hey guys,
so i have a blog started, entitled "halloween, volta ladies in the volta region, and politics" but life has moved on now, and i actually just came back from a few days in Togo (the country to the east of Ghana- ghana is about the size of oregon, and togo is about 1/3 of that size! oh and ps they speak french there!)! i had a super great time, and was also able to stop by Kpando (in ghana - pronounced Pando)in the Volta region, which was really nice too! hmmm, see a pattern? the volta region is absolutely beautiful, and the people are so nice! i'm not seen as someone to interrogate or as a "$", but instead, people are just super helpful and i love it so much!
anyway, i'm back to reality now, (boo!) - i have finals on the 2, 3, 5, and 12th of december, and my independent research project (30 page paper) due on the 9th...although i AM almost halfway done with the paper, i really do need to study for my exams! i also have 2 more places to visit on my "to do" list, and my flight leaves on the 16th~ yikes, time is getting organized!
so i guess the point is that i'm kinda putting blogging on hold - thats not a promise, bc of course i dont hate, i procrastinate, heh...but no worries, i have the entire flight from accra to london and then from there to SFO to write really long stories about my time here (that i can type up to post!), and also ones about broader issues that i keep referring to- gender inequalities, ghanaian education system in general, politics (elections are dec 7), my research paper, and everything else! woot!
anyway, so i'll be back in california dec 17th (around noonish, i think) and will get back to SD after the weekend before classes start! i really look forward to seeing you all!
but for now, hellooooo research paper! ;)(and happy thanksgiving! haha)
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
still behind! -the north: witches, motorbikes and what not!
helloooo!!!!
wow, time is going by really quickly! i have my last lectures today, my twi final next monday, the rest of the month off, and then 4 finals in december! yikes! not sure if i'm ready for the countdown to begin....
3 weekends ago (ya i'm really behind, sorry) kurtis and i decided to trek all the way up north, almost to burkina faso, mostly to see how it is up there and also be history nerds haha... so it was a 15 hr bus ride up to bolgatanga (bolga) so we left on wed. Dunno if it was just bc we were spending 15 hrs on the bus, but we really enjoyed the movies- i really want to visit nigeria now just to see the acting scene, bc its absolutely fascinating. the best part about them, aside from their incredibly low budget, predictable plot (the prince falls in love with the village girl, but his mother doesnt allow it, but they end up together anyway; and/or all problems are solved with the loud prayer and the incantation of "IN THE NAME OF JESUS!"), and the fact that there is part 1....AND 2..... AND, if you're lucky, part 3! is how incredibly excited the entire bus is about it - not just laughing at jokes, but telling characters OUT LOUD what to do, cheering for them, etc....empassioned is the best word i've found for it - its pretty amazing!
As we went farther north, the scenery changed a lot - accra itself is really really urban, not very nice looking in most places, but when you get out, (and to the E and W) its really green/tropical/beautiful.... and turns out when you go even FARTHER north it turns into savannah.... kurtis likened it to california's central valley, which i gotta agree with in a lot of ways, cept its one of the least developed places i've been! no large fields of crops, but just grasses and trees growing...! very very different from accra in very good ways! Other differences before i tell you what happened:
1) everyone rides motorbikes/bicycles everywhere- we had really unpleasant tro-tro rides bc so much is unpaved/dusty/slow so everyone had it figured out! the best part is that even WOMEN rode the motorbikes! i'll have to explain more later, but ghana is SUPER male-oriented/dominated, and i have never seen a female tro-tro, taxi, or motocycle driver, so seeing so many in bolga was really funny, esp since they're driving these big harley-esque things in their slits and cabas (most formal dress) haha....
2) language: a bunch of us are taking twi, because although english is the official language, twi is spoken by much of the country, (english is almost everyone's 2nd language) and its REALLY helpful to know some basic things.... anyway, they dont speak twi in the north, its not (former) Akan territory. boo. so our skills were completely useless, and we never even figured out the word for white person, or any other basic words that make us better travelers.....it was kinda frustrating, and makes me even more cautious about traveling outside of ghana (ghana is surrounded by french-speakers so if i went there i wouldnt have a CLUE whats going on at ALL!)!!!
3) facial scarring: so btw, nowhere near the majority, but a fair, noticeable number of people have ethnic scars on their face, usually in Accra-area as a .5 inch or so mark under one or both eyes, a bit below the cheekbone. one story i heard is that its a tradition from times of hand-to-hand combat when you need to be able to identify each other (pretty effective, i would say!). anyway, so up north, we saw some crazy-cool scarring. the guidebook described it as "spider-webbed" but it was more like concentric half-circles very close together from around the eyes alllll the way across the cheeks, sometimes with more complex designs in there they were generally much lighter (not as deep) than the ones here! but they were fascinating and i hope they showed up in some of the pics i took, but no promises!
