Jane in Africa: July 2006

no, my mom's biggest fear of me finding a native and getting married here is not coming true. today i went to another jane's engagement party! it's vera's bestfriend/calls her sister. (everyone here calls close friends "my sister my brother" it's nice). it was in this brand new house in Accra. the groom and bride's side all gathers together and there is an MC who introduces all the relatives. the groom's family presents the dowry. back in the day they used to offer goats and apparently a bottle of schapps? (im not sure why it's the preferred alcohol.) more modern gifts which we saw today consist mostly of money but there was also a huge suitcase full of.. underwear and clothing for the bride! next week we are attending the actual wedding ceremony at a church three towns away called TuTu. WOW! i'm excited.

school
so some noteworthy names of students i teach are... Blessed (he's a cool 7th grader/hardworking student so he gets the job of ringing the bell between subjects.) Comfort is a tall 8th grader who can't stop talking and raising her hand and cleaning the board and doing teacher pet things. kind of overwhelming. instead of "teacher teacher" which is what the kids called me in Taiwan. they all call me Madam Jane. so it's this really loud repititive call of "Madam Madam" pretty funny. Regena is popular too (but you pronounce it like RA-GI-NA and it make me laugh the first time. yeah i'm sad). you also pronounce Racheal like RA-HELL. Prince (the Mentor winner- ghana's american idol) is a pretty popular name too. i have an 8th grader who's really smooth with the girls and likes to hold my hand. well, lots of the boys like to do that. by the way, i havn't had as many marriage proposals as people have warned from normal aged men. most of them are from boys in my class who are around 14. right now liz and i are writing the questions for the final exam. school ends in about two weeks. so i just typed up all these subject/verb agreement and passive/active voice questions. i hope they get good scores!! we are goign to start review soon. yes, the computer labs at school work... When there isn't a black out. which happened the other day. all the kids are kinda antsy cause summer vacation is almost here for them! i'm antsy too because my sister is going to arrive august 4th!! woohoo!

excursions
a couple weekends ago we visited botanical gardens! yes, only like 45 minutes away. there were some amazing trees and species of plants (dad would have been Really jealous... my favorite was this humongous tree called Ficus Elasticoidus. the inside was all open and you could have totally created a swiss family robsinson house in it). while we were there these people were filming a children's documentary. since they were white we talked to them. (basically anytime we have the opportunity to see/meet a foreigner we do!) they were filming this Barney-like character called Shockamooney (an elephant character from India) who travels the world. so if you see this in Blockbuster.. check it out!

last weekend liz and i took a tro tro (it's the crazy vans that they squeeze 15-22 people into to get around from towns or to the city) to visit vera's mom's house in a far off village. we passed this bridge that crosses the Volta River at a town called Kpong (say PONG) very cool. Vera's mom lives really far out in this cute little village. in front of her house is a lawn full of mango trees and plantain trees. baby lambs and ducks and hens walk around you while you cook in the outdoor kitchen. you had to brush your teeth with a cup of water outside but it was fine. even their outhouse was so clean and didn't stink! it was just a dream to be walking around meeting the village children and relaxing there. akropong seems so urban in comparison, almost wish i had picked an even smaller/more local setting.

a past volunteer named lindsay that stayed with vera in 2003 and 2004 came back to visit for a night. she was here for work. she works for an NGO called Bridge for Africa (visit the website and buy something cool from them! they are legit and awesome!). her job is basically to get in contact with local craft businesses and set up a relationship to ship their products to the US for people to buy hand-made genuine african crafts. we went with her to a nearby town to check out a bead-making family. we saw how beads were crushed from different colored glass and then burned in a kiln to make beautiful necklaces and bracelets and all different types of things. i really wanted to stay longer and be an apprentice bead-maker. then we went with them to the market to buy some of their products (psst some friends will be recieving some nice african beaded jewelry this xmas!)

money
so we buy water from mama aku across the street in plastic bags of 500ml. there are like 30 bags in a bunch and total it costs 7,000 cedis (which is like 75 cents). a ride on the tro tro to Accra for two hours is 10,000 cd (little over a dollar). right now the hour i'm using for the internet cafe is pretty cheap about 7,000 cd (some more frou frou places charge 12,000 cd). the teachers at akuffo tom school get paid pittance. i think 420,000 a month (what is that? like 50 dollars?) it might seem comparable. but it isn't. they still have rent and babies and real bills. yeah basically.. the exchange rate rocks for me!!!

