Twi lesson of the day: “m’kochye-nana”. verb. Literally means greet/salute the chief. Polite euphemism for going to the bathroom
PSA: I got my cell phone!! The # is (if you’re calling from the US)
011- 233 – 24 – 660 – 9700
From in Ghana:
024 – 660 – 9700
It’s free incoming for me, so go crazy, but I’m not sure about the calling card rates to Ghana. And I’m 4 hours ahead of NYC time (5 hours after October 29th). Adjust accordingly based on your location.
Getting on with it, this morning is the first sun I’m seeing since I landed here a week ago. Exciting. But I think the rain’s supposed to come back sometime soon. Apparently, this rain is really out of the ordinary for this time of year. I should be whining about the heat now. Global warming?
We met our Twi professor-to-be, Dr. Kofi Agyekum, who is a well known radio personality around here and a really cool guy, so that should be fun. Lectures have continued to be good, although I finally got caught sleeping in one. The room we have them in was designed to put people to sleep, or so I’m convinced. No matter how great the lecturers are and how interested I am in the topic, after around 10 minutes I can’t keep my eyes open. For one of the lectures, I was at the directly opposite the head of the table (and the lecturer), and after a valiant struggle on my part, it seems I fell asleep, head flopped back and mouth open, no less. At some point in her talk (about keeping healthy here) she reached the issue of sleep, telling us to make sure we got enough, and said something along the lines of “like your colleague over there.” I’m told everyone stared at me for a few seconds, expecting me to wake up when I heard that, but I was really out. Someone had to wake me up, and everyone had a hearty laugh at my expense. Some things stay the same in every country.
Friday night we finally got to eat somewhere other then the University Guest Center. They took us to a restaurant in East Legon (close to campus) called Chez Afrique. It was really good food, better live music, and a nice change of pace from eating on campus at the same place for all three meals a day. It would have been even better if my stomach hadn’t started hurting that afternoon. Two days later it’s still hurting, but getting better. I’m thinking of it as a nature-induced diet.
Yesterday (Saturday) we finally busted out of this joint, hitting up the town of Koforidua, capital of the eastern region, AKA Kof-town. They took us to two really nice waterfalls, Boti Falls and Akaa Falls. The ride was way longer then I was expecting, upwards of two hours each way, which again was made worse by my bad stomach, but there was a lot to see out the window so it was cool. We passed quite a few funerals and even some weddings, so a lot of locals were out in their finest, and it was a market day in one of the towns. It was amazing to see that many bright colors in one place. A riot of color, shall we say? Anyways, after the falls, we went to order our lunch, went to market while it was being cooked, and then went back to the hotel to eat.
Once again, I was reminded how much I suck at bargaining, but I still got about 10 feet in seed beads and around 20 recycled glass beads of various sizes and colors for C20,000, around $2. And a cool keychain for C15,000, which was way too much but the guy was really nice, and something about haggling over 50 cents just feels wrong. Other than that, the market was really fun, I got to practice my Twi greeting at almost every stall I passed, and all the ladies were genuinely amused at our attempts to carry on a basic conversation in their language. At one of the stalls I had a 10 year old girl translating for me, and apparently I got named something by her mother and aunt but couldn’t get her to tell me what it was. She just giggled whenever I asked her to explain what my name meant and nodded ‘no’. Most of the kids got really excited when we waved at them, but when my friend waved at this really young one who had run up to us, he ran back to his mom bawling. I know just how he feels. When I see how light my skin’s getting I want to cry too.
So, some observations about Ghana:
1) they take their religions very seriously here.
Many of the stores you’ll pass here are named something religious. For example, a hair salon named “True Light in Jesus Hair Salon.” I saw a lot that were funnier than that, but none come to mind as I write this at 9am.
2) Getting into any moving vehicle here is an adventure.
Reckless doesn’t begin to describe the way people drive in this country. Traffic lights are few and far between, and it doesn’t look like they’re really observed either way. Also, the number of lanes on a given road and their respective directions are at the discretion of each driver and up for interpretation at any time. If your lane isn’t moving, just create another one. Anywhere. The (negligible) space between the other two oncoming lanes, for instance. Successfully merging into traffic or crossing a road could really just be called a failed suicide attempt. Another thing that’s scary is that there are drainage ditches along the sides of most of the roads here, and along both sides of every road on the university campus. These are generally at least a foot wide (but more is common) and at least 2.5 feet deep. However, ignoring precise measurements, the space is ample enough to fit, say….an entire car or van tire. Combined with how close drivers cut things here, sitting in a window seat in a moving vehicle is definitely an adrenaline rush.
3) Credit goes to Faith for this one: Things that would take 5 minutes in the States take 3 hours here, and things that would take 3 hours in the States take 5 minutes here.
Case in point: The clutch of the van I was in broke just as we got on our way back to Legon, and we had to stop at a place to get it fixed. So we pull into a mechanic’s lot, or something, which is really just a space of red dirt moguls and shack made out of wooden posts and corrugated metal roof. We pile out of the car, with the (male) driver’s Celine Dion tape still blaring, and within two songs we have a new clutch. Which leads me to…
4) They’ve got an interesting taste in music here.
On our ride to Koforidua, we listened to a mix of local music and rap from the US, in between the two falls we listened to a classic Michael Jackson tape, which the other van stole for the ride back, and on the way back to Legon we listened to the Celine Dion – Greatest Hits tape about 3 times, and then switched to rap and R&B from the US. It takes a real man to admit he listens Celine Dion. And likes it.
