More ADVENTURE

Wednesday Feb. 1

The BUCKET GIRLS
The other day when the ISEP girl group was walking back from PIZZA TUESDAY there were two about 7 or 8 year old girls following us with big buckets of water on their head. I turned around and smiled at them. The instantly grinned back at me. It HIT ME…the simplicity of a smile can go A LONG WAY…one of my teachers in high school wrote down when I graduated…”if only you knew how much you effected people with your smile”…and I FINALLY understood what she meant by that. Smiling and acknowledging these beautiful children is way to impact the world while I am not in the classroom teaching. They continued to follow us so a couple minutes later I turned around and waved at them with a HUGE grin on my face. They waved back…MIND YOU I DID NOT THINK THIS THROUGH…and one girl dropped HALF THE WATER from her bucket…yep I DID DAMAGE TO THIS POOR GIRL UNINTENTIONALLY MIND YOU. They didn’t seem to mind and just giggled and waved…sadly they had to go back to the river next to the Pizza Inn and refill their water. At least they didn’t think I was evil…so next time I will think through what I do so I don’t damage the other person.

Another situation a girl came up to me another day when I was walking to IPO (heaven for internet and AIR CONDITIONING). I smiled at her and said “How are you?” in Twi (yes thank you very much I am SLOWLY picking up on Twi :D). She responded “Good” in Twi. Then, she asked me where the information center is…I knew what the building was but I wasn’t exactly sure where it was….in denial I gave her directions confidently…YA I WAS TOTALLY WRONG…5 MINUTES LATER…IF SHE stayed with me…WE WOULD HAVE RAN INTO IT…OOOPPPPPs. Sooo those are the two VERY embarrassing stories thus far.
:D

On a less HOPELESS NOTE…
DISCOVERY OF COFFEE CUE and SPLENDID Brunch with Alexandra

I met this girl Alexandra the other day next to the history department and we were venting to each other about the HORRIBLE system of registration at University of Ghana. I then discovered that she is a HOME STAY…which means she has a family that she sleeps with at night…which is EXACTLY WHAT Sarah H. is doing in Rwanda and what Heather Newell did for her training. We became FAST friends and decided to get together on this LOVELY Wednesday. She showed me this new Café on campus called Coffee Cue. IT IS SPLENDID! I got French toast and tea for 3 CD, which is about 2 dollars for a very filling meal. We chatted and I think I earned a visit to her host family’s house someday soon. :D During our duration at Coffee Cue, we ran into a group of like 40 people from Senegal that were going to 5 DIFFERENT AFRICAN CITIES trying to discuss how Africa can become a united front. I LOVED IT. I got to practice my French, which was SUPER SUPER SUPER EXCITING! It gave me the confidence to use it when I go to Togo and Benin. I was able to talk about politics and how critical communication is between countries. Many pictures were taken by them because they were fascinated that 2 American girls were studying abroad in Ghana instead of Senegal. Even though their complements were geared towards getting my number…I do take pride in the fact that they complemented my French. :D The entire day felt accomplished just from this ONE exchange of words. Alexandra can speak French too, which made the conversations even more enjoyable!

Two classes back-to-back NO SHOW TEACHERS…but Central Cafeteria Room Manager SHOW

After this wonderful interchange Emma and I went to two back to back classes where the professors did not show up but I got to meet more students. At the second class we sat down and before we knew it a strange man approached us and started asking for our names and he shared his and the he gave us a 45 minute lecture about what we were doing WAS AMAZING and how we should enjoy every MOMENT WE ARE HERE…which is what I am trying to do. I was able to show off what I have learned so far in Twi…and he was pretty impressed. It amazes me if you open up to a Ghana first they will open up to you with open arms horizontal. He was wonderful and before I knew it the professor didn’t show up after an hour so we went on our way.

REGISTERING FOR EACH DEPARTMENT…critical information not told to us…told to us by a STRANGER…TIA

So while Emma and I were going around WE WERE INFORMED THAT WE HAVE TO register for each department…which will require A BUNCH OF HIKING AROUND…TIA, this got on my nerves…but once I took a couple minutes I realized it really didn’t matter…none of the teachers were showing up so of course we have time to do these things. We went to the Sociology department and the head of the department informed us that THERE WAS A PROTEST and that the office workers wouldn’t be in this week…TIA…so how were we suppose to register to each department? We couldn’t…ohhhh well…hopefully we will be able to soon.

The protest is because these office workers haven’t been paid sense December and they want their money. Hopefully that will be taken care of so we can go to classes….hahahahahahahahahaha…such an ADVENTURE! 

SWITCH TO BAGGED WATER AND…THE NIGTH MARKET

So a big event for me today…besides speaking French and realizing that this protest may effect classes is I SWITCHED TO BAGGED WATER AND NIGHT MARKET FOOD…okay I know this is very confusing. So there are three different types of water in Ghana: tap water, bagged water, and bottled water. For the first two weeks I was on bottled water and today MARKS MY TRANSITION TO BAGGED WATER…This water goes through the SAME purification as bottled water it is just bagged so the surface of the bag may contain bacteria…but it is unlikely if you get the RIGHT bagged water…which I AM.

And Night Market food, this food is prepared outside by Ghanaian that might not have the best ideas of decontamination, but this food is VERY VERY cheap and mind you TASTES WONDERFUL. I got beans and joloff (seasoned rice) for 1 CD and was COMPLETELY FULL. This will allow me to stick to the 10 CD budget a day and have extra to use for Smoothies, Indian food, and traveling here and there.

Hopefully I won’t get sick…and if I do…TIA.

Ghanaian FOOTBALL GAME

Many of the ISEP kiddos got night market food tonight and so we all watched parts of the Ghanaian football game…I don’t know who exactly won…I will ask someone tomorrow (I went to bed early because I was tired and went on a run at 6am to get READY for running CROSS COUNTRY HERE).



I promise I will have the rest of this last week and this week up by the end of the week

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo