ay yo nawashabashebaaaaaaa

Over Easter break, Andrea, Julia, Mallory, Tina, Gaby, and I traveled to Lomé, Togo. We got off to an early start leaving Church Crescent (our residence hall) by seven am. We got on a tro tro to Aflao, the Ghanaian city at the border. The car ride was easy enough. About a million pot holes, but other than that is was lovely. It was basically like a personal tro tro because it seated eight people and we took up six of the seats – the two seats left were in the front. So we just got to lounge and enjoy our trip. Crossing the border was very easy… I got yet another stamp, woo! Crossing the border was so obviously a change in country. Not only did the language change, the beaches were very different and VERY beautiful, there means of transportation was different – MOTOS, and people weren’t as noticeably attracted to our “obruniness” (“yovo” in Togo) and basically left us alone for the most part. Our first stop was the shell station for a potty break, then after that we got on moto taxis. Moto taxis are just the most incredible invention. They are SO much fun and the best way to move around a city. The wind kept us cool on the hot day, as we drove by the beautiful coast of Togo. The water was so, so blue and the sand so orange it was like a postcard. I don’t know why Ghana didn’t build along the coast - it makes so much sense… Accra would be so much more beautiful if it were built right along the water, but oh well. We took the motos to the art center to visit some friends that Julia had made on her trip to Togo for spring break. There were all Rastafarians for the most part and they were all artists. We looked around at the stuff for a while, then from there we walked to our hotel, Hotel Le Galion. This hotel wasn’t anything spectacular, but it was really close to the beach and pretty centrally located. Andrea, the only French speaker among us, fought pretty hard for us to get a good rate for the weekend. We got avocado sandwiches on the beach for lunch, yum. Then after, we went to the beach and just talked and laughed all afternoon. It was a perfect beach day and so much fun. The water was really rough, but of course, Gaby, Andrea, and I went in anyway. After the beach, we all rinsed off at the hotel then went to get spaghetti. They sell spaghetti with a baguette almost everywhere in Lomé. And all for so cheap. The spaghetti is made right in front of you at little stall, usually on the side of a road. They put spicy peppers in it for a little kick that is so delicious. I will have to try to make some when I come home because it looked very easy and it was so good. (Ingredients: spaghetti, tomato paste, sautéed onions and hot peppers, and maggi flavor stuff). Oh! And you can get spaghetti with omelette. Which sounds pretty nasty, but seriously, its so good. They put a onion and tomato omelette right on top of the spaghetti and its just like having meat sauce or something similar, but much better, in my opinion. That night, we went out with the same guys we met at the art center. They were nice and fun. We went to a bar where we hung out. There was this one Rasta who was absolutely insane. He was just so crazy. I can’t even describe him… he made weird comments, danced weird, made silly faces… he was just a lot of fun to make fun of basically. And a little creepy. Gaby and I got ice cream, but then these little kids behind us kept asking us for money so instead, we just gave them our ice cream and that made them so happy. After the bar, we went to the biggest night club in West Africa – Privilege. At first there was nobody there because it was still early, like one am. But then people started coming and it filled up SO fast. We all danced the night away. It was interesting because there were seriously so many men that I would guess were gay. I think being gay is illegal in Togo, just like it is in Ghana, but it was so nice to see them all having fun dancing.

The next day, we got moto taxis of course to the bank, got out CFA, and then went to breakfast. Andrea and I got spaghetti, again. I wish Ghana got on that train and started selling spaghetti, like they do in Togo. Then we went to Le Grande Marche (I think that’s how you spell it) – the market. This market was terrible. I did not like it at all. Cars could drive through it so it was hard to get around. And it was so hot and uncomfortable. Finally though we found a little offshoot of the market where we bought lots of really nice fabric. After the market, we met up with Julia at the art center, then hung out there for a little while, then went to this really nice beach on the other side of town. It was a beach connected to a nice resort. We didn’t know if it’d cost us anything, because when we went in no one said anything. So we just laid by the beach for a couple of hours. And Gaby, Andrea, and I again swam most of the time. It was so nice and we showered off in the little outdoor showers, when this guy came up to us and told us we’d all have to pay for our time at the beach. That would’ve been fine if it wasn’t for the annoying, fat Lebanese guy who ran the place who obviously told the worker to tell us this. The Lebanese man was just so disgusting… I’m sorry to be so rude, but he wasn’t hospitable at all.. Finally we made an agreement that we’d buy French fries and drinks to make up for the beach payment, which the worker agreed to and the owner was just very rude. We tried making eye contact with him to thank him and just smile… but he wouldn’t and ugh. It was annoying. We ate our overly priced snacks and left. But as we were on our way out – good karma came and the shuttle that runs from the hotel to the airport said he’d take us back to our side of town, which could easily have been like 3000 CFA.