4) a bit more on life in general: it was lower standard of living up north. not gonna lie. many students on campus, esp those who have spent their entire lives in only one or two regions of ghana, have a really bad impression of people up north, so i really havent talked to ghanaians about the trip too much, but it really was def. less developed, way fewer people spoke english (why would they need to? politics are spoken in local languages and the few foreigners who do come are generally volunteers who are staying for an extended time and so learn their language...we got asked mroe than once if we were from the peace corps hah), only in bolga did we see any 2-story buildings, or ones made out of anything but clay and/or natural products and/or sheet metal, and much dustier (not gonna say dirty-cus thats a matter of if you clean the dust/dirt or not!)..... but it was also a really really really nice, calm break from life in accra. we didnt get hassled anywhere near as much! woot!
5) much more muslim; maybe this is why so many in accra have a negative opinion, because religion IS such a big issue, but it was really cool - really interesting to see more elaborate mosques, more ppl in traditional muslim clothes, just a different feel in general! yes, we still did get woken up in the morning to christian music, but also heard the nighttime (and other) calls to prayer just as much! very cool! id really like to go back up to the northwest (we were in the northeast) where they have more historically interesting islamic points!
So our first day up there, we went to sirigu, even closer to the burkina faso border, to where there's a womens craft co-op that is doing reasonably well! it was pretty cool to be taken around the place, but honestly there wasnt anything else to do other than the tour/museum (as cool as they were), and it took a really long time for the tro-tro to fill up (there and back). the tro-tro ride there was one of the most unpleasant ever - it was about an hour over pretty bad dirt road, in a modified midsize car, meaning that ther was a second row of seats added to the back. however, instead of 3 in each row, the driver made 4 of us squish in each row except his, meaning that not only could i not move my feet bc of the cargo, and i was getting hugged by the ppl next to me (ok not tooooo abnormal) but also were hitting our heads on the roof, and got a thick layer of dirt on us. also, 3 of the women in the 2 seats we large, middle-aged women with children on their laps. so if you count them, there were 14 of us! everyone was complaining, and the guy's car almost broke down too! hahaha o ghana....
The next day we went to gombaga, where there is a witches camp. the ride there was also pretty exciting, as we were traveling in a HUGE tro-tro that fit 40-60 (dunno how many ppl were riding on the top) people in it, when i realized that, as slow as everything was going, at least we werent gonna get there and have our day ruined by rain! it hadnt rained in weeks! as i also laughed at how nice it was that the windo next to me had no window in it, bc the breeze felt AMAZING, oh yes, it started to POUR! the old woman next to me got really angry as we both tried to hide, and everyone laughed at us (including kurtis), and tried to get us to move, but there really wasnt room :( finally, the lady grabbed a prayer mat from the empty seat in front of us and we held it against the window. oh ps, its made out of STRAW!.... oh but ps, it dried within 15 minutes of when the rain stopped and we got out of the tro-tro... hahahha
anway, so we got to gambaga after a wild goose chase to find a wall built in the 16th century, which would have been cool but our only directions were "to the left of the dam" and nobody seemed to be able to lead us there, but we DID find it!!! haha witchcraft is a big deal here, so this camp is actually for women who have been accused of being witches can go, to avoid being killed by their village. apparently, they arrive, and the chief performs some type of ritual so that they're not witches anymore, (something involving killing chickens and alcohol, suprise, suprise) but since their village wont accept them anymore, they stay there. there's apparently been some issues from humanitarian orgs who believe the place is like a prison- that would be an arguable point, given that people dont really leave, except that their standard of living, while low, is barely, if any, lower than that of the rest of the village! actually, when we met the chief, and he asked us what our mission was. when we responded that we wanted to see the camp, he asked us (through his interpreter) "do you have a problem?.... or do you just want to look?" hahahahahhahahahaha we assured him that we were just history students traveling...
so the camp itself was relatively large, with a couple hundred people in it, but it was really difficult to get an idea of what people thought about being there: everything was done through the interpreter, the chief's son, who often didnt even ask the woman the question, and just answered it himself, and anyway he could have said whatever he wanted us to hear! still, it was cool to check the place out - i had heard about it in my study of religions class, so it was super cool! the ride back was less eventful until we got onto a tro-tro that had to be push-started (by all the guys in the tro-tro -- maybe there IS an advantage to being a girl?) several times on the way...
we got back to bolga relatively early and went to tongo, which was a really cool little village but the tour was really bad, but it was cool to see. a ghanaian who looked at my pictures of the chief's palace (where his extended family lives, taken from his roof) he asked if people actually lived there. i said yes, and he was completely amazed - its this huge labrinth of small huts/houses that has no planning and cant be too sanitary and what is running water? dunno. it was a really pretty, mountainous area, so it was really nice to see!!! good times!
when we returned to bolga, we were already feeling a bit strange/out of whack, and we both woke up the next morning to our 15 hr bus ride back feeling super sick. go us. luckily, the movies were from the same producer as the "chart-smashing" ones we watched on the way up! woot! we got back to accra, and ended up getting a free ride from some guy who'd been on the bus w/ us! woot! but our luck ran out when we got home and the water was out :( we were SO dirty and sick for the next couple days but hey, gotta say it was pretty awesome! woot!
have a awesome day and i'll try to catch up a bit more! sorry!
wow, time is going by really quickly! i have my last lectures today, my twi final next monday, the rest of the month off, and then 4 finals in december! yikes! not sure if i'm ready for the countdown to begin....
