taken from gillian's camera

a picture from bike riding in aburi and one from that awesome fettuccini-laden dinner!

(my blog's doing that random no-line-between-paragraphs thing)

it's now wednesday, and the official day counter is in the SINGLE digits. that's right, 9 days until we leave for the states, and 13 days until i'm back in texas. before i go, i want to take pictures of all the things and people i do and see everyday. that's the kind of thing you don't think about until you're gone. so that's my project for the remainder of my time here, in addition to PACKING and finishing up two tests and papers which are still lingering over me. the past three days have been fairly un-blog-worthy, simply because they've been spent writing a 20 page paper with gillian. this is one of our biggest projects of the semester, so it's good to have it done!

random thought, but: remember a while ago when i said i had seen buildings with people's names on them? like isha's collection, etc.? well, since then i've also found: "marilyn's latest fashions," "prince eric" (i'm not kidding) and "sarah's fabric." also, at makola, there's a woman who sells fabric named diana (spelled d-i-a-n-a). that one made me smile ;)

>>also, please pray for solomon's lodge. in the past week, two of our girls have gotten malaria or "malaria" and have spent lots of time in the hospital. just to remind everyone, malaria is not contagious, it's transmitted through mosquitos. it is very treatable, especially in ghana, where the infection rate is so high. please pray for everyone's continued health and safety in these few short days left. let's just finish this thing healthily.

>>alright so this blog was highly jumbled, but bare with me!

sending lots of love to texas, new york and beyond. you texans, stay safe in all that rain...and don't get the swine flu. i kid i kid.

>>love love love

a gift for you on this tuesday morning

gillian and i are working on a paper for one of our classes, and upon searching for what i assume was "rap in ghana" or something of the sort, gillian found this.

enjoy!

chicken fettuccini alfredo

at the aburi botanical gardens by a broken down helicopter


I wrote this blog last night, but couldn't post it til this morning because our internet was out. Let’s see, since Tamale, I had a pretty normal week.

Monday I had my last class Media and Society class at Legon, which ended up being a “revision” class. The professor basically just told us what kinds of questions to expect on our final (next Thursday 5/7). He was surprised to see that only 40 out of 450 students were at the revision. WE were surprised there were even 450 students in the class ever! No previous Media and Society class had ever had that many students in it.

Tuesday I registered for my fall classes and I got all the ones I wanted! Next semester in New York I’m taking: History of Communication, Film: History and Form, Media and Identity, and Copyright, Commerce and Culture. I’m really excited about all of them! I’m in my Film: History and Form class with Marykate! It’ll be great to have a class with her again J.

Wednesday was kind of boring, nothing too exciting happened. Thursday Marykate and I got pedicures and manicures—the second of the semester! It was nice to get away from the house for a bit and relax. I nearly fell asleep in my oversized salon chair, as it should be.

FRIDAY was a really fun day! We had a makeup recitation session in the morning. It ended up being really fun and quite a cultural experience! The guest professor was Esi Sutherland, who is a really famous African writer, and is known all over the world. She brought in some people from the Accra Dance Company (or something like that), who brought with them lots of “costumes.” These were basically all different types of cloth and beads and head-wear. They dressed us up and we got to learn a few dance moves, too! I was dressed as an Ashanti woman, in formal wear. My favorite part of the whole experience was that they gave me a bustle (aka, a fake butt)! Ghanaians definitely aren’t lacking in the butt area, and so to be more realistic, they had to help me out a little bit! I asked if they add the bustle when Ghanaians wear the outfit, and they said, yes, all people add the bustle. So mayyyyybe these big butts we see under all this beautiful clothing have been a rouse all along!

my bustle

my typical weekend wear

Saturday was another NYU field trip to Aburi Botanical Gardens, in Aburi (where Tetteh Quarshie cocoa farm is). We had passed the botanical gardens when we went to Tetteh Quarshie, but didn’t have time to go, so I’m glad we got to go with NYU. It was just a day trip, so we got to leave the dorm around 10 a.m. and got there around noon. We first had a guided tour through the ten different lawns of the gardens. We saw many different plants, whose names I don’t remember (of course). My FAVORITE was this tree, which is actually two trees living symbiotically. They grow around each other. After 35 years or so, the outer tree ends up killing/strangling the inner tree, leaving the inner tree hollow and dead. The coolest part is that because of this, you can actually walk inside the tree, and even climb up the inside! It was really cool and quite a photo op! inside the tree