…Okay, I don’t really remember anymore what happened in Togo specifically and I’m probably boring you. So basically highlights of Togo:
- spaghetti and omelette. mmm...
- MOTOS MOTO MOTO
- avocado sandwiches
- Privilege - largest nightclub in west Africa
- Rastas... EVERYWHERE.
- at the market, andrea picked out the single ugliest shoes for me to try on and we were all in tears laughing so hard about it
- beautiful beaches
- a very lonely Easter (I guess a lowlight)… Andrea and I spent ALL day going around Lomé looking for Mike, Danny, and Josh… then tried to find Julia, found her late late, but that was so fun to hang out with her and Marco
- met two beautiful Cote d’Ivoirian sisters who spent most of the weekend with us… unfortunately, I couldn’t communicate very well with them verbally because they only speak French, but they were just so great
- my new found desire to learn a second language.. maybe a third. I don’t know when, but I really need to. Togo was just so frustrating not being able to communicate verbally with so many people that I really would’ve liked it. Seeing the way Andrea was able to communicate was just so inspiring. It’s happening. I’m going to be bilingual. When? Undetermined, but it’s a new aspiration of mine.
- Last day, it POURED… and on the way out of town, there were hundreds of termites flying around. It was so nasty. And where did these termites end up?... STUCK TO MY BACK. It was so gross. Andrea had to pick each termite individually off my back. Yuck. What an experience. Oh and then our bus ride home was a trillion hours because we took the first bus we saw because we were drenched. Bad idea. MetroMass stops for literally EvERY SINGLE HUMAN BEING on the side of the road. Note to self and anyone else traveling to or through Ghana: don’t take MetroMass if you want to get anywhere on time.

The next weekend we traveled to Tamale in Northern Ghana.
Tamale was wonderful. Here’s what I wrote in my email to Allie and Lizzie because I’m very lazy and don’t want to type up a new blog entry…
This weekend was so, so moving. We did so much incredible stuff on our little weekend trip.
Our trip was up to Tamale (not Mexican food "tamale", "but
tah-mah-lay") in Northern Ghana. I almost didn't go on the trip
because they didn't really make it seem THAT cool.. but I'm so happy I
did. It was a 12 hour bus ride up to Tamale. It wasn't too bad
though. I slept the whole way obviously. The night we got there we
ate dinner then slept, but then the next day was jam packed with so
much. So the first thing we did was we got a lecture about Northern
Ghana that was really interesting where they told us about the tribes,
education, history, etc. I'll spare you all of that unless you're
actually interested. Then we went to the market which was so great.
I love markets, they are one of the things I'm going to miss most
about Western Africa. They are just so practical and have
everrrrying. We only had a short time at the market so
I didn’t get much. Next we went to the Central Mosque of Tamale. We
all had to cover our shoulders and knees. And it was so so hot
outside. But that's okay, I really wouldn't have wanted to disrespect
the faith. The mosque was so so so beautiful and now I have so much
respect for Muslims. It was so eye-opening and wonderful. Our tour
guide told us all about the Islamic faith and showed us how the pray,
when they pray, told us about the women's role in the Muslim
community, and well... I'm sure more. After the mosque, we ate lunch,
then went to Dr. Abdulai's Health Clinic. Oh gosh guys, this man is
so incredible. He had such a a contagious smile and a loving spirit.
He lost all of his family when he was young - his siblings and
parents. And somewhere along the line he developed a want to care for
so many people. He has his doctorate and he opened a Health Clinic
for anybody who can't afford treatment and all in the name of God -
it's completely donation based and even the other doctors who work
there are volunteers. And they do every type of surgery and treatment
you can think of. He opened the clinic in 1992 (I think) and there
are people staying there that have been there since it's opening and
some others who have just heard of it. He also runs a sort of "Meals
on Wheels" program, if you've heard of it... I think you have Al.
Basically, he drives around Tamale with a bunch of food in his van and
anybody who is hungry can come get some dinner for the night. He
explained that he does this because "You go to the person you love,
you don't wait for them to come to you." He is seriously filled with
so much love and happiness despite being around sickness and death all
the time, he keeps his head up and loves every patient as if they were
his own child. After we left the clinic, we pooled together money
amongst us (plus one of the girl's here, her mom is visiting) and we
raised 700 Ghana Cedi for him and his clinic... that's in addition to
a bunch of donations that we all got together before we left for
Northern Ghana. So basically we hooked him up haha. After we visited
the clinic, we went to see Diviners! Aka Fortune Tellers. It was so
bad ass. It was this Muslim guy who moved sand around to see about my
future. He told me a bunch of very general stuff and then that my dad
would die before my mom, that I need to sacrifice a "white cock, then
roast it and give it to children" haha, umm... and he kept mentioning
"my stomach" and I swear I never said anything about my stomach to
him. He said that the ailment "will be mild" but then I told him I
already have a chronic problem, and to that he told me he'd give me an
herb. Which I took (it was only 2 cedi)... not so much of a help, but I’ll leave the details out of this public blog. Okay well that was that. Unfortunately nothing
about my love life or anything - "it didn't come up in the sand"...
boo! That would’ve been fun to hear. That night, my friends
Leah and Katja and I wanted to get 'banku' a traditional dish here.