3 weekends ago (ya i'm really behind, sorry) kurtis and i decided to trek all the way up north, almost to burkina faso, mostly to see how it is up there and also be history nerds haha... so it was a 15 hr bus ride up to bolgatanga (bolga) so we left on wed. Dunno if it was just bc we were spending 15 hrs on the bus, but we really enjoyed the movies- i really want to visit nigeria now just to see the acting scene, bc its absolutely fascinating. the best part about them, aside from their incredibly low budget, predictable plot (the prince falls in love with the village girl, but his mother doesnt allow it, but they end up together anyway; and/or all problems are solved with the loud prayer and the incantation of "IN THE NAME OF JESUS!"), and the fact that there is part 1....AND 2..... AND, if you're lucky, part 3! is how incredibly excited the entire bus is about it - not just laughing at jokes, but telling characters OUT LOUD what to do, cheering for them, etc....empassioned is the best word i've found for it - its pretty amazing!
As we went farther north, the scenery changed a lot - accra itself is really really urban, not very nice looking in most places, but when you get out, (and to the E and W) its really green/tropical/beautiful.... and turns out when you go even FARTHER north it turns into savannah.... kurtis likened it to california's central valley, which i gotta agree with in a lot of ways, cept its one of the least developed places i've been! no large fields of crops, but just grasses and trees growing...! very very different from accra in very good ways! Other differences before i tell you what happened:
1) everyone rides motorbikes/bicycles everywhere- we had really unpleasant tro-tro rides bc so much is unpaved/dusty/slow so everyone had it figured out! the best part is that even WOMEN rode the motorbikes! i'll have to explain more later, but ghana is SUPER male-oriented/dominated, and i have never seen a female tro-tro, taxi, or motocycle driver, so seeing so many in bolga was really funny, esp since they're driving these big harley-esque things in their slits and cabas (most formal dress) haha....
2) language: a bunch of us are taking twi, because although english is the official language, twi is spoken by much of the country, (english is almost everyone's 2nd language) and its REALLY helpful to know some basic things.... anyway, they dont speak twi in the north, its not (former) Akan territory. boo. so our skills were completely useless, and we never even figured out the word for white person, or any other basic words that make us better travelers.....it was kinda frustrating, and makes me even more cautious about traveling outside of ghana (ghana is surrounded by french-speakers so if i went there i wouldnt have a CLUE whats going on at ALL!)!!!
3) facial scarring: so btw, nowhere near the majority, but a fair, noticeable number of people have ethnic scars on their face, usually in Accra-area as a .5 inch or so mark under one or both eyes, a bit below the cheekbone. one story i heard is that its a tradition from times of hand-to-hand combat when you need to be able to identify each other (pretty effective, i would say!). anyway, so up north, we saw some crazy-cool scarring. the guidebook described it as "spider-webbed" but it was more like concentric half-circles very close together from around the eyes alllll the way across the cheeks, sometimes with more complex designs in there they were generally much lighter (not as deep) than the ones here! but they were fascinating and i hope they showed up in some of the pics i took, but no promises!
4) a bit more on life in general: it was lower standard of living up north. not gonna lie. many students on campus, esp those who have spent their entire lives in only one or two regions of ghana, have a really bad impression of people up north, so i really havent talked to ghanaians about the trip too much, but it really was def. less developed, way fewer people spoke english (why would they need to? politics are spoken in local languages and the few foreigners who do come are generally volunteers who are staying for an extended time and so learn their language...we got asked mroe than once if we were from the peace corps hah), only in bolga did we see any 2-story buildings, or ones made out of anything but clay and/or natural products and/or sheet metal, and much dustier (not gonna say dirty-cus thats a matter of if you clean the dust/dirt or not!)..... but it was also a really really really nice, calm break from life in accra. we didnt get hassled anywhere near as much! woot!
5) much more muslim; maybe this is why so many in accra have a negative opinion, because religion IS such a big issue, but it was really cool - really interesting to see more elaborate mosques, more ppl in traditional muslim clothes, just a different feel in general! yes, we still did get woken up in the morning to christian music, but also heard the nighttime (and other) calls to prayer just as much! very cool! id really like to go back up to the northwest (we were in the northeast) where they have more historically interesting islamic points!
So our first day up there, we went to sirigu, even closer to the burkina faso border, to where there's a womens craft co-op that is doing reasonably well! it was pretty cool to be taken around the place, but honestly there wasnt anything else to do other than the tour/museum (as cool as they were), and it took a really long time for the tro-tro to fill up (there and back). the tro-tro ride there was one of the most unpleasant ever - it was about an hour over pretty bad dirt road, in a modified midsize car, meaning that ther was a second row of seats added to the back. however, instead of 3 in each row, the driver made 4 of us squish in each row except his, meaning that not only could i not move my feet bc of the cargo, and i was getting hugged by the ppl next to me (ok not tooooo abnormal) but also were hitting our heads on the roof, and got a thick layer of dirt on us. also, 3 of the women in the 2 seats we large, middle-aged women with children on their laps. so if you count them, there were 14 of us! everyone was complaining, and the guy's car almost broke down too! hahaha o ghana....