Afterwards, a few of us went down the hill to rent some bikes, which we got to ride around for a little bit. Never are you reminded of how out of shape you are until you get on a bike and have to ride around hilly areas for long periods of time. Gillian and I have bikes and ride them daily around our neighborhood but this apparently has done nothing to boost our physical stamina, as we were both exhausted after only a few minutes of pedaling. Needless to say, it was a lot of fun, but definitely tiring, and we only lasted 20 minutes or so around the gardens. Once everyone was done wandering around, we spent about 30 minutes at a “craft market,” which was really just a busy street lined with vendors on either side. It looked like and reminded me exactly of the “craft market” we went to in Kumasi. I got a really cool fabric patchwork oversized duffel bag which I will use as my carry on (since heaven knows I have far too much stuff).

Tonight is Gillian’s mom’s last night in Ghana…which everyone is really sad about. She’s brought such a joy to our house, despite getting sick herself for a few days. No worries though, she is feeling better. Anyway, tonight, as a parting dinner, she took me and Gillian to the Golden Tulip, a REALLY nice, REALLY expensive five star hotel in Accra. And it really is nice. I opened the menu, and as pathetic as this sounds, I literally had to hold back tears when I read the words “Chicken Fettuccini Alfredo” on the menu. It was the most American menu I have seen since I’ve been here, with dishes ranging from mashed potatoes to bacon burgers to all kinds of normal salads. I was in HEAVEN. Our dinner was accompanied by a piano player, and for an hour, I honestly did feel like I was in some ritzy hotel in America. The fettuccini was delicious, but even if it sucked, I would’ve appreciated it just the same. Just the fact that I ate something called chicken fettuccini was enough for me. Anyway, it was the perfect ending to a great few weeks spent with Barb.

We only have twelve days left—can’t believe it! This week will be busy spent writing papers and doing all sorts of projects and presentations. But Gillian and I have planned out our week so we won’t get stressed out. I only have two finals this semester, and they’re the last two days I’m here (one is the morning of the night I leave). But I’ve decided I will not stress out, so that’s that.

I hope all is well at home. I know Meredith’s graduation luncheon was today—I hope it went well and I wish I had been there! Can’t wait to see most of you so very soon!

love love love

tamale photo albums

here are the links to my tamale photo albums. check them out if you're so inclined:

album #1:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=118331&id=616486619&l=9955a0e820

album #2:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=118707&id=616486619&l=72daaa84fc

tamale (no, not the food)

Me and my friend Nassit at the widows village (read on, my friends...)

Tamale was AMAZING.

I guess I should preface this blog with a little description of what Tamale (no, not the food you Texans) is. It’s a city in Northern Ghana, about 14 hours north of Accra. Tamale is pronounced Tom-Uh-Lay, not Tuh-Mall-Ee. This trip was one planned by NYU. About 30 students went, and Gillian’s mom!

Because it was is so far away, we left EARLY on Thursday. I’m talking 4 a.m. early. But the bus ride went really smoothly and we got there around 5 p.m. We stayed at this place called the Tamale Institute of Cross Cultural Studies (TICCS). TICCS does lots of academic tours around Tamale, and they took care of us the entire weekend. They also have motel-esque accommodations, so that’s where some stayed (others had to stay at another motel-type place called Catholic Guest House). Anyway, after a long day’s travel, we ate dinner and went to sleep.

Friday morning we had breakfast around 7 and left TICCS with our tour guides to explore Tamale. But first, we had an hour long lecture on Northern Ghana (NG), where we learned some very cool things: NG takes up 41% of Ghana’s total land mass, though it only has ¼ of the Ghana’s population. Tamale’s population is about 800,000. Their society is patrilineal, meaning one inherits his/her ethnic identity from the father. (This is not the case in Akan society, where inheritance is matrilineal and inheritance is passed down from your mother’s brother.) The North took much longer to become developed, and did not establish formalized education until the 1930s, some hundred years after it was established in the southern part (Accra and such) of Ghana. The north has very few tourist attractions, and is not a metropolis like Accra. On this point, it was quite clear how “underdeveloped” NG is from Accra. On just the drive up alone, we would see the scenery change from buildings to arid land, with nothing around for miles. There are far fewer commercial transactions that happen in Tamale, though it is a surprisingly big city. The temperature was over 100 degrees every single day (much hotter than in Accra), though there was about the same amount of humidity. The people were SO much friendlier than in Accra, but we will get to that in a bit. Anyway, the north and south are basically total opposites. But back to the fun facts:

Farming and livestock raising are their two primary economic activities. I think I talked about this in a previous blog, but paying a bride wealth is a really big deal here, and especially in the north where everything is much more traditional and less modernized. Thus, cattle are raised for a dowry and bride price. If for whatever reason a man cannot pay the bride price, he cannot technically call his future children his own. Interesting stuff. As far as religion goes, there’s Christianity, Islam, and Traditional Religions (through the use of diviners—which I’ll get to, too). Our tour guide said “Africans are very additive- they take what is good and add on, though they never throw away.” He said this to mean that oftentimes Christians (and Muslims) will incorporate traditional African religious practices (like sacrifices and divination) into their own religious beliefs. This was especially evident up north. The guide also said, educationally speaking, in the north it is better to skip university because afterwards, a job isn’t guaranteed. However, farmers will definitely make money, and the job is secure and steady.

Anyway, so that’s my little Northern Ghana cultural lesson for you all. But back to what we actually did in Tamale. So on Saturday, after the lecture, we visited a local mosque. Northern Ghana has many more Muslims than the southern part of the country, so it was cool to see women wearing more conservative, modest clothing. The mosque was large and open, with a large round center. Many different colored mats lined the floors, and a Muslim showed us how they pray (always facing east, towards Mecca, always 5 times a day). It was interesting to find out that the men and women worship (pray) separately. There is a dividing wall between where the men pray and where the women pray, and it was explained to us that this is so there are no distractions or unclean thoughts during prayer. There is always a prayer leader who is in charge of leading the corporate prayers at the designated worship times. This person is never a woman. The women aren’t allowed to go to the upper levels of the mosque; however they made an exception and let our whole group go. We got to look down at all the mats and get a cool perspective.

After the mosque we drove around Tamale a bit and visited their market. It’s much smaller than either Makola or Kaneshi, but it is just as active. The walkways are narrower, and the people speak less English (obviously), so it was rather difficult to make transactions, but we managed. Of course I couldn’t stay away from the fabrics, and managed to buy a few more types of material for myself (AND for others!). I’ve found that the majority of the fabric patterns are pretty similar wherever you go in Ghana. The north had some designs that Accra doesn’t have, but typically, you see the same patterns wherever you are in the country. As we were leaving the market, we passed a gorgeous little baby eating fufu (a local yam-like dish). At first she was a little skeptical of us obrunis but she quickly warmed up to us and started smiling from ear to ear. (See picture below.)

After, we had a quick lunch at TICCS, and then headed to a clinic. Now this clinic was something else. It is run by a man named Dr. Abdulai, who for many years was a practicing private doctor in Accra (or some other big city, I forget). One day, he received a calling from God that he should help those who can’t help themselves—the lepers and the mentally sick and poor. In 1991, he moved back to Tamale, his hometown, and singlehandedly set up a clinic where they rely only on “divine providence” for funding. They do not charge any, ANY money for their services, and in fact, will only treat you if you can’t pay. If you can pay (and he says he can tell), then he asks you to visit a government hospital, as he wants his services to go to those who otherwise couldn’t get any. He relies on both monetary and medical donations, and said what they need most is antacids and pain medicine. He has a completely volunteered staff of 15 other doctors who have followed this same calling, and together they treat thousands of patients a year. They divvy out the donations to the patients according to need. One thing he said that really struck me was, “We believe in equity, not equality.” By this he meant that each patient will get the treatment and care and medicines that he or she needs, aka, the medicine may not be distributed completely equally among the patients. But this outlook, I think, is very indicative of how governments should run their own countries (and how the West should approach development). You do no one any good if you “distribute the wealth” without any sort of assessment of who needs what. Providing for specific needs is much more practical and, frankly, cost-effective, than giving everyone everything, even if they don’t need it.

Dr. Abdulai

They have made housing for lepers and other in-patients, as many of them were found on the street with no one to look after them (because there is so much stigma associated with any sort of sickness, let alone a sickness that is physically visible (leprosy)). Dr. Abdulai showed us around the facilities, and is the most joyful, funny, giving, selfless man. He was wearing a t-shirt and shorts the entire time, and would go up and greet every single one of his patience that he introduced us to. The lepers were so happy to have this man as a doctor and as a friend, and one had the biggest smile of anyone I’ve ever seen. Such joy in that place. That is what a heart for God and his people is supposed to look like. We presented Dr. Abdulai and the clinic with lots and lots of clothes and medicine that we NYU students had brought to Ghana and didn’t use. He went through each bag of stuff and told us where everything was going, making sure we knew how our donations (clothing and monetary) were being distributed. It was such a moving experience and one I will not soon forget. What a gracious and most humble man.