Sunday we did a lot of great
stuff too. We went to the very north of Ghana, to a city called Paga
to visit a slave camp where other Africans would capture fellow
Africans for the Europeans and keep them in the camp. This camp was
SO hot and dry. Like blisteringly hot. And they told us about how
they only had one meal a day, they had to be barefoot, and how they
were basically left to the "survival of the fittest". Not only was
that bad, but when the Europeans wanted slaves, they had to WALK from
northern Ghana BAREFOOT to the slave castle on the coast - Cape Coast
(I visited this castle at the beginning of the semester). The drive
is about 15 hours to Paga... I can't even imagine how they'd walk.
How anybody even made it. It was so eye-opening and I'm grateful we
got to see it. Wow this is long, I'm sorry. After the slave camp, we
went to a the "Widows and Orphans Ministry" and its exactly what it
sounds like. Widows in northern Ghana have been/are ostracized when
there husbands die so these women banded together and try to make a
living. They weave baskets and basically do all they can to live
happily. This was my favorite part of the trip. When our bus arrived
at the site, literally all these young children came running at the
bus so excited to see us! They were clinging to us and holding our
hands and just so happy to see someone that was there to love them.
We brought lots of donations for them too. When we got there, we all
sat around in a huge circle under a huge tree that provided so much
shade, it was pretty crazy, because it didn't seem like it would
provide that much shade. And the widows talked to us about their
projects - the basket-weaving - and what they do and how they have the
orphanage there too. They were so grateful for our donations. The
kids were absolutely adorable. If i was going to bring home a
Ghanaian child... this is where I would've picked him/her up. There
was this one little girl that I was OBSESSED WITH. Ah, going to this
little neighborhood was exactly what I wanted to do this whole time
and I'm so happy we finally did it. I just had such a good time with
the children and the widows. Now I think I know that I want to help
out at something like that later on in life because it just made me so
happy and I had a smile on my face the whole time. Oh, and I got some
really cute pictures of these kids. I was only there for like an hour
and I miss it so much already haha. Okay, well that was basically
then end of the trip. Then Sunday we were up at 3am to get on the bus
back to Accra.

Since Tamale, lots of work. Documenting, photo projects, recitation project, music project, and just this morning my Legon Psychology final. It was really sad to have our last academic thing at Legon.

Last Friday in recitation, we all got dressed up by this Ghanaian group in traditional Ghanaian clothes, it was so fun. They gave me an enormous booty made out of fabric. There are some great pictures of us... and my friend has a video of me dancing haha. Its funny. And it was so fun. We also learned a lot about Ghanaian culture, so that was good. But dress up time...overshadows that haha.

Saturday I went back to Aburi Gardens, the place I went to with Akirash. This time we did a bike tour which was SO FUN. But dang, am I out of shape and was it HOT HOT HOT! Mallory, Chris, Eric and I went into the village and rode around and it was so beautiful but so hilly and hot. It was such an incredible experience. It made me really regret not getting a bike at the beginning of the semester because I feel like I could've seen so much more of my area had I had one, but oh well. Actually, no regrets.... just happy I got to do the bike ride in Aburi.

Wli falls this weekend!! It seemed so far away when we looked at the calendar three months ago, but now its here? Time flies. Only a few more weeks here. I'm really starting to get nostalgic. Taking pictures of everything. Cherishing every moment with my friends. Trying to enjoy everyhing, even doing my homework? Just taking in Ghana. It's going to be so hard going all the way back to LA being away from all my new friends who will be in New York. I really hope that I'm better about staying in touch with everyone than I ahve been in the past. I'm so bad about that... so something needs to change. The world is so small now with skype, facebook, phone, etc. so I think i'll be able to do it. Okay, now i'm getting unnecessarily sappy. But really I'm just so happy that I've had this experience, and I'm going to miss it so much. I better get off the computer, stop talking about it, and actually just live it. ["Imagine single violin in background"]

love peace love peace love

just call me girlfriend

Okay, so I still haven’t updated about Namibia, but that’ll come shortly. I do have a new resolution that I made the other night upon the realization that I’m here only for a little bit more than a month (let’s not talk about it…), that I need to spend less time on my computer, and more time with my friends here and with Ghana. I’ve started to realize the benefit of studying abroad with your own school, simply because you meet so many people that you otherwise wouldn’t have met. Most of the people here did not know anyone else on the program, just like me. And now that our time here is almost ending and I’m 3,000 miles away from everyone and they can all spend the rest of college hanging out in New York, I can see the advantage of studying with your own school. I also realize that its just as great that I now know people from many different backgrounds, etc. that I will have this incredible connection with… and will hopefully be able to visit in the future. So yeah… I’ll be online less, basically. But still updating my blog, hopefully.

Monday was a good start to my resolution though! Or at least I think so. Because, after my psych class with Andrea, we stayed on Legon’s campus and hung out with a friend of her friends who go there and live on campus. It was really fun. Their names were Katman and Hamzah. Almost as weird as Griffin. People here, by the way, think Griffin is the MOST bizarre name. “That should be a surname” or… “ Girlfriend?” Griffin when pronounced with a Ghanaian accent, almost ALWAYS sounds like “girlfriend.” It’s quite amusing as I’ve sort of picked that up as new nickname here. Anyway, Andrea and I had a good time with our friends, we talked a lot about Ghanaian day-of-the-week names – mine is Adwoa, and if you were born on Monday and you are a female, yours is too. Monday, male = Kojo. The Ghanaians thought it was so interesting that we wanted to learn about their culture… Hamzah didn’t even know his day of the week name, how unfortunate. We also went to Hamzah’s residence hall and hung out there for a bit and met his roommates. Oh and we also talked to this old guy Uncle Ray who was really interesting. He went to University of Ghana and he used to teach in the economy department there but now only goes back to LEgon to “gossip and hang out” with his old buddies. He was a funny old guy. After hanging out at Legon, Andrea and I missed dinner with the group at Tante Marie, so we decided to get some Chinese food because we’ve been craving it for a long, long time. Mmm so good. Then we just hung out. I got a lot of good music from Andrea on my ipod. Then went to bed.