The next day we went to gombaga, where there is a witches camp. the ride there was also pretty exciting, as we were traveling in a HUGE tro-tro that fit 40-60 (dunno how many ppl were riding on the top) people in it, when i realized that, as slow as everything was going, at least we werent gonna get there and have our day ruined by rain! it hadnt rained in weeks! as i also laughed at how nice it was that the windo next to me had no window in it, bc the breeze felt AMAZING, oh yes, it started to POUR! the old woman next to me got really angry as we both tried to hide, and everyone laughed at us (including kurtis), and tried to get us to move, but there really wasnt room :( finally, the lady grabbed a prayer mat from the empty seat in front of us and we held it against the window. oh ps, its made out of STRAW!.... oh but ps, it dried within 15 minutes of when the rain stopped and we got out of the tro-tro... hahahha
anway, so we got to gambaga after a wild goose chase to find a wall built in the 16th century, which would have been cool but our only directions were "to the left of the dam" and nobody seemed to be able to lead us there, but we DID find it!!! haha witchcraft is a big deal here, so this camp is actually for women who have been accused of being witches can go, to avoid being killed by their village. apparently, they arrive, and the chief performs some type of ritual so that they're not witches anymore, (something involving killing chickens and alcohol, suprise, suprise) but since their village wont accept them anymore, they stay there. there's apparently been some issues from humanitarian orgs who believe the place is like a prison- that would be an arguable point, given that people dont really leave, except that their standard of living, while low, is barely, if any, lower than that of the rest of the village! actually, when we met the chief, and he asked us what our mission was. when we responded that we wanted to see the camp, he asked us (through his interpreter) "do you have a problem?.... or do you just want to look?" hahahahahhahahahaha we assured him that we were just history students traveling...
so the camp itself was relatively large, with a couple hundred people in it, but it was really difficult to get an idea of what people thought about being there: everything was done through the interpreter, the chief's son, who often didnt even ask the woman the question, and just answered it himself, and anyway he could have said whatever he wanted us to hear! still, it was cool to check the place out - i had heard about it in my study of religions class, so it was super cool! the ride back was less eventful until we got onto a tro-tro that had to be push-started (by all the guys in the tro-tro -- maybe there IS an advantage to being a girl?) several times on the way...
we got back to bolga relatively early and went to tongo, which was a really cool little village but the tour was really bad, but it was cool to see. a ghanaian who looked at my pictures of the chief's palace (where his extended family lives, taken from his roof) he asked if people actually lived there. i said yes, and he was completely amazed - its this huge labrinth of small huts/houses that has no planning and cant be too sanitary and what is running water? dunno. it was a really pretty, mountainous area, so it was really nice to see!!! good times!
when we returned to bolga, we were already feeling a bit strange/out of whack, and we both woke up the next morning to our 15 hr bus ride back feeling super sick. go us. luckily, the movies were from the same producer as the "chart-smashing" ones we watched on the way up! woot! we got back to accra, and ended up getting a free ride from some guy who'd been on the bus w/ us! woot! but our luck ran out when we got home and the water was out :( we were SO dirty and sick for the next couple days but hey, gotta say it was pretty awesome! woot!
have a awesome day and i'll try to catch up a bit more! sorry!
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
you like my man obama?
So you think you live in an obama city, state, or now country? dude! catch up! i live on an obama CONTINENT.
Ok, sorry, just had to get that out. i know i'm still behind on telling you about some of my adventures, but i dont think that in a few weeks, you'll want to hear anything more about the elections!
So first off, yes, i voted via absentee ballot and the embassy. So i'm also assuming that you all have heard about how wildly popular obama is here in africa. we've been barraged with obama gear since our first days here - from bracelets to shirts filled with his face (with "ghana" written on the bottom) to signs and random people on the street asking us if we support him. Well, most of our group is from california, and we're all students so we havent run into much trouble...haha... there are SOME mccain supporters here, generally the ones who know more about the issues and realized that he is much much more in line with their social beliefs, but i also believe that some of them are just trying to be cool/different, and some are trying to see if we'll mention anything about the candidates' race in the process.....
in terms of state elections, i really had to do some research (aka read the pamphlet and talking to people at home) to figure out some things, and even then didnt entirely.... but in a lot of ways i'm really happy i wasnt in california- i know things got pretty emotional sometimes, especially on the big issues, but i was able to not get caught up in the arguments! i also didnt mention either of the 2 big props to ghanaians - both abortion and being gay are illegal, and completely accepted as the right decision- the fact that we would have prop 4 and 8 would get all those obama supporters confused again....haha
anyway, so this whole 8 hr time difference was NOT conducive to watching coverage, but somehow we all went somewhere (oh, ya, we ARE still in ghana= i dont ever know where we are!) i think where the NYU students are? to watch the election results, beginning with the bus ride over after 9pm.... the first bus to the place was full, but we ended up getting on the 2nd with a bunch of commonwealth boys (the all-boys/frat-like hall), having to stand bc there were so many of us, and the c-wealth boys SANG the ENTIRE way, mostly in twi, but it was SUPER fun because everyone was SO excited! turns out it was a HUGE event, with a really large screen projecting CNN, and a bar/lounge area with more regular tvs.... it was SO exciting to hear all the projections come in, and everyone (several hundred people, probably about 70% students/under 30) cheered like crazy - and when they asked for mccain supporters, i dont think they found more than 10 or so haha....either that or they wouldnt admit it anymore!
