My last post was sort of negative, so here are my top 10 best things about Ghana.
1) My internship. The people I met and worked with at my internship at Hope Community have, by far, had the greatest impact on me. I am actually really surprised at how attached I have become to the boys that I work with, and it really upsets me that I may never see them again after I leave. While I used to not look forward to going to my internship, I now get excited every time I get to go in and spend time with the boys (and a few girls). They really are great kids who have just had sad lives, and are a bit rough around the edges (which makes me love them even more).
2) The people. I have made so many new friends in Ghana, whether it be Americans or Ghanaians. While I do have to admit that most of my friends here are from America, they are friendships I will continue when I return. The people of Ghana are some of the greatest people I have ever met. From my security guard “best friend” Jacob to random women I have met in the market, most of the people of Ghana have been nothing but kind to me.
3) Learning the tro-tro system. I said in one of my first blog posts that I wanted to a tro-tro pro by the time I left Ghana. While I may not be a pro (sometimes I still have to ask), I know how to get where I need to go. I know which tro-tro goes where, the hand symbols the mates make to show which way they are heading, and the fares. Understanding the public transportation system of a place is certainly a sign that you know your way around, and I guess I can say that I have learned to navigate the city of Accra.
4) Learning how to bargain. I have actually gotten pretty good at it. I know what a fair price is, and if I use my limited knowledge of Twi, I can usually get the price that I want. I have to say, bargaining is an art, and while I have not completely mastered it, I have gotten pretty good.
5) Seeing elephants in the wild. Just an awesome thing I can check off of my “to-do” list!
6) Not getting seriously sick. While I did have a serious respiratory infection, and a few stomach issues, I have managed to make it through my time in Ghana without having to go to the hospital! Let’s hope that I didn’t just curse myself.
7) Traveling. Through trips planned through CIEE and trips that I have planned myself, I have managed to see quite a bit of Ghana. I have been to Kumasi, Volta Region, the North, Takoradi, Akwidaa Village, and Cape Coast. Next week I am hopefully leaving the country for the first time since I have been here and heading to Togo for a few days! All of the trips I have taken have shown me different aspects of life in Ghana, and have certainly left me with a few great stories.
8) The exchange rate. Things in Ghana are cheap, which is great for my bank account. I haven’t had to spend my time here counting my money and budgeting myself, which makes me very lucky. I have been able to live life in Ghana as I wish, and sometimes spoiling myself with nice meals out or days at the pool.
9) The lack of classes. The classes that I did have were terribly boring, but they met only once a week for 2 hours (and we usually got out early). I had very little class time, which allowed me to have a lot of free time to do things that I would rather be doing. Like travelling, and going to the beach and generally enjoying life.
10) The food (well, some of it). While I do complain a lot about the massive amounts of rice that I eat, there are certain foods that I will seriously miss when I go home. Groundnut soup with rice balls (my favorite Ghanaian dish, by far), red red, and especially fried plantains! I bought a cookbook, but who knows if I will be able to cook it like the Ghanaians do!
Monday, April 26, 2010
Monday, April 19, 2010
Ten things that I haven't had or done since I have been in Ghana
10 things I haven’t done/had since I have been in Ghana:
1) Had hot water. Okay, sometimes during the day the heat from outside heats up the pipes and we have warm water, but that doesn’t really count. However, the thought of taking a hot shower in Ghana makes me cringe because it would just be a terrible experience.
2) Had running water for more than 5 consecutive days. Actually, 5 days might be a stretch. Needless to say, I am very resourceful with a bucket of water.
3) Worn a seatbelt. Sorry Mom! Most cars don’t have them.
4) Felt completely clean for longer than 30 minutes. It’s dusty and hot here, what can I say.
5) Drank tap water. Seems unimportant, but it is getting annoying having to go to the gas station every time I need water.
6) Felt cold. Despite the fact that it is super hot, it is kind of nice knowing that I will never need a sweatshirt, and I will never have a chill (unless of course I am in air conditioning).
