Labone Coffee Shop (a 'famous' coffee shop near the house we live in) at 8:15 in order to get to the bus station by 9, to hopefully get on a bus by 9:30... even 10 would've been great. Soooo, we get there, all buses are sold out until 11:30. Okay, cool. We'll wait, we're in good company, right? 11:30 rolls around when over the intercom we hear "Passengers on the 11:30 bus to Takoradi are going to have to be patient." ... haha, only in Ghana. 12:30's here, and we finally get on bus. Mmm.. maybe one of the worst rides. Gaby was so generous to let me have the window seat so I could sleep since the night before we stayed out with David and the night before that I had just gotten back from my 20 hour ride from Burkina Faso - yeah I was pretty sleepy. The bus: no useful A/C just warm air blowing at us through the vent, lady behind me putting her knees in my back, couldn't open the window for air because the lady behind me had a child (since when does it matter if the window is open because you have a child?) = very little sleep, soooo sweaty in the sleep that I did get, so uncomfortable (those knees are nothing like the massage chairs at the Asian nail places). The only thing good about the bus is it got us to our destination. After a 4.5 hour ride.
So the bus ride was over. How about the tro tro ride there after. Quite difficult to find the tro tro to Akwidaa. Every taxi driver ever approached us about taking us to the Green Turtle Lodge. They all know that Obrunis are going to the Green Turtle Lodge. This would've been a great offer had it not been 30 cedi. So finally after finding the tro tro station, the one tro tro that was going to Akwidaa had to literally be put back together. It was actually taken apart before we got in it. The car had been used to transport a LOT of something - we're still not sure exactly what - but in the process they had taken out all the seats. So when they heard we needed to stop at Akwidaa, they put it back together and we were on our way.
The tro tro ride was really great, although Gillian, the birthday girl, would disagree. We didn't really know if this was going to take us to the right place. It was getting dark so there was really no way to tell if we were getting anywhere productive. And the people driving and operating the tro tro had no idea what the Green Turtle Lodge was. But I had a good time, and I just reallllly wanted to get to the Lodge. Also, the tro tro conductor was talking about how life was beautiful or something, I don't really remember, but it was fun, nonetheless. Okay, so we got dropped off at Akwidaa. Now what do we do... no sign of Green Turtle Lodge, except another swarm of taxi drivers offering to take us to the Lodge for some pretty steep prices. Finally we settled with 15 cedi because apparently it was pretty far and that's the lowest anyone would go.
Fifteen cedi was worth it. This ride was "cray-cray" (in the words of Gaby, aka crazy). SO long and SO bumpy. It was especially wonderful in the pitch black. We had no idea if where the taxi driver was taking us was legitimately going to the lodge or if he knew where he was going or if we'd end up at the lodge at all. This ride was so long. It was probably like 1.5 hours on the bumpiest road through little villages every once in a while. Finally! We made it. We ended up paying the driver 20 cedi because 15 just didn't seem like enough, especially since he'd have to make the drive back with no one in his car, so he'd obviously not be making any profit.
We finally made it to the Lodge after 12 hours of traveling (any future travelers to the Lodge - it really shouldn't take that long... just don't get on a late, late bus or look for a tro tro for too long, it’ll significantly prolong your experience). Getting to the Green Turtle Lodge was the most incredible thing. This place is so beautiful and just so serene. It's literally on the beach. The bar, the restaurant, the rooms, the tables, the everything is in the sand on the beach. Aw... what a place to end up at after such a tumultuous ride here. It was lovely. When we got there, Elizabeth talked with the man at the reception desk. She had originally booked three rooms but a few people bailed, so we only needed the two. He wanted to charge us for all three but Elizabeth explained to them that she had tried contacting them many times to cancel it but the phone service at this place = nada. Because it’s in the middle of nowhere. But we finally got him to agree that we wouldn't be paying for the extra room, and thank goodness we didn't because if we had. We might not have made it home this evening at all.
Having said that, no one budgeted enough money for the trip. I mean I guess we had JUST enough money! The first night…out of two nights.. there we started to realize that money was an issue. Soooo we all just pooled our money together and started a very strict budget. It was actually quite hilarious. We set aside the money we each owed for the hotel room and put it underneath the fan, obviously the most safe place. Then since all the food is on the tab, we would set aside money for our food. Then we set aside our money for the trip home. Then we set aside money for dinner and breakfast – we’d share both, two dishes for the four of us.. Lunch wasn’t going to be an option, we didn’t think. So this was the beginning of our little stay at Green Turtle and, really, thank the Lord that they didn’t charge us for the extra room. That would’ve been seriously bad news – aka NO food for us.