cooking
liz and i have started to cook full meals since last week! vera is taking night classes in Accra for hotel management (one day we will return and stay at some amazing resort she'll run). so we are on our own for dinner. which it's turning out to be no problem because she recently purchased a gas stove (we pitched in for the cylinder of gas). it's like i'm on little house on the praire cause we are so grateful for a stove! no more fanning the charcoal for half an hour!

chinese
wo hao jiu mei you yong zhong wen. bao qian wo de tai wan han ri ben peng you!
i notice chinese everday! mama aku's daughter's name is a-mei (yes like the taiwan pop star) and i call her mei mei for short. lots of products randomly are from china and have only chinese written on them.. or arabic... or italian. for instance our toilet rolls have the brand huo ri (like live days). and the chocolate we sell during break at school say "cha ke li...hao bang!" (chocolate how great!) and then there is this candy makeup we sell and it says "xiao yang ren" (small lamb person? but the lamb character has san-dian swei on the side). i don't really understand it. my mom is going to send me a chinese dictionary! thank god! i don't want to forget everything i learned last year!

sorry no pictures! the upload function didn't work on here. GRR. i will try soon! i have many many more! they won't fit on my flash drive!

it's july! here's the scoop on the past month:

home:
we share the kitchen, bathroom, rest of house with: vera (another teacher who takes care of us/cooks us amazing food. she's unmarried, 35, teaches catering--sorta home ec/nutrition-- is hilarious and sings and shouts and taught us our most useful word: "ta" which means fart in trui. we act like a bunch of adolescent boys making jokes about ta-ing), dickson(a 50 some year old dad who works at ghana national bank in town. he visits his wife and three kids who live near cape coast every other weekend), and koffi (30 some year old guy who drives a taxi and teaches us the native tongue by just refusing to talk to us in english mostly. he tried to enlist my help mowing the lawn last week but the pulley thing for the string broke. and yes, we store the lawn mower in the dining room). there aren't any humongoid bugs so far, but lots of lizards. they climb in and out of our window. pretty much harmless bc they are eating the nasty bugs and do a funny dance with their heads . speaking of wildlife.. everyday on the 20 minute walk to school i pass by possibly 20 gazillion chickens and baby chics and just as many sheep. i used to always think to myself "i never have to worry about bird flu cause i'm never near wild fowl.. hmm take that back!). i've gotten good at impersonating the "baaa" of a sheep. we've been teaching the kindergarten classes "Old MacDonald" (along with "Miss Mary Mac" and "Five little Monkeys jumping on the bed") and now a bunch of the kids "baa" at me when they see me. Nice.

liz's bed and our world map!

main hallway

our lovely bathroom

vera and christy (one of her past students that was stayng with us for a while are pounding fufu)

vera and i on a walk to the Teacher's Training College. site of the first school in all of Ghana (1840's).

religion:
christianity's influence is everywhere. i've been to church three past sundays- longest consecutive stretch for me. i don't know if i will go this sunday (maybe the junior service for 17 year olds and under) since i don't really know what is going on with the sermons spoken all in trui. but it is so entertaining! the women wear beautiful/elaborate tailored dresses of colorful fabric. and the older men wear toga-esque versions in bright colors. they have drums.. right up near the choir. and there is probably more than 30 minutes dedicated to LOUD singing (aided by ear-splitting stereosystem) and dancing and waviing of hankerchiefs in the air. wow! plus, god is in the language and everyday life. people are always explaining getting over sickness, or good luck, or reasoning because "of the grace of god". the back windshield of taxis have humorous sayings .. like yesterday i saw one with "SHAME" in big words. best so far was "God is God". top four store names are "Shower of Blessing Mini Supermarket," "Thank U Jesus Business and Comm Center," "Jesus is Able Auto Parts" and "By His Grace Beauty Salon."