This past weekend was great toooo! Friday, we went to Kokrobite for our documentary making class. Tro tro ride was so gross, Katja and I were sweating on each other and just ew it was so hot. One thing that was great about the tro tro ride though was there was a little family (mom and three kids under the age of seven). The mom was sitting behind two of her kids with one of them in her lap. As the tro tro filled up, the two little ones were sharing a seat in front of their mom and when a man got on the tro tro, he just picked up the little girl and sat her in his lap like it was no big deal. She sat with him for the whole ride. It was just so nice. Katja and I talked about how that would never happen in the US for so many reasons, like lawsuits, etc, but here it was so normal and people just care for one another in all aspects of life. It was a small gesture, but I really appreciated it, even from afar.

Once we got to Kokrobite, we filmed a bunch, so that’s good. We still have a go back a few more times, but it’ll hopefully be interesting. Then Saturday, Tina, Leah, Katja and I went to Kumasi, a city about four hours out of Accra. Its home to the largest market in west Africa… and yes it was the largest market. Okay, so getting to and from Kumasi was half the fun. And half our trip.

Our day started off getting up at seven am. We knew we’d have to be at the tro tro station early because the trip is no less than four hours. So we woke up and decided we should look in the Bradt Ghana guide where we could get a tro tro to Kumasi and it said Kaneshie station. That made sense because you can get practically ALL other tro tros from Kaneshie (to Kokrobite, Cape Coast, Takoradie, …lots of places), but not Kumasi. We got to Kaneshie and asked someone where we should go. “over the bridge” so we went over the bridge to the tro tro station, then when they asked where we should go “back over the bridge” to the other side and you can get one from there. Then back again… “where do we find a tro tro to Kumasi?” ..finally, “you have to take a tro tro to Circle then from there you can get a tro tro to Kumasi.” Goodness. I think they just wanted us to get a little exercise by crossing that bridge a bunch, and if not, we definitely got some good exercise. We got a tro tro to circle and the guy sitting next to me on the tro tro, Samuel, said that Circle was very crazy and that since we’re obrunis the tro tro conductors would swarm around us trying to get us to take THEIR tro tro, so that he’d help us find one. And I’m really glad he did because Circle was INSANE. He was so nice and helped us find one for cheap. People were literally grabbing all of us trying to get us to take their tro tro. At one point Katja was circled (no pun intended) by like eight Ghanaian men who she had to push away and tell she didn’t need help. Finally, we got on a tro tro for five cedi to Kumasi. Niiiiice. Unlike most tro tros, this one was spacious and had a flat screen TV..? They didn’t use it on the ride, but it had one. Weird. That’d be like a public bus having a flat screen TV. Hmm.. maybe for long rides up to Tamale or something. Anyway, we waited for a while for the tro tro to fill up, bought some delicious hazelnut wafers and some other snacks for our long ride. The ride was really long and really dirty. We had the windows open the whole time and by the end of the ride, we were all covered in dust. Leah had makeup remover pads and when we wiped off our faces, especially Tina and me because we were by the windows, the wipey was black. It was so nasty. Then washing off my neck and shoulders, ew. It was grossssa.

When we got to Kumasi, we found a cheap hotel in the middle of town, Nurom, so we asked how to get there. We should’ve known after the morning’s events that asking for directions will probably lead up astray, but we weren’t thinking. Everyone lead us completely in the wrong direction. And after asking around some more we realized that we were in the entirely wrong part of town so we took a taxi to Nurom just to find out that there was no vacancy. Then this “Canadian,” named Bless, with a gold grill that said “GOD” showed us where to find fried rice for lunch. From there we went to the National Cultural Center to look at the art centers. We got some really cool stuff. I got some shoes and some gifts for people at home, so I’m not going to say what I got… just in case you’re reading. Then Mallory gave me money to buy something that she saw when she was in Kumasi for spring break. Long story short: I wanted to buy a couple things from this guy, in addition to what I was getting for Mallory, and this guy would not bargain with me. I was an angry camper and left without buying anything, but it was so ridiculously overpriced. Whatever. Then it started pouring. So cold. So so cold. Then we got a taxi to our new hotel, Hotel de Kingsway. They almost made us get two rooms because they didn’t want four people in the room, but once they realized we were going to put up a fight about it, they said it was okay for us all to stay together. The room was HUGE and the bathroom was so unnecessarily big I don’t know why they didn’t want four people. For dinner, we ran to the closest restaurant right across the street because it was still raining. As we were eating, a man sat down with us to talk to us about his NGO. His name was Nanasei and he runs a very lovely NGO called Global Youth Network (www.gynetwork.blogspot.com). We hope to return back to Kumasi in a couple weekends to volunteer with him at an orphanage or something. We considered doing it this weekend, but I think I’m going to Togo and maybe Benin.

Sunday, we woke up early and right as we left the hotel we got bombared by a bunch of Ghanaians who wanted to sell us stuff. We were all just so groggy and not in the mood to be talking with these people. All we wanted was an egg sandwich. And of course right as we’re getting really frustrated with them, a troupe (must attribute this word to Caroline) of kids with instruments parades by. What. The. Hell. Seriously, it was just so weird. So one of the guys pestering us insisted that he take us to get egg sandwiches. He dropped us off at a little stand… it was very good. And after that, we went to the market. Even though it was a Sunday and markets are usually more closed down on Sundays, it was still pretty hoppin. I got some fabric, some beautiful scarves for… get this. 10 pesewas. Then after walking along a railroad track… and wondering how any railroads go on these tracks (they don’t), we stopped to buy flannel shirts? In the blisteringly hot sun. We thought this was a reallllly good idea. As we were trying them on, we started to realize maybe the worst idea we had ever. It was so so hot. But they were 50 pesewa… how could we say no? So then we just walked through the market a little more, talked to a bunch of people. And just loved life. Being with Tina who is Indian and Katja who is half Korean, the people at the market could not understand how we were all together. People were so confused, thought I was Asian, and just didn’t understand that being from the United States, there are lots of different races. It was so funny. After the market, we went back to those pestering men because they were outside our hotel. We talked to them for a while then found our way to the tro tro station and fried rice. The ride home was not as comfortable as the ride to Kumasi… whoever thought wrapping car seats in Ghana in plastic was seriously deranged. We stuck to the seats for the whole ride home. It was so nasty. As we got off the tro tro, yet another reason I hate being obruni, a guy came up to us and immediately thought we needed help finding a taxi. Which we didn’t. This guy hailed us a taxi and expected us to pay him for it. Then his friend put his hands in our taxi and tried to pickpocket Leah… when I saw this I slapped the guy’s arm so hard, and he immediately got away from the car and the taxi driver sped off. Being obruni has serious drawbacks. But being in Africa totally makes up for it.

