Under a Pawpaw Tree

Arrival

2010-06-24T13:10:00.000-07:00

Washington DC.

Finally.
After the joys, the sorrows, the goodbyes, the long days on which I wanted a cold Seattle breeze and the moments I thought would last for, if not ever, at least much longer than they did.

Met up with Turkey in Germany, and now just trying to realize it is real. We're home, well, almost.

So. I'm alive.

(Note: we met up with the students on our program who had been in Turkey, not Turkey itself... no, as far as I know Turkey is still over where it aught to be).

Departure

2010-06-22T17:54:00.000-07:00

THIS is it.

I am reminded now of a moment some ten months ago when I took the few minutes before finally stepping out of my room to write something named Departure. Even then I knew an era would be ending, and that was what I spoke of.

Life moves on. Even as we sit here willing time to stop, it wraps us up in its swift channel and whether we have our bags or not, it's taking us home. On this last night we sew up the fabric of this life around us, cocooning ourselves in Ghana, in our memories, in our love for this place that it may never let us free.

We will get over it, as all things pass. But at least for me it will take time. And what our loved ones must understand is this passage, when perhaps it will take only a song or a picture to leave us stranded in the despair of this ending, that it is not the things around us that make it hard, it is rather that we created something so beautiful and cannot go back to it.

Of course as we go back each will be thrown into the tumult of beginnings, but for now it is only the emptiness that strikes us.

Now it really is the last minute. The stress of today, cleaning packing goodbye-ing.....

And I am now
Afia Panyin

Here we go.

2010-06-06T10:40:00.000-07:00

We stole one more week to travel up to the norther most tip of Ghana with two intentions: sit on Crocodiles and see Elephants. I am happy to say we accomplished both... except I didn't actually SIT on the croc, I rather hovered 2 inches above it.

The journey began Monday, waiting 3-4 hours in the bus station to finally leave at 4pm. Then we sat in that bus until 8am the next morning when we arrived at the boarder of Ghana and Burkina Faso in a small town called Paga. Throughout the night we froze to death because I had insisted we pay an extra 2 cedis for AC, which, to my defense, would have been wonderful had we been traveling under the sun. There were Ghaliwood films playing all night. And Ghaliwood tends to drive me crazy (no offense to any Ghanaians) for the tinny sound quality, and I'm sorry to say but, bad acting. Every few hours we stopped to urinate or buy food for whatever the hour was, a mere 9pm, 12 midnight or even 3am there were women with baskets of bread, trays of boiled eggs with small pepper sauce, bananas, mangoes or pots of fried rice balanced on their heads and sold by street light or oil lamps. People asleep on straw mats or nothing at all. 20peswas to use the loo. And the moon was a plump half above, lighting the scene, coming through my window to light upon my upturned face.

At a few points we let on enough head-scarved women and capped men to fill the isle. They sat on plastic stools stowed on the bus for just that reason, and the guy behind us grumbled about overload.

Arriving in the morning, munching on some left over crackers I'd brought, we find ourselves not 100feet from Burkina Faso. We sit down to enjoy some B&E&T, the most common breakfast/anytimeofday meal- Bread&Egg with Tea. Now, there is something I should mention about Ghanaian breakfast, and that is, they like their food heavy. "Tea" is what you take in the morning before breakfast, and it is either some chocolatey drink, Milo, Ovaltine, hot chocolate, or Lipton with lots of cream and sugar, AND bread. That is "tea". When I first came and drank only the liquid, they would ask me where the bread was. So anyway, there are "B&E" setups on every corner- like Starbucks in Seattle- and you just ask for however many peswas of bread you want usually 20 is ok, the egg is 30 and the tea brings it to a cedi or just above. The seller chops a bit of onion and tomato in the egg, fries it up and you have a nutritious, cheap and absolutely satisfying meal.

We met with the sister of a friend of a friend who was from Paga who got another friend to help her ride us to the croc ponds on their motorbikes.

So we get to the ponds and it just looks like a little flood area, and then we see the back of a crocodile emerging as the locals call it. So there are like four crocs surrounding us and that's not all, we are supposedly going to SIT on them. There was something about it that went against everything I had watched on those nature shows. One at a time we went and squatted by that prehistoric hunk of muscle and teeth and armor and claws. I could have sat on it, but resting my hand on its rough back was enough for me. As I hovered there the image of it's head just whipping around to snap me in half kept running through my mind.

The story of Paga is that there was a prince who was somehow exiled from his home and was wondering in the wilderness lost and thirsty when he sees a crocodile and it is wet, so he says to himself "well if this croc is here and it is wet, there jolly-well must be water near by" "hallelujah!" So indeed the crocodile leads him to water and in return the human is supposed to keep watch over the animal, which is why the two live in peace up to this day. The locals there estimated 200 creatures living in that pond alone and that they have swum with them. I mean I've thought swimming with dolphins and sea turtles is pretty cool, but CROCODILES? That's a whole other level.

After that we visited the home of the friend here in Accra. Her sister took us to a mud hut with straw roof, into a nice room with a couch, TV, a few faded black and white photos of people, and a bed of foam on the floor. Once we were seated she brought us water, which they had to go buy making us feel terrible. They asked us what we might eat, and offered a Nothern specialty called "tizet" which we gladly accepted. While waiting, a very old man came into the room and settled on his bed with his two grandchildren in their school uniforms sitting by him. He spoke to us of his travels around Ghana and outside, telling us he is Mamata's father. (Mamata is the woman here in Accra). I loved listening to him, his old, slow voice, he kept saying he was so happy to have us, that if we wanted to stay overnight it would be wonderful but he knew we had short time. At that moment I felt so blessed. Here we were with people we didn't even know in this small village, them treating us with such hospitality- it wasn't set up by AFS or family or anyone else, it was the beautiful outcome of doing exactly what I came to do- making connections.

They served us the tizet and let us eat alone. The three of us shared a pot of sticky corn dough that was different from the other Ghanaian dishes, more watery and less fermented, and a smaller bowl of okro stew with a tantalizing chicken flavor. After a day with no real food but bananas and crackers this warm, heavy meal was absolutely stellar, and it was all the better to be eating with my hands from the same pot as my two companions. After many thank you's and a few pictures they sent us off with pieces of fried guinea fowl, 6 hard boiled eggs and a tub of peanut butter big enough to last a year. We couldn't believe it, to say the least. Then they drove us on the motorcycles back to the taxi station to catch a car to Bolgatanga. All told I think that that morning was one of the best memories I will have of my stay here, our trips, Ghanaian hospitality, because as Adam said, it was completely "legit". And it was. It was exactly the reason why I don't want to just tour.

We got through Bolga and down to Tamale, back to where we had been in October with AFS- in fact we visited the same Belgin-owned restaurant we'd had wonderful pizza... only this time our wallets suggested we go for a coke, and it was mostly a guise to use the bathroom because well, it was a real bathroom with tp, doors, flush ability and soap.

Next goal: elephants. This led us back to Mole National Park, which we had also gone to with AFS... but you know, it is so much funner (and hotter, sweatier, stressfull-er, and longer) to go solo, to hop from trotro to trotro, figure it out, arrive in after dark and have to find our hotel, to bear the grit and live on bread and peanut butter. On Wednesday we arrived in another village called Larabanga rather late. It was at the end of a never ending road which had these awful ridges which made our bus rattle and shake so the racket made conversation impossible, leaving us to bounce on our seats, holding and praying that the whole shebang wouldn't go kaput right then and there. Absolutely beat, we step off the bus and are greeted by a tall man in a long white dress which the Muslims wear. He ushers us into a sweet compound, sits us on benches and without even talking about it convinces us to stay there in his guesthouse with his sheer friendliness. And the place we had thought about staying at he said had no electricity. Half an hour later we found ourselves bathed (bucket bath of course) and laying on foam on the roof under a cavern of stars, the hint of a plump moon rising, lightening flashing, soundless.

I wake. 3:21am I have to pee and it is rather cold. Leia, my sister, once told me that if you are holding urine in your body it makes you colder because your body is trying to keep the liquid warm. Hobble down the ladder and go to the pit in the floor used for such purposes. Back on the roof I stand. A baby cries in a house below. Roosters are crowing though there is no light.

We arise before the sun has shaken off the mist and hop on bikes towards the Park, some 6km away. Wheels beneath me for the first time in so long, the freedom of downhill, the panting of uphill in the still cool morning of wilderness. There are no words. I picked up a twig of a woman covered in so much colorful cloth on her way to some form of work, somewhere along this long dirt road. Little further, we pass two school children walking to class and, since the woman has alighted, we pick them up, a boy and a girl in class four in their yellow and blue uniforms. We pass a family of baboons. Warthogs. Monkeys.

We debated whether or not to splurge and spend the 40 cedis to go on a safari car tour, as we didn't see elephants immediately at the waterhole, over bread and peanut butter. A cheerleading quad of North Carolina girls in matching tops and mini shorts were also there getting ready for the walking tour... so they all had to rent Wellingtons becasue all they had were flip-flops. Hehe. Then one of the guides comes over and says the old man there wants to know if we would join his safari car because he is alone and there are four of us and it would be perfect- free for us. We thanked him profusely and hopped on. (We were four because there was another girl traveling alone, who we had happened to have seen down on Busua beach a month or two before. If I didn't mention Sofie didn't come one this trip, just me Marie and Adam). This lovely man was a retired writer from Toronto with a Scottish accent who had lived in Accra for some 13 years as a missionary. He was writing a book about literature in Ghana and Nigeria. (We scored a signed copy) . Truly he was a wonderful old man, liked talking, interested in us, had vast and rambling knowledge, and told us that a Brit once said to him that "Canadians are like Americans on decaf" which made us howl. We agreed on certain Ghanaian phenomenons, such as the use of the word "urinate" as the sole key to a place to piss- "bathroom", "washroom", "pee", or "restroom" result in nothing but confusion. Why are we embarrassed to say it?

And finally, after 2 and a half hours of nice conversation and woods, occasional antelope, warthogs, monkeys we arrived at the very same waterhole that we could see from the top where we saw two elephants. Now, besides the desire to go to Paga, the only real reason for this bang up trip was for Adam to see elephants. As he saw it, he couldn't go all the way to Africa and not gaze upon a true, wild African Elephant. And he got his wish. Two massive animals, half stained with muddy water, gentle yet fearsome less than a hundred feet away from us.

We biked home that night after dark, slept out on the roof again. The sweet man who owned the place awoke us at 1:30am telling us it would rain, so we got downstairs and not three minutes later do my ears fill with the crashing of water on a tin roof. I had never heard it so loud before.

The rest was a blur- driving from 4:30 to 11 along bumpy roads back to Tamale, then Kumasi and finally home sweet home to Accra.

All told it was beautiful. The north is mostly open, with many trees, villages of round huts with thatched roofs, traditional cloth exploding color, mosques, beggars.

We are left with two weeks. Saying goodbye, finding the last treasures, trying to figure out how to bring everything back, making sure my mental list is satisfied, preparing to take the leap back home and then to reperch again. As it is no secret now, my family will be moving to New Mexico come August.... just another adventure on this continual spinning earth, another home, another life. As I leave this one I get ready to embark on another. Is it a sunrise or a sunset?

Sea Shells

2010-05-24T17:06:00.000-07:00

Two girls, feet buried in wet sand, skirts hiked around their knees, fingers swiftly searching. Double bent they prod the shore plucking shells, stones- glinting and salty. As a wave rocks the landscape, retrieving some of its bounty and producing more. Their eyes must be quick, fingers quicker lest that pearl is lost- but they are often lost- again and again their hands dart for one only to be swallowed by foamy brine and their treasure not yet grasped already gone. Skirts fall in the dash for glinting purple and come up sea soaked, but the girls barely notice. Sometimes she will take the chance after one over the other, there is only this time before the wave comes to decide, to chase, to try, and sometimes she comes up with diamonds, sometimes nothing but the salt and sand but there is no time for regret, the next wave is coming and the eye is already roaming for its next infatuation.

Can't we find these metaphors for life in every moment? Isn't the universe reflected in the contents of a teacup? I am searching for something. And even as I reach for it, chance comes to obscure, snatch or distort that which I desire, leaving me to blindly persue something I may or maynot manifest, and once taken, may or may not keep. Then there are those waves that come and not only sweep away the object of your desire, but knock you down, soak your skirt, leave you altered.

Sun scortched, hands overflowing yet minds stuck on those treasures lost, toes clean, thoughts expanded to exlposion from the sheer expanse of ocean. Knocked down on the cool shore, cold breeze, skin radiating pink heat, complete silence save for rhythmic crashing, is this freedom from the searcing? Momentarily.

Me Ye Ghanaba

2010-05-10T11:58:00.001-07:00

Well, we've hit the books again. Sat through half a day at school and realized I was already sick of it. The sweat, the uniforms, the late teachers, the hard wooden desks. And at the same time, I felt such an affection for my class- now that I know each person's personality, their niche in the dynamic, how they fool around... and as always when I am with them I begin thinking about how school was back home, the way we interacted with each other as opposed to how they do here, so during math class in which we are learning exactly what I learned last year, how to calculate the circumference and area of a circle, I began to brainstorm what makes a Ghanaian a Ghanaian.

Note: please excuse my repetitions, for I have probably mentioned some of these in passing...

First is the hand shake, as that is the prelude to all relationships. The Ghanaian hand shake ends with a little snap, one person's middle finger against the other person's. I find it funny sometimes, as I see "secret handshakes" to be a gangsta thing to do, when I see two men in suits finishing off a business transaction with this gesture, or I greet a grandmother and she snaps my finger. Also, handshakes are much more common- on average I will do this 7-12 times a day. Its a way to greet, a way to have a smile, just a passing "eeee, Yao" and we shake and I keep walking (I mean to a friend at school).

Greeting:
1) The person who enters a room, or meets another person who was already in that place is expected to greet first. For my first few weeks I was always greeting people, whether they were coming to me or I to them and my family kept telling me it wasn't good.
2) The younger person is always expected to greet the elder, unless in the above situation. In that case, if the elder is entering they will either not greet, or do a general one.
3) Youngsters are not expected, and indeed shouldn't ask their elder "how are you". An elder asks you, and you can ask in return but you must add a "please" before it, in Twi.
4) When shaking hands with people in a room, always begin at the right side.

Expressions:
"Twinglish" is common. Every so often they through English words. in their Twi... eg. "ma me book, wii" (give me a book), which helps me stay abreast in conversations now that I also get bits of the Twi.
"I'm coming" - it means they are going away and will come back shortly
"You don't have to" - you can't or really shouldn't
"00000" / "paapaa" - added to anything to exaggerate: "I'm hungryoooo" or "it was hot paapaa"

When speaking to an elder one is constantly saying "please", but in Twi. It feels weird to do it in English, but it would be: How are you? Please, I am fine.

Moving on... One always invites others to eat their food, and, if you are invited and don't want to take any you say "thank you", and if you want to eat you just eat. I used to say thank you as I ate, which is improper.

When in the presence of elders: Stand. Remove cap. Keep left hand behind back. DO NOT CROSS LEGS. Speak when spoken to. Keep hands out of pockets. Of course that is all the traditional formal stuff... often it is unnecessary.