7) Blend in. No matter where I go, I stick out like a sore thumb. It is not necessarily a bad thing, everyone should know what it feels like to be a minority, but it’s just completely different from what I am used to, I get attention wherever I go.
8) Had real cheese. There are some sorry attempts for cheese in this country, but I miss cheddar and feta.
9) Had an interesting or mentally stimulating class. This may be nerdy, but I love most of my classes at American. The classes here, with professors reading word for word from their notes, expecting you to write everything down have been, by far, the biggest disappointment of Ghana.
10) Been to a gym. This may be an amazing statement to all of you, but I miss exercising. I tried to go running, but it is just far too hot (even at 5am) and the Ghanaians give me weird stares.
Many of these things are the negative aspects of being in Ghana. I don’t mean to sound like a negative Nancy, just thought I would let you all know! I really do love Ghana, and as my time in this country ticks down, I have such mixed feelings about going home. On the one hand, I miss living a comfortable life with my friends and family. On the other hand, Ghana has been one of the most amazing and educational experiences of my life.
1) Had hot water. Okay, sometimes during the day the heat from outside heats up the pipes and we have warm water, but that doesn’t really count. However, the thought of taking a hot shower in Ghana makes me cringe because it would just be a terrible experience.
2) Had running water for more than 5 consecutive days. Actually, 5 days might be a stretch. Needless to say, I am very resourceful with a bucket of water.
3) Worn a seatbelt. Sorry Mom! Most cars don’t have them.
4) Felt completely clean for longer than 30 minutes. It’s dusty and hot here, what can I say.
5) Drank tap water. Seems unimportant, but it is getting annoying having to go to the gas station every time I need water.
6) Felt cold. Despite the fact that it is super hot, it is kind of nice knowing that I will never need a sweatshirt, and I will never have a chill (unless of course I am in air conditioning).
7) Blend in. No matter where I go, I stick out like a sore thumb. It is not necessarily a bad thing, everyone should know what it feels like to be a minority, but it’s just completely different from what I am used to, I get attention wherever I go.
8) Had real cheese. There are some sorry attempts for cheese in this country, but I miss cheddar and feta.
9) Had an interesting or mentally stimulating class. This may be nerdy, but I love most of my classes at American. The classes here, with professors reading word for word from their notes, expecting you to write everything down have been, by far, the biggest disappointment of Ghana.
10) Been to a gym. This may be an amazing statement to all of you, but I miss exercising. I tried to go running, but it is just far too hot (even at 5am) and the Ghanaians give me weird stares.
Many of these things are the negative aspects of being in Ghana. I don’t mean to sound like a negative Nancy, just thought I would let you all know! I really do love Ghana, and as my time in this country ticks down, I have such mixed feelings about going home. On the one hand, I miss living a comfortable life with my friends and family. On the other hand, Ghana has been one of the most amazing and educational experiences of my life.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Volta Region
This past weekend I spent two days in the Volta Region of Ghana. I had no idea, but I think this may be the prettiest part of Ghana. It is very rural, but full of beautiful green jungles and hills and mountains. We drove up on Saturday morning and the first stop was Tafi Atome monkey sanctuary. It is some sort of local, eco-tourist project run by the people that live in the area. The monkeys there are Mona Monkeys, and they are super cute. We got to feed them bananas which was pretty cool!
The next stop was Mount Afadjato, which is the highest freestanding mountain in Ghana. Is it really that high? No. Was the hike up it terrible? Yes. It took hiking to a whole new level. Practically vertical, super rocky, and it took about an hour. It was the sweatiest I have ever been in my entire life, and the most exercise I have gotten since I’ve been in Ghana. But, the view from the top made it totally worth it. There were more green mountains and a small town at the bottom. We could see the Togolese border and a waterfall in the distance!
