Hellooooooo!!!!! :)maakye! (pronounced ma-CHe, "good morning!")
sometime last week, I signed my name up on the list to join a sport team for my hall, volta hall (ladies with vision and style!), and our first meeting was sunday night. so i guess i'm used to sports team in the US, (think the movie bring it on- "this is not a democracy, this is a cheer-ocracy")where seniority/skill is king/queen, and things are generally set in when/how things are done. but its the complete opposite here. the meeting was extremely democratic, with everyone able to voice their opinion on anything from refreshments after the game, meal coupons, certificates for graduating seniors (level 400s), the practices of other halls, and also if/when you should skip lecture to go to a game/training.... everything was carefully written down for consideration and discussed democratically. oh ya, EXCEPT for the fact that we were to meet @ 5:30 am at the entrance to the hall to run as a group. yes, ladies and gentlemen, my butt has been out of bed, dressed, and attempting to smile, by 5:30 AM AAAALLLL week. i'm considering playing both volleyball and basketball, but we'll see how things go....
the best way to describe practice is probably: ghanaian. ok, i know, DUH, but to expand.... 1)LOTS of hall pride, 2) trainings are "compulsory" but there is no system to keeping track of people and who's there/not. this is significant bc there's such a housing crisis on campus, but athletes get guaranteed a bed, so it causes lots of problems when ppl dont see the people who were given beds! 3) i never know whats going on in terms of the schedule. ever. i think we have a game on monday??? 4) some of the girls are really good, but most 100s (freshmen) have never played. translation: the really good players have a lot of natural talent and have learned from older players for a few years, but prob never really "coached" - wow! 5) they accept int'l students a lot, but i've noticed that they all ask first how long i'm staying- one girl asked that before ANYthing else, and when i answered, she just said that a friend of hers from last semester left and she was really sad. awwwwww :( :(
anyway, i've had a REALLY good time playing- i'm def on the better half of the girls so far, but thats perfect- i LOVE getting respect for how i play- when you get a kill or make a shot and they give you a high five, its the best feeling bc you're getting the most genuine respect i've felt here - not based anything, but just for playing! i LOVE it! yay-ness!
Anyway, so we actually HAVE had classes this week: (well, still not all of them) - classrooms vary from being reminiscent of barns w/ outdoor-style chairs and speakers to regular halls, but if its flat, you REALLY need to sit in the front or else when the microphone goes in and out you wont be able to understand ANYTHING that happens.
each class selects a class captain who attempts to convey info between students and the prof - how to get the course outline, the reading materials which are generally photocopied, if the room or time changes etc... but its still really difficult to do these things. I actually met the head of the history dept, and when I mentioned that I was in his class, he asked which one, and even when I said i was NOT in the "black diaspora" class, he told me to tell every int'l student I know that the test next week in that class has been canceled. ummmmm ok?
in large lectures (200 or so?), int'l students (ID'd by being white) are not a large % of the class, but still get referenced specifically as int'l students, which is strange for me to be singled out, but even more awkward was a class of about 50 students of which int'l's were the majority, and the professor essentially taught the class to US, not the Ghanaians, which i really didnt like, bc all the Ghanaians around me kept protesting in twi, and making angry noises! booo! the flip side of that is a class that i am the ONLY american, but IT is the ONLY class that i have an american professor! DUDE! it was def weird to hear her give lecture, but i laughed when she apologized to the Ghanaians, and asked them (based on last semester's experience) to NOT call her before 8 am.... or on the weekends.... or on christmas... heh oh ghana....
oh and sometimes (student) preachers get up in front of the lecture before the lecturer arrives to tell us about how we should live our lives. thanks.
one of my favorite moments so far def came this last monday - i was having a bit of an up and down day, that had just gone down again when yet another lecture did not happen. after waiting for more than half an hr, most of the class was getting up to leave, when a friend and i hear some ghanaian girls calling out "obruni! obruni!" we both turn and they point at me and go off on how much they like my dress! i really like it, and i've gotten a lot of compliments on it but this was def the best! they asked who had made it, took a picture of me (awkward, but oh well), how much it cost, asked me to tell the tailor to come to their hostel! aaaaahhhh! you all know how little i usually care about how i look, how rarely i wear a skirt let alone a dress, etc, so it was REALLY nice to be so welcomed when i've been trying so hard to catch up to how well the ghanains dress here!!! i was SO stoked!!!!
yesterday's rain made for a strange day- i was going to just go to the market to buy running shoes, but in the last minute i reconsidered dropping a class and went to it instead. When we got out, it was raining too hard, so i talked with some ghanaian friends of mine until it seemed to stop, but as soon as we got out, it started again! we took cover in a half-built building until it calmed down again. oh ya, that was 2 hours later! i love how in the US, we all would have been in a rush to go do something different, had to go to get something done etc, and would have gotten significantly wet to go do it (you know that when its raining ppl just put their heads down and jet through it!) but they guys and i literally just stood around and talked for 2 whole hours!
on the more confusing end, after a nice afternoon nap, i noticed a girl outside of my door, looking at the hours posted on the computer lab next door (dont get too excited, i've only seen it open twice even though it says its open 8-5), so i decide to go be social and say hi to her, and see if she knows anything about the lab. she was very quiet but seemed to enjoy talking to me about all the rain etc, but then didnt have ANY interest in leaving. none. at one point i even got a phone call that my friends were cooking downstairs, so i suggested that we go down to watch/help, and the girl goes "no, i'm fine here". this would have been fine/fun, but i really dont think she understood a lot of what i was saying, and her responses were all short and full of giggles and then long pauses. i had NO idea what to do bc i was running out of things to say (she was not starting any of the conversations)!!!! ahhhh! she even asked if i had an pictures to show her, which i did (thanks teresa!), and was actually fun to have something continual to talk about! eventually (2+ hrs later) i was finally saved by the same friend calling and asking me to BRING something downstairs, but i was SO confused about if i did the right things or not or what kind of impression i made on her! bring on the confused-ness!
anyway, hope you all are well and enjoying whatever weather you've got! bring on the rain!
much <3!!!!!!!