Pure Ghanaian:
People suck their teeth to show annoyance or disapproval. I find it completely condescending, and very hurtful.
Hiss and/or loud kissing noises to get attention which I find rude and annoying yet effective, especially when trying to buy something off of someone's head.

Going out: LOOK GOOD. Look "fresh".
Iron everything. Have outfits that match- EVEN GUYS! Guys will wear sneakers with red on them, jeans, red belt, red shirt, red cap. Or these awful pink and/or flowered starched shirts with popped collars and their fake-worn jeans, stiff caps tilted to the side almost falling off their heads. They are the fresh guys. Girls wear very color coordinated outfits too of course, one or two colors. I have seen completely yellow and completely pink outfits- I mean pink skinny jeans, shoes, shirt, belt, necklace, earrings, hair clip. I would never have the audacity.
On the other hand, those who are out working, hawking, selling, wear completely discordant outfits- skirt with blue and orange stripes, a shirt with Obama on it and a scarf with a dull flowered pattern that belongs on Victorian drapes. Lots of skirts. And shawls. SO MUCH COLOR. My fellow YESer Adam Streeter has done a wonderful bit on all the second - (or fifth) hand clothing, so I'll do some promo and say you should check out his blog: http://adamtoghana.blogspot.com

(Adam, since I know you are reading this, I expect your next blog will feature a certain address... winkwink.)

Last but not least is GMT. Greenwich Meridian Time.... or Ghana Man Time. : )
I'll just say if the invitation says 3, come by 4:30-5.

And now I am listening to Hallelujah in Danish and drinking an iridescent red drink called bisab which we made ourselves from dried flowers after I trekked all over town and into a very cramped marketplace to find them. It is sweet and tangy, bit of ginger, hint of cloves... like sour apple cider, but more robust. Petal syrup.

Snapshots

2010-05-01T05:48:00.000-07:00

Kumasi:

It's night, on a rooftop in the midst of some forgotten neighborhood on the edge of town. The air moves and the silhouette of a palm tree sways. A distant horizon glows with one neon sign flashing, and we wonder, what could it be? The stars are few, as they always seem to be here and there is no moon, but lonely street lamps shed yellow light on the world and we have sight. A radio is somewhere below filling the sleepy streets with reggae... "...there is no place like home, home sweet home, when I go far to (Kumasi) I will always come back home..." and we sigh. Night has covered the landfill with its charcoal smoke which sits between us and the rest of town to the west. This morning we trekked over those ashes in our chalewates (flipflops), past a family in their Sunday best, paid the 20 peswa toll to cross a wooden plank over a flow of water and waste, came out with blackened feet and blacker lungs. Night may cover it, but we all know what lies in the dark, empty space like a hole out in space waiting to suck you in, and your reggae beats too. Just below us in the dirt street outside the hotel is one lotto booth spilling yellow on the earth, one man inside reading the Daily Graphic, occasionally visited by long shadowed fellows, just doin' his thing in his little snippet of life. I try to teach Sofie to salsa dance, but reggae really is not right for salsa. We peel oranges and suck out the sweetness, remining, fooling, being.

Busua:
Lying on the beach at night, the stars are finally brilliant here, away from the city, the smog, the dust. We lay with our heads on each other's laps in a little square- lucky we were four- getting bit by sand flees, the crash of waves, stories and little peeks into each other's lives, silence, constellations.

Sunyani:

Driving in a cab, smooshed together four in the back heading towards the monkey sanctuary. The driver pulls over in a small town and tells us we should get down here or give him another 1.5 cedis each to go all the way. We didn't agree to that though, back in Sunyani he had said we could get there for 3.50 each- all the way. Each of us try explaining to him that it doesn't work like that, he had agreed to something but he just said it was a misunderstanding back at the taxi rink. It goes on and on. We disembark. Maire begins hauling our bags out of the trunk saying we should just leave, that it's not ok, which it wasn't. Some other men come over and we are quick to give them the story, us in English and the cab driver in Twi, schoolboys come, and finally a mediator who settles that we should pay him small more or let him take us to find a trotro. The thing is he could have been easily telling the truth- a lot of men had been directing us and giving us the options of how to get to the sanctuary, either taxi and trotro which would cost a little bit less but make more hastle or this, the taxi direct route, but we had been pretty clear with him before we got in the cab... But just as easily he could have been trying to make a little more off us because he had no better way to waste his time. So it turned out with us asking him to take us all the way for a little more than we bargained for, much to the disgruntlement of our wallets. After half an hour up a bumpy, dusty road, me sitting on Marie's lap we made it to a nice reception area with a mango tree dripping juicy yellow stickiness. The tour guide led us to the village through the forest and we proceeded to find families of monkeys jumping about us. We fed them bananas.... As we are feeding all the small ones they rush in, grab the fruit and stuff their mouths, until the Big Daddy comes over, saunter up to the man with the goods. He sits. The man offers him a bite. He peels the banana with the dignity of a king and breaks off a piece to nibble on. Then, when he is finished, he saunters away and all the little ones come rushing back to grab their little paws some chop.

Shapshot:
My heart pounding, legs pumping, firm sand below, then waves then sand, down the strip of beach, early morning exercise, go go go till I feel I might drop, down to the end, touch the tree, turn around, beet red face, short breath, satisfaction.

Kejetia

Largest market of West Africa. The air is thick; sound, dust, movement, sweat, heat, color, a maze of THINGS a pulse of action, go or be run over by the cart too heavy for men to hold against gravity, step aside or risk bumping the girl who is carrying a load as tall as herself of boxes full of who knows what on her head, shout or don't be heard, hold on to your things or be picked, bargain or be taken, keep up with the rest or be lost forever in the twisting avenues beneath tin roofs or bare sunlight with crockery forests in one isle and bolt upon bolt of color bursting fabric and then caves of Accentuation- nails, polish, makeup, hair, jewelry, Excessoria to the max with a preacher pacing up and down yelling into his microphone repenting and amen, and hallelujah, and the man behind him reiterating everything again in his twitchy trance shaking his hands to the heavens until they get into an argument, a microphone yelling at a voice in some dialect and then they both go back to exactly what they were doing, and then you're thrown into the fray of hawkers, food, shoes, books, clothes, everything is there. We cross the street, a woman is breastfeeding her child on the median strip under an umbrella while cars go past on either side. I had to pee. Please ma'm, is there a urinal (they don't get "washroom" or "bathroom" once I used that and ended up having to squat to get the woman to understand. On the side of the road.). No, sorry the urinal is WAAAAAY over there. I walk away. tsss, tsss. I turn back, a big woman motions me over. You need to relieve yourself? I nod. She brings me into her little three walled shop, holds up a drape and gives me a little cup. Yep. TIA straight up.

Snapshot:

We have a box of oats. Water. A can of sweetened condensed milk called Jago, spoons.... Hunger. No bowl. So, as water comes in little plasic bags here, we drink one down and slit open the bag to make a cup, pour in our oats, water, Jago, mix it all around, and mmmmmm it was delicious.

Nowhere:

Night, again, in the trotro to the coast after a very long day. Today was the day of the monkeys, we'd roused at a blinding 5am to meet a friend at 6 to get a nice show on the road, had the whole shebang with the driver, fed monkeys for two hours, made it back red with dust in every crease of our clothes and pore of our skin, packed up and headed to Kumasi, 3 hours in a bumpy hot trotro, waited in Kejetia again for an hour for a car to Takoradi, everyone staring at the disheveled, dirty, tired, slightly cranky obrunis, learned for the first time that there is something even cheaper than water and that is mangoes, in mango season, they are 5 for 20 peswas, you do the math.... mangoes here are different, the local kind. You have to tear a small piece off the top of the skin and suck out the inside, just like oranges. it is either the cleanest way to eat it or the messiest depending on if you decide to, after sucking, peel back the skin and finish it off, then it leaves you with a yellow face and long strings stuck between your teeth. (Any guesses why I didn't take pics?). But back to the moment. We are driving along, finally in a trotro, but to the wrong town, no matter, it's only an hour from the right one, and we had to get somewhere. I am crammed between Sofie and Adam, my shin digging into the corner of a box and my other knee up against the seat in front of me. Freezing now from the rush of night air coming from the cracked open trunk (or boot as they call it here), my head bobbing with sleep and awareness against Sofie's shoulders as I try to cover her exposed skin. We fly over a pothole- the car gets a flat tire. Everyone files out and the men flag down some other cars to get it fixed. Middle of nowhere, still an hour or more from our destination, in the dark we could only pray and crack jokes, so that's about all we did. Obviously we got in safe and sound and slept at the same place we had gone to before in Cape Coast which was really rather nice, to have a memory of having been there before....

Busua:

Bathing suits, sand, our bare bare feet, pounding together, running down the sloping shore and finally our feet hit the waves, warm and inviting, we dive in, wash off 8 days of nonstop travel, relax into the water, let it embrace us, oh the glory of that moment..... We swam all day for two days, three days? Sleeping in the afternoon when the sun was too scorching, reading and nibbling on little piles of fruit, local RedRed for dinner on the roadside, bean stew over fried plantains. Our hotel, Pete's Place was situated about a two second run across a strip of sand from the ocean and a minute walk from the town's only road where we could buy a meal for less than a dollar. The beach was not full of rastas, trash, whites, locals, anyone really, I mean they were there, mostly surfers both foreign and local, three little girls selling mangoes, cookies and water, but not in the annoying abundance as on other beaches we've explored.

Snapshot:
Another trotro, this time on the way back to Accra. We barely speak, the traffic is bad, the sinking feeling of life setting back in. What we would do to take back those stolen days and steal them again and again, just us and the world. Arrived into Circle in the evening, bombarded by the guys hissing and calling, the air thick once again, fatigue, dirt, the city swallowing us whole.

Snapshot: A few days later:
My entire bodytan is peeling off and I am left as white as before the trip. Great.

Flight

2010-04-04T06:28:00.000-07:00

Spring is blooming fast and furious though it feels no different here.

So I'll start at the beginning...
Ghana's independence day is March 6, 1957 and they do not have BBQs and watch fireworks late into the night to celebrate- but they certainly celebrate. My Danish friend and I decided to go to Independence Square where we heard all the celebratory action would be...despite the fact that every Ghanaian we told us that we shouldn't waste our time in the sun when we can watch it on TV. 7:30am we reach Tema station and head out on foot for the square though Sofie is not feeling up to par, I just tell her it's not far.... so we are walking along for a while... and then a longer while... getting into a rather slummy part of town- see some boys playing football in what looks like a mini broken down castle, another slave fort, in fact one I had heard about but couldn't find. We keep trekking in the rising heat, buy an orange, some bananas... powdered milk which Sofie eats with a sash of water just plain like that... eww? Finally we ask someone if this is the right direction and of course it is not so we spend another 45 minutes walking back past the football boys, past the station and on to the Square and get there right in time for the celebration. But of course not in time to get a seat.

This year was different I have heard. They usually invite the military and police to march in all their uniformed glory, but this year they ("they" being the government I assume) requested about 40 junior high and high schools to train their cadet corps (mini-militant training) to walk in formation at the square. It was rather awful though becasue the children were fainting in the heat from standing out there for hours and had to be carried to the shade. Overall it was a bit boring and hot, and we couldn't hear the speeches given and then they shot off a few guns. The best part was just seeing
our friends after they were done marching.

On the weekend after it was our school's Founder's Day which is celebrated by the students performing traditional dances from their respective tribes. It was very beautiful, and actually made me rather... jealous? extra-conscious? *blank* becasue it hit home what it means to have culture. After I was talking to a friend though, and they were telling me that even though they do it, they feel very removed from it. Our school was founded 83 year ago by three English colonizers (whose faces are on the purple cloth).

The very next day we were back to the Independence Square for the annual Thanksgiving Ceremony. We, myself, Maire and Sofie went becasue we heard the President would be there... and we figured it was rather special because my class was specially invited to represent Achimota.... so we went, though the hours we spent sitting there I can't say we didn't regret it just a smidgen. It was basically hours of praise for another year of Ghana attended by the president and everyone else "important" as well as a few schools and other uniformed organizations, individuals, etc. (in fact I believe my host father was invited, but did not attend). The things that struck me- first, it was all out in the open, no metal detectors, no glass boxes, no bag searches not even personal ID checking... just the president and entire governmental body there with those invited and from afar those not invited just watching. Then there was the very fact of what it was. A day reserved to giving thanks and praying for the country. There was a 10 minute speech from the president, but it wasn't quite what we were imagining. The best part, of course, was just being with my classmates outside of school, even if we still were in uniforms.

THEN the next week we went back to Sagymasi, the village, for another funeral. This time something very interesting happened. During the burial of the 42 year old woman, there were some other women who began acting out gold digging, which was the woman's occupation. So here they are burying the casket, crying and singing while the women are play- digging in the ground and haggling over prices and running away from police, all laughing and making a show... but everyone was just sort of looking at them through their sorrow. I asked my uncle if it is normal, and he said that yes indeed sometimes people will come act out the professions of the dead. And sometimes they try to prop the dead up to make it seem like they are doing the work. Yes. Interesting. Not sure just how I would react to that. The village remembered me, and got to meet my friend Marie who is now living with me.... which is another addition.

So, one night my friend from Missouri comes to my door at 9:30pm on a school night with ALL of her bags asking if she could stay becasue something happened with her family. I don't want to go into what happened... just say there were some personality differences, but the point is she's now living with me... We have fun together, me the red-headed hippie and her the Midwest Mexican, sort of opposite but similar in all the right ways.

So THEN there was this past weekend..... PARAGLIDING!!!!!!!
For the past 5 years there has been an international paragliding festival held at this particular mountain here in Ghana a few hours away from Accra. We went up by trotro to Koftown (that's it's local nickname, I can't attempt the real spelling) and spent way too much sika at the bead market, then stayed the night with another AFS girl.... ate mangoes and cake for supper after getting all showered on and squeezing 5 in a taxi. Up on the mountain the next day we purchased our 50 cedi tickets (about $35) for the parachuting..... then waited, what? 30 hours? Yes. They told us there was no way we were flying that day because apparently people had been buying tickets through the Tourist Board for two days already.... Great. So we then had to figure out a place to stay, which proved rather difficult. We called hotels, all booked, we called another AFS girl, didn't answer, but there was another AFS girl (actually from Seattle, go figure) who was there with her host family and they were staying at a camp site there. She said, well, maybe you all can just camp out under these empty cabanas, I mean no one is around and there should be a party all night anyway, and, come on, its Ghana. So we did.

After a lovely meal in town we got back up to the hill and found our piece of cement, gathered bamboo leaves with a few random mattresses, and covered them with our extra clothes for our beds. I went out to the edge of the mountain and looked out over Kawhu, the town/city below nestled in the black mountains, a line of traffic snaking away to the south- everyone coming up for the Easter weekend. It was a beautiful night, up on the mountain, lightening, huge groves of bamboo, cool breeze, the feeling of adventure in the atmosphere, and of course, most importantly, great company. We were 9: the three YES students, two Belgian students who we had stayed with in Koftown, two German volunteers and two Ghanaians (a host brother and a work colleague of the Germans). Sleeping was surprisingly comfortable just very COLD for the first time in a long while. We were curled up under any cloth we had- most of us had brought something but we were in a cloud before we even went to sleep and the cloud just got thicker each hour. Woke up with the sun and ate the three loaves of bread with chocolate spread that we bought the day before. Lovely day for flying.