It was fairly frustrating tho because the first polls didnt close until 11pm our time, and they didnt make final projections until 4 am! after cheering when the annalyst projected obama's win in california (duh, but we had to show our state pride!) after he got ohio (around 3-3:30?) and essentially clinched it, but that was cool with me! didnt really sleep much bc i got up early to check the props, but didnt get very definitive answers (boooo!) and now its time for lecture, and its our last one for this class, so i really need to go!!
ps its our last 2 weeks of classes- how crazy is that?
much love from obama-land....!
Ok, sorry, just had to get that out. i know i'm still behind on telling you about some of my adventures, but i dont think that in a few weeks, you'll want to hear anything more about the elections!
So first off, yes, i voted via absentee ballot and the embassy. So i'm also assuming that you all have heard about how wildly popular obama is here in africa. we've been barraged with obama gear since our first days here - from bracelets to shirts filled with his face (with "ghana" written on the bottom) to signs and random people on the street asking us if we support him. Well, most of our group is from california, and we're all students so we havent run into much trouble...haha... there are SOME mccain supporters here, generally the ones who know more about the issues and realized that he is much much more in line with their social beliefs, but i also believe that some of them are just trying to be cool/different, and some are trying to see if we'll mention anything about the candidates' race in the process.....
in terms of state elections, i really had to do some research (aka read the pamphlet and talking to people at home) to figure out some things, and even then didnt entirely.... but in a lot of ways i'm really happy i wasnt in california- i know things got pretty emotional sometimes, especially on the big issues, but i was able to not get caught up in the arguments! i also didnt mention either of the 2 big props to ghanaians - both abortion and being gay are illegal, and completely accepted as the right decision- the fact that we would have prop 4 and 8 would get all those obama supporters confused again....haha
anyway, so this whole 8 hr time difference was NOT conducive to watching coverage, but somehow we all went somewhere (oh, ya, we ARE still in ghana= i dont ever know where we are!) i think where the NYU students are? to watch the election results, beginning with the bus ride over after 9pm.... the first bus to the place was full, but we ended up getting on the 2nd with a bunch of commonwealth boys (the all-boys/frat-like hall), having to stand bc there were so many of us, and the c-wealth boys SANG the ENTIRE way, mostly in twi, but it was SUPER fun because everyone was SO excited! turns out it was a HUGE event, with a really large screen projecting CNN, and a bar/lounge area with more regular tvs.... it was SO exciting to hear all the projections come in, and everyone (several hundred people, probably about 70% students/under 30) cheered like crazy - and when they asked for mccain supporters, i dont think they found more than 10 or so haha....either that or they wouldnt admit it anymore!
It was fairly frustrating tho because the first polls didnt close until 11pm our time, and they didnt make final projections until 4 am! after cheering when the annalyst projected obama's win in california (duh, but we had to show our state pride!) after he got ohio (around 3-3:30?) and essentially clinched it, but that was cool with me! didnt really sleep much bc i got up early to check the props, but didnt get very definitive answers (boooo!) and now its time for lecture, and its our last one for this class, so i really need to go!!
ps its our last 2 weeks of classes- how crazy is that?
much love from obama-land....!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Updates, updates, and more updates!
Wow! i'm super-duper behind on updating you on my life but its been going pretty well!
So, I guess it was 3 weekends ago, some friends and i were going to go on an outdoors-y trip to the volta region (its SUPER pretty over there!) but then we found out that the national soccer team, the Black Stars, was going to play a World cup qualifier against someone (nobody really knew who, but hey...) in Takoradi, so we went west instead! We had an interesting time getting there, as the mate on the tro-tro made ups get off WAY too early and we ended up walking a lot and getting hassled a lot which is really lame but whatever...
So we got up saturday m orn ing in time to get to the stadium (even tho we dididn konw where it was) by 8am, several hours before the game was to start, bc we had no idea about how to get tickets. we got there, and it was really kinda crazy- the stadium was really nice and seemed pretty new, and there were TONS of people there already. we ended up getting in the expensive (10cedi, not 2) line, but it really didnt matter.... it was also crazy cus at first, i was in one of the s mallest minorities of my life - of course, i'm always racially very much in the minority, and ghanaian society is very very VERY male-dominated (that'll have to be an entire post itself!) but all of that was WAY even more so at the game! We decked ourselves out in ghanaian gear, from jerseys to hats and flags and balloon thingys...which was SUPER fun but we got super mixed reviews from people - we got a lot of "oh! you love ghana! i love that!" but also really annoying racial remarks like one guy who told us in twi that they should let all the black people in first and us not at all.... boo.... anyway...