Friday, August 29, 2008
Monday, August 25, 2008
O so much........except school......
Hello everyone!
so i'm not gonna lie, i just read my friend teresa's blog (she's in india) and she's TOTALLY inspired me to write more interesting blogs..... hehe, so if this is bad, you can blame her! jk j <3
So the weekend before classes "started", a group of us decided to go to HoHoe, up in the Volta (East) region. I left with a bunch of people without really much planning bc I had been attempting to register for classes. We got on a tro-tro (minibus- the easiest/cheapest public transport around here- you stand at the stop and wait for someone to drive by and call out their window the location they're going, then yell back at them, and they slow down enough for you to get a foot in, and keep going! if the sliding door closes all the way w/o holding onto it, you're in a good one!) to the SDC station, where we would get a real chartered bus there- too bad we went to the WRONG SDC staction, but the nice men who worked there took the 7 of us in one of their own large charter buses to the right one - we werent quite sure what was going on, but Ghanaians really take care of you!
So the bus we were on played CONSTANT/LOUD/CHRISTIAN music - one song's lyrics were "move it to the left for jesus, move it to the right for the lord.... shake your booty for jesus, shake the booty jesus gave you for the lord" - NO JOKE, and when some of us (11 of us from the group at the time) started laughing, we got some serious evil glares from Ghanaians who apparently believe that shaking the booty jesus gave you is sacred. go us. we also stopped for food on the 4 hr ride. let me rephrase- we pulled off to this rest-stop size place and women/girls SWARMED the bus with everything from (sweet) bread to water to crab kabobs to meat pies to plantain chips.... anything that they normally sell on the streets of accra, but it was CRAZY how much they swarmed, so I guess SDC stops there on a regular basis.... so while i'm on the topic of people selling things into buses/tro-tros etc, its EVERYWHERE here- you can buy any kind of food/water, jewlery, gum, childrens' toys, etc- without even leaving the car- they're not too pushy, which is nice, but Accra traffic is INSANE during rush hour and i always wonder if they do better w/ cars on the streets or in markets....
so we got to Hohoe and we all got into a hotel for the night, but had no food, so again, some random nice guy from the hostel brought us down the street to a good food vendor (selling regular food that you can get anywhere here- rice, (regular, fried, or jollof) fish, chicken, spaghetti, and salad and some FANMILK, which is this DELICIOUS vanilla ice cream or frozen strawberry yogurt or frozen chocolate milk- i LOVE ghanaian hospitality!
so the next morning, i trooped along with just 3 friends and all i knew at the time was we were going to the caves that were suggested in our guide book - it was AMAZING. we got off the tro-tro in a village, in front of the "tourism office" which was a single building with only a desk and a few papers on it - it was closed, but we asked around and someone fetched the guy who was working in the fields. so we decided to walk around the village, or i should say down the one street- it was so nice! people were really friendly, but didnt really speak much english (they speak ewe there) but the funniest part was that while you passed, the children would jump up and down for your attention and yell/chant O-BRU-NI, which is weird bc obruni, or white person/foreigner is a TWI word, not EWE, but it was super cute and the adults always smiled when the kids did it....
so we stayed at the guest house and our guides took us up to the caves -very cool hike, i think we saw burkina faso from a distance! each of teh 6 caves was generally small, but served a different purpose when the people lived there; the bats were a bit freaky in some, but the walls of some of the caves were climbable so the larger ones were really fun to explore! we also got to see a really cool small waterfall and go into it a bit, while eating COCO fruit which is now officially one of my favorites, even though you cant eat it- if you do, you get that awful bitter taste (duh, its coco) but it was SO sweet!) we got back REALLY dirty, hungry and exhausted. our host asked us what we wanted for dinner, and when we said spaghetti, i figured we'd get pasta with some tomato and canned beef, but they had more in mind than that - it was AMAZING and while his wife was preparing it over coals (2-3 hrs they spent on that!) he taught us some ghanaian board game. it was kinda like sorry/trouble, but i laughed the entire time because the pictures in each of the 4 corners were of...... you guessed it, JESUS! hehe, oh ghana....
so after dinner, our guide from the hike brought us around the village a bit more, so we saw some kids playing drums/singing outside of the church, so we decided to watch them, and our guide ended up teaching us all how to drum a bit together! woot first drumming lessons! i really hope to take some here at school, but it was good to get a bit of an intro....
so the next day we went to Wli (pronounced Vlee or Vee-lee), for some serious waterfall action- we were super excited that we could go up to the upper falls (we heard they were closed for the season) and although it was a SUPER steep/muddy/bugs/green hike, we finally got to the falls and were blown away -literally! the water and resulting wind were SO powerful that we put our stuff more than 10m away from the edge of the water and it STILL got really wet! we went in some, but it felt like we were in a HUGE storm the entire time- even more wind than when i went in a boat to niagra falls in the US! yikes!!! the lower falls were much more calm and the wading area much larger, but they were both SUPER cool - and i promise, pictures WILL come eventually!/soon!
by the time were were ready to back to hohoe/accra, it was getting dark, and we werent too worried about time bc we had like 7 hrs to get to hohoe, but the taxi we got into was not a good one- a guy at wli had tried to help us get into a good one, but the one we were in started bucking/stopping in the middle of nowhere, and not only did he not answer our questions about what was wrong (in english OR french), he proceeded to turn OFF his headlights and look out the window BEHIND us as we rolled back down the hill! it was funny for a bit bc like, oh well, welcome to ghana, right? but then we started getting totally sketched out bc he was NOT a happy ghanaian. we finally got to a small village where we had spent some time before, and after rolling backwards down ANOTHER hill (the car couldnt/wouldnt move forward), we decided to get out and get into a new one- but as we did so, the guy's engine miraculously started "working" again and we had to throw our stuff out of the trunk ASAP before he sped off, trying to bring our stuff with him! yikes! by the time we got into another 3 arguments with drivers about getting back to hohoe, we finally got into a tro-tro and had a safe/less eventful trip back.