(This picture, by the way, is from the air)

Walked over to the runway..... got our names on the list..... and..... waited.

We ran into a school friend, a young woman from the embassy and a university student who we had met at a production of Vagina Monologues some months ago. There were many foreigners, in fact most of the people paying for rides (and all the people giving them) were not local, yet there were numbers of Ghanaian families there too watch... it was rather amusing actually because all the locals were dressed up for the city, pink dresses, spik and span ruffly blouses, heals, I mean the works, contrasted to the obruni, most of whom had the "globe trek" or camping look- sweaty, little dirty, backpacks, tank tops, and Tevas. And Burnt. The whites were red, slowly growing redder as the day and days passed.

So our turn FINALLY came at 4:30pm. I went last. My pilot came over looking tired from a long day of flying, said his name was Billy. Asked if I got sick easily, I said no, Great- you like roller coasters? Of course! And he smiled. So we got all the gear on, a big pack that is the seat, laid out the parachute on the steep hillside and made sure all the thin ropes were straight and strong. He said I had one job- to run hard and fast and keep running until my feet were in the air. After watching almost 200 people do it, I pretty much had the idea, and was only afraid I would trip and fall which would screw up the whole thing and in my worst nightmares would end in us rolling off the cliff all tangled up in the strings and fabric of our wings..... Luckily, I ran and kept running and my feet left the ground and the wind filled the sail and the cliff fell away below me. Suddenly I was a balloon rising, Billy said to lean to the left, the other left, and we swung around above the crowds who had moments before been snapping pictures of us. The misty cliffs, afternoon hazed, side lit... the cool air rushing past, the very sound of the forest- chirping and rustling when we got close enough. Past the overlook I had sat at for hours the night before, above our cabana, above the road and cliffs and people, the smells and heat of the ground. Billy pointed out dangerous looking clouds, birds and the rising smoke which would take us higher. We were 500 feet above the take off zone which was a mountain, so we must have been much more than twice that height above the LZ.

I cannot describe the feeling of being up there. The freedom, and yet the attention required, weight shifting, watching the clouds and feeling the air lifting you or not, the birds, how to control the chute to turn and find the rising drafts. I didn't feel like a bird. No, I was not flying I was being lifted like a balloon, a dandelion seed, a baby in a storks beak. It was incredible to say the least. Billy even let me take the reins for a little while, it is quite easy to steer, just pull down on one handle and let the other one looser and shift weight by crossing one leg over the other. He has been flying for some 11 years, and had been to South Africa and South America... I remembered when I was little and used to see the paragliders at the Santa Barbra beaches, used to wonder what it was like to be in the air like that. I asked if he had flown there, and he said it is some of the most beautiful flying.

We came down after about 30 minutes, landing was surprisingly easy, and then I was looking back up at the mountain. And on the other side of the fence there was a group of children, young and dirty squabbling- pushing, yelling, grabbing.... Billy said they had been fighting over water bottles all day. So do you give the thirsty kids water because they obviously need it or do you save them the struggle when you only have enough for one? And a little girl comes up with the precious Voltic. That is the brand here- their slogan is "Don't say water, say Voltic". I landed with a thud back in Africa, or at least a part of Africa. Most Ghanaians are frustrated at how they are perceived, and although I don't want to go into it now, I would feel better reminding everyone that while poverty is a problem and comes up in moments like that, it is not all there is here.

We made it home by 9 in a trotro with all our limbs and money and sense, just rumbling stomachs. And I will say that I was lucky to have had such a great ride, there were others not so fortunate. They simply did not get any wind to take them anywhere, so they basically coasted to the LZ. So yes, made it home and now are planning our next adventure to go around the southern part of the country because the north is dangerous right now with CSM (an annual disease).

So I end here, many hours later with Paul Simon playing and taking me back to that car ride to Colorado that changed my life. Marie is painting Adinkra symbols on her drum. Adinkra are the traditional symbols that most often adorn cloth but are now used as logos for companies, on fences, just as general decoration. My legs have an awful lot of mosquito bites from sitting out here for so bloody long but ravaging Youtube for my favorite songs and writing to you all is worth it. Yesterday riding home from church we passed a woman selling pig feet in little bundles of three.

Just Life, Just Death

2010-02-20T10:37:00.001-08:00

In Rural Ghana...

Escaping Accra, again, this time stuffed in a crowded car between my brother and grandmother. We roll across the dirt, the broken highway, the speed bumps and potholes and into greener mountains, rolling hills, heavy skies and cooler breaths. Out into the village.

It was a different world there. But so comically reflective of Ghaliwood- Africa Magic- that I recognized it somehow. I was on the set with the same old women wrapped in cloth in the cement compounds painted blue and light pink, goats, chickens, naked children weaving through. Saw the men drinking palm wine, which they always do too much of in the films, and got to see the process of "tapping" palm trees, a term thrown about quite often, always to my confusion. The Actually it was a Togolese man who explained it to me, and he only spoke French, so there I was wracking my brain to understand him, and surprisingly I got most of it... The tree is felled and you "coupe, coupe" the branches till it is smooth, then notch a little hole out of which the sweet, thick, whitish wine drips from for about a month, filling plenty liters. When fresh the drink is not so potent, very sweet and lovely- traditionally drunk out of a calabash- very cheap- completely natural. When it sits for a few weeks the alcohol goes up, and if it is distilled, which they also do locally, you get Ghana's Gin and it is pure alcohol used for mixing. There is a local drink which is the pure stuff flavored with roots and herbs and voodoo (kidding) to make a shot to knock you down. (Too bad I didn't get to try that one, hehe.)

Went out to farm expecting of course nice flat rows of tomatoes and cassava... well, we never got
out of the forest. Cocoa, plantains and bananas shade the growing pineapple, cocoyam, and yam, and they out in the sun the cassavas grow with particular long (tall as me) branches crowned by distinct thin leaves.

The cassava is grown by planting this stick, whereas the yam and cocoyam are planted like potatoes, using a sprouting eye. Pineapples are grown by simply chopping off the spiky top and sticking it in soil, and
cocoa trees are grown from seed and nursed in the village before planting in the forest. They all also grow wild. The thing about farming like this, in the trees, is that any passerby can come and harvest your crop... this is beneficial for voodoo masters becasue they get paid to administer charms to protect people's farms- it may seem like a joke to us, but it's completely legit here.

The village life was noticeably hard. We fetched water in the morning for our bath, and tea and household needs, me and the young ones. Fortunately for this village they had a pump just in close to
the houses so we only walked five minutes to get there... but this was a small village. We cooked eggs and tea on a little coal stove and bathed with one bucket. This was the village my whole host family (Dad, uncles, aunts and older cousins) grew up in, this was their place, their home, their childhood. It is pretty incredible to see just how far they have gotten- living in this house, with a pool and three cars in the drive.

So the point of it all was a funeral, but for me that ended up being just the excuse. I saw a dead body for the first time and was at a burial, which was a Christian burial and nothing very "traditional", and went to the party which was just a big gift giving ceremony to the family of deceased... In the middle of it the clouds blew over, dust whipped our faces and funeral dress- all black and red- and the heavens broke sending all the old and young dashing back to their houses. I didn't witness any strange or interesting Ghanaian funeral rites, except for the whole fact of the matter, that hundreds of people, mostly old, had come back to their home for the event. The person who died was an elder, so even those who did not personally know him came, which I think I could say is pretty different from home. So overall the funeral itself was just a bunch of watching from the outskirts as elders greeted elders and gifts were given to the family..... my experience was about being in the town.

So. Life. I saw a woman the other day carrying a load of plastic baskets as tall as she was on her head. It was fatter than her too- the bundle that is.
Three Elements. Labadi Beach, December
I walked to the AFS office the other morning instead of school becasue we were going to the embassy...

Le Matin

On the trotro, small girl, wide eyes on her mama's back, neck craned around to stare me down. No smile. No frown.
I walk down past where the hoards are yet sparse,
walk and buy some coco a millet porridge, poured in a bag with sugar. 2o peswas. Walk small bit further,

buy a bowfloat- fried corn dough, sweet sour, 30 peswas. I now have a full meal for just about 35 US cents...
Thin World. Volta Region, January
Walking faster in anticipation to the beat of a rumbling stomach... past cripples, hands stretched for coins, coins which I have to spare and do. A man asleep on the cement, disrupting the growing flow of foot traffic, his few 5 and 10 p. pieces scattered about him. I hope he isn't dead. Cross the street- moving with the flow of business men

and women, uniform clad youth like myself, and early sellers. Shake off the 4 year old Sudanese refugee clasping my wrist. This child's skill thus far in life is being able to identify those who might have some coins or loose pockets and latch on to them. They are trained not to cross the street, not to be aggressive, just to implore with dirt rimmed eyes.
Circle Overhead. Accra, January
I pass a man selling gum, lollipops, Mentos, and greet Goodmorning. He replies, Good morning, and have a nice day. Thank you, and you too.
Then he looks at me, as I look back, smiling, his lips- Receive it.

Receive it. Receive it. It came into me, and I did, but what does it mean? Receive the day, receive my blessing, receive each moment, receive the sun rays... like a poem or a riddle it played through my head, walking past my reflection- green with white flowered dress down to my knees, brown sandals, black rubber with hot breakfast inside. Past a small girl's face pressed up against the glass, squished nose, this is the world, past woman in her compound in one long ntoma piece of cloth, cup in hand, toothbrush scrubbing. Past morning, past frying doughnuts, past steaming rice
and bread and egg and up to the little white and blue AFS.
office to sit and take my meal in the cool of morning, the quiet behind these walls, a different day beginning.

Looking Down. Cape Coast Castle, January
Everything is spinning down, zooming down at top speed, me with my hands off the handle bars, feeling the wind trying to grasp at it to slow. I'm rather uncertain about going back. Obviously it is not a question so much as a feeling... of sadness and disbelief thinking that this will ever end. Walking to buy credit the other night- sunset time, cool air, bats overhead I felt the satisfaction of being home. Deep fulfillment comes, not from always the gogogo, the seeing this and that and leading the super-life of one who is passing through, no, though that can bring some sort of satisfaction. But in that moment, it was the feeling of being home, of living real life, down time, normal old going to buy credit for my phone. And I relished it becasue so often I get caught up in trying to do the most, be the most, say or see or show the most. So often I equate living with thrill, but strolling along that road I felt normalcy suddenly take on a whole new significance.

And finally, though it is not entirely related, here reads a passage from one of my favorite books, The Prophet.
Shrimp. Volta Region, January
"And an old priest said, Speak to us of Religion.
And he said:
Have I spoken this day of aught else?
Is not religion all deeds and all reflection, And that which is neither deed nor reflection, but a wonder and a surprise ever springing in the soul, even while the hands hew the stone or tend the loom?
Who can separate is faith from his actions, or his belief from his occupations?
Who can spread his hours before him, saying "This is for God and this is for myself; This is for my soul, and this other is for my body?"
All your hours are sings that beat through time from self to self.
He who wears his morality but as his best garment were better naked.
The wind and the sun will tea no holes in his skin.
And he who defines his conduct by ethics imprisons his song-bird in a cage. "

There, something to chew that should be thoroughly digested by the time I write again...

Independence

2010-01-19T11:08:00.000-08:00

Then half of the stay was over, and 2009 was over and being 16 was over and therefore three new pages had been opened, blank and ready for me to create my own life with. Time Time Time is taking me breathless through, sweeping me off my feet into and beyond the days and moments and weeks. I wish I could just pause and speak of all the emotions, sights, and beings I have encountered.

The Holidays With Family
Christmas did not feel like Christmas, but not only because I was in skirts and sunburned. My host grandmother's 80th birthday was the 26th, and her massive party was held here in my house, so the days before and after were filled with relatives and friends and cooking and cleaning and more cooking and generally preparing. The amount of food we made- well, I should say THEY made, becasue I mostly walked around in awe or chopped onions or fetched water or took care of Lady- was incredible. Coolers and coolers full of rice, watchee (a rice and bean dish from the north which I LOVE) and jallof- huge cauldrons of stew and soup and shito (a spicy sauce for the rice and watchee) and fried chicken and fish. Christmas night I sat out back with my sisters peeling onions at midnight when it began to pour on us- dancing in the rain after scrambling to get the laundry and food under shelter, in the streetlight, washing the day's work away... Then I made christmas cookies with my little brothers... and I have to say they came out alright, though most people found them too sweet... and it was 4 am and my mom and auntie were still frying the chicken and fish out in the yard because the rain had gone as suddenly as it had begun. The next day at the party there must have been a few hundred people in our yard and over the course of the party all the food was eaten,though I'd thought it not possible. I enjoyed feeling like a part of the family when I was helping out and being part of running the party- serving and clearing amidst just dancing and talking and enjoying the outcome of all the hard work.

Ghanaian parties are very big and they all seem to appear the same... loads of food, people sitting and eating in their lovely dresses and some people dancing, a loud sound system pumping the air with live singing in Twi what are probably mostly Christian songs.

For another few days after the party we were cleaning up all the dishes and repacking all the rented cutlery and plates... our yard is mostly recovered though there are still black spots of burnt grass and one of the laundry lines is almost touching the ground... I don't know what destroyed it.

New Year
31st night is big in Ghana. They don't watch a ball drop (and from far away, describing the event it seems so absolutely random!) or clink champagne glasses at midnight... no, every Ghanaian rich or poor, pious or not goes to church on the last day of the year to pray in the new season and release the old. So even if it was not the New Year's Eve I might have been expecting, it certainly was once-in-a-lifetime! I went to Independence Square where there were thousands of people gathered for the International Christian Gospel Church service. The pastor was really quite good and preached about this new year being one of BREAKTHROUGH for all people in all areas of life. The last 15 minutes of '09 we were all praying praying praying- people jumping, shouting, rocking back and forth whispering "jeasus jeasus JEASUS" and then the last second struck and we all broke out cheering and a thousand white handkerchiefs were waving in the midnight before me and a firework went off alighting the arc-de-triumph-look-alike with the black star and FREEDOM AND JUSTICE declared on top. Everyone a dancin and singing in the new year and we got little bottles of oil to anoint ourselves with and we shook the hands of those around and there were tears in my eyes as they swept the crowd again and again in disbelief.

Cape Coast

The young days of 2010 were fairly uneventful- bidding my mom and brothers goodbye again as the headed back to South Africa maybe not to return until I leave. They left a rather enormous rip in my heart and vacuum in the house. I thoroughly miss them all- playing snooker with Jake, bouncing Lady and making faces with her, Marco-Polo in the pool with Baron and Kelvin and, of course, cooking with my African Mama. Once they left though I rallied up my friends and we all went down to Cape Coast- about two hours out of Accra.