Some of the houses for the inpatients

After the clinic we broke into three groups of ten each and visited a diviner. A diviner is a spiritual leader who, according to African beliefs, can foresee the future. They’re almost like fortune-tellers in America, but much more legit and not hoaxie. Like I said earlier, many Christians, Muslims and traditionalists visit diviners for providence and warnings about the future. For instance, one may visit a diviner if he is about to take a long journey to make sure he will be safe. If the diviner (through using kola shells, sand, feathers, or other tools) sees that he will not be safe on the road, he will prescribe a remedy in order to avoid the bad fortune. Many Ghanaians, and West Africans, swear by these people. Generally, one visit costs 1 Cedi (though ours cost 2, Obruni special!). Anyway, so we met with the diviner first as a big group. He didn’t speak English, so we used a translator. The diviner told us he had been practicing divination since he was very young, and hopes to teach his children the skill. I asked if he had any other source of income, and he said he did some farming on the side. We all individually met wit him. Each person’s divination took about 10 minutes. Our diviner used kola shells to read our future, and mine is looking good. Here are a few highlights:

*I will live a long life and die a happy old lady
*I will have 2 boys and a girl
*My mom loves me very much
*I will travel for a few more years and then settle down in one place for a while
*I will come back to Ghana (and I will see him again…ehhh)
*There is a boy in my life and the diviner said he’s “the one”
*Oh, and one of us will buy a car soon (Mom?! ;))
*I am studying something involving music and talking (I guess you could count this if you stretched “communications” to literally mean “talking”)

Man, there were so many others, and I wrote them all down right after my session, and then proceeded to fold up the paper and put them in my pants pocket, which I washed the next night. Some things he said were definitely just not true, but others were pretty spot on. Either way, it was a cool cultural experience, AND while we were waiting for everyone else to go, we got to play with his daughters. He had some precious kids, and Gillian’s mom fell in love with them. She even tied a baby around her back like the locals do (I think this is an NYU in Ghana first, at least for this semester) and tried to balance a bowl on her head at the same time. We had a great time watching dusk go to pitch blackness, and watching his wife and her friends prepare dinner by firelight.

Speaking of Gillian's mom, this picture was taken at her birthday dinner last Wednesday. Don't they look alike?!

Woooo do you think I’ve written enough yet???

One more day to go! Alright, so Saturday we drove 2 and a half hours northeast to a town called Paga. At Paga, we visited a former slave camp. Earlier in the semester I went to Cape Coast, where the slaves were kept in dungeons before being shipped across the Atlantic. Well this slave camp, called Pikoro, was much different. This is where the salves were actually collected and kept before making the WALK to Cape Coast. Now let me just remind you that it took us 15 hours to DRIVE to this place from Accra. Now imagine WALKING, chained at the ankles, for a month straight, barefoot, with no food or water to Cape Coast, where even if you had survived the long walk, you probably wouldn’t survive the castle. The camp kept 150-180 slaves at a time, coming from various villages. Sometimes, families would sell off one of their men to the slave camp in order to pay off a debt. The conditions were hot and terrible, as they had to labor all day in the heat. April isn’t even the hottest month, and when we were there it was 105 degrees outside. Now imagine that, with no shirt, no shoes, no water, laboring all day. And this is before ever making the walk to Cape Coast, which is before trying to survive the terrible conditions at Cape Coast, which is before trying to survive at sea, which is before making it to the West and having to labor under terrible conditions for nothing. Nice job, history. Anyway, I don’t want to get on another slave rant or anything, but it was an important thing to see and definitely shocking (maybe even more so than Cape Coast).