we got on the SDC bus again, and we think that bc its 4 am, we might get a break from the (christian) music but NO! the engine starts up and the video comes on: "nigeria, praise the lord!" no joke. praise session. the entire 4-8am trip. oh ghana......
that sunday and the sunday before, a group of us went to an orphanage to help out there - ok, so thats what we thought it was, but turns out its just an old govt building where a bunch of kids (and families? dunno) sleep, and every saturday, a reverend and his wife come, bring them to a library and on sundays, feed all of them. there's probably about 50 or more of them, and some of them live there, but some of them just know about what happens every weekend, so come from quite far away to play somewhere safe and get some food. we dont do much with the kids but they all love us - literally, the first time we came, they all RAN screaming at us to hold our hands and hug us. i feel really weird that we dont really do anything except play with them, but the kids def remembered us from week to week so it was really nice.... and this last week, the reverend asked me to bust out the first aid kit for anyone who needed it! not that i have any training at all, but i AM capable of cleaning wounds, putting neosporin/bandaids on, and telling kids that they're gonna be ok, which is what they really wanted- some of them just showed me a scar and told me to patch it up, but then i realized that their skin was so dirty that i cleaned it up anyway and told them they were gonna be fine.... :( / :)
o ya, so i'm here for schooool right? well, last week i was supposed to go to all 12 classes that i'm registered for, but the REASON im registered for 2X as many as im going to take is that the finals schedule hasnt come out yet, and i was gonna go to the first week of classes to see which ones i wanted to take. however, for mon and tues, the profs were on STRIKE (they hadnt been paid in 5 months), and between wed and thurs, i was lucky enough to have 2 classes actually happen, and another prof actually DID show up to tell us to come back next week..... i say i was lucky bc i dont know anyone else who had more than one class actually happen!
I also went to a meeting last night for hall sports, and i'm hopefully going to play volleyball and/or basketball here - they're SUPER intense about them, and have a LOT of hall pride but i cant tell how good the players are so we'll see what happens with that.... but i DID get up to run with all the volta ladies (with vision and style!) at 5:30AM this morning- no joke, 5:30!!!!!
so we'll see what happens this week! i'm def still behind on these updates, but i'll be back soon, i promise! (esp if classes keep not happening....!)
so i'm not gonna lie, i just read my friend teresa's blog (she's in india) and she's TOTALLY inspired me to write more interesting blogs..... hehe, so if this is bad, you can blame her! jk j <3
So the weekend before classes "started", a group of us decided to go to HoHoe, up in the Volta (East) region. I left with a bunch of people without really much planning bc I had been attempting to register for classes. We got on a tro-tro (minibus- the easiest/cheapest public transport around here- you stand at the stop and wait for someone to drive by and call out their window the location they're going, then yell back at them, and they slow down enough for you to get a foot in, and keep going! if the sliding door closes all the way w/o holding onto it, you're in a good one!) to the SDC station, where we would get a real chartered bus there- too bad we went to the WRONG SDC staction, but the nice men who worked there took the 7 of us in one of their own large charter buses to the right one - we werent quite sure what was going on, but Ghanaians really take care of you!
So the bus we were on played CONSTANT/LOUD/CHRISTIAN music - one song's lyrics were "move it to the left for jesus, move it to the right for the lord.... shake your booty for jesus, shake the booty jesus gave you for the lord" - NO JOKE, and when some of us (11 of us from the group at the time) started laughing, we got some serious evil glares from Ghanaians who apparently believe that shaking the booty jesus gave you is sacred. go us. we also stopped for food on the 4 hr ride. let me rephrase- we pulled off to this rest-stop size place and women/girls SWARMED the bus with everything from (sweet) bread to water to crab kabobs to meat pies to plantain chips.... anything that they normally sell on the streets of accra, but it was CRAZY how much they swarmed, so I guess SDC stops there on a regular basis.... so while i'm on the topic of people selling things into buses/tro-tros etc, its EVERYWHERE here- you can buy any kind of food/water, jewlery, gum, childrens' toys, etc- without even leaving the car- they're not too pushy, which is nice, but Accra traffic is INSANE during rush hour and i always wonder if they do better w/ cars on the streets or in markets....
so we got to Hohoe and we all got into a hotel for the night, but had no food, so again, some random nice guy from the hostel brought us down the street to a good food vendor (selling regular food that you can get anywhere here- rice, (regular, fried, or jollof) fish, chicken, spaghetti, and salad and some FANMILK, which is this DELICIOUS vanilla ice cream or frozen strawberry yogurt or frozen chocolate milk- i LOVE ghanaian hospitality!
so the next morning, i trooped along with just 3 friends and all i knew at the time was we were going to the caves that were suggested in our guide book - it was AMAZING. we got off the tro-tro in a village, in front of the "tourism office" which was a single building with only a desk and a few papers on it - it was closed, but we asked around and someone fetched the guy who was working in the fields. so we decided to walk around the village, or i should say down the one street- it was so nice! people were really friendly, but didnt really speak much english (they speak ewe there) but the funniest part was that while you passed, the children would jump up and down for your attention and yell/chant O-BRU-NI, which is weird bc obruni, or white person/foreigner is a TWI word, not EWE, but it was super cute and the adults always smiled when the kids did it....
so we stayed at the guest house and our guides took us up to the caves -very cool hike, i think we saw burkina faso from a distance! each of teh 6 caves was generally small, but served a different purpose when the people lived there; the bats were a bit freaky in some, but the walls of some of the caves were climbable so the larger ones were really fun to explore! we also got to see a really cool small waterfall and go into it a bit, while eating COCO fruit which is now officially one of my favorites, even though you cant eat it- if you do, you get that awful bitter taste (duh, its coco) but it was SO sweet!) we got back REALLY dirty, hungry and exhausted. our host asked us what we wanted for dinner, and when we said spaghetti, i figured we'd get pasta with some tomato and canned beef, but they had more in mind than that - it was AMAZING and while his wife was preparing it over coals (2-3 hrs they spent on that!) he taught us some ghanaian board game. it was kinda like sorry/trouble, but i laughed the entire time because the pictures in each of the 4 corners were of...... you guessed it, JESUS! hehe, oh ghana....