Our first night was great. And so relaxing. We ate dinner on the beach. This was before we realized the money crisis and ALL six of us got dinner. (There were six of us the first night… Mallory and Gillian ended up leaving on Saturday morning because Mallory’s mom was coming to town and the poor birthday girl didn’t feel well). After dinner, Gaby and I put on our suits and just laid on the beach and walked in the water. It was so peaceful and calm. We just listened to the waves crash on the beach and the palm trees rustle against each other. It was so quiet. So empty. And just so still. We took a short nap on the beach and just set our alarm so that we’d actually wake up and go to the room. Going back to the room was the worst part of the night. Gaby and I went to our rooms – we were both in different rooms, both sleeping on the floor. Hot hot hot hot hot hot night. The windows were open but almost literally no ventilation. And I sweat so much in my sleep. I almost got out of bed and woke Gaby to see if she’d like to go sleep on the beach, but I was just too lazy. She had the same thought in the middle of the night, but she was too scared to leave the room haha. So we both slept miserably and SO HOT.
Although the room was hot. It was an awesome room. It had a great shower, a bed, and a ‘green’ toilet. Everything was solar powered. The toilet was self-composting – so no water, also meaning that the waste is broken down and decomposed organically – you’d love it Greer! And you couldn’t put anything down the toilet but toilet paper. To make it smell less, we had to put ashes over the waste. It was so nice. I really want a self-composting toilet! And solar power. Which was lovely. Except at night when it goes out, because there is no ..sun. This was only a problem night two when Gaby and I actually got the bed and the fan – but the fan worked probably twenty percent of the night. Just our luck.
Finally, it was time to get up. We ate breakfast on the beach – just some toast, because by this time we realized the budget crisis. After breakfast, Gillian and Mallory left to go back to Accra. Sad times. But the rest of the day was so unbelievably wonderful. We just laid on the beach. Played some beach volleyball. And laid more. It was really hot so we spent most of our town under the little shades. Half way through the day we decided we NEEDED to fit lunch into our budget so we had a “budget meeting” – we held these frequently throughout the day with the little money that we had. We decided we could fit two cheese sandwiches into our budget. We ordered them. But then ended up waiting so long for them – they had to make the cheese, grow the tomatoes, and um .. make the bread. Not really but it really seemed like we waited forever. I think it was because we were so hungry from our small breakfast. We got our cheese sandwiches which were good. Definitely not filling though. So we put our order in for dinner and you have to tell them the time you want it – so we ordered the cheapest – two pastas with tomato sauce at 7:30. We had a great afternoon laying the beach, playing the water. The waves WERE HUGE. They took us down like sumo wrestlers. We, I think, all actually thought we might die. After being thrown down by a wave I had so much sand in my bottoms – it was like I had severely poopy pants. After that we decided those waves were too cray-cray. So we just hung out. We played cards and did our best at playing dominoes – anyone know how to play dominoes? No? Yeah me neither. So we didn’t really play dominoes. Dinner time slowly came. As we were waiting we saw another table get the pasta. We anxiously peeked at it. Wondering how big so that we wouldn’t expect too much or too little. We got the zoom camera out and took a picture of the pasta to inspect the size of our upcoming meal. It seemed like a good size. About an hour later we received our two pastas and devoured them. It was SO delicious. All we wanted was more! We could see that pasta across the way still. The girl at the other table didn’t finish her pasta. Our eyes ogled at it just wanting it in OUR BELLAY. Unfortunately, we weren’t feeling creepy enough to ask her if we could have her leftovers. Sooo instead, in honor of Gillian, we had another budget meeting and splurged 2.5 cedi on fruit and fondue! They said it was my birthday so the waiter who brought over our fondue started singing.. whispering happy birthday to me. It was so funny but so yummy to have our fondue made of mouthwatering Ghanaian chocolate. We had fresh pineapple and banana to dip in the chocolate. It was perfect for our little hungry tums. After this we were all so exhausted from the sleepless night before and all the sun from the day, so we went to bed at 9pm.
