Screaming Babies at the Black Stars Match

Good news! I’m not going to be deported!! Friday I took a day trip to Togo (country boarding Ghana to the East).  And after a roundtrip trotro ride of 8 hours and 40 Ghana Cedi ($30) I got my passport stamped for another 60 days in Ghana.  We also had lunch in the Lome, Togo which only means one thing: amazing food, at least in comparison to Ghana.

Saturday we set out for Kumase to attend the World Cup qualifier match between Benin and Ghana.  For the occasion I donned a lovely red, yellow, and green Ghana sweatband to support my country of residency. In order to actually get the tickets we had to wake up pretty early (granted, it was after a late night of celebrating my friend’s 21^st birthday) and wait outside of the stadium in the rain.  Rather than buying the tickets ourselves, we have to pass money and a small bribe through the front gates for someone to run inside and get out tickets. In the process I met two little boys (they called themselves John and Little John) who were sweet talking all of the obrunis into buying them tickets for the match. I’m assuming they finally got some because I saw them in the VIP section during the match…and then the older of the Johns walked me back to the hostel – it was very sweet.

 

The match was definitely a very Ghanaian experience.  The Black Stars (Ghana) scored the first and only goal within one minute of the start of the game, but the rest of the match was fun to watch…although I know very little about soccer.  I’ve never seen a crowd so loud and excited in my life. I think some of the most fascinating things about this country are the different sounds that Ghanaians make.  One of the best I’ve heard yet is their war-like cry at football matches. The first time I heard it I thought a child had been hit by a car. It sounds like a dying baby, and I pinky-swear I am not exaggerating.  It is the most intense and shrill thing I’ve ever heard.  Every time one of the Black Stars came anywhere near the goal the screams would burst from the crowd. It most definitely took some getting used to. 

One thing to be thankful for is no one I know was injured or hurt during or after the match.  For the last match in Ghana, the stadium sold twice as many tickets as they have seats, and the stadium was so packed 6 people died of suffocation.  That was not the case this time, but I haven’t heard the official death count yet.  I do know that there was a scuffle outside the stadium gates, and shots were fired, but I was back in my hostel by that time. It’s a little intense how crazy the crowds can be, but I’m so glad I was able to go.

I’m beginning to realize how much I’m going to miss Ghana when I leave.  Don’t get me wrong; I’m very excited to consistently have running water (it’s been off for four days) and air conditioning and all of the modern conveniences of home.  But Ghana has been kind to me, and it’s beginning to feel like home. Every time I start speaking Twi, Ghanaians get the biggest smile on their faces – like they are proud of my efforts.  During the few hours the game was taking place I felt very proud to call myself Ghanaian, at least for the Semester. 

Kokrobite and Basketballs of Hope

            I have officially been in Africa for about two and half months…and to be honest I feel like I’m having a mid-trip crisis.  My visa is expiring this weekend so I have three options: 1. Deportation 2. Leave the country and reenter or 3. Send my passport to immigration and wait forever to get it back.  For a few hours on Monday I was literally looking for cheap flights to Europe for the weekend…instead I’m going to be heading to Cote D’voire.  I think I could use a quick visit back to the states, and then I would be set to go for my remaining 7 weeks here.  Hopefully I will have recuperated soon because I still have so much to accomplish and experience here.   

            This past weekend a few friends and I traveled about 30 kilometers west of Accra to the beach resort Big Milly’s in Kokrobite.  I think it will rank among one of my smoothest weekend expeditions in Africa – at least no one screamed at me this time.  The beach was great and so typically African, with lots of colorfully painted fishing boats and children selling oranges on top of their heads, and of course tons of Rastas playing football on the beach.  Our room was a cute little hut with a functioning shower, mosquito nets included.  I swam and read and made friends with a 12-year-old Ghanaian named Cecilia.  When I shared my Disney princess gummies snack with her she wasn’t quite sure what to make of them.  She picked at them a bit and eventually ran home with them and promised she had eaten and enjoyed them. 

            Our first night at the resort a group of drummers and traditional African dancers preformed traditional African war and fertility dances for the villagers and tourists.  It was amazing and so entertaining! There was lots of pain and beads and headdresses.  I will not stop being amazed by how expressive the dancers are with their movements. In between performances random locals would mosey onto the dance floor and break out into synchronized dances.  Apparently, all the locals know the traditional dances. I was content to simply witness the festivities.