so after dinner, our guide from the hike brought us around the village a bit more, so we saw some kids playing drums/singing outside of the church, so we decided to watch them, and our guide ended up teaching us all how to drum a bit together! woot first drumming lessons! i really hope to take some here at school, but it was good to get a bit of an intro....
so the next day we went to Wli (pronounced Vlee or Vee-lee), for some serious waterfall action- we were super excited that we could go up to the upper falls (we heard they were closed for the season) and although it was a SUPER steep/muddy/bugs/green hike, we finally got to the falls and were blown away -literally! the water and resulting wind were SO powerful that we put our stuff more than 10m away from the edge of the water and it STILL got really wet! we went in some, but it felt like we were in a HUGE storm the entire time- even more wind than when i went in a boat to niagra falls in the US! yikes!!! the lower falls were much more calm and the wading area much larger, but they were both SUPER cool - and i promise, pictures WILL come eventually!/soon!
by the time were were ready to back to hohoe/accra, it was getting dark, and we werent too worried about time bc we had like 7 hrs to get to hohoe, but the taxi we got into was not a good one- a guy at wli had tried to help us get into a good one, but the one we were in started bucking/stopping in the middle of nowhere, and not only did he not answer our questions about what was wrong (in english OR french), he proceeded to turn OFF his headlights and look out the window BEHIND us as we rolled back down the hill! it was funny for a bit bc like, oh well, welcome to ghana, right? but then we started getting totally sketched out bc he was NOT a happy ghanaian. we finally got to a small village where we had spent some time before, and after rolling backwards down ANOTHER hill (the car couldnt/wouldnt move forward), we decided to get out and get into a new one- but as we did so, the guy's engine miraculously started "working" again and we had to throw our stuff out of the trunk ASAP before he sped off, trying to bring our stuff with him! yikes! by the time we got into another 3 arguments with drivers about getting back to hohoe, we finally got into a tro-tro and had a safe/less eventful trip back.
we got on the SDC bus again, and we think that bc its 4 am, we might get a break from the (christian) music but NO! the engine starts up and the video comes on: "nigeria, praise the lord!" no joke. praise session. the entire 4-8am trip. oh ghana......
that sunday and the sunday before, a group of us went to an orphanage to help out there - ok, so thats what we thought it was, but turns out its just an old govt building where a bunch of kids (and families? dunno) sleep, and every saturday, a reverend and his wife come, bring them to a library and on sundays, feed all of them. there's probably about 50 or more of them, and some of them live there, but some of them just know about what happens every weekend, so come from quite far away to play somewhere safe and get some food. we dont do much with the kids but they all love us - literally, the first time we came, they all RAN screaming at us to hold our hands and hug us. i feel really weird that we dont really do anything except play with them, but the kids def remembered us from week to week so it was really nice.... and this last week, the reverend asked me to bust out the first aid kit for anyone who needed it! not that i have any training at all, but i AM capable of cleaning wounds, putting neosporin/bandaids on, and telling kids that they're gonna be ok, which is what they really wanted- some of them just showed me a scar and told me to patch it up, but then i realized that their skin was so dirty that i cleaned it up anyway and told them they were gonna be fine.... :( / :)
o ya, so i'm here for schooool right? well, last week i was supposed to go to all 12 classes that i'm registered for, but the REASON im registered for 2X as many as im going to take is that the finals schedule hasnt come out yet, and i was gonna go to the first week of classes to see which ones i wanted to take. however, for mon and tues, the profs were on STRIKE (they hadnt been paid in 5 months), and between wed and thurs, i was lucky enough to have 2 classes actually happen, and another prof actually DID show up to tell us to come back next week..... i say i was lucky bc i dont know anyone else who had more than one class actually happen!
I also went to a meeting last night for hall sports, and i'm hopefully going to play volleyball and/or basketball here - they're SUPER intense about them, and have a LOT of hall pride but i cant tell how good the players are so we'll see what happens with that.... but i DID get up to run with all the volta ladies (with vision and style!) at 5:30AM this morning- no joke, 5:30!!!!!
so we'll see what happens this week! i'm def still behind on these updates, but i'll be back soon, i promise! (esp if classes keep not happening....!)
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Well, since you asked....
Hey!
So ive been in Ghana for almost four weeks now. A lot of people have asked me about what I think about south Africa versus Ghana. While my story has stayed about the same, people have reacted really differently. In South Africa, people wondered why the heck we/I would leave the united states to study somewhere else, and when I mentioned studying history, they wondered what I was going to do with that. They also wondered why the heck Ghana, like isn’t south Africa adventure enough? Aight, so I got a lot of that (at least the history part, and I see why) in the united states as well but they honestly thought I was crazy for leaving-most South Africans don’t leave or travel much. Here in Ghana, ive also gotten questions as to if going abroad is compulsory – unlike in south Africa, students (Americans in the majority) are some of the only white people you’ll find. Since we stand out so much, I guess people wonder… I (and I think the others on the trip) try really hard to let everyone know that we REALLY WANT to be here, it was our choice, and we are happy to be so welcomed here. When I mention that I was in south Africa, and it totally gets brushed off, or I get asked which one liked better. Heh, that’s interesting to answer
So to the Ghana versus South Africa question: to be honest, the differences scared/culture shocked me more than anything else, especially as other eap students asked my about SA within a few hours of arriving here! I knew things would be different, but no idea quite so different. To begin with, my time in south Africa was amazing, but we were def tourist/travelers, depending on the situation. Yes, we went to class for 3 hrs (minus a coffee break) 4X/week, we had a UCT id, and we called campus “home”, but class was with other Americans, with an American professor, and since it was winter break, not many students were around campus. It was VERY fun, and I loved my whole time there, but it was not as much cultural emersion. Don’t get me wrong, I had a GREAT time exploring the country, but I feel like a bit of a fake wearing a UCT t-shirt.