The next morning as we were eating our breakfast, this guy Sean came to sit with us. He had just been discharged from the PeaceCorps because of the governmental travel alert and the military coup. It was so nice to talk to him. At first, we thought that he was European, he kind of looked it, but then we found out he was from Illinois. He was in Mali to do work in a village with their water and sanitation. Ironically, he had two amoebas from drinking contaminated water. He realized the stupidity in drinking the water and just said that getting back to the States was going to be hell with all the medicines he’s going to have to take to get rid of everything foul in his body. He was very soft-spoken and so informative. He told us about the Peace Corps application process and how in depth it was. He talked about how he was planning to go to Mali and had these huge projects to put wells in and help with the sanitation of the water, etc. But when he got to his village, they really didn’t need help in that area because they already had funding from somewhere else, so he essentially just “hung out and drank tea” the whole time. The people you meet traveling around Ghana are just so great. It was so nice to talk to him. Unfortunately we only got to talk to him for about an hour before we had to check out.
Checking out was kind of shady, because we had to pretend like Tina wasn’t with us or they were going to charge us an extra 5 cedi for the extra person. So Tina and I hid in the room as they checked out and we ended up having JUST enough money. Then we were off to the STC station – another hour and a half on the rocky rocky road. But we had an incredible taxi driver named Frances. Frances was a such a fun little man. He was fun to talk to and wanted to teach us a little Twi, even though Twi isn’t really widely spoken in the Western Region where Takoradi is. He also asked us all if we were married or had boyfriends and our ages. When I told him I was 21 and didn’t have a boyfriend, then Tina said she was 19 with a boyfriend, he asked why I didn’t have one even though I was older than she is. He then told me he was going to find me a Ghanaian boyfriend from Green Turtle Lodge. How that’s going to work… I have no clue. But it was cute nonetheless.
At the STC bus station, we met a Ghanaian girl who was obsessed with American culture. It was hilarious and sad at the same time. Hilarious because of her obsession and what she was obsessed with. Sad because she’s left so much of her culture behind. Her name was Esi. Esi talked about how foreigners all think that Africans live in trees and hang out with monkeys and elephants, but really people aren’t like that… obviously haha. She said that the American stereotype was that females are all promiscuous. … unfortunate. Anyway, she was hilarious. She LOVES Sex and the City and wanted to know who all our favorite characters were. She loves Miranda because she’s blunt. She also said that she checks Perez Hilton EVERY time she gets on the computer to check the latest gossip. She loves Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, and she’s not a fan of Jennifer Aniston. She asked us if American men liked big butts.. and we told her mostly they like big boobs. And to that, I said well I have neither.. and Esi points to my boobs and says “Oh, you can get that fixed” and I told her that I didn’t want plastic surgery at all and she said, “Well if you have the money, why not?” Oh man, she was awesome. It was also unfortunate though because she didn’t know her family’s language. She didn’t really know her roots. This was appalling to me just because I feel like I’d love to know all of that stuff, and its just a shame to see her throwing it away for American gossip. She did make a good point that not knowing the language was also kind of bringing Ghanaians together because its like they al have one unified language so everyone can communicate. But this is a good example of a “real” Ghanaian experience – not all Ghanaians live primitive lifestyles… hers actually seemed quite luxurious.
Getting home was way easy this time. And when we got home, there was a huge rainstorm, and we went out to dinner for Gillian’s birthday. It was delightful and so nice to celebrate her real birthday!
Today… besides having a hard time at volunteering, I lost my phone and I’m pretty sad about that because I lost the numbers of some Ghanaians that I don’t think I’ll be able to get again. Hopefully it’ll show up somewhere. If not… oh well! Who needs a cell phone in Africa anyway.. I mostly only used it for an alarm anyway.