The three days whirled past on salty air and 5 am wake up calls- deep dungeons and dark jungle- pineapple juice dripping down our chins and loaves of bread. We four- Adam, Marie, Sofie and myself- got a ride down with my host brother Bush and got a flat tire on the way, in the middle of green mountains and coconut trees. The first day we woke early to see the sun rise on the roof of our hostel.... but of course the Hamatan dust hazed out the horizon all day.
Cape Coast is most famous for the salve castles built by the Portuguese in the 17th century. The castle in Elmina was actually the first sub-Saharan fort built in Africa and became an epicenter of European desire along the coast causing tension among the colonizers. Of course the castles were used to house the whites, most prominently the Governor, and there was much trading of goods through those white walls, however a significant chunk of that trading was the shipping off of slaves to all parts of North and South America.
We were able to go on tours in both of the castles on which we were taken down to the dungeons where the slaves had been kept for months at a time- deep under the castle, dark with barely air holes but at least tall ceilings- told us about how around 200 men would be crammed in as much space as the Governor got for his living quarters, how they were chained to each other as they died and had no place to dispose of their body waste. Of how food and water had been simply tossed on for the fittest to struggle for.

And how the women, crammed in the same conditions only saw the light of day when brought out to be looked over by the Governor when he desired them... and only washed if they were the one chosen to climb to his chambers.

By the way, this is me and Adam climbing the poles that had been used for training the soldiers. The next day my arms complained royally, asking me why I had decided to climb up it...twice.

Katkum National Park
From Cape Coast, Katkum is only a 40 minute taxi drive and we spent a lovely day on the beach and shopping before heading out to the jungle.
Arriving around 5pm to an empty park, the park rangers led us up to the sleeping platforms we had read about in the Lonely Planet guide book. About a ten minute hike through the deep forest around and over roots- it was like the floor was alive with snakes frozen on top of one another.

Somehow there were showers up there in the middle of the "campsite"- open showers with just stone walls and after such a long day we readily stripped down and cleaned off there in under the canopy in the coming dusk- rapidly coming dusk... Adam, being the last one to bathe, came back in the dark. I remember Sofie's darling voice calling to him, Adam? Yea- . . . Adam? Adam? (more high pitched now) ADAM??? Wut? OH, thank you. oh, what for? Oh, just being you, and being there, and answering and being alive.

Our accommodation, which was I think 36 Ghana Cedis, was an elevated platform about the size of a king bed with wooden railings around it, a few steps up, a mattress, a low mosquito net and a tin high roof that would not have helped against rain, and only blocked out the stars... few though they were through the thick canopy. So the four of us crawled under the mosquito net, ate some fried rice we had bought by flashlight beams, and tried not to think about how utterly alone we were. The night was uneventful, fortunately, but the whole place reminded me way too much of a Thai horror movie I'd seen and so I was pretty creeped out and as Anna could attest to, a bit jumpy.

Around 5 the next morning we aroused, still in darkness, got dressed, packed up, at a little bread we'd bought out of the taxi window on the way there, and went down to the lodge. Getting to the canopy walk by 6 or 6:30, the whole place was ours, and even our guide had to go to leave us to open up the exit, as we were the first tour of the day. Considering that the previous day we had talked to some Californians who were not all that impressed by Katkum- having been on a tour of 40 and therefore pretty much ushered through the series of rope bridges, I considered us very wise to have stayed overnight and gone so early. The canopy walk is incredible. Suspended between the tops of very tall trees, above the mesh of green vines and branches but below even greater limbs- in the mist of the morning, in the cool of the day, the sun eventually rising, out above the distant treetopped hills.

A monkey scooting up the long smooth stretch of trunk to the awaiting fruit above- followed by another, and another, and another- funny fuzzy little creatures in their own domain just doing their morning thing. Then they jumped from one tree to a shorter one and scooted down that one's trunk. Apparently there are many kinds of monkeys in the park as well as some forest elephants, however they are very shy and we were counted as lucky to have seen anything "wild" at all.
Imagine the perfection of that moment- sun rising, monkeys climbing, four little humans on top of the world- and for those of you who know me well, that is exactly where I like to be- the fresh air, the long day ahead, the pure white satisfaction of having gotten myself there.... with a ton of support and guidance and reassuring and trust and wisdom from so many many people. So here is a little shout out to everyone who helped me- teachers, relatives, friends, AFS, YES, Bra Bush and of course, most importantly my beloved parents. Thank you for giving me this, for letting me go, for teaching your fledgling to fly- and look where I have perched. I wouldn't let you down if you could see me now, here in the treetops, here in the world, in the beauty and the sorrow of reality- out here, where I belong.

The Ride Home

...don't remember much...

Sacirfice and Sunshine

2009-12-29T02:03:00.000-08:00

Step back, relax, look through the glass one more time. But I inevitably see myself reflected, wide eyed and expressionless, waiting for a way to get through to the outside, trying to break the inertia.

Then REWIND---

The second Eid Muslim festival, in honor of when Ishmael (not Issac) was almost sacrificed by Abraham as a test by God to ensure his dedication, was a few weeks back. We were able to spend the day with a Muslim couple going to a few different mosques to pray and witness the sacrificing of a cow, which we had NOT prepared for. Actually we were slightly prepared, for in the morning we met at the embassy where the American head of cultural affairs, as sweet woman who had done much work in West Africa. She kept making comments that we were so brave to be doing what we were doing today and she didn't think she could handle a sacrifice, and we looked at each others surprised faces thinking, well, in this case there was less bravery and more ignorance.

Sacrifices are made in honor of Allah on this national holiday and the meat is divided into three parts- one for the family who bought and killed the cow, one for the family and friends that they decide to bequeath with cow, and one for the needy, orphans and homeless.

This is an excerpt of my journal entry after the day:

Moments in time- the animal on the cement, tied hooves, limp tail. A calm beast, like one who is resigned to accept it's fate, knowing the dull blade is meant for its jugular vein. In the name of Allah- but is it ever right to slaughter so inhumanely even in God's name? When the blade came down I expected the metal to slice through the flesh, to immediately abort the flow of life- instead the man slowly sawed through the tough flesh, through the veins, through the bone- a hollow pipe thus exposed, and the stony animal barely grunted.
Red rivers running toward the feet of the wide eyed children, barely scaring them away. Final shudders of life shaking the massive animal- bolts of energy screaming it's not my time to die.

Later we tried a Nigerian/Ghanaian dish that we had never had. It was a sticky ball made of rice and cassava powder- slightly sour by itself, and you dip it in a tomato stew/sauce or a green one that was very very slimy and not entirely appetizing. Overall it was enjoyable, though not something to write home about ha ha ha. Sorry.

I also got a new perspective on the veil as it being a means of protection for women through being modest. I actually realized that in the future I would consider veiling myself for that very purpose if caught in a situation that called for it. Our host explained to us how Muslims believe that since we have cloth we aught to wear it and it is considered primitive to expose unnecessary skin. This is the thought behind their modesty, which I find very interesting, even if I don't quite agree.

Then there was the trip to Krokrobite (pronounced krokrobitae) that I took with some other exchangers which I mentioned in my last blog. About 45 minutes outside of Accra, we got there by public transport, me and four others squished up in the back of the trotro with one rasta man who was very nice.
Just a note- the lights just went off, so we are 8 kids age 1-19 sitting in an absolutely dark den where the TV was recently unfolding some soap opera, we are lit by cell phones and laptops, the blue illumination coming from hands- blue tooth r&b entertainment playin the song i've been singin all day, and Lady crying probably because it is dark, because she is usually so content. Oh. They just came back on. Everything is Illuminated.

Today I went to the mall and on my way home I saw someone selling very old beat up books on the street, so I moseyed over and found some titles like "The Russian Adoption Handbook" and guidebooks for Guatemala, Amsterdam, San Fransisco, Canada and London, then Ovid's Metomorphosis which I bought for 1.5 cedis, about a buck. There was some Martha Stewart- but it was like some biography on her brother. I definitely got a good laugh and will be visiting the spot again.

Back to the beach- traveling there, out of the city, in the trotro slowly approaching the water, a truly sparkling blue ocean, the perma-swayed palm trees then through the coastal villages, little more than slums, sprawling and inhabited boxes with crisscrossed lines of laundry. Then when we reached Big Milliy's Back Yard we were in resort zone obruni land.
These long fishing boats on the hot hot sand, massive nets hanging off and around- boys playing football on the beach and heaps of scarves from Libera sold by a rasta in a blue sequin midriff. the whole place was a rasta camp- nice background reggae and assuredly a peaceful place (and for those of you who would jump to the wrong as conclusion I would, no, the place did NOT reek of wee, though I'm sure it would have been readily available). In the trotro going home we met a nice obruni volunteer from Germany. He had just finished high school and was through some small NGO... then he told me that he had been an exchanger in Texas living with a single Indian (as in East Indian) woman who had grown up in South Africa, gone to college in Canada and was hosting a Venezuelan student at the same time! Now that is a cultural experience.

These children were selling bowfloats- large puffy balls of fried dough- and when I began snapping them, oh they loved it, except one girl, the one who told me to delete the picture of her- insisted really.

From the left- Sophie, Me, Marie, Silka and Coralie, the latter two have since gone home- they were on the 6 month volunteer trip.

This was from the football match- though you can't tell, this man is very short and the popcorn is about half his height again and he just cruised the stadium selling sugar or salt popcorn for 50 peswas.

My small brother Jake, or as we call him, Kookoo (because his day name is Kweku) and my little sis Abena, though we call her Lady.

Scattered Scales.

May the new year be blessed and prosperous.
Love to all.

Take me out to the ball game

2009-12-13T11:32:00.000-08:00

KOTOKO vs. HEARTS OF OAK

National Ghanaian teams- arch rivals here in Accra, today, 4 cedis ($2.75 maybe), wear red and white if you are Kotoko, the Ashanti team from Kumasi, or red, blue and yellow for the Hearts of Oak.

I wore red and white.

Waiting in the stadium, the energy mounting with drums and chants, the Hearts fans with gourds and rhythm, all the young men in yellow and red clapping and dancing. Although I have only experienced one actual professional sports game (baseball) in a stadium before, I can safely guess that American fans don't drum and dance to pump up the vibes. Especially not the young men. Watching and feeling the unity in the division I somehow appreciated sports all the much more in that moment. Looking around the stadium, which was not that big as stadiums go, but had a fairly good turn out I noticed at least three drums leading a beat for the surrounding fans to celebrate to- all through the game they played, singing religious songs, and songs about the team.

Before the game began, two gulls flew over the stadium and the fans wearing red and white began cheering. At first I couldn't figure why- there was no action on the field, but then I saw people pointing at the sky and realized it was the gulls, who were then joined by more. I then remembered all that I've been told about how the Ghanaians are very superstitious when it comes to sports and since the gulls were white, they were considered a good omen for Kotoko.

I sat there with all my brothers (young and old, for the young ones are back from South Africa) and my bra Bush kept a heated exchange going with some rival fans sitting behind us- I can't really express how funny it was how their tones (for that was all I could understand) would swing from joviality to the heated passion of enemies. I would hear them spitting twi back and forth and then turn and see a wide grin on my brother's face- he gave a bet that we'd get the first goal within 5 mins, a bet which we unfortunately lost.....

As always, there were people selling things from their heads, but today I saw a new one- some small school boy was selling gum, mentos, and cigarettes. First, of course, I thought it was strange seeing cigarettes being sold at all because nobody smokes but then I realized how young the boy was and thought of legal ages... something that is easy to forget about here.

The match itself was unfortunate. Kotoko scored on a penalty kick but the ref called a foul and the goal was canceled. Hearts scored and the score stayed 1-0 for the rest of the time. I can say that the ref did NOT seem to be neutral, and I have heard that there is much corruption in sports here....

As we left the stadium among the celebratory music and water spraying everywhere- people were throwing water bottles off the stadium after emptying them on their neighbors- there was a row of young men responding to the call of nature along a wall... or should I say they were seeing a wall about a horse.... Ghana Ghana.

***

I have no thoughts to speak of me, no mind space left to ramble about my own self, but I can say that I've been doing very well these past days and weeks. I can say that I've been sunburned from a beautiful day on a beach- the sort of perfectly tropical beach that seems impossible to have reached and to be sitting on, eating a pineapple that is not the best pineapple I've ever had but is quenching and succulent in the moment. I can say that I've been singing and watching the sun, been being myself, been exploring what that means and finding interesting things.

Nyame Adom, me ho ye.

Peace and blessings.

Motown

2009-11-15T05:06:00.001-08:00

The trip up north- school boy at the village, and Mosque. This Mosque was particularly famous- it as believed that the first man who found the place and set up the community was buried next to it and then the tree sprouted three days later. To this day the people eat the leaves of the tree on special occasions in a ceremonial way.

The mosque had different entrances for different people- men, women, chiefs, and is still used on Fridays for prayers, however we did not get to enter.

Sitting under a tree at school, feeling the cool shade, the heat of sunburn, the airy trees, the red earth, the human tall termite mounds, the black etches of a cracked path, the sinking benches, the pastel sky, seeing, and saying, T. I. A. But in a completely different sense. This IS Africa. This IS the great legendary place that Western Man has always explored, I am in the enigma- this is AFRICA----
and it is the same feeling when you look out over the coastal plains, the bush fires there, the spotty landscape, the smoke, smog and fog and know were you are.

So, Life. Mosque at sunset, this was actually on the day of the festival that happens right after Ramadan. We went to a Muslim community and watched a parade of chiefs, there were tons of people- and I turned around and here was the sun setting against these wires, well, as you see.

Ahimota Senior High. I am sitting upon Lover's Lane, in my school uniform which what I wear now for a majority of my existence. I have to say that I appreciate the uniform, in all of its conformity and sometimes discomfort... I love it because it is the tag which says that I belong here- that I am a part of this place, not just a visitor. Now, when I am taking the trotro home people call "Motown girl", instead of "Obruni". That sums it up right there.

So what is Achimota schooling like? How does one of the most prestigious
high schools in Ghana run?
Here is a typical day in school:

I wake up and leave the house by 6:30. On the way I pass the women who sell oranges and bananas at 10 peswas (about 7 cents) a piece, but of course if you buy more then they "dash" you an extra or two. We always greet and pass a few words in twi, and I tell them I'll go and come. Waiting for a bus is never long- in the morning at my station there are never that many passengers waiting, though those that there are can be business men or old women with baskets of things to sell all on our way to work. I love the trotro because of this, because everyone uses it- policemen, school children, fashionable young women, people coming from funerals, going to weddings, and somehow we are all in the same place at one time... So I pay my 20 peswas (maybe 15 cents) to the junction where I get down (they don't say get "off" and I remember the first time we all took a trotro with AFS, and they said "get down, get down" we thought there was a shooting or something! Though now that we know Ghana, we would never make the same mistake even if we didn't understand).