The next day we trekked to Wli Falls, which is a gorgeous waterfall in the jungle. It is not necessarily a big waterfall, but it is very tall, and you can go swimming in the lower pool. The water was pretty cold, but we had a lot of fun anyways. That’s really all for that weekend; it was pretty low-key but still a great time! More blogs coming soon :)
The next stop was Mount Afadjato, which is the highest freestanding mountain in Ghana. Is it really that high? No. Was the hike up it terrible? Yes. It took hiking to a whole new level. Practically vertical, super rocky, and it took about an hour. It was the sweatiest I have ever been in my entire life, and the most exercise I have gotten since I’ve been in Ghana. But, the view from the top made it totally worth it. There were more green mountains and a small town at the bottom. We could see the Togolese border and a waterfall in the distance!
The next day we trekked to Wli Falls, which is a gorgeous waterfall in the jungle. It is not necessarily a big waterfall, but it is very tall, and you can go swimming in the lower pool. The water was pretty cold, but we had a lot of fun anyways. That’s really all for that weekend; it was pretty low-key but still a great time! More blogs coming soon :)
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Mole Mole Mole!
My trip to Mole National Park, up in the North of Ghana was an adventure by every definition of the word. Here’s a breakdown of the trip!
Thursday: Planned on leaving Pentagon at 7am to get to the bus station by 7:30-8:00 to get our bus tickets. As usual, we have all gotten onto Ghana time (late for everything) and left around 7:20, and it took longer than usual to get a cab. One thing we did not count on was the incredible amount of traffic heading into Accra that morning. So, it took us over an hour to get to the bus station, which we got to at about 9:00. I had reserved tickets for a 10am bus to Tamale (a city in Northern Ghana, and the departure point for Mole) so I thought we were set. But, travel in Ghana is never so simple. Apparently, while I was on the phone with the woman who booked my 10am tickets, the 10am bus actually filled up. So, she reserved us five tickets on the 8:30 bus, but failed to tell me this small detail. There were two tickets left on the 10am bus, and there were more on a 3pm bus. We didn’t really want to split up, but decided this was the only way that we were getting there. It was decided that my friend Brittney and I would go on the earlier bus because I booked the hotel, and it was Brittney’s birthday. So, Brittney and I got situated on the bus (in a very cramped seat in the back of the bus) and, by some miracle, there were three open seats and all of my friends got onto the bus! So, we got situated for our 12 hour bus ride up to Tamale. Mind you, Ghana is about the size of Oregon, and driving the distance that we did should not have taken 12 hours, but the roads are bad so it takes much longer. The bus ride was pretty bad, but I slept a lot because I had been out until about 3am the night before. We made some friends on the bus, two American guys who are working in Ghana, and they ended up hanging out with us all weekend. By about 10pm we made it to Tamale, and got to our hotel and passed out.
Friday: We had to leave for the bus station at 7 to make sure that we got tickets on the 1:30 bus to Mole. We got the tickets no problem, and proceeded to walk around Tamale to try to find somewhere to eat. We had completely forgotten that it was Good Friday, and despite the fact that Tamale is a largely Muslim city, everything was closed. The people were also much more hostile towards us than in Accra. One of my friends made a comment about a man that was following us, and he just started yelling at us and calling us “fucking stupid oburonis”…so that was interesting. We decided to just go back to our hotel and eat at the restaurant, which was good and cheap. By 1:00 we were back at the bus station, which was PACKED. The bus was late, as usual, and we found some seats in the shade. The bus finally arrived and we piled on. As I got on, I realized that I had the same seat number as one of my friends, so I just decided to sit in another seat. When the boy who actually had the ticket for the seat I was in got on the bus, he threw a fit. He wanted me to get off the bus and take another one because there was no seat for me. But, there was no way that I was getting off that bus. I figured he could just stand for the ride, but he absolutely refused and threw a little hissy-fit. Well, one of our American friends that we met on the bus ride up gave up his seat and offered to stand so that I could sit, which was super nice of him. The bus ride was pretty terrible, four hours on dirt roads with no AC. The bus was packed with people and luggage and there was no real room to move. About half way to Mole, my friend Molly had to go to the bathroom really bad. They ended up stopping the bus and throwing Molly out the window (because all the doors were blocked) so that she could run across the street and pee in the bushes. Everyone on the bus thought that this was just the funniest thing ever. We finally got to Larabanga, a small Muslim village near Mole where we were staying and got situated at our guesthouse. The guesthouse was pretty simple- no running water, and a pit latrine (a concrete hole in the ground for the toilet). We actually ended up sleeping on the roof because the rooms were so stuffy, which was really nice, especially because the stars were so pretty.