I'm now starting a blog entry about my homestay, Burkina, and um everything in between. Catching up on this blog is quite a pain in the b. So I'm going to try and start updated more daily than monthly.
love peace loooove
Another thing that made me angry today is that when we were saying bye to the director, Marta and I were explaining to her that we wouldn’t be in for a while because it was our spring break and we weren’t going to be in Ghana. So she said that was fine, but then out of nowhere she asked us “How do you do laundry?” So we told her we have washers and driers at our hostel/house/dorm/whatever you want to call it. And to that she said you guys aren’t getting the real Ghanaian experience. You need to be doing things like Emily and Sophia and living with families and doing the real thing here. And this just really frustrated me. I know that we are especially spoiled living in this beautiful complex in a developing country, and when people say stuff like that its really annoying. Like don’t you realize that we know that we are fortunate and that really do appreciate everything about this experience. And just because we’re not hand washing our clothes, making fufu every week, living without A/C, and “living the real Ghanaian way” (whatever that means) with Ghanaians, doesn’t mean that we’re not getting any less of a great experience as anyone living with a Ghanaian family or any of the like. This is where NYU houses us and we pay for it, so this is where we’re going to live. Also, we’re here studying abroad just like anyone in Paris or Rome. We’re here just as much to immerse ourselves in the community and to learn about the way people do things just as much as anyone else in any other country, if not more, because coming here is SO different than the US whereas in some other countries, the lifestyle is more similar. People don’t make snide comments to other students studying abroad and living in resident halls, just because they’re not living with families and getting the “real” experience. We’re living just as much of a “real” experience in A/C and with wireless internet is just playing into the stereotype that Ghana and even Africa are not developed. “Real Ghanaians” live this way too, it just doesn’t happen to be the way that stereotypical Ghanaians live. If anything its wonderful to be living this lifestyle in a place that most people wouldn’t expect it because it shows how advanced this country is and how much its growing. Like Tina just said, “I think its demeaning to limit yourself to thinking that the African experience is just some primitive way of living, especially after all they’ve come through to get to where they are now.” Ugh, I don’t even know if I’m making any sense any more, I just really don’t appreciate it when people say that kind of stuff to me. It’ll be nice to be on spring break and have time to just relax and reflect on the past couple of months. I’m very happy here. So don’t let this post make you think otherwise, I just think that some people are very close minded and don’t see all sides of the situation.
Phew, back to the exciting, fun stuff that I’ve been up to. This weekend was absolutely wonderful. We got off to a bumpy (literally) start, but it ended up being just so marvelous.
Thursday night, Gaby and I went to get a drink with her friend David from Ashesi University. She met him in her dance class. We were originally going to go to his friend's birthday at some club, and he was going to pick us up but he ended up being stopped by the police because his car wasn't registered and he was like 3 hours late, so we just said, um... no club, let's just go talk. And he said he'd much prefer that, he only wanted to take us to the club to not let us down. At the bar, we just talked and it was so nice. He is very educated and quite privileged too and he had a lot to say about Ghana and America and life in general. He's been to the US a bunch to visit some family that he has there and says that one day he'd like to move there. But not for his whole life - just for a bit. He had many observations about that US... most of which were very true. He said that when in America, people don't really have the time of day for you. And that's true. Here in Ghana people are SO willing to help you out, to talk to you, to spend time with you - they simply like your company. Whereas in the US if you were to ask someone in passing "How are you?" it's expected that its a short answer, "Good", and you both go on with your day. Here, to some extent, that's true, but people also just LOVE to talk to you also. So if you were to walk by a stranger and say "Ete sen?" (How are you?) and they reply "Eye." (fine) (hopefully you remember this all from the earlier Twi lessons)... you might actually have a full conversation with them about their day, their family, their life/your day, your family, etc. That's somewhat frustrating about the US... but I guess I'm used to it, and I might be irritated if everyone I said hi to in passing actually wanted to have a full conversation with me about my day. David also observed that people just looove to eat and watch t.v., i.e. obesity in America. It's too bad that we have that reputation. We then talked about how many people have an expectation that when they get to America... their life is made. That they are set for the rest of their life. When no, that is not true at all. People have problems in the US too. They have to sacrifice a lot also. There are a lot of opportunities in America, but it's not necessarily easy to achieve. So that was nice talking to David. It was also nice to get approached by the waiter saying that this creepy, thuggish Ghanaian man wanted to give me his number. Ew. So I took the piece of paper with 'Charles'' number on it and asked David if I should do anything - he said basically to just acknowledge that I got it. And then when Charles was on his way out he came over to our table bent down by me and said "I'll be expecting your call soon" yucckkkkk. Charles and I haven't hung out yet, I'm going to call him tomorrow.