In SA, I was often bothered by race relationships. I don’t know how other people in our group reacted to it, but I noticed it almost constantly. Apartheid has been over for almost 15 years, but in someone’s mind, in the education of non-whites, in the attitudes of both sides, in economic disparity, in housing, that’s not very much time! I saw it on both sides tho- and (as expected) more in the rural than urban areas. One memorable afternoon, a friend of mine was asked for change for some amount of money by a black man. As she did so, the white shopkeeper sharply told her to make sure to count it again, and to not EVER trust a black man. Granted, this was not a regular occurrence, but judging by his (lack of) reaction, it was more common than we had witnessed. I also saw a lot of healing happening, although not directly, but through things like the district six museum (my favorite!) that celebrated diversity and healing, and the accepted diversity of Cape Town itself. However, race was something notable about myself and/or those around me everywhere we went.
From the moment we arrived in Ghana, we have been encouraged to speak Twi, to say Akwaaba (welcome), to learn our names (based on the day of the week you’re born), in a phrase, totally embraced by Ghanaian culture. We have had a completely different experience. we (or at least I) love the food- yes I crave cheese, but I crave jollof rice, wache, and fo-fou, and whatever that sauce is that they put on meat, just as much! My treat for the day is usually fried plantains, or a bottle of soda or frozen yogurt (literally, yogurt that has been frozen) for $.40. I LOVE buying and drinking the sachets of water (you cant drink the tap water – even Ghanaians don’t) by biting off a corner and drinking it! I LOVE the phrases “you are welcome” (to a location) and “you are invited” (to share food, regardless of if you’ve ever met the person before). I’m not as big of a fan of the word obruni (white person or foreigner) or getting my skin petted every once in a while, but I really shouldn’t take offense to those things. A friend mentioned that the reason some of us have trouble with the word is that while its not really derogatory, it IS an identification based on the color of your skin- aka something you would NEVER EVER do in the US, so its still SUPER strange.
Like I said, we do stand out a lot, especially if you walk in packs. I know we’re charged more in the tro-tros, markets, we’re laughed at when we ask what’s in a certain dish, or don’t know how to eat it, but its (almost) always a happy laugh, with a correction and a smile as to how to do better in the future. I’m also a lot more memorable to people than they are to me- it would be a bit better if I could pronounce some of the name in the first place, but someone who
Churches are another great story- they’re a HUGE deal. We think the “Bible belt” in the US is, er, interesting, but I cant believe not only how intense some people are here, but also how MANY of them there are! There are chapels in each of the dorms/hostels – I found the one in my hall (volta) one night when we heard a LOT of singing from our rooms. A friend and I decided to see what was going on and/or meet people or whatever, but when we looked in, it wasn’t a full house of people, but only about 10-15, singing VERY loudly, and when we couldn’t say no to an invitation to come in, we found out that they had been FASTING for 5 days, and were doing an ALL-NIGHT prayer event. We skipped out when the testimonials started, but wow... a church meets in our chapel on Sunday mornings WAY too early, but so do all the other churches – the “student” catholic mass starts at 7, and they have daily mass at 6:30!!!! Yikes!
Anyway, more to come later, but just in case you were wondering....
hope you're all well! much much much <3!
So ive been in Ghana for almost four weeks now. A lot of people have asked me about what I think about south Africa versus Ghana. While my story has stayed about the same, people have reacted really differently. In South Africa, people wondered why the heck we/I would leave the united states to study somewhere else, and when I mentioned studying history, they wondered what I was going to do with that. They also wondered why the heck Ghana, like isn’t south Africa adventure enough? Aight, so I got a lot of that (at least the history part, and I see why) in the united states as well but they honestly thought I was crazy for leaving-most South Africans don’t leave or travel much. Here in Ghana, ive also gotten questions as to if going abroad is compulsory – unlike in south Africa, students (Americans in the majority) are some of the only white people you’ll find. Since we stand out so much, I guess people wonder… I (and I think the others on the trip) try really hard to let everyone know that we REALLY WANT to be here, it was our choice, and we are happy to be so welcomed here. When I mention that I was in south Africa, and it totally gets brushed off, or I get asked which one liked better. Heh, that’s interesting to answer
So to the Ghana versus South Africa question: to be honest, the differences scared/culture shocked me more than anything else, especially as other eap students asked my about SA within a few hours of arriving here! I knew things would be different, but no idea quite so different. To begin with, my time in south Africa was amazing, but we were def tourist/travelers, depending on the situation. Yes, we went to class for 3 hrs (minus a coffee break) 4X/week, we had a UCT id, and we called campus “home”, but class was with other Americans, with an American professor, and since it was winter break, not many students were around campus. It was VERY fun, and I loved my whole time there, but it was not as much cultural emersion. Don’t get me wrong, I had a GREAT time exploring the country, but I feel like a bit of a fake wearing a UCT t-shirt.
In SA, I was often bothered by race relationships. I don’t know how other people in our group reacted to it, but I noticed it almost constantly. Apartheid has been over for almost 15 years, but in someone’s mind, in the education of non-whites, in the attitudes of both sides, in economic disparity, in housing, that’s not very much time! I saw it on both sides tho- and (as expected) more in the rural than urban areas. One memorable afternoon, a friend of mine was asked for change for some amount of money by a black man. As she did so, the white shopkeeper sharply told her to make sure to count it again, and to not EVER trust a black man. Granted, this was not a regular occurrence, but judging by his (lack of) reaction, it was more common than we had witnessed. I also saw a lot of healing happening, although not directly, but through things like the district six museum (my favorite!) that celebrated diversity and healing, and the accepted diversity of Cape Town itself. However, race was something notable about myself and/or those around me everywhere we went.