            On my second night at the beach I met a fellow American who had moved to Ghana to start his own NGO.  He had even gone to seminary in Atlanta and heard of my hometown…the whole conversation made the world seem very small. But it was also very encouraging because he is doing something that I would like to do in the future and I felt I could learn a lot from his experiences. I also met a Rasta named Jesus (or Thomas) who was my age and very sweet. At one point in our conversation I asked why he didn’t have dreads, and he told me his mom had come for a visit and made him shave them off. She said, “What is this? No one in our family is a Rasta!” He explained that he respected his mother and didn’t want to upset her, so he settled for wearing a bandana and looking like Tupac instead.  He also offered to take me to Mali and Niger, but I respectfully declined.

            Sadly another girl in my ISEP group is going home tomorrow. I wish she could finish out the semester, but she has been sick for quite a while and is ready to just feel well again. Once again, I feel very thankful that I haven’t been hospitalized or seriously ill like many of my friends.

            A friend of mine is trying to raise money for a village school here in Ghana.  The school is also a home for a good portion of the children who attend the school.  However it’s very under funded, and there are no activities to speak of once school is finished for the day/week.  So, my friend is trying to raise money to build a basketball court on campus that can be used while school is in and out of session.  She needs at least a hundred votes on the website www.givemeaning.com/proposal/basketballsofhope in order to get the funding for her project. So, if you have the extra time please log on and vote for her proposal!

Food Poisoning, Lake Bosumtwi, and Marriage Proposals

I know it’s been a while on my blog updates. So sorry. I have officially had my first bout of sickness here in Africa. I think it was food poisoning or a bacteria infection from some food or water. Either way, it wasn’t fun but thankfully it was short lived and didn’t involve a hospital stay. It did keep me here in Legon for a weekend but my friends were very kind and stayed with me. As my time is dwindling here I’m realizing my weekends to travel are becoming fewer and fewer…I’m going to be back in the states before I know it.

This past weekend a few friends and I headed up to Lake Bosumtwi located in central Ghana, which is the biggest natural lake in Ghana and was made by a meteor that hit the earth. Before we made it to the lake we spent some time in Kumasi (the huge market town). On Saturday morning we decided it would be fun to wander through the market which is the Biggest in West Africa and not for the fair-weather traveler. Not the best idea we’ve ever had. It was crazy crowded – think the day after thanksgiving shopping (Africa style of course) on crack. We somehow made it into the meat section of the market, which you can only imagine, smells to high heaven and made me consider a vegan lifestyle. Not to mention we could barely keep sight of each other because of how crowded it is. After wandering, completely lost, for about an hour we made it out. Amazingly enough only Jayne was pick-pocketed, and thankfully it was only her phone. She was at the end of our line of obrunis, so she was definitely a target.

After our eventful morning we took a series of trotros and taxis to get to the Lake Point Guest House. Which is right on the lake shores and has these cute little huts and everything is eco-friendly. We swam in the lake and just chilled at the lodge. It was a nice break from the crazy noise and trash of Accra. After dinner we headed back to our hut and found the lovely family of ridiculously large spiders that happened to be staying in our hut too. Of course it turned into a thirty-minute ordeal of trying to kill the spiders with shoes and bug spray while we screamed and jumped on the bed every time they moved. One escaped but the other was not so lucky. At one point in came running at my foot and scared the crap out of me, but I finally got it. Of course Jayne and Kendall, rather than trying to kill it, spent their time standing on the bed capturing all the chaos on video…should make a hilarious facebook video.

The next morning we hiked along a dried-up stream through the mountains surrounding the lake. Amazingly enough I did not twist my ankle on the river rocks…it was a great morning and so beautiful - Lots of bamboo and butterflies and beautiful views of the lake. When we got back we decided to check out early and save some money heading back to university a day early. Man was that a disaster. The Austrian lady who owned the lodge and her Ghanaian husband were not having any of that. They insisted on us paying for our second night (33cedi, which in Ghana is A LOT for a hotel room-even a nice one)…and we of course, said absolutely not. They told us that anywhere in the world when you make reservations to stay you pay for those nights. Which is absolute bullocks, and I told them so because I myself have worked in the hotel industry. They said, “This is Ghana” but we informed them that we live here too and always check out early. Anyways, it turned into a two-hour stare down of us trying to reason and insist upon fairness while they yelled and made a few racial comments along the lines of “This is Africa, these white people don’t belong here.” The woman who said it was Austrian for God’s sake!! At one point both Jayne and Kendall were crying from frustration with these ridiculous people. In a perfect world we would have paid for the services we HAD received and walked away. However, we were in the middle of nowhere with no transportation and an angry owner threatening to call the police for trying to destroy his business. So we paid them and vowed to write every travel book and review about their blatant disrespect and terrible business. My friend Max kept saying, “I have backpacked all over the world, and this is just not how business is done.” I walked away from the whole ordeal thinking “only in Africa!” My friends and I are pretty excited to write four separate letters of complaint to travel books – especially those based solely on independent travelers’ reviews…