The next day was Ghana’s Independence Day! Happy Ghana Independence Day – March 6, 1957! Fifty two years of independence and peace – how exciting. That morning, we were off to Green Turtle Lodge, a little beach resort outside of Takoradi for Gillian's 21st birthday. To get to Takoradi, we took the intercity bus. It was 6.5 cedi. We met at Labone Coffee Shop (a 'famous' coffee shop near the house we live in) at 8:15 in order to get to the bus station by 9, to hopefully get on a bus by 9:30... even 10 would've been great. Soooo, we get there, all buses are sold out until 11:30. Okay, cool. We'll wait, we're in good company, right? 11:30 rolls around when over the intercom we hear "Passengers on the 11:30 bus to Takoradi are going to have to be patient." ... haha, only in Ghana. 12:30's here, and we finally get on bus. Mmm.. maybe one of the worst rides. Gaby was so generous to let me have the window seat so I could sleep since the night before we stayed out with David and the night before that I had just gotten back from my 20 hour ride from Burkina Faso - yeah I was pretty sleepy. The bus: no useful A/C just warm air blowing at us through the vent, lady behind me putting her knees in my back, couldn't open the window for air because the lady behind me had a child (since when does it matter if the window is open because you have a child?) = very little sleep, soooo sweaty in the sleep that I did get, so uncomfortable (those knees are nothing like the massage chairs at the Asian nail places). The only thing good about the bus is it got us to our destination. After a 4.5 hour ride.
So the bus ride was over. How about the tro tro ride there after. Quite difficult to find the tro tro to Akwidaa. Every taxi driver ever approached us about taking us to the Green Turtle Lodge. They all know that Obrunis are going to the Green Turtle Lodge. This would've been a great offer had it not been 30 cedi. So finally after finding the tro tro station, the one tro tro that was going to Akwidaa had to literally be put back together. It was actually taken apart before we got in it. The car had been used to transport a LOT of something - we're still not sure exactly what - but in the process they had taken out all the seats. So when they heard we needed to stop at Akwidaa, they put it back together and we were on our way.
The tro tro ride was really great, although Gillian, the birthday girl, would disagree. We didn't really know if this was going to take us to the right place. It was getting dark so there was really no way to tell if we were getting anywhere productive. And the people driving and operating the tro tro had no idea what the Green Turtle Lodge was. But I had a good time, and I just reallllly wanted to get to the Lodge. Also, the tro tro conductor was talking about how life was beautiful or something, I don't really remember, but it was fun, nonetheless. Okay, so we got dropped off at Akwidaa. Now what do we do... no sign of Green Turtle Lodge, except another swarm of taxi drivers offering to take us to the Lodge for some pretty steep prices. Finally we settled with 15 cedi because apparently it was pretty far and that's the lowest anyone would go.
Fifteen cedi was worth it. This ride was "cray-cray" (in the words of Gaby, aka crazy). SO long and SO bumpy. It was especially wonderful in the pitch black. We had no idea if where the taxi driver was taking us was legitimately going to the lodge or if he knew where he was going or if we'd end up at the lodge at all. This ride was so long. It was probably like 1.5 hours on the bumpiest road through little villages every once in a while. Finally! We made it. We ended up paying the driver 20 cedi because 15 just didn't seem like enough, especially since he'd have to make the drive back with no one in his car, so he'd obviously not be making any profit.
We finally made it to the Lodge after 12 hours of traveling (any future travelers to the Lodge - it really shouldn't take that long... just don't get on a late, late bus or look for a tro tro for too long, it’ll significantly prolong your experience). Getting to the Green Turtle Lodge was the most incredible thing. This place is so beautiful and just so serene. It's literally on the beach. The bar, the restaurant, the rooms, the tables, the everything is in the sand on the beach. Aw... what a place to end up at after such a tumultuous ride here. It was lovely. When we got there, Elizabeth talked with the man at the reception desk. She had originally booked three rooms but a few people bailed, so we only needed the two. He wanted to charge us for all three but Elizabeth explained to them that she had tried contacting them many times to cancel it but the phone service at this place = nada. Because it’s in the middle of nowhere. But we finally got him to agree that we wouldn't be paying for the extra room, and thank goodness we didn't because if we had. We might not have made it home this evening at all.
