happy birthday DAD!

WOW, TWO DAYS. The greeting ‘two days’ in Ghana goes for any amount of time that has passed since you’ve last seen someone. So I’m saying two days since I’ve posted a new blog.

I realized the other day that the time I’ve spent in Ghana has surpassed any previous duration I have been away from home. During my free time (which somedays is farrr more than others), I calculated the longest time I lived away from home. When I went to Australia I was there from February to June, totaling 136 days. As of today (October 26) I’ve been on my Peace Corps experience for a count of 148 days. It’s hard to get my head around the fact that I’ve been in country for 5 months already. Five months sounds a lot longer than it really is, but there are certainly days I feel like I just arrived and other days I feel like I’ve been away from my family and friends forever. I know that reads confusing, but it’s confusing to me as well. I just wrote an entry in my journal about how much I absolutely love Ghana, especially my village and the people, but I also wish I could see all of you who are reading these blogs! I know that these next two years will fly by though, seeing that 5 months have already past.

So since I last updated, I’m finally settled into my house and I’m no longer needing to go to Wa as much as before. Before I was having to go to buy things for my house, but now I think I have just about everything I need. My house is now a home, and I am settled in. Thus I can spend more time integrating into my community and not having to travel to Wa.

My community is more welcoming than I could have ever imagined. They are genuinely happy to see me everyday and that makes me feel comfortable and at home. You know they say ‘When in Rome, do as the Romans do’.....so when I’m in Ghana, I’m doing as the Ghanaians do. I try to mimic everything they do, from cooking to cleaning and playing with children to speaking with them. Some things are easier than others, like now they tell me I cut kapala (fufu) correctly with my right hand; however, I struggle greatly carrying water on my head. Just earlier today I pounded kapala with some women and I noticed that I’m improving slowly. It’s not easy to pound yams, but today they almost let me go from start to finish. Speaking of kapala, it’s becoming one of my favorite Ghanaian foods. Kapala served with groundnut soup - mmmm - it is absolutely delicious. And back to the topic of carrying water on my head...wow, it’s NOT easy. I usually fetch my water with my bike, but I want to slowly try to do as all the other women and small children do, so I tried to carry a basin of water on my head. The borehole is probably 200, no more than 300 meters away from my house and by time I got to my house I soaking wet from the water splashing around. The cause was a combination of my incapability to properly carry water on my head and my body physically jolting from laughing so much. It was extremely funny, as everyone I passed yelled “Naama...Naama...” and then they proceeded to laugh and point at me. I’m slowly overcoming the feeling of embarrassment, because everything I do is mostly wrong or looks silly because I’ve never done it before. So I just embrace it all and I laugh it off. =)

ACE update! :) So Ace is growing fast and becoming even cuter everyday. He’s such a smart dog; he knows his name, he can sit and he LOVES to howl. He even recognized people, especially his ‘father’ Tingbani. Tin is one of my best friends in Kulkpong and he watches Ace when I travel. Ace loves him and when he sees him or even hears his voice he starts wagging his tail frantically. I joke with the community and say he’s definitely a Ghanaian because he always greets people (which is something Ghanaians take very seriously and ALWAYS do). My favorite thing he does is talk and howl. If I howl “ooow” he will begin to whine and then he acts like he uses all the energy in his little body to generate the most pitiful but cutest little howl. The village thinks I’m absolutely crazy when I howl, but at the same time they think it’s hilarious. Now some people come to my house and howl at Ace when they see him!

So there is so much happening that I could write, so I’m looking back at my journal entries and I’ll post a few things I write about.

14 September --- Daily I inform Ghanaians of things we do differently and the same in America. They’re very inquisitive, and I love the questions they ask. They’re always asking ‘Do you know this?’ or ‘Do you have this or that in America?’ I’ve been asked everything from pigs to turkeys to razor blades to trees.

Saturday past, market day, Zoe (my closest PCV neighbor) came back from Wa and the rain was coming paaaaa. She’s hanging out at my house when Tahiru comes over in his traditional Muslim dress/gown. She says “Are you wearing a dress?!”. Without any hesitation, he firmly responds “YES!”, like it’s totally normal for him to wear a dress. We never laughed so hard; Na-eem, Tin, Zoe, myself and Tahiru himself couldn’t control our laughter.