so the line we were in aimed for the box office building with windows m ost of the way up, so we figure people will go in through the DOOR to get in or hand their mon ey and get their tickets through the window....but of course not! so the box office got super full of people, and we realized it might be super difficult to get tickets.... until people started climbing in through the WINDOWS to get in.....for a while most people were getting pushed back outside by the people in, but after failing to give mo ney to some people inside, we realized we were completely screwed. eventually, a guy in line with us showed us a guy who was willing to jump through the window and get tickets for us for an extra cedi each.... we say ok, but by that time, a bunch of our friends had called asking us to get tix for them (10 in fact) but the guy wouldnt get that many, so we just gave him our money and waited outside the line, along with a bunch of other people who did the same thing...so we were waiting, i'm starting to get kinda worried, cus its getting SUPER crazy in there, when a TON more people suddenly start jumping through the window, cept this time nobody was pushing them out! so it became a MASS of people jumping into the window! whatever, their problem, right? until i hear a bunch of yelling and turn around in time to see the police (wearing motorcycle helmets) charging towards us, literally pushing people out of the way! AHH! so we ran out of the way and watched them start hitting people down off the windows! a friend of mine actual ly almost got hit with the handcuffs they were swinging! yikes!
within a few minutes, there was the neatest line formed in front of the box office, with the police in a more fomidable line next to them....and i'm now even more worried: 1) how is the guy going to get out now? 2) how will he find us? (oh wait, we're white jk....VERY difficult to forget, apparently ), 3) what if he just wanted o ur 11cedis/person and run (but if he were going to do that, he would have taken the money for all of our friends' tickets, huh) 4) if he doesnt come back, there's no WAY we would be able to get back in line! boo....
but somehow, the guy came back with our tickets! wohoo!!! so we got into the game!!! woot! it was pretty crazy.... it would have been cooler if there had been a bit more competeition (we played lethsoto) but we won 3-0 which was SUPER cool! we didnt really get hassled at the game (everyoe was too excited) but after the game, walking the very long walk back to the hotel was not too fun- not necessarily negative comments but just a lot of drunken twi aimed at us, but its REALLY tiring to hear "oburuni, et te sen?" incessently! boooooooo ! but the game really was cool, and i'm SUPER glad we went!
the next day we (isaac and jackie, btw haha) headed out in search of adventures, and def found one! btw, it was sunday, aka everything including most tro-tros werent working, so we had some interesting encounters with taxi drivers but ended up getting in one that took us to this random little village, prince's town, which was WAY down a poor, unpaved road! the driver claimed to be the son of the chief, who we tried to meet, but he wasnt there.... but then we somehow got on a tour of the old slave castle - who knew? anyway, it was BEAUTIFU L there, a lot like cape coast, where you see a beautiful coastline after coming out of a room where thousands of people died! incredible! we also got to ride in dug-out canoes out into a huge lagoon surrounded by a bunch of wildlife, and the other boat actually got to see some monkeys! woot! but wow it was beautiful!
so the next weekend, (ps the weeks have been absolutely FLYING by here- monday-wed i have 1-2 hrs off between getting up at 6:30am and getting back to my room after 7:30...then thurs/fri are spent catching up on errands, schoolwork and/or traveling....) the EAP center took us to a festival in the Eastern Region, less than 2 hours away-- turns out there are MOUNTAINS surrounding us- who knew? haha anway, only about 15 of us went, which was nice, bc it wasnt toooo big of a group! we got there and it was a lot like a somewhat more tame cape coast festival- chiefs being taken around in big chairs carried by 6-8 people with tons of drummers, firing guns, of course singing, dancing, really hot..... but it was pretty cool bc instead of following the parade, we got really really cool seats (UNDER THE TREE ;)) right next to where all the dignitaries' chairs were st up, and where they all processed by to sit down! aka it was a lot less stressful- ! (exciting!) we even got to see the presidential candidate for the (now ruling) NPP (new patriotic part y)- Nana Akofo-Addo!!!!! crazy crazy npp supporters! Too bad the paramount chief looked mad at the world the entire time, but hey...ahhhhh good times!
anyway, but more general updates on life: starting the few days before the festival, the phone network that all the EAP students use was down (for like 3 days, no calls/txts/anything), then the power was out that weekend, and then the water was out for a few days, then back in time for me to leave the following wed for a trip (sorry, saving that for a new blog!) but then went off again like 15 min before i got back...but i got kinda sick off something i ate while i was there so i've been kinda sick and the water's been off almost all week: why am i saying all of this? its life in ghana! there's always SOMETHING slightly different, if not wrong or slightly incovenient, then just plain strange! (ps when the water has been out this week, it comes on at least once a day or so to fill up the gigantic tanks (poly tanks) so we DO have water, you just have to fill/haul buckets for anything you need!