From the moment we arrived in Ghana, we have been encouraged to speak Twi, to say Akwaaba (welcome), to learn our names (based on the day of the week you’re born), in a phrase, totally embraced by Ghanaian culture. We have had a completely different experience. we (or at least I) love the food- yes I crave cheese, but I crave jollof rice, wache, and fo-fou, and whatever that sauce is that they put on meat, just as much! My treat for the day is usually fried plantains, or a bottle of soda or frozen yogurt (literally, yogurt that has been frozen) for $.40. I LOVE buying and drinking the sachets of water (you cant drink the tap water – even Ghanaians don’t) by biting off a corner and drinking it! I LOVE the phrases “you are welcome” (to a location) and “you are invited” (to share food, regardless of if you’ve ever met the person before). I’m not as big of a fan of the word obruni (white person or foreigner) or getting my skin petted every once in a while, but I really shouldn’t take offense to those things. A friend mentioned that the reason some of us have trouble with the word is that while its not really derogatory, it IS an identification based on the color of your skin- aka something you would NEVER EVER do in the US, so its still SUPER strange.
Like I said, we do stand out a lot, especially if you walk in packs. I know we’re charged more in the tro-tros, markets, we’re laughed at when we ask what’s in a certain dish, or don’t know how to eat it, but its (almost) always a happy laugh, with a correction and a smile as to how to do better in the future. I’m also a lot more memorable to people than they are to me- it would be a bit better if I could pronounce some of the name in the first place, but someone who
Churches are another great story- they’re a HUGE deal. We think the “Bible belt” in the US is, er, interesting, but I cant believe not only how intense some people are here, but also how MANY of them there are! There are chapels in each of the dorms/hostels – I found the one in my hall (volta) one night when we heard a LOT of singing from our rooms. A friend and I decided to see what was going on and/or meet people or whatever, but when we looked in, it wasn’t a full house of people, but only about 10-15, singing VERY loudly, and when we couldn’t say no to an invitation to come in, we found out that they had been FASTING for 5 days, and were doing an ALL-NIGHT prayer event. We skipped out when the testimonials started, but wow... a church meets in our chapel on Sunday mornings WAY too early, but so do all the other churches – the “student” catholic mass starts at 7, and they have daily mass at 6:30!!!! Yikes!
Anyway, more to come later, but just in case you were wondering....
hope you're all well! much much much <3!
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
In GHANA- catching up!
Helloooooooooo!
i'm so very sorry for not posting a blog in a while- this whole africa time thing is pretty nice for us, but i guess not so nice for americans ;)
I would really like to spend an entire blog about how AWESOME the end of my trip in South Africa was, but i'm afraid this is closer to the cliff notes version: we got back to johannesburg from the game reserve for enough time to see the apartheid museum and then say goodbye- or at least try to- it was an amazing museum, mostly because of all of the videos of protests and rallies/riots etc, as well as interviews with black and white leaders on apartheid. parts of it def made me sick to my stomach but i had no idea how large the museum was so i did not allot my time well enough and didnt get to see some parts very well at all :( :( :(
after people left for the airport, amanda (from UCD -<3 u!) and i set off on our adventure, beginning with a night in johannesburg and then to the N. Drakensburg area - this is the area around the east part of Lesthoto (pronounced LesUtU). it was BEAUTIFUL - very very steep mountains and our hostel (ampitheatre backpackers) was literally in the middle of nowhere. no fences, you could see the most gorgeous fields and mountains everywhere and it was totally chill, a VERY nice hostel! we took a day trip into the mountains to see the "world's 2nd highest waterfall, the highest in africa" which was an AWESOME hike (i dont have the pics at the moment but i will post them soonish?) up some VERY high cliffs, if i remember correctly around 2500-3000 meters high (esp for those of us who are scared of them!) but you would be TOTALLY proud of me for getting up there and not being toooo scared- the waterfall was (as we thought) just a trickle (literally, we scampered across the stream that creates it without noticing it much) but it was REALLY cool up there!
The next day we took another trip to Lesthoto, the highest country in the world, and only one of 3 that are completely surrounded by another country (can you name the other 2? heh). here i got some of my favorite pictures from the entire trip- there were no paved roads (coming up one, our guide had to tell everyone but the back seat to get out bc we couldnt make it up w/ all the weight!), and we saw random sheep/goats and boys selling us dead mice to be eaten! i passed on the mice, but did get to try some local homebrewed beer! it was absolutely disgusting, and im not sure if it was the beer or the clay pot we were all drinking out of - it def tasted more like clay! heh but we also got to visit a school (not in session) and learn about how/why it was set up (the people of lethsoto couldnt count! they counted their sheep/cattle by putting stones from one pile to the other) and we also got to see some cave paintings, some of the oldest in the world, and it turned out that our guide for the trip (and the day before) had written his thesis on the paintings! so it was really cool to learn it from him!
so since amanda's flight left the next day, we found a greyhound bus that would pick us up in harrismith, the closest town to our hostel- we were kinda sketched out bc our guide/bus left us at the stop, it was starting to get dark, and we didnt have a ticket, but he assured us that people did it all the time! yikes, but luckily, i was staying relatively calm and amanda is much better at talking to the greyhound people than i was, and everything was fine getting back!
not much happened after amanda's flight left- i went to the "top of africa" - the highest building in joburg (and all of s. africa? maybe?) and to a couple small places w/ the hostel owner's stepson, but honestly, there wasnt much for me to do other than that!