Last week, I went to the after school program twice. Gaby and I decided we wanted to make mandalas with the kids. We told them to divide the circle however they wanted and we gave them examples of ours and then we told them to depict things like their family, their faith, their friends, home town, fears, aspirations, dreams, etc. It was so wonderful the things they came up with. Some of them drew that they wanted to be football players, some that they wanted a book, some wanted cars, and the one that struck me the most was a dream for “good ventilation.” It’s something we take for granted, but most places here are so poorly ventilated, and with this heat its so bad. When we were done, we asked for all the markers and colored pencils back.. when we couldn’t find a few, we told them that if they couldn’t take care of our stuff, they wouldn’t be able to use it ever again. This was appalling to them, and they absolutely tore the room apart looking for these markers. They were so appreciative of the supplies and it was so great to see how quick they were to help. These kids really teach me a lot and its so rewarding to see them express themselves creatively… something that isn’t encouraged too much in Ghanaian public school. The next day at the school, Mallory, Tina and I took Gaby’s computer and showed this video (http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/news/poisoning-the-poor?mode=send) and then asked the kids to write letters to companies like Nokia, Dell, and Microsoft asking them to find a more responsible way of disposing of their e-waste as to not pollute their beautiful country. It was pretty successful, except one kid didn’t quite understand…and when Tina looked at his letter, he had asked the company to “Please send their e-waste.” He thought the movie was showing how they got all the old computers and stuff and thought it was a good thing. It was so hilarious. I really enjoy helping with the after school program and I’m happy I’ve begun to help.. too bad they have a three week break starting really soon ☹.

This week was pretty non-eventful. Just class and the bead market. That was really cool and beautiful. Andrea and I now have belly beads! On the way to the market, we drove by this huge truck and as we passed it, there was a MONKEY in the front seat with the driver. It was so funny and just unexpected. So great, only in Africa really. And photo was so wonderful this week! We had our critiques on our “Narrative in Five Parts” projects – self-portrait, landscape, the other, signage, and ‘j’ne c’est pas’ (basically whatever doesn’t fit into those categories). Our class was so great because we had a visiting guest artist/critic, Senam Okudjeto. She was so helpful and just brought a totally different feel to the class. She was so great. Look up her work and you’ll see what I mean. This weekend, we’re off to Togo for Easter and just to explore.

Okay, that's it.

love love love

every step of my trip to and through cape town

Okay, so this is really long (and not even all of Spring Break). This is mostly so that I can remember everything, but if you'd like, come with me and enjoy!

Soooo... Gaby is bullet pointing her spring break and since I do everything Gaby does… I’m also going to bullet point my spring break.

• Kotoka airport was the easiest thing in the world. Someone told us that we should be there three hours in advance. Whoever thought that was necessary obviously has never gone through the easiest customs line in the world. We could wear our shoes through security and I think Marlee even had water in her water bottle. Kotoka airport was also the COLDEST airport in history. The air conditioning unit was blowing right on me and Caroline and I thought maybe I’d get frostbite. But I didn’t, thanks goodness. Jasmine, Tanesha, and Aiesha were also on the same flight, but it took them much longer to get through the airport. Funniest thing ever said to a stranger – a Ghanaian worker to Tanesha, “Are you mad?” Tanesha is probably one of the funniest people ever but never looks happy, per se, and this lady felt the need to comment on it. So hilarious.

• Got on the plane, got my window seat, and got cozy. I sat next to a Ghanaian lady who was going to Johannesburg to visit her brother who she hadn’t seen in four years. Her name was Sarah. It was her first time on a plane. She was just so adorable and nice – in fact, she hissed at the flight attendant to get their attention for me when the headphones they provided me were broken (Ghanaians hiss at people to get their attention… sounds pretty rude, but it’s actually quite effective). So I fell asleep for most of the ride listening to South African Airway radio – channel 8, African music. It was so soothing, especially after my complimentary split of wine. Sleepy time…

• Johannesburg airport was so nice. Like being back in America. We were only there for a little bit.. then got on our connecting flight to Cape Town. The man sitting next to us waiting to get on the flight had the biggest newspaper EVER. You literally cannot sit next to anyone while reading it because your arms will be in their laps. Its completely unnecessary… maybe they do it to be funny.