My CRA, Julia, and me at Pikoro

After the slave camp, we drove another half hour or so to Bolgatanga to visit a widows village where the widows sell beautiful baskets they make to earn a living. Here in Ghana, widows are treated terribly. Usually, widows are either blamed for the death of the husband (because they didn’t properly care for him), or accused of being a witch. Honestly. Widows are social outcasts and are not allowed to socialize with anyone for at least a year, if not longer. Now imagine going through the grief of losing your husband, magnified by the fact that you are ostracized and accused of such a tragedy. Widows will be taken into the town center and beaten and bathed, humiliated. So this village we went to is a safe haven for widows to live in a community with their children. So we pulled up to the village and immediately at least 60 kids came running towards our bus. I guess they knew why we had come, and greeted us sooo warmly. One little boy even ran straight into me, wrapping his arms around my legs and just hugging me. His name was Nassit, and he followed me around the entire day (he's the boy in the picture at the beginning). We brought them more clothing donations, as it was clear the kids were wearing whatever they could possibly find. Many of their clothes didn’t fit at all, or were so old and dingy that they’d probably be better off without them. The widows were so kind and so welcoming, too. We, again, had to use a translator, and they welcomed us and told us a little about what they do. They explained that basket-making was their source of income since their husbands had died. Before we started browsing through their baskets they did a traditional dance for us, accompanied by boys playing the drums. Their baskets were GORGEOUS, and of course, I bought a few (and some additional things). I found a really stupid/cool hat (see pictures below) that I just love, but will probably never wear in the states. Perhaps I’ll give it to my PaPa when I get back. Side note, but…I have NO idea how I’m going to get any of this stuff home. No idea. I have probably accumulated 50 pounds of souvenirs alone—far too much to take on a plane. I warned Gillian that the night before we leave I will probably have a nervous breakdown and freak out because I can’t get any of my stuff back (you’ve, too, now been forewarned). Oh well, it always works out, and if I have to leave some tank tops behind, oh well.

OH! and I got to learn how to basket weave!

Me and the rooms at the widows village

SO, that was my Tamale weekend. We left at 3 am on Sunday morning, and made it back to Accra by 3 pm. I spent Sunday night doing nothing, as per usual, and yesterday Gillian, her mom and I went to a pool for a few hours. I don’t think I got any tanner, but it was a lot of fun and nice to cool off and chat. I think her mom is staying til Friday, which is so exciting! We love having her here. Only 17 more days til I’m back in the states, guys!! I can’t believe it.

Alright, this thing is getting out of control long, so I’m gonna end it. But enjoy all the pictures. I will post a link to the full albums in my next entry.

you know, this may have something to do with why i love africa. (photo cred: gillian)

love love love

happy easter!

with love, from ghana!

we commemorated easter with a party at solomon's. we invited church crescent (the other dorm) over and had a bar-b-que south african style (thanks to some south african friends we met at champs), danced, and had a great time. some of the girls even hard-boiled eggs the night before and hid them around our house, and of course, gillian and i being the children that we are, partook of this easter egg hunt and found four (see picture above). kinda reminded me of my childhood easters at nana's house at the lake, when all my cousins and her neighbors and i would go all over her hilly yard looking for eggs in our sunday easter dresses. last easter, i was with my friend jon in texas, celebrating at the berry center, where my sister played some sort of percussion.

easter morning marykate, some friends and i went to st. peter's catholic church to celebrate. now, if you remember i went to a ghanaian church earlier in the semester with G, and decided that'd be the last time i went. however, i really wanted to go to church on easter, so opted to suck it up and deal with the FOUR hour long service. now, mind you, the sermon was only 20 minutes, maximum, followed by a translator doing the entire sermon again in twi. the other 3 hours and 20 minutes were devoted to announcements, performances (which were actually cool), two offerings, and communion. all in all, it was great and i'm glad i went, but BOY do these people know how to stretch out a church service.

gillian's mom is here and she's awesome! gillian seems so happy and has so much energy, and is a spitting image of her mom. she brought goodies my mom sent to her to bring for me, along with the new gavin degraw cd which is phenomenal. anyone who knows me at all knows i love gavin degraw, and was saddened when i found out he had a new cd come out while i'd be here and couldn't access it. but, thanks to my gracious mother and sister, i am currently playing the entire cd on repeat (along with a few other cds my sister sent along).

all in all, it's been a GREAT few days and i'm really, really enjoying my few short weeks left. gah, i still can't believe that in three weeks from saturday i will be back in the states!! seems so surreal.

wishing you all lots of love on this tax-day eve!

love love love

tetteh quarshie cocoa farm

pronounced (teh-tay kwar-shee) cocoa farm.

me with some cocoa pods

(since my blog isn't letting me add spaces in between my paragraphs, a new paragraph will begin with ">")

the last few days have been a lot of fun! i guess i last posted on tuesday, which means since then i have: gone to makola (again), bought more fabric for all you lovely people, visited a fabric/clothing store (run by a lovely lady named gifty) that marykate and i have been wanting to visit FOREVER, taken things to marjorie, our new tailor fred, AND the almond tree, picked up things from both marjorie and fred, attended my first trivia night at a local obruni sports bar called champs, went to the art center again (met a really cool ghanaian named "colin powell" who knew all the capitals of every u.s. state, plus every capital of every country in the world), saw milk for the first time, and went to tetteh quarshie cocoa farm! oh, and i've done a little bit of school work here and there...you know, tough life.