Having said that, no one budgeted enough money for the trip. I mean I guess we had JUST enough money! The first night…out of two nights.. there we started to realize that money was an issue. Soooo we all just pooled our money together and started a very strict budget. It was actually quite hilarious. We set aside the money we each owed for the hotel room and put it underneath the fan, obviously the most safe place. Then since all the food is on the tab, we would set aside money for our food. Then we set aside our money for the trip home. Then we set aside money for dinner and breakfast – we’d share both, two dishes for the four of us.. Lunch wasn’t going to be an option, we didn’t think. So this was the beginning of our little stay at Green Turtle and, really, thank the Lord that they didn’t charge us for the extra room. That would’ve been seriously bad news – aka NO food for us.
Our first night was great. And so relaxing. We ate dinner on the beach. This was before we realized the money crisis and ALL six of us got dinner. (There were six of us the first night… Mallory and Gillian ended up leaving on Saturday morning because Mallory’s mom was coming to town and the poor birthday girl didn’t feel well). After dinner, Gaby and I put on our suits and just laid on the beach and walked in the water. It was so peaceful and calm. We just listened to the waves crash on the beach and the palm trees rustle against each other. It was so quiet. So empty. And just so still. We took a short nap on the beach and just set our alarm so that we’d actually wake up and go to the room. Going back to the room was the worst part of the night. Gaby and I went to our rooms – we were both in different rooms, both sleeping on the floor. Hot hot hot hot hot hot night. The windows were open but almost literally no ventilation. And I sweat so much in my sleep. I almost got out of bed and woke Gaby to see if she’d like to go sleep on the beach, but I was just too lazy. She had the same thought in the middle of the night, but she was too scared to leave the room haha. So we both slept miserably and SO HOT.
Although the room was hot. It was an awesome room. It had a great shower, a bed, and a ‘green’ toilet. Everything was solar powered. The toilet was self-composting – so no water, also meaning that the waste is broken down and decomposed organically – you’d love it Greer! And you couldn’t put anything down the toilet but toilet paper. To make it smell less, we had to put ashes over the waste. It was so nice. I really want a self-composting toilet! And solar power. Which was lovely. Except at night when it goes out, because there is no ..sun. This was only a problem night two when Gaby and I actually got the bed and the fan – but the fan worked probably twenty percent of the night. Just our luck.
Finally, it was time to get up. We ate breakfast on the beach – just some toast, because by this time we realized the budget crisis. After breakfast, Gillian and Mallory left to go back to Accra. Sad times. But the rest of the day was so unbelievably wonderful. We just laid on the beach. Played some beach volleyball. And laid more. It was really hot so we spent most of our town under the little shades. Half way through the day we decided we NEEDED to fit lunch into our budget so we had a “budget meeting” – we held these frequently throughout the day with the little money that we had. We decided we could fit two cheese sandwiches into our budget. We ordered them. But then ended up waiting so long for them – they had to make the cheese, grow the tomatoes, and um .. make the bread. Not really but it really seemed like we waited forever. I think it was because we were so hungry from our small breakfast. We got our cheese sandwiches which were good. Definitely not filling though. So we put our order in for dinner and you have to tell them the time you want it – so we ordered the cheapest – two pastas with tomato sauce at 7:30. We had a great afternoon laying the beach, playing the water. The waves WERE HUGE. They took us down like sumo wrestlers. We, I think, all actually thought we might die. After being thrown down by a wave I had so much sand in my bottoms – it was like I had severely poopy pants. After that we decided those waves were too cray-cray. So we just hung out. We played cards and did our best at playing dominoes – anyone know how to play dominoes? No? Yeah me neither. So we didn’t really play dominoes. Dinner time slowly came. As we were waiting we saw another table get the pasta. We anxiously peeked at it. Wondering how big so that we wouldn’t expect too much or too little. We got the zoom camera out and took a picture of the pasta to inspect the size of our upcoming meal. It seemed like a good size. About an hour later we received our two pastas and devoured them. It was SO delicious. All we wanted was more! We could see that pasta across the way still. The girl at the other table didn’t finish her pasta. Our eyes ogled at it just wanting it in OUR BELLAY. Unfortunately, we weren’t feeling creepy enough to ask her if we could have her leftovers. Sooo instead, in honor of Gillian, we had another budget meeting and splurged 2.5 cedi on fruit and fondue! They said it was my birthday so the waiter who brought over our fondue started singing.. whispering happy birthday to me. It was so funny but so yummy to have our fondue made of mouthwatering Ghanaian chocolate. We had fresh pineapple and banana to dip in the chocolate. It was perfect for our little hungry tums. After this we were all so exhausted from the sleepless night before and all the sun from the day, so we went to bed at 9pm.