aw and one more anecdote about life before i forget: i'm sure by now you're getting some kind of idea one way or the other about how nice/etc people are here and/or how welcomed i am- but before you do, this is the best example i've got right now: so thursday night i was going to go to bed, when i remembered i had to get my laundry from the line outside- i got downstairs, and realized that it was starting to RAIN!!!! yikes! so i RAN all the way across the large rectangle of rooms in my hall to where the lau ndry l i nes are, and quickly got them all in my basket, and back under some cover...btw NO ghanaian girl would ever get her hair wet (bc its chemically straightened or has extensions that smell when they get wet), so no matter how much/little i care about getting wet or not, its j ust not a good idea for me to walk back in the pouring rain, so i decided to wait it out. within a few minutes, a girl came from behind me (girl #1) and asked what i was doing, and i explained that my laundry had been on the line and i didnt want to get it wet by walking back in the rain!; she gave me a sympathetic smile and said that i could pass around under the very narrow overhang all the way back to my block, but i was surprised that it was large enough (bes ide the fact that it would look like i was staring into a bu nch of peoples' rooms!) and hesitated to follow her. before i could, another girl (girl #2) also came from behind me and said "oburuni, ___?" with an angry scorn on her face. boo! it wasnt the normal "et te sen" or "wo ho te sen" or the other phrases i know or can respond to, and she didnt look happy so i said, "i'm sorry, i dont undersand everything you're saying" she laughed at me and said that she asked me what i wanted. i told her the same story, but she just shook her head, popped up her umbrella, and walked away laughing at me. that got me angry enough that i didnt want to see ANYONE any more, so i made a beeline to the overhangs and walked as quickly as i could through the wet and rocks back to my block. BOO! ANGER!!! but as soon as i got back to where my block meets the longer one, i almost ran into girl #1, who had put down her load and was carrying TWO umbrellas- one for herself and one to give me when she found me! awwww it made me SO happy! i didnt know either girl before that night: i feel like that kind of thing happens a lot here - for every person that is really rude/angry/trying to cheat me, there's someone else out there who has my back ;) woot!
much love to you all, hope you had a good halloween, and HAPPY NOVEMBER!!!!!!
So, I guess it was 3 weekends ago, some friends and i were going to go on an outdoors-y trip to the volta region (its SUPER pretty over there!) but then we found out that the national soccer team, the Black Stars, was going to play a World cup qualifier against someone (nobody really knew who, but hey...) in Takoradi, so we went west instead! We had an interesting time getting there, as the mate on the tro-tro made ups get off WAY too early and we ended up walking a lot and getting hassled a lot which is really lame but whatever...
So we got up saturday m orn ing in time to get to the stadium (even tho we dididn konw where it was) by 8am, several hours before the game was to start, bc we had no idea about how to get tickets. we got there, and it was really kinda crazy- the stadium was really nice and seemed pretty new, and there were TONS of people there already. we ended up getting in the expensive (10cedi, not 2) line, but it really didnt matter.... it was also crazy cus at first, i was in one of the s mallest minorities of my life - of course, i'm always racially very much in the minority, and ghanaian society is very very VERY male-dominated (that'll have to be an entire post itself!) but all of that was WAY even more so at the game! We decked ourselves out in ghanaian gear, from jerseys to hats and flags and balloon thingys...which was SUPER fun but we got super mixed reviews from people - we got a lot of "oh! you love ghana! i love that!" but also really annoying racial remarks like one guy who told us in twi that they should let all the black people in first and us not at all.... boo.... anyway...
so the line we were in aimed for the box office building with windows m ost of the way up, so we figure people will go in through the DOOR to get in or hand their mon ey and get their tickets through the window....but of course not! so the box office got super full of people, and we realized it might be super difficult to get tickets.... until people started climbing in through the WINDOWS to get in.....for a while most people were getting pushed back outside by the people in, but after failing to give mo ney to some people inside, we realized we were completely screwed. eventually, a guy in line with us showed us a guy who was willing to jump through the window and get tickets for us for an extra cedi each.... we say ok, but by that time, a bunch of our friends had called asking us to get tix for them (10 in fact) but the guy wouldnt get that many, so we just gave him our money and waited outside the line, along with a bunch of other people who did the same thing...so we were waiting, i'm starting to get kinda worried, cus its getting SUPER crazy in there, when a TON more people suddenly start jumping through the window, cept this time nobody was pushing them out! so it became a MASS of people jumping into the window! whatever, their problem, right? until i hear a bunch of yelling and turn around in time to see the police (wearing motorcycle helmets) charging towards us, literally pushing people out of the way! AHH! so we ran out of the way and watched them start hitting people down off the windows! a friend of mine actual ly almost got hit with the handcuffs they were swinging! yikes!
within a few minutes, there was the neatest line formed in front of the box office, with the police in a more fomidable line next to them....and i'm now even more worried: 1) how is the guy going to get out now? 2) how will he find us? (oh wait, we're white jk....VERY difficult to forget, apparently ), 3) what if he just wanted o ur 11cedis/person and run (but if he were going to do that, he would have taken the money for all of our friends' tickets, huh) 4) if he doesnt come back, there's no WAY we would be able to get back in line! boo....