food:
so the kitchen in our house is really more like a big room with a table. since.. there is no stove (we use small "coal pots" like little grills on the floor) and the sink is busted (we use water from buckets we fill up somewhere else). we've been watching vera closely and started to help cook, and even prepared a full meal! most difficult might be getting the charcoal hot enough in the beginning. btw... as predicted i love yams! i might, yes i definitely do, love them more than potatoes!! uncooked they are gigantic brown roots that could be used as a deadly bludgeon. we usually cut them up and boil them, or mash them, or fried? i don't if we've doen that method. we fry plantains though YUM, and pound fufu (mashed cassava and plantains), or banku (mashed cassava and corn) or just have rice or spaghetti. dinner is the biggest yummiest meal. for breakfast we usually have oatmeal, sometimes porridge (it's JUST LIKE SHEE-FANG! but they told me to add sugar and i said i'd rather have soy sauce..too bad havn't seen that around these parts). at school for lunch the teachers dont really eat much. we usually have a coke/or fanta with digestives (yeah man, digestivse are big stuff here! good thing i love them from london).

Republic Day
last weekend was Ghana 1st (ghana's independence day) and Mr. Boafo (the proprieter of the school, really jovial large man with like 6 children) took us and Vera out to celebrate. we went to Palm Hill, nicest hotel/restaurant in akropong to get drinks (the liquor tasted like rubbing alcohol) but we did get a whole story on his life and how he started the school 12 years ago to give something back to the community and how they have had volunteers coming for 10 years and their plans for acquiring a grant from America to do more construction of the school. we spent the rest of the night at a local pub drinking red wine and watching the French/Brazil match. wow what a good game!

drinks at palm hill

Black Stars
it's been beyond amazing being here for the world cup. both of the last two games ghana played we ended school early at 2pm so everyone could go home and support. there were a bunch of people down the street gathered outside watching the first one vs. US. it was hard not to cheer with them when ghana kicked our butts! people (young and old, men and women) were yelling, running down the street and taxis and tro tros passing through town were blaring their horns! it's so cool to see an entire country show their national pride in this way. i wish football was bigger in the states (and i wish i could actually play but i have the poorest foot coordination at sports). but you can tell that a championship means a lot more to them here. i read a hilarious newspaper op-ed about the game and it said something like "everyone came out to watch the sweet game of soccer ...even vendors and mentally challenged people came into the strees... they jubilated all night". it was so sad when ghana lost to brazil! hey if you want to send anything-- mail soccer balls! liz and i only brought one and the boys at school already have kicked the heck out of it. we need to buy a pump. of course, they are ridiculously talented for the lack of organization or formal practice. they run around barefoot on this steep slope with barely any grass and huge piles of stones and they are SO Happy!

crowd watching the match down the street

cute quirks:
- in public when you want to get someone's attention you don't say hey you go "SSSSSSSS". it's disconcerting when you first hear people hissing like snakes but you get used to it.
- when you don't want to spent money on units for your cell but you want to let someone know you are thinking about them you "flash" them. no not that flash. you just call them but hang up after one ring. it's like a "hey i'm thinking bout you ring". we flash all the time. our teacher friend joe flashes us every other second.
- when you want to carry a heavy load (say like the mornign we ran out of water and had to go to a nearby spring to bucket it back). just just carry it on your head. the women, and men, carry EVERYTHING on their heads. not just little baskets... large bundles of fire wood, huge bags of flour, gigantic tupperware containers of rice, beans, bread, anything. once in accra a girl not much bigger than me carried probably 100 lbs worth of produce and a gas tank on her head for like half a mile. no sweat. they are amazing!
- if you have a baby, no doubt strap him on your back, while you are carrying huge buckets on yoru head or doing housework or doing anything. babies on backs are everywhere.
- two tv shows are the big to-do right now. we go across the street to mama aku's house (she is a a large lovely woman who is the town seamstress and has made liz and i two dresses already though they fit funny...) to watch "Timeless" on weekend nights (a super corny phillipino soap opera badly dubbed and in poor sound and reception quality. but it's so addictive!) as well as "Mentor" (ghana American-Idol. Prince-- a 23 year old chubby guy won and his winning song was "Let it Burn" by Usher).