SO my flight to Ghana had a 13 hr layover in egypt, (dude, for $200 cheaper, i figured i might as well!) and i hoped to meet my friend kevin, who had been studying there for the past year - i got in at 7am, and i got in the "transit passengers" line, where everyone was showing the man their passports and itineraries/boarding passes for their next flight- i handed him mine, and he takes it from me and tells me to come back in an hour! i had a minor freakout moment, but realized that there were lots of other people doing the same thing and that i should just chill, call my friend, etc. very long story short, i was not able to call my friend because the phone cards required Egyptian pounds and the only atm inside security was broken, and at 12:15, i was FINALLY called over the intercom that i could get my passport. however, by this time, kevin's flight was about to leave and i did NOT get my passport- they told me to get on a bus to a hotel- they had reserved a room for me, and a voucher for free lunch! they also said that i should take the same bus back, and THEN go to customer service to get my passport again! i tried to explain that i really just wanted my passport, was willing to pay the $15 visa fee, and just wanted to get out to check out cairo!!!!! (kevin had given me instructions on how to get to the pyramids by myself, but he said it would take about 5 hrs and my flight to ghana was changed to 6:30pm!) but to no avail- i was ushered onto the bus and away! so instead of being all cool and going to see the pyramids or ANYTHING in cairo, i saw the airport (very well) and some random hotel. i know. sooooo anti-climactic, but i guess it was a lesson in patience?
so i FINALLY got to Ghana, and everything was fine with getting me through the airport and to the university- o and btw, they drive on the RIGHT side, slightly freaky after being on the LEFT in south africa! so we get there, and all the power is out! everyone was apologizing about it but nobody was really complaining, and i started to learn about both Ghanaian hospitaliy and Ghanaian time. heh, both quite interesting. hospitality: EVERYWHERE you go, people say "you are welcome!" we started learning about what (not) to do around here, especially use of the left hand, gender relationships, the fact that "flirting" means "having an affair" and "portable" means cute (aka portable houses are NOT white trash heh), intros to the great food here, how to eat it, *crossing the street!*, registering for classes (more about that later) etc..... the hospitality has been very nice, except when it applies to random guys talking to you to get your number (3 so far today, and its only noon!) but really nice when you're lost looking for classes or somewhere to eat!
we spent the first weekend here in kumasi- the capital of the ashanti kingdom, and where the kwame nkrumah university of science and technology (KNUST) is. it was incredibly beautiful up there, much more green than here in accra/legon, and the campus seemed much more developed (from what we saw) i think it got a lot of our minds turning about returning to KNUST in the future ;)
we also spent a day at cape coast- home of the infamous slave castles. very emotional. we vistied cape coast castle and elmina castle, both of which brought you into dungeons where the human waste, food, etc had not been cleared out, so while they looked like dirt floors, they were so much more :( they also explained how those who misbehaved were dealt with (put them all in a single cell until they all die- and again, the floors were not completely excavated)
registering for classes (o ya, i'm supposed to be studying, right?) has def been a challenge. you: 1) dont bother looking at the course catalogue, only a few classes are offered each semester, so 2) you go to the dept, check the schedule, stand in line, register for classes you want, but the times might not be up, so you might have to come back later (sometime in the week) and then 3) go online to register for them again. however, i spent all morning yesterday, and on my 5th department, polisci, i was finally able to register for one. i stood in line at the history dept for 2 hrs before they told me that they're not registering my level (300) until wed. i should come back then. however, i was more successful today! woot!
you will ALL be jeaous to know that yesterday i heard BOTH PRESIDENT KUFUOR and KOFI ANNAN speak, and they walked by me less than 20 ft away! only 2 guys with large guns (walking casually WITH them, not just standing in my way) separated us! turns out that KOFI ANNAN is going to be our new CHANCELLOR and it was being installed!!!! very very cool! i thought it was just a lecture, so i didnt bring my camera (BOOOOO) but it was a huge celebration!
aight, i'll prob get a more emotional post out soon, sorry that this was more of a list again, but i think you're mostly caught up! but before i forget some random facts that might make you :) 1) my ghanaian name, based on being born on a thursday, is Yaa - how appropriate? 2) i've already lost 2 pairs of shoes- my SALTWATERS (aka my identity!) were left in south africa, and my "hippie n. california shoes" on a bus back from kumasi 3) i've gotten called a guy more times than fit on a hand- i understood some of it, but then i realized at an orphanage that we helped out at, that it was because my ears arent pierced. go figure! 4) ive actually been dressing more nicely, and have bought 3 dresses and worn all of my skirts at least once! we'll see if this trend lasts......
anyway, sorry for such a long post, hope you all are well! <3 the emails!
i'm so very sorry for not posting a blog in a while- this whole africa time thing is pretty nice for us, but i guess not so nice for americans ;)
I would really like to spend an entire blog about how AWESOME the end of my trip in South Africa was, but i'm afraid this is closer to the cliff notes version: we got back to johannesburg from the game reserve for enough time to see the apartheid museum and then say goodbye- or at least try to- it was an amazing museum, mostly because of all of the videos of protests and rallies/riots etc, as well as interviews with black and white leaders on apartheid. parts of it def made me sick to my stomach but i had no idea how large the museum was so i did not allot my time well enough and didnt get to see some parts very well at all :( :( :(
after people left for the airport, amanda (from UCD -<3 u!) and i set off on our adventure, beginning with a night in johannesburg and then to the N. Drakensburg area - this is the area around the east part of Lesthoto (pronounced LesUtU). it was BEAUTIFUL - very very steep mountains and our hostel (ampitheatre backpackers) was literally in the middle of nowhere. no fences, you could see the most gorgeous fields and mountains everywhere and it was totally chill, a VERY nice hostel! we took a day trip into the mountains to see the "world's 2nd highest waterfall, the highest in africa" which was an AWESOME hike (i dont have the pics at the moment but i will post them soonish?) up some VERY high cliffs, if i remember correctly around 2500-3000 meters high (esp for those of us who are scared of them!) but you would be TOTALLY proud of me for getting up there and not being toooo scared- the waterfall was (as we thought) just a trickle (literally, we scampered across the stream that creates it without noticing it much) but it was REALLY cool up there!