• The plane ride to Cape Town was only a couple of hours. I sat next to a dad and a daughter. I forget his name… but while we were talking he asked me what I was studying in school, and upon telling him that I was a psychology major, he said, “Oh man, could I use a psychologist…” and basically just spilled to me about his ex-wife and their problems. Seriously, this therapist/psychologist biz could get a little weird if random people I don’t know just tell me their life story. Basically though, we told me how his wife, the mother of his cute little girl, cheated on him with a 65 year old. Then went on to tell me about how he thinks its because she never had a dad and that she just needed an older man in her life, blah blah blah. Tooooo much information. Finally I got to sleep though.. it was still reallllly early Ghana time.

• Upon landing in Cape Town, we walked out to get our car and there was a cute man standing there with a sign that said “Busching” (as in Marlee Busching). Marlee reserved us a shuttle so that we wouldn’t have to deal with a taxi, etc. at the airport. He ended up being a great tour guide and told us a lot about South Africa and Cape Town during our drive to our hostel on Long Street – Carnival Court.

• We checked into our hostel with the “awkwardly cute front desk guy” who we later found out has a name… it was Sean. We asked him how to get to a Robben Island tour and he told us to take a taxi. When he told us this, we asked him if the taxis are metered or if you bargain with the taxi drivers because in Ghana there aren’t meters… only negotiations. Sean was a little weirded out by this question until we explained that we have been living in Ghana for the past two months.

• Got into my first metered taxi since being in Africa, on our way to the V&A Waterfront. Even though I knew the Rand was worth less than the dollar, watching the meter looked like we were going to have to pay a FORTUNE! It was something like 50 Rand… 5 US Dollars. While walking around the Waterfront looking for somewhere to eat, this lady approached us because… silly us, all four of us were wearing Ghanaian clothes. I was wearing a tank top I had made, Marlee a dress, Caroline a skirt, and Monica a shirt. It was actually pretty ridiculous. This lady wanted a picture with us. She was from somewhere in Western Africa, but living in the US, so she felt so connected with us. She walked with us for a while until we went off to get lunch. After lunch, we had to hurry to the Robben Island tour because we were late for take off time (you have to take a boat to Robben Island, hence the island).

• The whole thing was completely amazing…. At least the parts I was awake for. I was so sleepy from the trip from Ghana, I literally fell asleep for a little during every part of the tour. On the boat, on the bus tour, and I’m really embarrassed but while in a prison cell during an ex-prisoner’s talk about his stay in Robben Island. I didn’t actually fall asleep but I was dozing off. I don’t know which is worse. I hope the tour guides didn’t notice me because its not like I wasn’t interested, I was, I was just so tired. I did learn a lot though. Our bus tour guide was so hilarious and charismatic. He showed us around the island and explained how every country has or has had some sort of impact on Robben Island. After our bus tour of the island, we went on the tour of the prison with another guide. He showed us Nelson Mandela’s prison cell and told us why people were imprisoned and how they differentiated between whites, blacks, and colored people. During apartheid, being black was worse than being colored so you’d get worse conditions while in prison. Gosh, its so crazy how recently all of this happened… Apartheid only ended in 1994.

• After our tour ended, we walked around the waterfront, where I got some coffee Haagen Daz, mmm. If you’re still reading, comment and tell me what your favorite ice cream flavor is.

• On our way home to our hostel, we saw three of our friends, Jackie, Katie, and Emma, who were also spending their spring break in South Africa outside at a little bar. Then we went to MEXICAN FOOOOOOOD! Ah it was so delicious. We were all a little ravenous about it. For instance, we go nachos for the table. It was a well sized dish. Emma got up to go to the bathroom and in the time she was in the bathroom, we got the nachos and finished them off. Oh and the fajitas were so good – I felt like I had a food baby after dinner.. I think I might have had to unbutton my top button, shh… It’s weird because I didn’t used to love Mexican, but now I do love it so much and it was the most wonderful thing to have upon our arrival. One thing I still do miss soooo much is sushi. I have to find some here, stat.

• Our first night out in Cape Town was pretty fun. Our hostel is rated in the top 20 list of party hostels in the WORLD. And it lived up to this title our first night. Being a Saturday, they had a huge party in the bar – Zanzibar. Loud, loud music and tons of people. The music that was playing was really loud technoy stuff. South Africans dance really funnily too. We met a lot of really nice people from all over the place, mostly South Africans though. People are so hilarious. This one guy was so funny to Caroline. Caroline was kind of slouching on this bench and he went up to her and said, “Sit up!” So Caroline, like he was a drill sergeant, sat up immediately. Then he said “Stand up!” so she did. Then he said, “Hug me.” Hahaha, it was so funny. Who does that to a complete stranger? Crazy people. This is the same boy who was calling me Shakti all night because I’m apparently just like a little girl from The Matrix with that name. Never seen it, so I can neither confirm nor deny. Oh and as we were sitting on the balcony, someone from another bar’s balcony threw a glass bottle at a police car driving by. It didn’t do any damage to the car, it was just pretty stupid of them because they the police had to get out and investigate. It was pretty stupid. After a while, we decided to walk around Long Street and there were quite a few beggars. This one girl asked me for money EVERY SINGLE DAY we were in Cape Town. I gave her my coins if I had any, but otherwise she just got a big hug… but I think she appreciated it – she always called me “sista.”

• Just so you know… I wrote down all of my spring break on a legal pad in small bullets and what I’ve just written took up only one page of this baby legal pad… so buckle up. This’ll be long. I think I have about 10 pages of this legal pad. Maybe I’ll just write a short novel. And really these bullet points are quite unnecessary, they might as well be separate paragraphs. But I’ll go with it.