The next morning as we were eating our breakfast, this guy Sean came to sit with us. He had just been discharged from the PeaceCorps because of the governmental travel alert and the military coup. It was so nice to talk to him. At first, we thought that he was European, he kind of looked it, but then we found out he was from Illinois. He was in Mali to do work in a village with their water and sanitation. Ironically, he had two amoebas from drinking contaminated water. He realized the stupidity in drinking the water and just said that getting back to the States was going to be hell with all the medicines he’s going to have to take to get rid of everything foul in his body. He was very soft-spoken and so informative. He told us about the Peace Corps application process and how in depth it was. He talked about how he was planning to go to Mali and had these huge projects to put wells in and help with the sanitation of the water, etc. But when he got to his village, they really didn’t need help in that area because they already had funding from somewhere else, so he essentially just “hung out and drank tea” the whole time. The people you meet traveling around Ghana are just so great. It was so nice to talk to him. Unfortunately we only got to talk to him for about an hour before we had to check out.
Checking out was kind of shady, because we had to pretend like Tina wasn’t with us or they were going to charge us an extra 5 cedi for the extra person. So Tina and I hid in the room as they checked out and we ended up having JUST enough money. Then we were off to the STC station – another hour and a half on the rocky rocky road. But we had an incredible taxi driver named Frances. Frances was a such a fun little man. He was fun to talk to and wanted to teach us a little Twi, even though Twi isn’t really widely spoken in the Western Region where Takoradi is. He also asked us all if we were married or had boyfriends and our ages. When I told him I was 21 and didn’t have a boyfriend, then Tina said she was 19 with a boyfriend, he asked why I didn’t have one even though I was older than she is. He then told me he was going to find me a Ghanaian boyfriend from Green Turtle Lodge. How that’s going to work… I have no clue. But it was cute nonetheless.
At the STC bus station, we met a Ghanaian girl who was obsessed with American culture. It was hilarious and sad at the same time. Hilarious because of her obsession and what she was obsessed with. Sad because she’s left so much of her culture behind. Her name was Esi. Esi talked about how foreigners all think that Africans live in trees and hang out with monkeys and elephants, but really people aren’t like that… obviously haha. She said that the American stereotype was that females are all promiscuous. … unfortunate. Anyway, she was hilarious. She LOVES Sex and the City and wanted to know who all our favorite characters were. She loves Miranda because she’s blunt. She also said that she checks Perez Hilton EVERY time she gets on the computer to check the latest gossip. She loves Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, and she’s not a fan of Jennifer Aniston. She asked us if American men liked big butts.. and we told her mostly they like big boobs. And to that, I said well I have neither.. and Esi points to my boobs and says “Oh, you can get that fixed” and I told her that I didn’t want plastic surgery at all and she said, “Well if you have the money, why not?” Oh man, she was awesome. It was also unfortunate though because she didn’t know her family’s language. She didn’t really know her roots. This was appalling to me just because I feel like I’d love to know all of that stuff, and its just a shame to see her throwing it away for American gossip. She did make a good point that not knowing the language was also kind of bringing Ghanaians together because its like they al have one unified language so everyone can communicate. But this is a good example of a “real” Ghanaian experience – not all Ghanaians live primitive lifestyles… hers actually seemed quite luxurious.
Getting home was way easy this time. And when we got home, there was a huge rainstorm, and we went out to dinner for Gillian’s birthday. It was delightful and so nice to celebrate her real birthday!
Today… besides having a hard time at volunteering, I lost my phone and I’m pretty sad about that because I lost the numbers of some Ghanaians that I don’t think I’ll be able to get again. Hopefully it’ll show up somewhere. If not… oh well! Who needs a cell phone in Africa anyway.. I mostly only used it for an alarm anyway.
I'm now starting a blog entry about my homestay, Burkina, and um everything in between. Catching up on this blog is quite a pain in the b. So I'm going to try and start updated more daily than monthly.
love peace loooove
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