i am realllllly trying to make the most of my FEW short days left in ghana, and it's funny because as time is running out, i am re-falling in love with it and really trying to do as much as possible while i'm still here. my friend anika and i were talking about how we think it's so strange that this four months of our ghana life is just a little bubble, a little chunk of time where our lives were SO different. but we will ultimately go back to our usual lives, having lived this ghana life that we will be seemingly cut off from once we leave here. not to that we can never have anything to do with it again, just that the people we interact with and the things we do on a daily basis will be a faint memory, at least 'til i return. which i will do. the whole thing is just very strange/happy/sad. 27 days! for those who don't know, i plan to leave on friday may 8th, getting into new york on saturday may 9th. my best friend jon is picking me up from jfk and he's been instructed to immediately take me to the olive garden on 22nd and 6th. i'll spend a few days in new york, spending time with my friends one last time before summer, seeing my cousin's new apartment, and going to my friend kala's graduation. i will fly back to texas on tuesday, may 12th, where summer will officially begin!

>GOOD NEWS! gillian is OUT of the hospital. :) she is back home and it is great to have my roomie back. i missed having someone to blurt out random things to, or someone with whom i

could find mindless ways to waste away hours on the internet. they didn't find anything specific wrong with her (yeah, after a week of ALL that!), but she is feeling better and is in good spirits because...her mom is coming TOMORROW!! we are ALL so excited to have a maternal influence in the house, especially one who's bringing with her some goodies from my mom!

tomorrow is easter, which we'll celebrate bar-b-que style. solomon's is hosting a bar-b-que for all the nyu in ghana people, along with some of our ghanaian friends and neighbors. should be a fun time. i'm going to church in the morning with marykate...can't wait for another raucous ghanaian church experience! i hope you all celebrate easter with the people you love, and remember what it's all about (strangely enough, not those marshmallow peeps OR the easter bunny).

>since the title of the post is tetteh quarshie cocoa farm, perhaps i should give a little more detail about the day trip we took this morning! anika, marykate, stephannie, marika's sister and i got on an 8 am tro-tro from apapa to tema station, where we took another tro-tro to aburi, where the cocoa farm is! aburi is also where the botanical gardens are, and we will be taking another trip (with nyu) up there in a few weeks! it's gorgeous and up in the hills, overlooking other cities. the scenery is very different than accra- very hilly and green and tropical. the cocoa farm was rather small and not quite what we were expecting, but it was still really fun! for some reason, when we got there, there was no one manning the entrance, so we just walked in and showed ourselves around. about 10 minutes later, a ghanaian named tio found us and asked us to pay. initially he asked for the "foreigner's" price, though there was a student price on the price list. we insisted we were students at their ghanaian university and should therefore only have to pay the students' price. plus, what the hell is a foreigner's (aka obruni aka white person) price anyway? if we tried to pull that crap in america...well, we just wouldn't even dream of pulling that crap. but, we worked our magic and only paid the student price, and got a really neat tour of the farm. apparently it takes something like 3-6 months for a cocoa pod to get ripe (the yellow color), and then 2-3 days to ferment, and 7 days to dry. they sell the cocoa by weight. usually each bag of cocoa is 64 kilo and will make about 100 ghana cedi. i asked how many pods it'd take to make one bag, and based on some calculations, it'd take about 30 ripe pods! plus manual labor...that's a lot of work for only 100 cedi a bag! the adventure was fun and i had a great time with my girlfriends. :)

notice the "foreign tourists" fee...yeah right.

marika, stephannie, ataleigh (marika's sis), me, anika, and marykate at tetteh quarshie.

>we just got done ordering chinese food and are gonna have a movie night. last night we watched milk, which, if you haven't seen, you need to stop reading this and go out and rent it RIGHT now. seriously. RIGHT NOW. it was phenomenal and the acting was great and the story is so inspiring and the issue of gay rights something i am very passionate about. do yourself a favor and rent it now. tonight we're gonna watch frost/nixon, which is supposed to be very good, too! i'll let you know! :)

>have a wonderful, wonderful saturday and happy easter, friends and family. missing you all so very much.