When I walk from the junction to school- about 25 mins- I pass the same man who wears a blue baseball cap and hustles past with a small look and smile, I pass the same three women with large baskets full of plantain chips going to the junction for a day of hawking, I am passed by the same trotro full of school kids who one time all stuck there head out to call GOOD MORNING to me, and Mrs. Suspicious because she always gives me a sidelong glance until I smile, and she usually smiles back, and Mr. Blue Shirt because I swear he has worn the same type of blue button up every single day and he is always holding a radio out in front of him, and we always exchange an "etesen - eye" (how's it - it's fine) and a smile and if I am eating a banana, he asks me where his is and we laugh, and I could go on but the day has only just begun.

I love these morning walks, when it is still cool and my mind is open and fresh- the feeling of belonging given by these interactions. The walk up toward the school is long and under these magnificent shading trees, some of which have small yellow petals of paradise which float to the ground like fallen sunshine. But then there is all the trash among the trees- backlit bags, like dandelions, on a lawn of leaves.

First we all go to morning devotion at the chapel. Led by a female student, everyone sings, listens to some sort of sermon given by a student or teacher, usually about discipline, religious devotion, or something, and we sing more hymns and give the school prayer which is as follows:

"O God, who art the King of kings and the Lord of lords and the Father of this people, we thank thee for this School and all the opportunities that we have in it.
Blesss thou this place adn may thy glory dwell herein. May the sons and daughters come to know the life that is life indeed, and go forth from it as living water to a thirsty land, for thy name's sake. Amen"

Chapel is always mixed for me. While I find the sound of the music- the soft voices in such a mass as to produce a lovely melody, I feel like people sing them as words, and without much though into what they mean. Two days a week (I think?) the small percentage of Muslims and Catholics may go to their own places of worship- for the former it is my class room because it is big enough, and for the later, they have their own chapel.

Then classtime, and my classes are as such:
Core- English, Math, Social Studies and Integrated Science (Agriculture, Physics, Biology and Chemistry, each given two periods a week)
Elective- Textiles (in which we are actually finally doing traditional weaving!!!!) and Ceramics (and we are actually working with clay!!!) and Literature (in which we are reading both The Tempest and a Ghanaian story-A Woman in her Prime)
Other- Religous and Moral Edu., PE (which is a class ABOUT PE, and its role in history, so far in Ancient Greece and in Ghana, though we don't actually DO any PE) and General Knowledge in Art. and ICT.

The day is broken into 10 periods of 40 minutes and I usually have 4 or 5 subjects in a day, no subject more than twice a week. Unlike the American school system, I am with the same kids for every class- we are all 2Voc2- Form 2 (like 11th grade), Vocational track, option 2 which is Visual Arts. (Voc. 1 being Home Economics- cooking and marriage stuff). When we first entered the school we were given the options- Science, tracks 1-4, each with different focus, slightly, General Arts, tracks 1-5 which had electives like History, Geography, French, Government, etc. or Vocational 1 or 2. Personally, I though the vocational class, with textiles and ceramics and artsy stuff would give me more sense of the culture- though I would have loved to do French and History... one more note on classes is that in the elective category there were some other options, and during those lessons the students split up- eg. while I am doing textiles, others are doing Picture Making or Graphic Design. Ceramics or Jewelry. Literature (4 students) and the rest in Economics.

The most frusterating thing about school is that teachers are often late or don't show up at all and either send a note with the class prefect (who is responsible for the class in absence of a teacher) or we do nothing- I mean we do nothing even if the note is sent, but at least then we have a feeling there is still a teach out there. Teachers will answer cell phone calls in class too and will come without the text book and have to borrow a student's one. But they expect us to be on time, awake, stand up when answering a question, keep the classroom clean (no such thing as a janitor) and do all of our assignments despite their own lack of discipline. Then there is the lack of resources which I find really depressing. Classroom, are just rooms with hard, terrible for your back desks, a black board (or in the not-vocational classrooms, white boards) and some chalk. No maps, not pictures, no mathematical tables, no projectors, no flag, no extra pens, no scissors, tape, rulers, absolutely no nothing except trash and it is for two reasons. 1. no funding. 2. if there was anything there worth anything, it would be stolen before it could be used twice by the village people who live on the outskirts of the place against whom there is no protection.

These are my Motown chickitas- Sofie the Dane and Anna Marie the Missouri girl who is on YES and whose videos are featured above. Someday we are going to write the adventures of the poedunk mexican, great dane and redhaired hippie. I'll give you all a discount on the sure to be best seller. Here we are in front of Frankies with Papa- a boy from Marie's class who we happened to meet at the American Embassy while we were all on midterm vacation (the boarders, which is 95% of the school, get to go home). The story is- we were going to get some school supplies, and enjoy a day out together, and we went to the embassy to pick up a package for me and while Iwas waiting, all the sudden all these Motown kids start coming out and I was like WHAT AREYOU DOING HERE? I mean we YESers haven't even been invited to the American embassy yet, but they had come for a program with a group of american exchangers that came to Achimota for a few weeks.... (btw, Motown is the local nickname for Achimota) and so Papa decided to join us for a day.

As far as academics, I am finding them very simple- not many assignments, no exercises to do, class mostly consists of waiting for a teacher and taking dictated notes... my favorite classes are Social because of the subject matter- leadership, resources, nations, etc. and the teacher is very very good in that he is not late, he leads an interactive class with q&a as form of discussion, and brings in real life examples and comparisons (quite a few having to do with the US). The only real way to measure our academic learning is by the monthly test and end of term exam... however the questions are pre set for those exams and not by the teacher, so sometimes the teacher has not taught us far enough, or not mentioned a specific answer or the information was from last year, form 1, which is all really frustrating, but still my average score has been great and I am not stressed over school at all, whatsoever period.

Last note on school.

When I was coming over there was a lot of talk of caning in school, but when I got here I forgot about it, being so wrapped up in everything else. Well, a few weeks ago our French teacher came to class, late, and the place was not swept... though I had been trying to sweep with my feet the large trash because there is no broom or bundle of sticks in the classroom. So he came in and said it was unfit for teaching and he would come back only once it was clean.... then he left. A few people looked for a broom, the prefect tried to rally the people who were supposed to sweep that day (we do have a chart) and, though it was slow, progress towards sweeping was being made... however when the teacher came back in the place was still a mess because we had just found a broom and were just beginning to sweep, i mean one person was sweeping and the other 51 (yes, my class is 52 students) were sitting, talking, rapping, reading, sleeping, staring, laughing, etc. so he was furious that it wasn't done and he marched us all to the caning man. He began with the sweepers- boys twice on the buttocks/back and girls twice on the hand. Some of the girls were tearing up at the prospect of it, and some were telling me to go back. I think there was a general interest in how I was taking it, if I was brave or chicken and if, ultimately, the man would hit me. As it turns out, fortunately for us all, day students were exempt because we are not expected to sweep, though somehow my name had been on the list for that day, but I had been foot -sweeping, as I mentioned, and the guy said he didn't want Obama getting mad, so I was ultimately exempt, with the other two day students. I don't really want to go into the morality of it. The way it was done or if it was deserved or is the right way to punish even when it is deserved, or if it is ever deserved to be hurt or how someone can do that to a child in the first place. All i know is that I was stony calm the whole time, not afraid, just disgusted, in my stomach a knot of tension.

I would like to take a moment to clear up some things that have since evolved ... mainly, my family situation.

When I wrote what I wrote way back in August, I was very disturbed and thought I had all the information,which I didn't, so let me reintroduce my host family.

My Dad did not move to South Africa, the trip he took there was only a few days. I really like my host dad, though we do not have many opportunities to really talk because his schedule and my schedule are directly opposite. But I can see he is a very benevolent and hard working man.

In the house also live the two younger girls, Abena and Afia who go to Junior high, as well as older Afia who is attending a college french course... she actually lives about an hour away with her family (her father is my Dad's older brother) but because of classes she has been staying here. To the left is her and her sister Abena at a wedding we went to. We definitely get along, though we may be very different in nature, and she has taught me plenty already just by being herself. We go clothes shopping together, and last night we went to the High Vibes Festival at the National Theater. It is an annual four day music fest of highlife artists from around west Africa- we heard bands from Ghana, Liberia, and Guinea all playing highlife, which is a bit like jazz meets reggae... maybe? Brass and drums, traditional and drumset, some used electric keyboard, base, guitar and vocals. Twi, French, and English songs mostly- it was very cultural and enjoyable.

We got matching dresses for the wedding....

My brothers, Ken, Bush and Kwesi are great. They are older, maybe 30s and are always willing to talk, take me places when I need, or tell me how to get somewhere.
this called Juxtaposition, With Clouds.

This was at Mole National Park, on our trip to the north.
So, I will leave you now and though I always say this, I'll try to be more consistent in my writing.
i have changed my comment setting because I heard it wasn't working so you can try it again and leave me questions.
Much love to all, and I hope you are all peaceful and well.

Time in Cumulonimbus clouds

2009-10-26T07:13:00.000-07:00

Under the raw sun. Sweat. Dust. Bags of water are perfect for squirting people with.
Your face has changed, they said when I came back from my trip. It's the sun I said, I am not made for this climate you see.

I'm sitting in my tv room with a bowl of rice with tomato stew- it is not too late, but dark outside, getting mentally prepared for heading back to school after a week off. My sisters, of a sudden, jump up and run out... i listen... it is raining- oh, for joy, i love the rain, I remember days of JCSchool when we would hear the rain and ditch class and feel it on our skin- oh, and my sisters, oh they love it too, i'll follow them outside and dance with them. I go out. The rain is gentler than it sounded in the house. My sisters have dissapeared. Halfheartedly I look up... then notice my sisters have gone to hustle in the laundry that was drying. They readily dodge out of the water, armfulls of sun-stiff cloth, back toward shelter. So I walk over, the pulse of my excitement as washed away like the rain, and I grab the rest of the clothes.... and they are already back by the tv, and I can still hear the lullaby sound of plinking on metal.
This is an allegory. when there are two different wave lengths, I am so often on the Other One.

Hands. When I see my hands I am reminded that I am different. Yes, sometimes i don't notice, i forget I am white, forget they stare because of my skin, forget how oil and water act in a confined container... then I see my hands and... well... But too, they get the brunt of the action, and they are good hands- if soft, soft compared to the hands I am shaking. One night I am grinding tomato stew for dinner- we are making boiled yam which you dip in this hot pepper/tomato sauce and eat with sardines or other fish. I knick the tips off the peppers, small peppers, hot peppers, one of them is not good, so I break it in half, rinse it in the bowl of water that the vegetables are sitting in, some of the seeds come out, the bad part is gone, I toss the rest in and move on to the next pepper. Maybe a few of them were half bad, so I have opened a few, the juice mixing invisibly with the water, and I grind- something I am getting better at- add onions and then tomatoes, soon I am finished. Then I feel a tingling in my hands, my fingers, my thumb. It intensifies, a burning, a stinging, an inescapable heat in all of my fingers... I remember the peppers. oh god, it was the juice, now seeping into my pores, unwashable, intolerable, and yet... waddaya gonna do 'bout it? The feeling went away by morning...

Yesterday, Fufu time came and I offered to pound it. So I pounded and pounded and pounded, I am getting better at it though still find it... just somehow strange, and yes, hard. When I was finished, my sister came and took over, I looked at my hands and there were three ripe and red blisters, the skin hanging off, stinging at the touch of night air. I have not had true blisters since doing the monkey bars in 2 grade! Then and hour later my sister was out doing laundry, I was sitting with her thinking my hands hurt too much to touch water... then she said how oh she had blisters too from the fufu and how they stung stung stung. Realizing that she had no choice in her suffering, and I was just sitting there, I took over the rinse bucket, and you know, it hurt for the first few shirts, and then the pain just went away, but you know how far the gesture will go. I realized that it will be nights like that, after a good work we sat down to eat freshly killed and roasted pork (my dad was having a party and so it was for them but there was soooooooo much we all had our fill) and playing pool with my brothers- I am getting better at it- almost won a few times- that these were things I would remember and miss.

Generally life is just slower here. People are not focused on doing things, going places, accomplishment, action in the same way that I never thought I was but and am realizing that i am, as a product of western culture. Obviously I can't generalize all Ghanaians, but from what I've observed, apart from school, and work, things are laid back. And honestly sometimes I can't stand it, but have realized that that is something I am learning about.

Ok down to the real stuff- the week off.
So all AFS exchangers- 5 German volunteers, 6 Belgin students, 6 Americans (students and one volunteer) and one Dane in a bus. Driving through Ghana. What did we do? We sang some good old Lion King, gave the truckers behind us a good puppet show with some socks Adam had in his bag (and little faces Sharpied on). Then I sprayed him with my water- perfect timing, he was telling a story or something, you know, with people's attention, and was taking a breath and BAM- right in the face. I had been having urges ever since I started drinking that sachet, so they all knew someone was gonna get it.... but justice was made- the next day at the breakfast table no less, Silka casually saunters behind me and, pulling my shirt away just totally soaks my back. In exactly the sort of way that looks like you've been sweating for all the pigs that can't.

Watched a fetish priest- this old withered woman all powdered in white dust and wearing some cloth that sometimes didn't really stay up and there was some sort of red liquid on her... was it her own blood? Was it the blood of the other woman dancing with her? No, I later found out it was the blood of a SACRIFICED CAT. TIA right? We saw how beads are made, saw how shea butter goes from fruit to nut to butter (and our sweet Dane, Sophie, bless her, dips her finger in with everyone else, but instead of rubbing in on her skin she ate it thinking it was butter, you know, butter, that stuff I dream about sometimes). We thrashed rice, and I tell you, I know why people invented combine harvesters. That was actually one of my favorite parts becasue I have reallly always wondered how rice is harvested. we saw wild monkeys, on the "safari", ate PIZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA at this really nice break from life here- a resturant owned by a Belgian dude, and it was damn good. So, if you ever find yourself in Tamale, stop by Sparkels, and if it is on a monday or a tuesday you'll even get a scoop of free ice cream (unfortunately our group was toooooo big... yes it was a VERY sad moment).
saw how kente cloth is made... got really sunburned... drove wayyyyyy too much...on those bumpy potholey unpredictable impossible for sleeping on roads that make you say TIA every time you are lifted off your seat- stood behind a waterfall- I mean at the last moment realized it was something I couldn't miss, got one of the Belguins to join me in stripping down and climbing behind under the downpour of white water. There was this one seat, directly in the falls and sitting there the world becomes nothing but the cold pounding on your head, the water in your eyes, blurred images of trees and people waving that we have to go but nothing matters when it is just you in the element, laughing at the feeling of being crushed but not diminished, laughing at being released from the hot, sweaty predictability of the bus, at being in Ghana, at being free and alive and the water seeps into your skin, mouth, eyes, refreshing and cleansing, and then you slip down to the shallows and retrieve the garments that almost kept the whole experience from happening and follow everyone back to the car.

The clouds, oh my, the clouds sometimes when the sun is low and there is lightening flashing- enormous white and orange pillows in the sky, towering and softly melting, shifting and flowing into some other shape, shade... Somehow the clouds are truly majestic here.

I will try to stay more consistent with my posts, sorry it took me so incredibly long.