• Sunday, we went kayaking in a little town outside of Cape Town called Simonstown to see PENGUINS! At first when we had to get up at 8 Am after a night out, I didn’t know if it’d be worth it, but once we got there, and got some physical activity going, it was so fun. The penguins were so cute, and the water was so so so cold. That is the closest I’ve ever been to Antarctica… but that’s pretty obvious. After kayaking, we just walked around this adorable little town. Lots of antique stores and just cute things everywhere. We saw ads for houses and the houses were so cheap compared to American houses in similar locations. I mean beautiful houses for much less than you’d ever except – like on the water for $300,000…3,000,000 Rand. Then, we had lunch at this beautiful place called “The Meeting Place” – I want to open a restaurant like it some day. We took the train home for 12 Rand… first class. There were about 50 kids on our bus from some day camp or something all singing camp songs and playing games. I wouldn’t have minded had I not wanted to nap so badly… oh well. Once the (what Caroline deemed the) “troupe” got off, we all napped pretty soundly until the last stop in Cape Town.

• That night we had a delicious dinner and the best fruit cobbler, then went back to our hostel to hang out. The only people there were these lame, lame Americans. They were just so annoying. One was from Mesa, Arizona and just thought he was the coolest person alive. Needless to say, I went to bed early because I just couldn’t handle their pretentious and annoying conversations.

• Monday, we did a winelands tour which was so amazing. I almost didn’t go on it because I wanted to skydive that day, but then we arranged for another day to skydive instead. To get to Stellenbosch for our tour, Isaac in a little van picked us up at our hostel. He does tours often to different places in Cape Town. On our way to the winelands, we picked up a Polish couple, Hannah and Robert, who I love… and I wish I got their contact information. Anyway, as they got in car, Hannah said something along the lines of, “Oh aren’t you a lucky guy today?”… So we thought maybe they were brother and sister, but really they were just a really fun, sarcastic cute couple. On our drive to Stellenbosch, we saw a township and Isaac talked to us a little bit about them. Then told us about how bad traffic is going to be in 2010 because of the World Cup, and how all South Africans are going to be mandated to carpool. Our first stop was Bergkelder winery. We did a cellar tour where we tried about seven wines. Our guide taught us how to taste wine. I don’t really remember the steps but it was something like, first rate the color, arbitrarily, really. Second, smell it. Then taste it. Fourth smell it again after swirling your glass. Then do this weird sucking thing to get a different taste of the wine… and choke. Then drink it. I definitely started to feel the wine after that first tour. Hannah and Robert did too. They kept talking about how they wanted to dance! It was so funny. Our second winery was Goats Do Roam. They had cheeeeeese there. Being in Ghana, there is a lack of dairy products. I don’t usually crave cheese at all… I actually never really have dairy but having this cheese at Goats Do Roam was so delicious. I had so much goat cheese it was crazy. Caroline and I got baguettes and chevin goat cheese and just snacked, yum. We also all bought some wine there – it was so each. For good wine it was about 55 Rand… $5.50, woo. Next we were off to our picnic that Isaac set up for us. He had homemade cookies for us and then cold cuts and salad and drinks. Just as we were setting up, it started to drizzle and it got really cold. Robert gave me his jacket because I was so cold… another reason why I love that couple. Next, we went to another winery. After the first two, I couldn’t drink anymore. I definitely don’t think I got the Gosnell drinking genes. I gave all my wine to Robert and whoever was willing to take it from me. Hannah and I were out for the rest of the day. Next, Isaac took us to a cheetah conservatory where we got to pet cheetahs! It was so awesome. These cheetahs were rescued and are just so used to humans. They were so calm and soft and beautiful. It was really bad ass. That was our last stop, then Isaac dropped us off at home and got really sad saying goodbye to us. He really loved us. And we loved him, he was great. Oh, I forgot to mention how well informed Isaac was about current events, not only South African but American. He was talking about how he was so disappointed that “my man John McCain” didn’t win the election. He said that he liked his fiscal policy, his stance on war, etc. It was so interesting to talk to him about it. People in Ghana all love Obama, but simply because he’s African. It was so captivating to talk to someone from abroad who knew probably more than I do about my president. In fact, we met a lot of people in South African who were fans of McCain and were really up on American politics and current events… I felt kind of out of the loop.

• That night we went to a bar for happy hour, drinks were incredibly inexpensive, two for one. I guess all-in-all South Africa was pretty inexpensive. It was really bizarre though because the bar said 21 and over. Which I’m obviously allowed for, but all of my friends are underage.. minus Katie and maybe Emma. But they let us in anyway without our IDs because we told that they we didn’t want to carry around our passports as IDs because its unsafe… he obliged. After happy hour, we went to Kurtish food. It was so good. Right as we were about to get our check, belly dancers came out. This would’ve been cool had I not just read in the menu that there would be a “Compulsory 10 Rand” fee added per head if belly dancers came out during our meal. It was fun to watch but irritating that we each had to pay extra for this lady to dance in front of us. Literally, had we received our check like two minutes earlier, we wouldn’t have had to pay. Then since it was Monday night and we wanted to do something fun, Emma (she used lived in Cape Town last summer) knew of this club for 18 and up. So we got a cab there… again same problem because we didn’t have ids. When we explained that our only ids were our passports, they still wouldn’t let us in and said that we didn’t all look 18. Rude. We went to club next door, and they said they’d let us in, but only if Caroline and Monica showed ID. Even more rude. So we just decided to walk back to Long Street and go to our hostel to hang out yet again. It ended up being a short night because I got tired early… probably from all that wine, and we went to bed.