I keep encountering situations with Ghanaian men that I find pretty hilarious. I’ll tell you a few of my favorites. When I was traveling in Wa (northern Ghana), my friends and I were bartering for some fabric. At one point I was very kindly telling the man to be a good Christian and give us poor students a fair price and he looks to my friend Alli (who is very petite and little) and says to me, “Okay, I give you 5 cedi and you give me your daughter.” Apparently a good deal on fabric is equivalent to selling my daughter to this man! Not to mention she’s about four years older than me…of course no one ever believes me that I’m only 19 – they literally laugh in my face when I tell them. Whatever…I still got a good deal on the fabric ☺ Yesterday in Kumase when we were surrounded by men trying to get us on their bus (it’s like a game – who can snag the obrunis), this 40-year-old Ghanaian man decided it would be a good time to propose to me. The conversation went something like this:

Man: “I like you.”
Me: “I’m not getting on your bus, it’s too expensive.”
Man: “No, I like you.”
Me: “Okay then.”
Man: “Where are you from? Britain?”
Me: “America.”
Man: “Obama!!!!! I love you, take me home to your country.”
Me: “Sorry, but I’m living here right now.”
Man: “Let me have your phone number.”
Me: “No.”
Man: “Let me have your email address.”
Me: “No.”
Man: “Why don’t you like me?”

I feel like I have one of these encounters at least twice a week. I have my first test this week, and I think it’s going to be pretty painful, seeing as how I never have any idea what the professor is talking about...although my friends have mentioned that they rarely even grade the exams, especially in this class because it’s about 800 students. And I’m beginning to actually barter in Twi – I feel it’s very effective because the Ghanaians love it and this it’s hilarious when the Obrunis try to speak their language. They usually just lower the price because they think we’re so funny and appreciate how hard we’re trying.

That’s all for now! Good news – I got the camp job this summer, so I will be heading to Wisconsin for a few months. Gramps and Grammy – I got your letter and there should be one coming your way soon. Love and miss you all!

Bonjour!

Well, bad news…my camera was stolen on my way back from Togo. So the pictures will be nonexistent for a while. As the Ghanaians say, “It is finished.” This past weekend we headed to Togo (country to the east of Ghana) because it was time to renew our visas and if we crossed the boarder it’s free. However, we were only given a stamp for 30 days, so it looks like we’ll be heading to Cote d’Voire sooner than we thought for another visa stamp. Despite those two disappointments it was a good weekend.

We crossed the Togo boarder Friday evening. It’s a French speaking country and no one in our group spoke French…so right away we knew it would be interesting. As soon as we went through immigration (an adventure when you don’t speak the language or have any of the currency to buy a visa) we were being followed by this possibly mentally challenged man on the beach. He kept up a steady stream of French and every time we tried to lose him, he was more determined to follow us. So very quickly I learned my first French words: “Fee shay mwa la pay!” I know my spelling is atrocious, but it means, “Please go away!” It came in handy a few times and was pretty effective.

Lome, the capital of Togo, is known to be the Paris of West Africa. So of course the food was amazing and the architecture was French inspired. And there was cheese! I haven’t had cheese in two months – such a luxury. It was a nice change from Ghana. Our first night we stayed in the city at Hotel de Gallione. It was full of expatriates (lots of greasy old men), but we loved it because there was live jazz music. New people showed up all night long with their own instruments for the jam session: violins, saxophone, guitars, harmonicas, drums. It was great.

The next day I had my first experience on a Moto Taxi – which is basically a motorcycle you hop on to get around the city. I loved it! It was so much faster than the trotros – I wish they had them in Accra during rush hour. We also headed further into Togo to the Safari Hotel, which ended up being amazing!! It had a pool and was right on the beach, and of course, amazing food. When we were hanging out at the beach all of the little village kids decided to come play too. We had no way of communicating with them, because they didn’t speak French or English, but they were adorable and ended up teaching us games and playing in the water and sand. Even the moms joined in the swimming by the end of our beach trip. I walked away with a nasty sunburn, but thankfully the weather back in Ghana has been pretty overcast so my burn hasn’t been too annoying.

This coming Friday is Ghana’s Independence day, so that should be a fun party and a relaxing weekend without travel – I haven’t been home for more than four days in about a month. Also, the athletic director at the university has decided to start up a girl’s softball program, so it looks like I’m going to be on the first University of Ghana softball team. Another American student and I will be teaching Ghanaian students how to play, as it’s likely they haven’t ever seen a softball game…I’m excited about the chance to make some Ghanaian friends at practices!