>love love love

(ps- dont know why this blog is formatting like it is. i've tried to fix it but it's not working. will try again later. sorry!)

creations from marjorie!

i am so excited! i have been getting things made for you all from marjorie. last weekend's successful trip to makola market provided me with lots of fabric for everyone who requested something, and i have been giving it to marjorie in increments.

she brought some of the finished products over tonight, and they are all SO great!! and each is SO *insert your name here*. can't wait to distribute and to have a mini-fashion show with each of you dawning a unique and made-for-you african creation. trust me, though, i made sure each fabric/outfit combo is "wearable" and "trendy" by american standards. :) eeeek, can't wait!

i have a few more people and odds and ends to shop for, but my souvenir/gift shopping is ahead of schedule and right on track. i hear that in past semesters students have frantically run around the last week trying to buy things and have marjorie make things, and that's NOT how i want to spend my last week in ghana (which is only FIVE weeks away!).

if you want something made and haven't let me know, please let me know soon. we are making another trip to makola on thursday where i will probably buy my last batch of fabric. if you don't know what you want yet, but know that you want something, at least just let me know the colors you like so i can go ahead and get the fabric--we can talk designs later.

besides coming home from the hospital to an abundance of marjorie creations, today was a great day! i saw gillian twice at the hospital. HOPEFULLY she [better] will be released tomorrow, once the results come back from several tests she's waiting on. thanks for your continued prayers. she's in great spirits and feels much, much better. just ready to get out of that damned hospital. i don't blame her.

i am in great spirits, too, after that renewing trip to woe and an overall easy and good week thus far class-wise. one of my friend's sister's is here visiting for 10 days, so hopefully we can take her to all the places we went the first few weeks we were here, when everything was new and exciting and overwhelming.

miss you all so much but will see you VERY soon!

love love love

back from woe

woe was so much fun! just what i needed/wanted! we spent most of saturday just touring around our professor's hometown (not village, as he reprimanded gaby for). apparently, a town is anything that has more than 5,000 inhabitants, and woe has 7,000, so it's doing pretty well.

we got to woe around 11 and visited our prof's house, which is definitely one of the nicest in woe. that's to say, it's actually got a foundation and is painted on the outside. most of the homes in way are either made with cinder blocks or mud, and many resemble the mud huts you'd suspect to find in an "african" town.

woe is a huge fishing community, as it has the atlantic ocean on one side of it, and a large, knee-deep lagoon on the other side. fresh catch is sold in baskets on the side of the road, and if you slow down too much on these roads, your car will be bombarded on all sides with fishermen selling fish they probably caught 30 minutes prior. so cool! if you check out my entire album from the trip (link below) you will see what i'm talking about.

saturday is funeral day in woe, and we saw our fair share of funeral processions and mourners. traditional funeral clothing can be one of three colors: red, white, or black. surprisingly enough, red and white are worn exclusively for people who have passed in old age. it is actually disrespectful to wear black to an elder's funeral. black is reserved for funerals of young people. this is true of all of ghana, though in woe, specifically, we saw many people wearing black (we found out later that one funeral was for a 33 year old man who died in a car accident).

we went to the beach, saw fishermen pulling in nets that are literally miles out in the ocean (again, photos in my full album). we also visited a beach location were about 200 years ago, after the abolition of the slave trade (not slavery), british soldiers tricked 100 ghanaian musicians to come on board the ship to "entertain them" while they were docked, only for the ship to take off with all 100 ghanaians on board. they were taken to cuba and sold in the illegal slave trade, never to be seen again. kind of ironic when you're standing in one of the most beautiful places you've ever been.
mallory, emma, prof, chris (an RA), me, and gaby

my favorite part of the trip was getting to see a performance our professor organized! he is the "owner" of a children's cultural group in woe. the kids range from 9 to about 15 years old, and they are AMAZING and music and dancing. there were probably 15 kids playing different times of percussion--drums, various bells, etc.-- and probably 10 (5 girls, 5 boys) kids doing traditional ewe dances to the music. they were SO SO great. i think africans just have this natural rhythm and ability to move their body in completely rhythmic, flexible ways that us obrunis just do not have. at one point they brought us up and tried to teach us to dance, but we were terrible. still, it was SO much fun, and i don't know if i've laughed at myself that hard in a while.

the kid playing the big drum, standing up, was incredible
a traditional ewe dance
and then the obrunis gave it a shot. not quite as synchronized, eh?

needless to say, the trip was a great success. there were only four of us who went because three of the other students in the class (including gillian) were sick. but us girls had a great time, and it was good to be in a new environment. the dance/cultural group last night really reminded me of why i love ghana. it was quite refreshing and really really fun.

hope your weekends were good, too! i don't have a busy week ahead of me, which is nice. gillian should get out of the hospital tomorrow, fingers crossed, though they're still waiting on results of some of her tests. her mom is coming on sunday for about 10 days, so we're really looking forward to having a mom around, and for her to bring us lots of american goodies!

love love love!