• Tuesday, we were supposed to SKYDIVE! Erin, my friend from Pi Phi, told me that this was something I had had had to do. So I told my friends about it and we made all the arrangements. We were all set when we looked outside and saw it was a little gloomy… uh oh. Then we went downstairs to ask Sean, awkwardly cute front desk guy, about the sky diving conditions and he said he’d give us a call when he heard from the company. Sure enough, ten minutes later, we got a call from Sean saying that it was too windy but that they could reschedule us for Monday. Unfortunately, we’d be in Namibia by then, so we couldn’t go. I’m sort of happy we didn’t though because we had such a wonderful day anyway.

• Instead of skydiving, we went shopping along Long Street. Everything was really cute, but pretty expensive. I got a couple pairs of lounge pants that were two for the price of one. Then We went to Mr. Pickwicks for some lunch. They had really yummy milkshakes, so I got my favorite – Banana!

• After lunch, we went hiking at Lion’s Head, a suggestion from Sean. This was probably one of the most incredible hikes I’ve been on. First of all when we got to the trail head, we asked this man to take our picture. He took a couple of pictures of us. And as we were about to start hiking, we stopped us and said he’d like to take some pictures of us of his own for a photojournalism article he was doing on the dangers of being mugged while hiking. This is just what we wanted to hear – since we were carrying a backpack, each of us had a camera, and well it was only three young girls (Marlee, Caroline, and me). He said that there had been a lot of mugging on this particular trail and that there should be more signs about it, and that’ why he was writing the article. So once we had our photo shoot, and he told us we might be in the local newspaper – we don’t know if we actually ever were, we started the hike. I don’t know if its because I’ve done very little strenuous activity in this blistering Accra heat, but I felt so out of shape the first couple minutes as we were hiking. It was just a steady incline, but it seemed like K2 or something, not really. We finally started getting to the real hike part, and it wasn’t as bad. We passed some Germans who told us that there was rock climbing, scaling walls with chains, and some other really difficult stuff ahead, so we were prepared not to make it to the top, especially with our cameras and bags. We kept walking and literally every person who passed us we discussed the possibility of them being a mugger. No one mugged us yet. The hike was a complete circle around the mountain, so we got to see all of Cape Town from every side of this mountain. We kept hiking and finally we got to the top… lazy Germans didn’t even make it, just kidding. We were the only ones up there and it was unbelievably beautiful. I think the wind that prevented us from skydiving cleared the city of any pollution or anything, because standing on Lion’s Head I could see for miles. I could see the beautiful coast with its blue, blue waters, the downtown area, the waterfront, Robben Island, Table Mountain (the big mountain), and the incredibly blue skies with the white clouds making awesome shadows on the mountain. It was like something out of a postcard. I actually felt like a postcard photographer while I was hiking. Come to think of it most spring break was like I was in a postcard… Anyway, it was just so perfect. After we took all of our pictures, we started our way down. The hike down was just as great.

• When we got to the bottom we didn’t really know how to get home from there. We waited a while for a taxi, but then we saw this guy coming down the mountain. I asked him if he knew where we could get a taxi… he didn’t but then offered us a ride once his friend came down, because we were on his way home. Their names were Christian and Michael. They were so nice and funny. They were two self-proclaimed “decent South Africans.” We talked with them about the photojournalist who told us about the muggings. They too agreed that it’s a problem on the mountain. And said that if we had gone up the other route, we probably would’ve been mugged… lots of “dodgy” people hang out on the other route. Christian said that mugging is such a problem in South Africa that his brother bought his girlfriend a stun gun just in case. We also talked with them about Ghana, told them about tro tros, decribed them as dilapidated with bungie cords holding the door on. Tro tro generally are broken down with a Jesus saying on the back, folding down seats, and at least one high pitched voice yelling from it… basically vans that parents would advise you not to get into.

• We got back to the hostel safely, showered and went out to dinner. We had delicious burgers and sweet potato fries, mmm. We went back to our hostel for the St. Patrick’s day party. Tons of people were there. Right when we sat down we met a bunch of really nice South Africans from East London (Wouter, Ben, Belinda, Natasha, Daniel,…). They taught us a little Afrikaans and some of the clicking language, while we taught them a little Twi. We all stayed up all night until our shuttle to the airport at 5:30 am for the airport. On our way to the airport, we could see that Table Mountain was on fire. It was so terrible, it literally seemed like the entire mountain was on fire.

• When we got to the airport, we found out that there were only 12 people on our 50 person plane. Perfect, since we were all so tired… we each got our own tiny, tiny row. Carolie and I had to be woken up by the flight attendants when it was time for landing. Out the window, Namibia looked so vast and there was literally nothing around the airport besides grass and trees. It was crazy. In the airport, there was a place to pick up your firearms if you were in Namibia to hunt game. It was pretty appalling to see that check point, but whatever.

• When we got to our backpackers, Chameleon, we went swimming, then took a nap, met our weird roommates (guy who opened locker every hour in the middle of the night, so annoying), and went to the grocery store to get food to make for dinner. Our whole meal – pasta with vegetables cost us US $4. Oh and one huge perk about Chameleon, as much free rooibus tea as I wanted. Mmmm… We watched some TV with our German friend Fabian, saw some people watching Ace Ventura, and considered joining them but didn’t… they ended up being the boys who went on the safari with us!

Sossusvlei and Swakopmund coming up next.


Oh, I've been trying to upload pictures to no avail. Patience is a virtue.

love peace love love