Number of times I.....
have driven a car - 0
greeted people I don’t know - immeasurable
eaten cake - 0
drank tequila - zero :(
read a current girl magazine - 3 (the two I brought and the 1 Mom sent me!!)
bought a dog for 5 cedis [$3.70] - one :)
paid around $1.40 for a big serving of rice and chicken - plenty!
rode in a car that I thought would either break down and/or explode - too many
made a small child cry because I’m white - unfortunately, a good number
fell off my bike fetching water - 1, only once though..my first time
watched SportsCenter - ZERO. depressing.
received a phone call from Australia to Africa - 1 (Thanks Jared!!)
bought a nice pair of Silver jeans for 10 GHC ($7.00) - yep, once!


24 September

Today was an eventful day, as I was attending baby weighing and cooking with Tahiru’s wives. I was there from start to finish, as he said. Although nothing could really be said to one another, we managed to have small conversations and I learned a great around - for example, making rice balls in a calabash (a gourd made into a bowl). I watched and helped make my best (favorite) meal - rice balls with groundnut soup! :) Attempting to mash the rice with Ghanaian women watching was a trip - they say they aren’t laughing at you but with you and that’s true! It’s funny and I understand why they’re laughing, I just want to tell them it’s something I’ve never done before. So I’m like a small child trying to do everything, but the sad part is the small kids are even better than me!
Back to baby weighing: Other than loving all the adorable children, it’s neat to see the organization (and lack thereof) come together and flow. The mother arrive in their finest outfits and patiently sit around all morning and into the afternoon once a month. When they first arrive, they weigh the child and the registrar/child welfare book is passed to a person to record every child’s weight into a community log. Simultaneously, the nurses’ are preparing immunizations. They then continue to immunize the child in some type of order I’m yet to figure out. Even though it might look and sound like chaos, it somehow works and the job gets done.
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It’s the small things like these that continually add up to making Kulkpong/Ghana my new home. I’m finally feeling settled in in my new house, getting a routine (as much as I can in the most unplanned place) down, making friends and familiarizing myself with my new surroundings. It’s really the people I’ve meet that have made the transition particularly easy. Speaking with other PCVs, I’ve heard (and seen) horror stories! I’m fortunate to have it so easy in Kulkpong compared to the others. Before coming to the Peace Corps I might have thought no electricity or running water would be the worst of all living situations, but I’ve come to learn it truly could always be worse.
I’ve already gained an astonishing amount of respect for everything I have and have ever had in America. The convenience of a developed country is often overlooked by the person living there. It’s ‘normal’ to me (well, before it was) to wake up, take a warm shower, open the fridge to eat cold and safe foods and then drive to either work or where ever. Now my ‘normal’ is waking up to the sunrise, warming water if I want a warm bucket bath but I usually just bear the room temperature water for bathing, eating/preparing food with a propane gas stove, sweeping my veranda because the goats’ feces are everywhere and walking or riding my bike where ever I go. The daily activities make it seem like two different worlds, but at the same time things are so similar. People are people -- loving each other, breathing the same air. We all work to survive, just in much different ways.

13 October

Things have been great, better yet fabulous, lately. I’m really enjoying Kulkpong now.
Friday is Global Hand-washing Day. I’m trying to get the JHS students to teach the primary students to wash with soap at the critical times. With this small event, I hope to start a club or group in the JHS so they continue to teach their juniors throughout the school year.

[[Update from the October 13 entry]]
The JHS students really enjoyed my lesson on hand-washing and they seem excited to teach the primary students. They practiced teaching each other and they had a blast! They have so much enthusiasm, I hope this continues and rubs off on their juniors and the community.

On a wonderful note, Tahiru’s girls are my new little helpers. The oldest girl has always liked me, but her younger sister feared me for some time. However, now that her sister comes to my house she started coming with her. Now she’s free with me, always smiling and laughing. Tonight they’re here now and they are dinner with me. The oldest girl told Tin that my soup is better than her mothers! But I’ve eaten her mother’s food and I think it is delicious. It’s a cute things for her to say though!

[[Update]]
The girls are still my best friends :) The younger girl definitely doesn’t fear me anymore, she’s always at my house and yells NAAMA every time she sees me!

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Hopefully those entries have updated you all some on my life in Ghana! As you can read, things are going great and I’m doing fine. For all you worry warts, I’m healthy and I’m not sick. They do have food in Africa and I’m eating plenty. Other than the annoyance of bug bites, I’m a-okay.

It’s late here, almost 10 p.m., which is late for me. I’m off to sleep now....

p.s. I ate a Girl Scout’s Thin Mint cookie....unbelievably delicious. Thanks for the amazing package Mom & Dad :) i love you!

Mnenaa ka te bew. [May God bring us tomorrow]

peace, love & hugs
xoxo

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD! i love you, miss you everyday.