Saturday: Woke up at about 5am to the sound of morning prayers and goats. We decided that we were going to ride bikes to get to Mole because it was only about 6k away. We left for the park around 5:45 and saw some antelopes and warthogs on the bike ride over! When we got the Mole, we decided to pay for a car to take us on the Safari instead of walking. We had an awesome driver named Abu who was dead set on us finding the elephants. The safari was really fun, and Abu let us sit on the roof of the car once we got into the park. At the beginning all we were really seeing were wart hogs and antelope, and I was pretty sure we weren’t going to see any elephants. Then we saw an elephant footprint and started trekking by foot into the bush. This search wasn’t very fruitful, but then we got a phone call saying that the elephants were at the water hole. So, we booked it over to the water hole and there were three elephants chilling in the water (and a crocodile)! It was super cool to get that close to elephants, and I got a lot of good pictures. After that we headed back to another hotel actually in Mole National Park to have lunch. It was way too hot to ride out bikes back to Larabanga, so we just chilled at the hotel all day and swam in the pool. There is an observation deck to look at another watering hole and I saw even more elephants, and these ones were actually out of the water and walking around! Around 5 we biked back to the village (which was much harder than the ride there) and got some dinner and pretty much passed out for the night.
Sunday: Woke up at 4am to get a bus back to Tamale. The bus came by 4:45 and we made it back to Tamale by 8:30 and went back to our hotel. We got bus tickets home to Accra for 5pm that day, but we decided to get a hotel room to relax in and shower. We didn’t do much, but we did go out to eat at a great Indian food restaurant down the street. Then we got back on the bus and headed back to Accra. This bus ride was possibly the most miserable bus ride of my life. They played some Twi-language movie until 1am at full volume (with the worst sound effects I have heard in my life). We drove through a huge thunder storm and past a huge fire in a town. We finally got back to Accra at 3am and got a taxi back to campus. I was glad to be back, and also glad for a great weekend up North!
Thursday: Planned on leaving Pentagon at 7am to get to the bus station by 7:30-8:00 to get our bus tickets. As usual, we have all gotten onto Ghana time (late for everything) and left around 7:20, and it took longer than usual to get a cab. One thing we did not count on was the incredible amount of traffic heading into Accra that morning. So, it took us over an hour to get to the bus station, which we got to at about 9:00. I had reserved tickets for a 10am bus to Tamale (a city in Northern Ghana, and the departure point for Mole) so I thought we were set. But, travel in Ghana is never so simple. Apparently, while I was on the phone with the woman who booked my 10am tickets, the 10am bus actually filled up. So, she reserved us five tickets on the 8:30 bus, but failed to tell me this small detail. There were two tickets left on the 10am bus, and there were more on a 3pm bus. We didn’t really want to split up, but decided this was the only way that we were getting there. It was decided that my friend Brittney and I would go on the earlier bus because I booked the hotel, and it was Brittney’s birthday. So, Brittney and I got situated on the bus (in a very cramped seat in the back of the bus) and, by some miracle, there were three open seats and all of my friends got onto the bus! So, we got situated for our 12 hour bus ride up to Tamale. Mind you, Ghana is about the size of Oregon, and driving the distance that we did should not have taken 12 hours, but the roads are bad so it takes much longer. The bus ride was pretty bad, but I slept a lot because I had been out until about 3am the night before. We made some friends on the bus, two American guys who are working in Ghana, and they ended up hanging out with us all weekend. By about 10pm we made it to Tamale, and got to our hotel and passed out.