*so i think i figured out what i was doing wrong in the other links i would post to the full albums online. this one should work. to view the rest of the pictures, click here:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=114853&id=616486619&l=883494e8f6

for my morocco albums, click:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=111893&id=616486619&l=25051443ab

and

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=112175&id=616486619&l=7f15941798

woe (way)

just a quick blog to let you know that tomorrow i'm traveling with my society, culture and modernization class to our professor's hometown of woe (pronounced way). google magic tells me it's a few hours east of accra. google woe, ghana for more info and a very tiny wikipedia article on the town. we're staying in a hotel, though i think we are having dinner at our professor's house. should be an interesting experience, and will be a fun little overnight getaway from accra and all that it entails.

thanks for all the prayers, everyone. i find myself in better spirits today. got to talk to my mom today, who is an angel. and a saint. and a friend. and pretty much the best person in the world. this made me feel better.

i also got a letter from amanda (!!!). mmm how letters from dear friends brighten my day.

i am blessed beyond belief and need to constantly remind myself of this when i start getting in my complaining moods. thanks for your prayers, all. sending prayers your way over the atlantic.

love love love

"hope is here"

i am really, really tired. physically and emotionally. and for some of you i've expressed this privately via emails, but i guess if this blog is supposed to accurately depict my entire time in ghana, the bad must go with the good.

first, gillian is still not feeling well. we made another hospital visit tonight. they are going to run extensive tests to finally get to the bottom of all this. she is staying overnight, which i think is the best call. julia (our RA) and i will go back to the hospital early (like 5 am) in the morning to be with her as she gets more tests done. which means i really should be sleeping right now, but what's new.

at the hospital right before i was going to leave, gillian got a phone call from our associate director, krista, who was just checking up on her. she told krista i was about to leave as "hope is here." what she meant was hope, our night driver, is here to pick me up, but i interpreted that a totally different way. hope is here. part of romans 12 says, "Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer."

this verse really has hit me for a few reasons. a) joyful in hope. i have hope in a lot of things right now. hope that gillian will get better. hope that our time here will be/has been/is fruitful. hope in the future. hope in love. hope in humanity. b) patient in affliction. boy, couldn't have said it better myself. every night and every day, in my journal, in my head, and with gillian, i pray for patience. patience with the people here, patience with myself, patience with time. patience when i am most frustrated with ghana. c) faithful in prayer. i think god has really, really put prayer on my heart since morocco. the staff at the village of hope does prayer walks daily, where they walk around the voh campus, stopping at various houses or the school or the fences that border off the village and say a prayer for each location, and for the sustenance each place/location/venue will bring to the village. i think this had a profound effect on me, and i have really really been not only dedicated to, but moved to and want to, pray continually. since morocco, gillian and i have (tried to) pray every night together before she goes to bed. i find myself asking for prayer and praying for people much more frequently. and when i say i'm praying for you, please know i mean it. anyway, all that being said, i delight in being faithful in prayer. i just want to share that with you, praise god. but this verse above, in general, sums up what i think should be our ghana motto from here on out. i am trying.

for my sake, i am listing a few things on my list of things to pray about that i keep in my journal. some are totally stream of consciousness and 1 time deals, others we (gillian and i) pray about daily. if you are inclined, feel free to pray for these things too. i think honesty in our wants, desires and requests are imperative. and if we are to do as those verses say, let us be devoted to one another in brotherly (or sisterly) love.

here goes: for the safety, protection and happiness of our friends, family and loved ones in texas, seattle, new york and florida. for our navigators family. for the kids/staff/spirit of the village of hope. for ourselves- patience, joy, humility. for our friendship (mine and gillian's). for our friends here in ghana. for our relationships with our friends at home and in new york, that they may be just as strong when we return as they were when we left. for health, specifically for gillian's physical healing and peace of mind. for our hearts. for the future. for ghana and the people of ghana.

the list could/does go on quite a bit more, but this is enough for the world wide web.

i am heading to bed, as i have to wake up in 5 hours.

love love love

edit: this was written last night, before my internet went out. and before i spent the rest of the night puking my guts out (don’t have the slightest idea why). welcome to africa.