The next day we took another trip to Lesthoto, the highest country in the world, and only one of 3 that are completely surrounded by another country (can you name the other 2? heh). here i got some of my favorite pictures from the entire trip- there were no paved roads (coming up one, our guide had to tell everyone but the back seat to get out bc we couldnt make it up w/ all the weight!), and we saw random sheep/goats and boys selling us dead mice to be eaten! i passed on the mice, but did get to try some local homebrewed beer! it was absolutely disgusting, and im not sure if it was the beer or the clay pot we were all drinking out of - it def tasted more like clay! heh but we also got to visit a school (not in session) and learn about how/why it was set up (the people of lethsoto couldnt count! they counted their sheep/cattle by putting stones from one pile to the other) and we also got to see some cave paintings, some of the oldest in the world, and it turned out that our guide for the trip (and the day before) had written his thesis on the paintings! so it was really cool to learn it from him!
so since amanda's flight left the next day, we found a greyhound bus that would pick us up in harrismith, the closest town to our hostel- we were kinda sketched out bc our guide/bus left us at the stop, it was starting to get dark, and we didnt have a ticket, but he assured us that people did it all the time! yikes, but luckily, i was staying relatively calm and amanda is much better at talking to the greyhound people than i was, and everything was fine getting back!
not much happened after amanda's flight left- i went to the "top of africa" - the highest building in joburg (and all of s. africa? maybe?) and to a couple small places w/ the hostel owner's stepson, but honestly, there wasnt much for me to do other than that!
SO my flight to Ghana had a 13 hr layover in egypt, (dude, for $200 cheaper, i figured i might as well!) and i hoped to meet my friend kevin, who had been studying there for the past year - i got in at 7am, and i got in the "transit passengers" line, where everyone was showing the man their passports and itineraries/boarding passes for their next flight- i handed him mine, and he takes it from me and tells me to come back in an hour! i had a minor freakout moment, but realized that there were lots of other people doing the same thing and that i should just chill, call my friend, etc. very long story short, i was not able to call my friend because the phone cards required Egyptian pounds and the only atm inside security was broken, and at 12:15, i was FINALLY called over the intercom that i could get my passport. however, by this time, kevin's flight was about to leave and i did NOT get my passport- they told me to get on a bus to a hotel- they had reserved a room for me, and a voucher for free lunch! they also said that i should take the same bus back, and THEN go to customer service to get my passport again! i tried to explain that i really just wanted my passport, was willing to pay the $15 visa fee, and just wanted to get out to check out cairo!!!!! (kevin had given me instructions on how to get to the pyramids by myself, but he said it would take about 5 hrs and my flight to ghana was changed to 6:30pm!) but to no avail- i was ushered onto the bus and away! so instead of being all cool and going to see the pyramids or ANYTHING in cairo, i saw the airport (very well) and some random hotel. i know. sooooo anti-climactic, but i guess it was a lesson in patience?
so i FINALLY got to Ghana, and everything was fine with getting me through the airport and to the university- o and btw, they drive on the RIGHT side, slightly freaky after being on the LEFT in south africa! so we get there, and all the power is out! everyone was apologizing about it but nobody was really complaining, and i started to learn about both Ghanaian hospitaliy and Ghanaian time. heh, both quite interesting. hospitality: EVERYWHERE you go, people say "you are welcome!" we started learning about what (not) to do around here, especially use of the left hand, gender relationships, the fact that "flirting" means "having an affair" and "portable" means cute (aka portable houses are NOT white trash heh), intros to the great food here, how to eat it, *crossing the street!*, registering for classes (more about that later) etc..... the hospitality has been very nice, except when it applies to random guys talking to you to get your number (3 so far today, and its only noon!) but really nice when you're lost looking for classes or somewhere to eat!
we spent the first weekend here in kumasi- the capital of the ashanti kingdom, and where the kwame nkrumah university of science and technology (KNUST) is. it was incredibly beautiful up there, much more green than here in accra/legon, and the campus seemed much more developed (from what we saw) i think it got a lot of our minds turning about returning to KNUST in the future ;)
we also spent a day at cape coast- home of the infamous slave castles. very emotional. we vistied cape coast castle and elmina castle, both of which brought you into dungeons where the human waste, food, etc had not been cleared out, so while they looked like dirt floors, they were so much more :( they also explained how those who misbehaved were dealt with (put them all in a single cell until they all die- and again, the floors were not completely excavated)
registering for classes (o ya, i'm supposed to be studying, right?) has def been a challenge. you: 1) dont bother looking at the course catalogue, only a few classes are offered each semester, so 2) you go to the dept, check the schedule, stand in line, register for classes you want, but the times might not be up, so you might have to come back later (sometime in the week) and then 3) go online to register for them again. however, i spent all morning yesterday, and on my 5th department, polisci, i was finally able to register for one. i stood in line at the history dept for 2 hrs before they told me that they're not registering my level (300) until wed. i should come back then. however, i was more successful today! woot!
you will ALL be jeaous to know that yesterday i heard BOTH PRESIDENT KUFUOR and KOFI ANNAN speak, and they walked by me less than 20 ft away! only 2 guys with large guns (walking casually WITH them, not just standing in my way) separated us! turns out that KOFI ANNAN is going to be our new CHANCELLOR and it was being installed!!!! very very cool! i thought it was just a lecture, so i didnt bring my camera (BOOOOO) but it was a huge celebration!
aight, i'll prob get a more emotional post out soon, sorry that this was more of a list again, but i think you're mostly caught up! but before i forget some random facts that might make you :) 1) my ghanaian name, based on being born on a thursday, is Yaa - how appropriate? 2) i've already lost 2 pairs of shoes- my SALTWATERS (aka my identity!) were left in south africa, and my "hippie n. california shoes" on a bus back from kumasi 3) i've gotten called a guy more times than fit on a hand- i understood some of it, but then i realized at an orphanage that we helped out at, that it was because my ears arent pierced. go figure! 4) ive actually been dressing more nicely, and have bought 3 dresses and worn all of my skirts at least once! we'll see if this trend lasts......
anyway, sorry for such a long post, hope you all are well! <3 the emails!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)