Friday: We had to leave for the bus station at 7 to make sure that we got tickets on the 1:30 bus to Mole. We got the tickets no problem, and proceeded to walk around Tamale to try to find somewhere to eat. We had completely forgotten that it was Good Friday, and despite the fact that Tamale is a largely Muslim city, everything was closed. The people were also much more hostile towards us than in Accra. One of my friends made a comment about a man that was following us, and he just started yelling at us and calling us “fucking stupid oburonis”…so that was interesting. We decided to just go back to our hotel and eat at the restaurant, which was good and cheap. By 1:00 we were back at the bus station, which was PACKED. The bus was late, as usual, and we found some seats in the shade. The bus finally arrived and we piled on. As I got on, I realized that I had the same seat number as one of my friends, so I just decided to sit in another seat. When the boy who actually had the ticket for the seat I was in got on the bus, he threw a fit. He wanted me to get off the bus and take another one because there was no seat for me. But, there was no way that I was getting off that bus. I figured he could just stand for the ride, but he absolutely refused and threw a little hissy-fit. Well, one of our American friends that we met on the bus ride up gave up his seat and offered to stand so that I could sit, which was super nice of him. The bus ride was pretty terrible, four hours on dirt roads with no AC. The bus was packed with people and luggage and there was no real room to move. About half way to Mole, my friend Molly had to go to the bathroom really bad. They ended up stopping the bus and throwing Molly out the window (because all the doors were blocked) so that she could run across the street and pee in the bushes. Everyone on the bus thought that this was just the funniest thing ever. We finally got to Larabanga, a small Muslim village near Mole where we were staying and got situated at our guesthouse. The guesthouse was pretty simple- no running water, and a pit latrine (a concrete hole in the ground for the toilet). We actually ended up sleeping on the roof because the rooms were so stuffy, which was really nice, especially because the stars were so pretty.
Saturday: Woke up at about 5am to the sound of morning prayers and goats. We decided that we were going to ride bikes to get to Mole because it was only about 6k away. We left for the park around 5:45 and saw some antelopes and warthogs on the bike ride over! When we got the Mole, we decided to pay for a car to take us on the Safari instead of walking. We had an awesome driver named Abu who was dead set on us finding the elephants. The safari was really fun, and Abu let us sit on the roof of the car once we got into the park. At the beginning all we were really seeing were wart hogs and antelope, and I was pretty sure we weren’t going to see any elephants. Then we saw an elephant footprint and started trekking by foot into the bush. This search wasn’t very fruitful, but then we got a phone call saying that the elephants were at the water hole. So, we booked it over to the water hole and there were three elephants chilling in the water (and a crocodile)! It was super cool to get that close to elephants, and I got a lot of good pictures. After that we headed back to another hotel actually in Mole National Park to have lunch. It was way too hot to ride out bikes back to Larabanga, so we just chilled at the hotel all day and swam in the pool. There is an observation deck to look at another watering hole and I saw even more elephants, and these ones were actually out of the water and walking around! Around 5 we biked back to the village (which was much harder than the ride there) and got some dinner and pretty much passed out for the night.
Sunday: Woke up at 4am to get a bus back to Tamale. The bus came by 4:45 and we made it back to Tamale by 8:30 and went back to our hotel. We got bus tickets home to Accra for 5pm that day, but we decided to get a hotel room to relax in and shower. We didn’t do much, but we did go out to eat at a great Indian food restaurant down the street. Then we got back on the bus and headed back to Accra. This bus ride was possibly the most miserable bus ride of my life. They played some Twi-language movie until 1am at full volume (with the worst sound effects I have heard in my life). We drove through a huge thunder storm and past a huge fire in a town. We finally got back to Accra at 3am and got a taxi back to campus. I was glad to be back, and also glad for a great weekend up North!
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