Best hope and wishes and love to all and, of course, thanks for reading. If anyone has specific questions they would like to have addressed in my posts, please just leave me a comment requesting so.

School, Sea, Sunset, Somnambulation

2009-09-22T08:42:00.000-07:00

Well finally a shot of my sisters... from the left, Nana, Afia, Abena, though we call her Mina. This is the only shot I have of all three- and now Nana is living in Koforidua with her mum. We were swimming, obviously, in the front... Mina and Afia go to school alllllllllllll day, they leave 8am get home 7pm, or later. They are in Junior high, and granted it takes half hour to hour to get to school depending on traffic, but still...!

Below is my front yard, with the pool as you can see and my house... if you walk in that sliding door behind the fence, there is a lovely breezeway that is kept very clean for visitors. I have enjoyed teaching the girls a bit how to swim, or just encouraging them to feel comfortable in the water. Last I went swimming was in the evening- Afia and I made a fruit salad- pineapple, pawpaw (papaya), banana, orange- and we ate it while we swam, and the sun went down...

In some places dusk is merely sunset. The lifegiving ball of fire sinking in the sky slowly melts below the horizon and the haze becomes cool, or it is not witnessed because of the hanging clouds and only the dissipation of the light admits a shadowed world. But here, dusk is a time of its own. I began to notice it first when I was taking walks on the train tracks behind the house towards evening. As I was ambling I looked skyward and saw what was perhaps a bird above me, then another and another, and as I kept my eyes up they were filled with hundreds of small black reflections flying overhead. And as I looked closer I saw that, of course, they were bats. So I saw them again the next night and the next, always they come as the sun departs, though once the light is gone they have dispersed and I see none. Always they fly from the South, fluttering like funereal confetti on a current. And then that same current carries a most achingly beautiful voice, as though from the same far off gathering as the confetti, as though from the spirits of the other world are calling through a doorway, briefly opened each night when the sun is at just such a place, singing the praise of God, chanting the evening call to prayer. I have never lived in a place where I could hear proof of Islam each day, a few times a day, and always at this time of evening. So I floated on my back that day in the pool and watched the bats from the silence of the water, the strange and eerie silence of submersed ear drums, watched the light go, a few stars penetrate the light and dust, watched the black bodies of the desperately flapping bats move from south to north above me, watched it and then raised my head to hear the low, deep voice coming from nowhere and everywhere, coming from the human and the superhuman, weaving the fabric of the night around me with ancient melodies.

And these are my team mates, plus some Germans. From the left- Adam Streeter, whose blog is also definitely worth reading and can be found by looking at my followers. Anna Martinez who is doing the lovely video footage and is also attending Achimota School with me. Me... of course the one shot that had everyone in it and smiling I had to have my mouth all weird... then Meredith who lives in Tema, maybe an hour away with traffic.... don't know if she has a blog. Then our German friends Laura and Anne who stayed in Ghana in 2005 for 6 months and have made it back almost every year to visit and vacation. I sure hope to do the same!

This picture demonstrates a few things- first, the roasted plantains that she is selling- those are everywhere, though I actually haven't tried them prepared that way yet. The soccer ball on the umbrella: Ghanaians love soccer, though, this being Not America, they call it football along with the rest of the NA world. Ok, if you click the picture, and read the advertisment on the wall it is for Ghaliwood, which I got a kick out of. Have not see it yet, true Ghaliwood, but I'm looking forward to it. Then if you look behind the Ghaliwood signs, you see the green wall with half of another add for VEGA that has been posted over- well if I zoomed out the entire wall would be green and advertising VEGA and this would be one of many monotone walls advertising either a food or cell phone company.

oh. my. gosh. where to begin!!!!!!!!!!?

where did I leave off?
The Belgians, American and Danish girl came in dazzled and frazzled and tired and shocked, and it was finally I who was the "experienced" one to give advice and all.... a good feeling. Unfortunately most of them are living far away, up in other regions of Ghana so I won't see much of them. Except the Dane- she goes to my school. Schoool. SCHOOOOOOOOOOL!!!? what? I'm still in school? I'm supposed to be learning practical things as well as a new culture? I'm a teenager?

Let me back up.

We went to school when it started, last week to get our uniforms, pick our subjects and pay our fees. However that day only entailed waiting and walking around and waiting and then finally picking our subjects- even though we changed them again, just today. Then we waited for the rest of the week to be called by AFS and told that we would be going back to school to actually begin.... but we waited all week and it was only today, Tuesday the 22nd that we finally started school.

The campus is incredible. Absolutely beautiful. Built in 1927 by the British, Achimota Senior High School has a timeless and almost placeless feeling. Novelistic imperial British tropics. Could be India, could be any time in the 20th century, one could turn the corner and see some proper Missionary/Military wife in a sweeping white gown reading Dickens under a parasol... writing small notes in her journal about the red dirt and shining faces, the enormous black scorpions and breathtaking trees. How did those first people see this same land? Before it was over run with industrialization and media, before it was mostly Christian, and before the red dirt was paved over? Before the air was made thicker by smog, and before natives spoke English, the later of which is a simple way to say a lot of things.
There are immense trees over the whole campus, and wide open lawns in front of the tall white washed buildings. The buildings with blue shutters and a constant two feet of red dirt smudged around the base, some of which are dorms to house the approximate 1500 boarding students, some of which are our classrooms and others of which house the teachers and administration. The only real mark of the era is the large billboard between the boys dorms and the girls dorms reminding students that engaging in premarital sex can lead to HIV/AIDS.

Today we went to school late and finally got our uniforms and figured out our classes and got our books and were left with less than two hours to go to class, which was a nice amount of time to feel apart of something but not get overwhelmed. So, first impressions... the kids are as shy of us as we are of them... and since there are three of us obruni girls, at first it was easy to stay apart, but now that we are all in different classes (a conscious decision) we will each begin to blend into our own groups. I have chosen the Vocational Visual Arts track (vs. General arts or Science) because I am excited to do classes like textiles and General knowledge in arts that will give me more of a local taste- will be, hopefully, traditional Ghanaian, or at least West African. The class I came into was Economics, and I really like the teacher- he had taught in Missouri for a year and had also hosted an exchange student. But when we were going around telling him our names, and let me note that when a student is speaking in class he/she must stand, though most kids just sort of half raise their tushes from the wood bench, this one boy stood and said his name... well he was really tall, I mean tall for any standards and especially Ghanaian because most people here are fairly short, and so the teacher looked at me and said "Afia", because I had also given them my local name, "would you like to marry this sort of man?" well. I will leave you to imagine just how red my face was and just how loud that classroom became with hoots and hysterics. Welcome to Class 2V2. (Form 2, Vocational 2). My class prefect told me that ours is one of the notorious loudest classes in the school... which is fine by me because they are loud with laughter. So for now that is school, and I will post some pictures when I download them. Oh just a word about the assistant headmistress....I'll just say she is the stereotypical scary headmistress that you do not want to see after the first day. My friend, Marie, was debating about whether to go to form 2 or 3 (form=grade) and the woman was like, well if you want your name to appear at the bottom of the exam sheet every time, laugh laugh laugh, go to form three, but I won't change you around unless they demote you because you can't keep up ... laugh... well, Marie, bless her, said no, I think I can do form three thank you. (I'll keep you posted).
It is true that they post our exam results publicly for all the school to see.... great. and for the dress code. One pair of stud earrings is allowed. No bracelets, no necklaces, no second earrings, nails must be cut all the way down, no polish, no makeup, no hair clips, only in a pony tail- not down, not braided, not a bun, only pony, she kept saying it, only pony, only pony. The girls here actually are made to shave their heads from the very first class of school until they graduate high school. Sandals must be brown, nothing inbetween the toes (like flipflops) and no closed toes. No rings. No food in classrooms, not even in our bags, though they were willing to make an acception for us as day-students to bring tightly sealed completely concealed snacks for break time. Lunch is after school at 2:30- break is for a half hour at 11 and that is the only time we may use the restroom as well. Our uniforms must be washed and pressed... Yes. Dress code is tight, but overall I am more or less excited about school. But somehow over the past month I feel like I've grow so much I am out of school- I am beyond school or something, so it felt weird at first having to get back in that mindset. This summer has been so extraordinarily long and filled with new experiences from climbing a multi-pitch in Yosemite to visiting DC to everything about here I just couldn't believe that I had to go back to SCHOOOL.

This past weekend was by far the best I've had here... On Saturday I had another drumming lesson and learned my new favorite rhythm, then went out of Accra with my YES friends and an AFS volunteer to a beautiful park called the Aburi Botanic Gardens where we were toured around and saw trees planted by different presidents and even Queen Elizabeth. The place was made into a park in 1890 and has sections for herbal medicine research, conservation, and then the trees that we were toured through. Once I upload my pictures I will speak more of the Gardens. So we got home around evening and less than a half hour after I got back my brothers decided to go out so I spent a nice night drinking pineapple juice, listening to the music, admittedly feeling awkward at times... at a little spot on the side of the highway near the sea.
The next morning I got up to go with the same volunteer to the International Central Gospel Church, or ICGC. It was quite a church I must say- first it was big, hundreds of people all decked out in their Sunday Best, live band, ushers in suits, a big choir, even a balcony, and everyone was singin' and dancin' and and fillin' up that whole huge building with glory and praise. Then we went to the beach for the first time...

The beach. the beach. sandy expanse of untarnished white swept up by a crystal blue sea and elegantly swaying palm trees shading your personal haven...right? Warm water with gentle waves rolling around you and bright fish darting between your legs- It's the tropics after all.
WRONG.

Labadi beach is a touristy spot and hence a money making opportunity. Bars line the beach, with shaded tables to sit at (and pay for) very crowded- people selling things from bathing suits to carved wooden statues to mini drums to little Ghana bracelets to pirated DVDs...
I was so excited to be in the ocean that I just started running, jumping, splashing into the sea, feeling the perfectly chilled water and there- oh, is that seaweed, huh, why no, its a plastic bag. And that there- it's a ice cream bar wrapper, and that and wow- it really is dirty... then a whistle. Silly girl has gone flitting and prancing into the red flag zone. Ha, count on me to do such a thing... but truly it's hard to tell because most of the beach is red flag. In fact the area where we can swim is very small, like a hundred feet from white flag to white flag (though I'm a terrible estimator). But at least there is a lifeguard. Many Rastas, many Obrunis, many locals, music blasted from everywhere so loud that even when you are swimming you can be dancing... not my idyllic lie-on-a-beach-and-read place, but interesting in a people watching/meeting sort of way... and I did enjoy swimming, especially when it was later and the waves were really crazy, powerful but close to shore so still safe...
and then there was Eid, the Muslim holiday celebrating the end of Ramadan, as well as Kwame Nkrumah's birthday celebrations..... but I will wait until I have my pictures and some more time.

Personally, I am just riding the tide, starting school is the main thing on my plate, and having to get to school by 6:45 tomorrow. I have not felt real homesickness since DC, though I think of home and people- you all- often, especially when look at the night sky.

As always, that this may find you in peace.

by the way, this had nothing to do with sleepwalking, don't worry, you didn't zone out... but I'll be doing that soon... if I don't cut short all the things more that I want to say and instead sleep.

As-Salam Alaykum

2009-09-12T07:40:00.000-07:00

"AponnCHE"
"aponchee"
laugh laugh laugh laugh "no, no, no... AponCHE"
what is the difference?!
"aponCHEEEEEE"
Goat. AponCHE=Goat. They roam the streets here, and then they grace our stews.

Irony. Check it out. I guess you can't see that well, but those are slums... the billboard.... yea.

These are the same slums, it is very hard to capture from a
moving car.

First dress... not a great shot... they add extra material to make the hips look big,
which I thought was funny... so different.

Click on the pictures to get a super enlarged view. Especially the slum ones, you can really see.

Ghana countryside. Sorry about the cracks in the window.

The woman has a baby on her back... this bridge is just behind my house... I like to go there in the evening sometimes and there are train tracks to walk on, along the fields.
The boys are running across the street with heads full of limes.

This is my bedroom, though I've since removed the mats. Above is the Kwame Nkrumah burial site. He was the first Ghanaian president and was very interested in uniting Africa... I know painfully little about him... Most people adore what he did, but my uncle went on a tirade about how Nkrumah wasted the money that could have helped GHANA, and is therefore part of the reason why Ghana is still poor. Same uncle has told me numerous times how Ghana is one of, if not the richest place on earth, considering its size and the amount of tapped and UNTAPPED resources... Gold, oil, cocoa, salt... I can't remember now, but he feels like Ghana should be doing much better than it is. Below is the Presidential place... their White House... except for some reason the president is not there right now... then there is a shot of Accra. It doesn't really demonstrate anything, there are no people selling things at that spot and you get no sense of the traffic, but I liked it as a photo...

I cannot believe I have been here for a month already. Of course it feels like I have been here forever, and for no time at all... have done many things, but also sat around for way too long trying to understand the terrible Ghanaian soaps in a florescent lit den, while everyone else gets a kick out of talking in Twi to each other and the screen.

So I broke the semi-monotony one day by asking one of my uncles if I could take the trotro to my drumming lesson. After much debate about if I could get there in time, if I wouldn't get lost, if I should take this route or the other, he decided to come along with me. And I sure am glad he did. Trotros are the most common mode of transport, being cheap and accessible. From anywhere in Accra one can get anywhere by trotro at any time of day or night for less that one cedi. Ok, I have no way to verify if that is true, but you get the idea. So we caught the trotro, and took it to "Circle" where I would have been completely lost if I had gone on my own. The most interesting part was walking down a narrow sidewalk where there were literally hundreds of young Ghanaian guys on either side of me selling stolen cell phones mostly and hissing, calling obruni, or princess or just girl, or making a smooching noise, another common way to get someone's attention, or lightly grabbing my arm... yes, if my uncle had not been there I might have just fainted. No, I exaggerate. The next day I went through the same mob by myself and was perfectly calm and dignified, if a bit sweaty. That day was fun... I met up with some fellow YESers at Circle and we found the bank...ate some interesting street food- a different kind of fried doughball- stood out like a 7 fingered hand with three soar thumbs... made our way through the mazes of trotros, shoes, shoes, shoes.... were followed by a relentless guy wanting to get my or Marie's number, so we finally gave them to him....

JOKING- we would never do such a thing, don't worry.

...unfortunately I should say that this taste of independence was short lived because my dad said later he wishes I would not go by my own yet. By my own. I guess that is improper, but it is something my brother Dominic says... funny how it just slipped out.

9/11

We went to a mosque on 9/11.

seems appropriate, given the program we are on.

Sitting there listening to the prayers and preaching, which was focused on how Islam is misunderstood and is the most peaceful religion at heart, thinking that if the events of this day 8 years ago had not happened, I would not be here. Which is in absolutely no way to say that some good comes of every wrong because that would be attempting to be a justification and that's not my point, it was just a profound realization. One that actually didn't dawn upon me until my friend pointed it out. Beside the point.
It was not a traditional mosque in any way... just a building that could have been an office, but was transformed into a place of prayer by the atmosphere of quietude, the white and flowing hijabs on the women, the long mats being unrolled in the courtyard. If any of you are interested in Islam, the story of its birth, some reasons for its misinterpretation and a good, balanced opinion on its true meaning (with different ideas presented) I am reading a book called No God but God by Reza Aslan and would recommend it.