but somehow, the guy came back with our tickets! wohoo!!! so we got into the game!!! woot! it was pretty crazy.... it would have been cooler if there had been a bit more competeition (we played lethsoto) but we won 3-0 which was SUPER cool! we didnt really get hassled at the game (everyoe was too excited) but after the game, walking the very long walk back to the hotel was not too fun- not necessarily negative comments but just a lot of drunken twi aimed at us, but its REALLY tiring to hear "oburuni, et te sen?" incessently! boooooooo ! but the game really was cool, and i'm SUPER glad we went!
the next day we (isaac and jackie, btw haha) headed out in search of adventures, and def found one! btw, it was sunday, aka everything including most tro-tros werent working, so we had some interesting encounters with taxi drivers but ended up getting in one that took us to this random little village, prince's town, which was WAY down a poor, unpaved road! the driver claimed to be the son of the chief, who we tried to meet, but he wasnt there.... but then we somehow got on a tour of the old slave castle - who knew? anyway, it was BEAUTIFU L there, a lot like cape coast, where you see a beautiful coastline after coming out of a room where thousands of people died! incredible! we also got to ride in dug-out canoes out into a huge lagoon surrounded by a bunch of wildlife, and the other boat actually got to see some monkeys! woot! but wow it was beautiful!
so the next weekend, (ps the weeks have been absolutely FLYING by here- monday-wed i have 1-2 hrs off between getting up at 6:30am and getting back to my room after 7:30...then thurs/fri are spent catching up on errands, schoolwork and/or traveling....) the EAP center took us to a festival in the Eastern Region, less than 2 hours away-- turns out there are MOUNTAINS surrounding us- who knew? haha anway, only about 15 of us went, which was nice, bc it wasnt toooo big of a group! we got there and it was a lot like a somewhat more tame cape coast festival- chiefs being taken around in big chairs carried by 6-8 people with tons of drummers, firing guns, of course singing, dancing, really hot..... but it was pretty cool bc instead of following the parade, we got really really cool seats (UNDER THE TREE ;)) right next to where all the dignitaries' chairs were st up, and where they all processed by to sit down! aka it was a lot less stressful- ! (exciting!) we even got to see the presidential candidate for the (now ruling) NPP (new patriotic part y)- Nana Akofo-Addo!!!!! crazy crazy npp supporters! Too bad the paramount chief looked mad at the world the entire time, but hey...ahhhhh good times!
anyway, but more general updates on life: starting the few days before the festival, the phone network that all the EAP students use was down (for like 3 days, no calls/txts/anything), then the power was out that weekend, and then the water was out for a few days, then back in time for me to leave the following wed for a trip (sorry, saving that for a new blog!) but then went off again like 15 min before i got back...but i got kinda sick off something i ate while i was there so i've been kinda sick and the water's been off almost all week: why am i saying all of this? its life in ghana! there's always SOMETHING slightly different, if not wrong or slightly incovenient, then just plain strange! (ps when the water has been out this week, it comes on at least once a day or so to fill up the gigantic tanks (poly tanks) so we DO have water, you just have to fill/haul buckets for anything you need!
aw and one more anecdote about life before i forget: i'm sure by now you're getting some kind of idea one way or the other about how nice/etc people are here and/or how welcomed i am- but before you do, this is the best example i've got right now: so thursday night i was going to go to bed, when i remembered i had to get my laundry from the line outside- i got downstairs, and realized that it was starting to RAIN!!!! yikes! so i RAN all the way across the large rectangle of rooms in my hall to where the lau ndry l i nes are, and quickly got them all in my basket, and back under some cover...btw NO ghanaian girl would ever get her hair wet (bc its chemically straightened or has extensions that smell when they get wet), so no matter how much/little i care about getting wet or not, its j ust not a good idea for me to walk back in the pouring rain, so i decided to wait it out. within a few minutes, a girl came from behind me (girl #1) and asked what i was doing, and i explained that my laundry had been on the line and i didnt want to get it wet by walking back in the rain!; she gave me a sympathetic smile and said that i could pass around under the very narrow overhang all the way back to my block, but i was surprised that it was large enough (bes ide the fact that it would look like i was staring into a bu nch of peoples' rooms!) and hesitated to follow her. before i could, another girl (girl #2) also came from behind me and said "oburuni, ___?" with an angry scorn on her face. boo! it wasnt the normal "et te sen" or "wo ho te sen" or the other phrases i know or can respond to, and she didnt look happy so i said, "i'm sorry, i dont undersand everything you're saying" she laughed at me and said that she asked me what i wanted. i told her the same story, but she just shook her head, popped up her umbrella, and walked away laughing at me. that got me angry enough that i didnt want to see ANYONE any more, so i made a beeline to the overhangs and walked as quickly as i could through the wet and rocks back to my block. BOO! ANGER!!! but as soon as i got back to where my block meets the longer one, i almost ran into girl #1, who had put down her load and was carrying TWO umbrellas- one for herself and one to give me when she found me! awwww it made me SO happy! i didnt know either girl before that night: i feel like that kind of thing happens a lot here - for every person that is really rude/angry/trying to cheat me, there's someone else out there who has my back ;) woot!
much love to you all, hope you had a good halloween, and HAPPY NOVEMBER!!!!!!
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