There are certain things about Islam, such as praying 5 times a day, wherever one is, taking the 5 or so minutes to stop whatever is going on and join every other Muslim across the globe in an act of prostration to Allah, submission to something greater, that makes me have a great respect for the Ummah. Also, fasting during the month of Ramadan, which is almost over now, I mean fasting is not for the fainthearted... but fasting purely for religion takes such great spiritual devotion I am truly in awe. And of course, how much they must enjoy Eid, the equivalent of "Fat Tuesday" which comes for the three days after Ramadan has ended.

Religion is very prevalent here in Ghana, though it is predominantly Christian, not Muslim, at least in the south. I have been asked about my religion, and it seems people only accept two answers. Christian or Muslim. Being neither is hard because I am asked why and don't really know how to respond. It is both very simple, I just wasn't raised that way, but also very intricate because I am not downright atheistic. Why don't your parents take you to church? And forget trying to explain Unitarian Universalism... but the thing is, I wonder in myself why I am not religious... in an organized sort of way. I start wondering what my own beliefs are.... What will I teach my children should I be blessed with any? Blessed by who?
It is something I meditate on when I am in the Presby church and can't understand a word of the Twi service.

One interesting thing is that when we were in DC with the 400 other YES participants from around the world (have I mentioned that?), there was an activity we did around religion where we had to pass a sheet of paper and write what we knew about all the different major religions. I was really surprised that some of the kids had not heard of Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Agnosticism... I was surprised and concerned and judgmental (not of them, but of the lack of education they had been offered in this particular area)....

Tomorrow I will get to meet the other AFS kids coming from Belgium, USA, and either Germany or Finland. I have met some sweet German girls already who were on a program here three years ago and came back to visit, and I've begun to realize just how much AFS connects one to people from not only the place I am but to people from all over the world. So we chatted about our homes to each other and shared our observations about Ghana, new to us all. One of the funny things is that us Americans all come from different parts of the country, so we run into a problem when explaining "how things are in America" because we all have different experiences. It all comes down to, America is a very vast place and everything really depends on where you go.

I hope you enjoy the pictures, I will try to upload some videos too later.

Hope all is well.

The Kitchen

2009-09-08T02:21:00.000-07:00

What defines a place? Weather, people, geography, culture and within those all the various aspects of life from religion to vegetation. And Food. Food is one of the most essential definitions of place, and it gives a view into the rest- how it is prepared, taken and what exactly it is. So. Ghanaian food.

The picture is of my first meal here, a gentle rice dish called Jollof. By gentle I mean it was roughly familiar and not too spicy. And of course there was fried chicken and some sauteed cucumbers, tomatoes and beans, which they call "salad" but is very different from my definition of salad. Jollof proves to be one of my favorite meals, and it is basically rice cooked in a tomato, pepper sauce, and there is usually some canned corned beef thrown in for flavor. But I shall zoom out to the main ingredients, because there are so many variations on roughly the same things.

For the starch of the meal there is rice, yam, cocoyam, plantain, potato, and some other types of yam. These are taken with sauces made out of tomatoes, pepper, onion, "spices", fish, canned corned beef or tuna and in one dish a spinach like leaf. Fish is a big part of the diet, in all the soups and sauces or fried on the side, though I have only had it like that in a restaurant. Gosh, how does one tackle food....

Breakfast: usually I have bread and tea. Tea meaning either PG Tips or Ovaltine or Milo. The bread here is amazing- it is very white, very square, and infinitely light. I have never had Wonder Bread, but I think this is basically the same. We buy it unsliced, every other day from the store down the street, and I got to see one of the bakeries so I know that it is local bread (though obviously not local wheat). It is slightly sweet which makes it perfect on its own or with the delicious chocolate spread, which gets me through my sugar cravings because...

Ghanaians are not big on sugar. There are not really desserts, except sometimes watermelon, which is surprisingly flavorless compared to what I have tasted before, or pineapple which is really really sweet and juicy.

One thing that all of us YESers have found that is like a doughnut is called a "bowfloat" and it is fried corn dough with a bit of sweetness. Unfortunately they are addictive but give me stomach aches.

But back to the starches- all of them can be fried or boiled, and my favorite is fried plantains with a bit of ginger, especially when they are really really ripe and soft.

The specialties are fufu, banku and kenke. Fufu is impossible to explain, but I will try. So you take the boiled cocoyam, and-or boiled plantain and-or boiled cassava and mash it up. The mashing process is impressive because one woman sits there slowly putting in the chunks of starchy tuber and then mixes it while a man steadily drives a long log into the mortar where her hands are. I thought her fingers would be smashed a million times, but I realized that you learn from early on how to be quick and if the man has a rhythm then it is easy to work together. Slowly the fibers break down until it looks like a lump of bread dough. I have just completely mutilated the process- it is so involved... I will try to post a video... So then the fufu is taken with a "light soup" but as they pronounce, liesoup, which is really just a broth of tomato and pepper and it always has a hunk of fish or meat for everyone. Fufu is a long process... we start it in the mid afternoon, usaully after church on sundays, and end around 4 or 5 and eat it as soon as it is done because first it gets hard when it sits, and second it is so heavy that one does not want to take it any later. Then sometimes we will have some small rice or bread with tea in the evening. I have had fufu a couple of times, but I find it hard to eat. Because it has been broken down by the pounding, there is no need to chew it, and truthfully chewing it is rather unpleasant because it gets all stuck in my teeth, so one just smooches off a bit with the fingers, gets it all soupy and then quickly swallows it... which I find not entirely enjoyable. But I love the light soup, so sometimes I just have that.

Now banku and kenke are made out of fermented corn stuff, and are stickier and less slimy than fufu, and have a flavor, which fufu does not. They are sour, to variying degrees, and if it is too sour I do not like it. We eat them with sauce, again, a tomato, pepper onion spice sauce... and again with fish or meat..... yes.... it does get a bit monotonous, there is little that is not spicy and fishy and starchy. Fresh vegetables are not a big thing.... most meals are taken hot, which is because of the tropical diseases that can get into cold food. So far I like most everything, though I have to be careful with the heavy foods because they are so much heavier than what I am used to. Then they ask me what I eat at in the US and it is so hard to remember.... its all so diverse and just so different....

Dairy is nonexistent.... they bought cornflakes, which I tried, but seriously, putting water with some canned "Ideal milk" was a little bit weird. I said that at home I have cereal with real milk, and my sister was saying that this canned creamy stuff made of palm oil and stuff was milk, and I was trying to tell her..... and of course there is no cheese, and they use margarine....

Water is another thing. We do not drink tap water, no, I have not had a glass of water since Ive been here, it has all be taken from bags or bottles. even the locals drink sashes of water, little bags that you tear the corner off of and suck on.

Food.... let me see.... preparation... Most things have been prepared in bulk and then we heat them up- sauces and soups and stuff... I can not wait till we run out and I get to see the cooking process. The starches of course we make as we need, and i love that our pantry is full of these HUGE yams, and whole bunches of plantains. Of course we do make simple tomato pepper caned tuna sauces when it is late and no one feels like cooking and eat it with rice.... Because my host mom is not around the food situation is different- it is more fend for yourself and then in the evening the girls makes something or my Auntie brings us banku or fufu if we do not have time to make it.

Taking food... first of all we say "taking" more than "eating" which tripped me up the first few times. And this family is informal about eating.... most of the food is finger food, which I love, but also gets me very messy, and most of it is taken together... I had my first experience eating rice out of a bowl with my fingers and three other girls, which was enjoyable, if a bit of a race to try to get enough... one can easily see that eating together has caused everyone to eat faster.

Salad- well they do have salad... usually it is cabbage, carrots, green pepper, canned tuna, onion, and noodles. Or else they don't add noodles and they make sandwhiches out of it... put it between bread and put the bread in this nifty little warming oven.

In general I like the food, but find it a bit repetitive. and i occasionally really miss a good feta, cranberry, walnut, pear, spinach salad.

Switching angles... communication is sometimes frustrating. When I feel like I've told the right person what I want to do it then ends up being mixed up in the wash and coming out some other way, and in the end I feel like I messed up, even though I can't think of how I could have though to do it differently. It hasn't happened too often, but the few times it has I have felt very regretful that I didn't play it differently. I just keep reminding myself that this is only the beginning and I am learning so that eventually I will get it.

School begins next monday, on the 14th... and I have to say I am nervous.
I will be going to a pretty prestigious school and I have heard the academics are much more difficult here.... though I'm not so worried about that as much as just getting along, fitting in, finding my place in another new school. fortunately this is not the first school transition i've had to make.

I hope all is well with everyone, and I would love to hear from any of you, email, facebook, anything.

Shopping Spree

2009-09-01T04:50:00.000-07:00

"Having trouble tellin' you how I feel, but I can dance, dance, dance" - Lykke Li song lyric

Oh life goes in and out, roller coaster, up and down, and I am just trying always to dance my way into myself. As I spend the morning in a strangely quite house catching up on my fellow exchangers I feel both that I am part of a much larger network of similar experiences, and too that I am so so so alone here in completely my own situation, my own adventure, and I can't quite wrestle it into words to share.

But as always, it is best to being with experience.

Well, roller coaster indeed, I had two days of complete overload and stimulation which dumped me into a weekend of fatigue and a small cold. On Thursday I went shopping for some clothes...
The day began with a mango. The better part of a mango, and tea, with the usual powdered milk, which in itself has been strange to get used to. Dairy is not really practical here... anyway, the market. The market is situated in a 'trotro' station, trotros are like minibusses, so it is a mecca of trade with a constant flow of people coming in and leaving, and of course vehicles driving through the throngs, weaving between the umbrellas, under which there are goods like presents under a christmas tree. And people constantly parading their wares; belts to sponges, sunglasses to sim cards in one's face, and I simply keep an eye on Auntie Essi as she parts the red sea with her calm poise. One thing I realized, as I stood before a heap of shoes that all looked roughly the same, trying to find some that both fit, weren't too old looking and were ok for church, or walking, not really knowing what I needed or wanted, and having new ones thrust on my feet by another Ghanaian man, asked are they ok? yes they look nice, yes you buy, yes you like? are they ok for you? well, at home I can say yes they are ok, but I don't really want them, but here, Ok means that they are suitable and therefore worth getting... so I did a lot of, wait, no I don't want them... anyway, I realized that to go shopping at a place like that, I would need to have a clear idea of exactly what I needed and exactly how much I was willing to spend on it. Bargaining was an art. The whole experience was heated and flustering, except the bargaining, done by a skilled Auntie Essi who would then speak softly and not look at the man, softly and firmly, both with equal tones, until she would be still, and then tell me how much money to fork over. I could not understand a word of it, not even the rates they were talking about because they speak with the old money lingo, which I can't really translate into cedis yet. At one point when I had just made some slightly hasty decisions and was feeling quite flustered, trying to keep up through the noise and narrow paths between baskets of dried fish and piles of old electronics, Essi took my hand, softly. I have never been thrown a life ring or rope, but that hand, those calm fingers amidst the blur was a life saver as much as any other.

I could go on. We went to another part of town where ladies sold things out of their hand bags, until the cops drove by, and then we all hid our money and looked around like we were unassociated. And all I could think was, where does all this stuff COME FROM? I mean the sheer mass of plastic and cotton, the piles of second hand clothes and new shoes, it is just unbelievable. I asked Essi, and she just said, mass production is everywhere now, and shrugged.
I mean, I used to get totally overwhelmed shopping at Ross... this place makes it look like a "chique boutique"!

Friday I had drumming lessons until afternoon, then when I was picked up brother Bush told me we were going to the wedding. Now I had been told there was a wedding, but I had been told that this day was not really the wedding but the "engagement" and that the festivities were in the evening, so needless to say I was a bit unprepared. There is a theme here, and the lesson is: always be prepared Justine for spending time out on the town. So the rest of the day I spent at the reception for this wedding which involved sitting, sipping minerals (the local word for soda), listening to Twi, feeling disgruntled that I had not worn my new dress, and generally waiting because, as I was informed by an uncle, the whole thing was not going according to plan. Apparently the couple were of a certain region that likes to do things at night. So we got there- to an open courtyard bar- at three or so and waited until after dark- 6:30-7 for the bride and groom and everyone else to get there.... And I went to buy fish with my uncle, that was the best. We drove to "Oxford st" (you know why they call it Oxford, he said, because everything is so expensive) which might be called a main drag- a touristy spot where I saw many obrunis. So we just drove and when we passed the fish guys our driver hissed them over and the barganing began. As we sat in the car, four or five Ghanaian guys with buckets of different fish were all trying to make theirs look the most appetizing and cheapest. Talapia is a specialty fish, but we got red fish- the biggest one, more than a foot long, which my uncle cooked the following day in a delicious stew of tomatoes, oil, peppers, spices.... it is taken with banku, a sour, sticky, pasty mush of fermented corn that is not entirely terrible but not all that great either.

After winning some points by dancing- it was great, the aunties got up and laughed, hailing me with their swaths of cloth- we ate. And as I was finishing my plate, the drink guy (who made sure everyone had ice, alcohol or minerals) brought me a plate of food larger than my first and told me to eat all! eat all! else I charge you big money! Then we go dance, and you make sure to move your waist! and I said, o yes, but see sah, if I eat all I will no be able to dance! and it was all very humorous and in good fun. After the supper my uncles and brothers went to play pool and listen to live music, jazz and high life and I did dance, to the Ghanaian rhythm and hummed to myself when the song was a version of "Lean on me" and later, "Hard days Night".

On another note, I have found a really good friend, also named Afia. She is my "dad"s niece and has graduated senior high school but is taking French courses and plans to go to university. We both enjoy reading and I've asked her to recommend some good African authors, and we have both found a friend in each other. Today she showed me how to fry plantains, which is one of my favorite dishes, and she has promised to teach me more Ghanaian cooking, as she loves to cook herself.

I have begun to feel so incredibly privileged, that I am studying abroad, have been abroad before, can go home and even come back sometime... I don't know how to express the feeling because I don't know how if feels, just a big question mark. Why? circumstance. Fair? Un-qualify able. But it has made me more certain that I must give it back in some way, must make the effort to walk toward the middle ground, walk toward the center of the see-saw. In a way that is what I am doing, but not completely.

one more note: Laughter. laughter here is a spirit, a fairy, a jinn coming from the depths of these Ghanaian souls. It has a way of completely taking over the bodies around me so that the girls crumple as it rolls out of their mouths. Abenna begins to laugh, she stumbles to the wall, sighing, leans on the tiles to regain herself, or on each other, or on the floor, I absolutely love watching people laugh. I can't say I've completely every released my own Genie of Laughter, no, I remain upright in my humor, but one day, I know, one day I will laugh that thing right out of my throat and forever more laughter will be a full body experience.

Another note, on the irony of life as relates to the everlasting struggle for beauty. In Ghana they bleach their skin to become fairer, whilst we waste our money and time in tanning salons. Needless to say, both have terribly ugly long term side effects.

The picture I took on the first day out of my hostel window, of central Accra in early morning on a deserted street.

Asomdwee, peace.

Real Women Have Curves

2009-08-25T15:05:00.000-07:00

One day I am awoken by a rapping at my door, and Abenaa comes in to tell me that 'brarBush' (brother "Bush", yes nicknamed after our locally adored former president- I haven't figured out why yet) wanted to take me to get "Muslim porridge" and would I bathe? I hurriedly put on some clothes saying I'd bathe when I got back, thinking that we were getting the dry porridge to prepare here shortly. Well, we did not leave for another 45 minutes, though I had been under the impression we were in a hurry. Once in the car, still a bit groggy, I watched our residential area fade into slum and then urban dwellings- narrow streets with open sewers waiting for unaware drivers to steer their tires into and hens waiting for unaware food to peck at. The porridge operation was in full swing at this hour; girls and women behind huge tubs of what looked like really thin cream of wheat, but more of a cement color. Not altogether appetizing... And the woman up front was swiftly pouring bowlfuls of the porridge into bags, one at a time in such a methodically predictable manner I could see she had been doing this same series of actions for a while. So we got our bags of porridge and some fried dough balls and started home... or not.

I will divulge here for a moment because the porridge was quite a new experience. A bag is portable, it is penetrable, it is easily thrown out the window and it can hold hot substances, all of which make it perfect for serving porridge in. But I had never sucked my breakfast out of a bag before. Especially not a whitish, creamy breakfast out of thin clear plastic. Anyways, you just rip a hole in the corner and are rewarded with a gingery, warming, slightly sweet meal. And more than I could eat for less than 50 cents.

To make a very long day short we drove around Accra, stopping at some living barracks to meet friends, going to a restaurant to meet more friends, stopping by the office, eating, meeting more people, buying a coconut from one of the many cartloads, picking up friends and dropping them off, getting ice cream, driving the same streets over and over until I began to predict where we would end up, which felt like an accomplishment. For the first hour and a half I kept assuming the next stop would be home. I didn't know what to say to all these people but to reiterate the pathetically small phrases I speak of the local language. I hadn't really dressed for a day out and still felt tired, but eventually I relaxed into just observing. Fortunately, this is something I am quite fond, as you all might know, and there is no shortage of action in Accra.

I have heard the saying "real women have curves" and if this is the case, then Ghana is a hot spot for feminine reality. Yes, this place is a land of curves. Beautiful black fleshy fronts and behinds (trying to keep this PG) accentuated by fitting, colorful Ghanaian dresses. I appreciate seeing this different idea of beauty though at first I was surprised to see that the four final contestants for "Ghana's Most Beautiful" TV show were not the western ideal of slimness. It is obvious that the local diet, heavy on carbohydrates and meat, both fried in various forms, does not make it easy to be otherwise, but it is just as obvious that the beauty image is completely satisfied the way things are. So on the streets there are always innumerable women carrying baskets and glass boxes of savory bites on top of their strong necks. Then there are the numbers of lean, muscular men hauling carts of frozen yogurt or coconuts or brush. Alleys with broken streets, hens pecking across, smoke hazing the other end. Canals of sewage with scavenging white stork-like birds and children- green hues of algae and palms, the reflective tones of water and sky, and always a haze at the end of the view. For hours I watched it all go by, to a soundtrack of honking and hissing, (the way to get one's attention) occasional heated Twi conversations when we were taking someone somewhere and Soldier Boy (a rap song, for those of you over 25) when we weren't. It was not until dinner that we returned, wind blown, eyes open, full of new sights and tastes, sticky with smoggy sweat and satisfied.

However, if I've misheard the saying all these years, and it really goes real women have curls, then I'm afraid Ghana is becoming the western media. Fortunately I was aware of this before I came to Ghana. See, there were 30 Ghanaian teens coming to the US to study through the same program as myself who I got to meet in Washington DC at my pre-departure orientation. All the girls had long heads of mini braids, but one girl's hair was a dirty blond, so I asked another girl if it was a natural color. She looked at me funnily then said that none of it was- all of them had extensions, of course. As I came to understand, it is mandatory that girls buzz their hair until they are out of high school (this I will not be made to do, I have been told). So I realized quickly that the women here do not really have a problem with sporting artificial hair. And I am pretty sure that almost every woman here does. Whether using straight up wigs, extensions or profuse gels and sprays, most hair has the same unnatural stiffness and shimmer. The best I've seen so far was a 3 or 4 year old girl, in church, with her little dress and a wig that was black with shimmery red/gold highlights cut in a short business-woman sort of way.

Curves and curls, hues and haze whizzing by me, and I notice how kids have to entertain and take care of themselves and each other, and how few birds there are here- pigeon type ones and large crows that have white bands around their necks, but not in the ample amounts one might expect with so much to scavenge. And then I see that this world is a scavenging world. The street animals and people alike, all finding what is there, competing for survival. I will try to capture what I am saying in pictures, only, it feels like I am violating the subjects in some way. As one of the other AFSers said, it's not like they are tourist attractions, they are people living their lives. We are all people, living our lives, writing our own stories with every decision we make.

As always, I hope this finds you all in peace and health

Introducing....

2009-08-19T14:41:00.000-07:00

I write to the powerful mic of the nighttime gospel coming from a church nearby. I write in a comfortably warm room, to the hum of the computer and the tick of the second hand that is forever revolving around the small hand being pulled by gravity, always limp, while the minutes keep a timely loop, desperately, around the hour of 6, always. And as I write, I gaze ahead of me and see a thick, camel-colored-with-roses printed drape that reminds me vaguely of Fraulein Maria's homemade garments, and the white wall that is tainted with dirty finger memories. It is a modest room, prepared for two, and taken by only me- on the empty bed lies a keyboard that I have yet to play. This room was Jake and Kelvin's, the two younger boys who are my host brothers, but the only sign of this fact is the set of matching football (soccer) field mats .

The picture is of Jake, who is the youngest boy, at 6. He is very smart and was a constant companion for the first days, in the pool, outside, inside, playing cards, watching TV (it is a big time passer in this household). He has a very cute way of mumbling Twi/English so fast that I can often not understand him, but his smile is priceless and his little way of swaggering with a soda in one hand and package of crackers in the other.
Kelvin is 11, and Baron is 13 and they were both a bit shyer, but also preoccupied (I will explain) so I didn't really get to know them that well. They had a way of walking around with fairly expressionless faces, until I smiled at them, and then they would flash me these beautiful grins.
Abena is 1, and my my is she chubby and cute! The IDEAL little African baby with bright eyes, always smelling of a very warm oil. When her expression changes from curiosity, it is almost always to delight, and they all call her Lady, except they say it like Ledy, ledy, ledy.
The girls, who are somehow related, but I have not gotten that far, are Nana, Abena and Afia- they are 12, 14, and 15. Nana has a great laugh, where she throws her head back and lets it bubble from the back of her throat. Afia is quieter but also enjoys laughing, especially at me when I try to speak Twi. Abena is my sister. She is witty and confidant, likes to tease and has this beautiful way of looking completely serious and then lifting her cheeks to reveal this smile of smiles. Mostly, she loves to make me mimic her speech, her dancing, her looks, and then laugh laugh laugh and I join right in. I have figured out that if I ever feel awkward, I have only to ask to learn some Twi and we will all end up having a good time.
Mama Faustina and Akua are the ladies of the kitchen and house, Mama being round and loud and Akua being compact and powerful in her thinness. Then there are the Uncles. I have barely attempted to learn names and am only beginning to catch onto which actually live here and which are just guys from the office. My "Dad" is a business man, and apparently it is a family business because his other brothers seem to work there too, as do all the various male inhabitants, but then some just come as business partners. They are all very nice and always shake my hand, which ends with both of us snapping our middle fingers together using our thumbs... its hard to explain but it is the local greeting. And as I've said, they all call me Afia.
Imagine me, on that first day, arriving to a house expecting Mom, and four kids, and meeting room full of people after room!
But here is the catch: three days after I arrived, the three boys, and the other older boy who I forgot to mention, he is a cousin, as well as Akua and a load of suitcases boarded a plane for South Africa because the boys need better education that what is offered in Ghana, and the family has a second home down there. Then only a few hours ago, Mama Faustina and baby Abena joined them, and within a few weeks Dad is going as well. They will live there all year and come back on vacations. Also, I learned that the three girls are going to school in another region and will not be living here either. I have not been able to get completely clear why they are hosting me if they knew about the move, but I think it is somewhere in between not knowing that they would have to leave so soon, and them being the first family to offer. It is surprising and frustrating how difficult the language barrier actually is- often I feel like my meaning is lost in accent and the general chaos of whatever is going on, so it has been hard clearing my confusion. They keep telling me not to worry and that I will not be lonely and all, but I will let you all know how the situation unfolds.
The worst part was how much I fell in love with all of them- and the constant interaction - which leaves a huge emptiness in the house. I miss them all even though it was only a few days that I knew them.

On a different note, today we had a drumming lesson set up by the AFS people. It was amazing, I already can't wait till Friday for another. By "we" I mean the four YES Abroad Ghana kids, me, Adam (CA), Anna (Missouri) and Meredith (Virgina).

The days have been long. I must be accompanied on walks, automatic deterrent, even though this is a really nice neighborhood- Dad insists on it- and as of yet there is nothing I know about to do. And none of the girls here really like to go out that much. Both the heat and the heavy carb-based diet make me lethargic, which is a downward spiral, so I've been trying to get out somehow everyday. I went to Dad's office with an Uncle, and listened to a room of large Ghanaian men shout in Twi/English about local politics for a few hours, then tried to have it all explained to me.... but I was left more baffled than when I was able to connect the dots of English using my imagination. Went for a very long walk with some other uncles all around and talked about Ghana and America. "Brother Ken" impressed upon me how much anyone in Ghana would give to go to America, so please, let us be grateful for where fate has landed us, because I think most of you reading this are on a computer in the US.

It is strange how far away the rest of my life feels. If it were not for this computer I would feel very isolated indeed. A picture of a friend fell out of my journal today, I had forgotten it was there, and just looking at it the first thing that came to mind was "wow, the rest of my life is real". There's no way to explain how that feels. It just comes from how excruciatingly long this week and a half has been, how completely ripped out of the fabric of my life I feel, my known life, my trusted life, the life that indeed ended me up here, I remind myself. I remind myself that I asked to be here, I worked to be here, I want to be here, and yes, the rest of the world will go on without me, and that this too will just become another chapter in my book (though right now it feels like I'm completely starting a new one- no pages to turn back to for a clue as to how the plot is supposed to go). But I also know how true it is that by feeling the blankness I am learning more about myself than all the pages of the desired familiarity can teach.

I hope this finds you all in peace and health.

PS I have to say I really appreciated the comments. Not that I'm expecting them now or anything, it was just nice to have the whole "rest of my world still existing" thing reaffirmed in those little notes. Thank you.
Asomdwee (peace)

Arrival

2009-08-16T16:23:00.000-07:00

It seems like a fitting title, given the circumstances.

Yes, I have arrived in Accra, Ghana and am living in a house full Ghanaian laughter. My family is boisterous and large, with a plethora of incoming and outgoing relatives, "house help" girls that are treated like siblings, the Big Mama of all Big Mamas and now me, an "obruni" as they call the white foreigners. But before I introduce the family, I must tell you about Accra.

Akwaaba! Welcome to Ghana, the land of Sunshine, where Freedom and Justice guide the people.
Though as I write this I realize that the sun is what I have seen the least of since my arrival to an overcast, smoggy, generally hazy Accra. And yes, I must say I miss it. The sky. But, for the myriad of colors and faces and dresses and whir of action, I probably would not find myself sky-gazing all that often anyhow. This place is full of life, full of lush green trees, black and shining people who are always decked out in vibrant fabrics, full of smells- smoke, fuel, body odor, fish, fish, fish, open sewers, humidity, dust-- red dust from the sides of the roads, orangey like powdered Thai tea and contrasted perfectly with the greenery. And emerging from the dust are billboards, advertising Obama, CocaCola, black hair dye (?), and all along the streets are Vodafone adds, the leading cell phone, though competing for frequency are the patriotic colors of Red, Yellow and Green. Along the sides of the roads are people. Walking, biking, balancing baskets of dried plantains, peanuts, sashes of water, toilet paper, sandals, tires, everything and anything you can imagine on their heads, gracefully walking as though their necks were invincible. And the roads themselves? Basic rule: which ever car is fastest and which ever driver is riskiest gets the right of way. Cars slowing for people? Cars using turn signals? Cars staying in their own lanes? Do you WANT to get where you're going? (Whether or not you are alive is a minor factor). Yes. the roads are wild, because the traffic is terrible. If one doesn't accelerate to get the next spot, one might be stuck in the unmoving pile for another fifteen minutes. Accra is definitely another world, yet I am remided of my time in Thailand, which makes it seem like this world is not so large after all. Especailly when my host sister, Abena (not the 1 year old, this one is 14) taugth me the same game as I had learned from the Thais in a remote village- it is basically Jacks with rocks. And of course, being on my email doesn't make anything seem any bigger- except globalization.

So, I leave the Family unmentioned, but that will come in a later post. Know that I am well, I can't believe I have been gone only just over a week, and am very much looking forward to this year... and at the same time miss you all dearly.

One more note- my new name is Afia, meaning Friday born girl. There are basically 7 male and 7 female names in this area, that each person is called by, as well as any other names. One male and female name for each day of the week and you are named depeding on when you are born. Thus there are two Afias, two Abenas, four Kwabenas (at least), etc. in this one household. It makes me feel infintely a part of the clan when little 6 year old Jake/Kwabena retraces his steps through the house yelling "Afia, Afia" when I have lagged behind him, or when Akua says "Afia, you come pound da fufu". Yes, I have found a second, or third, home.

Departure

2009-08-07T17:12:00.000-07:00

It is the day of departure.

Inside me is a strange calm that I've felt all day, induced by the monotone gray, and the feeling of standing on a precipice. Elation and apprehension pull me in such opposite directions that I find myself suspended in a midair emptiness. Now I just want to leave, jump, decide, freefall, move onto the next phase with my body as well as my thoughts.

I feel this is the beginning of something that will guide the rest of my life, and the feeling extends to those around me, as we all take a step together in different ways. This whole year has been one of irrevocable change, and my journey is just the same wind, finally reaching me. So here is a clinking glass to beginnings and movement.

But in this particular moment I am focused on the sound of a doorway closing, an era ending, a precious era that has defined in many ways who I am today and why I am leaving. Right know that door feels to be never closing, and I keep peaking back- saying one last goodbye, grabbing one last curio- and I only hope it does not close on my fingers. So, the clink of glasses sounds again, this time, with glittering, doleful eyes, to endings.

Have there been things unsaid? Of course, and things undone as well. But that is a place one cannot dwell. My feet are poised at the brink, and I must release the qualms, and trust that this is the right path and that though I fall free, I am carried by Grace.

So, here I go.