I am starting to like homestay even better now that the town is getting used to us and my mom is serving me better food (or I’m getting used to some Ghanaian food). I am called obruni much less now and people are not as fascinated by us, so they leave us alone more. Some highlights of homestay so far are: playing football with the guys in town, learning some Ghanaian dancing and drumming with about 50 kids watching, drinking cold orange juice with the queen mother, and dancing in front of the chief and most of the town at a festival. For this festival, we were planning to meet the chief in the next town for their festival, but the community here saw us walking with firewood (the traditional gift for the festival) and told the chief that we were coming to see him. We could not disappoint the whole community, so we waited while the Peace Corps people went to get schnapps to also bring to the chief and then went to the festival in our town. The community waited for over an hour for us to show up and then made us unexpectedly dance in front of them. It was fun, but mostly funny. Also, I am apparently part of the queen mother’s family, which means I got a ride to church on Sunday (yes, I went to church) in a Mercedes and then went to her house after for snacks and COLD orange juice.
Anything cold here is amazing! We are obsessed with this treat called fanmilk, which is like frozen yogurt in a bag. There are three flavors but chocolate is my favorite, it is like frozen chocolate milk and then the end is like cold chocolate milk, both delicious! I even had an “ice cream cone” the other day, which was like sherbet on a cone and I am obsessed with having cold fanta whenever I can. In case I ever complain about running out of money here, it went toward cold items and my phone.
Which brings me to my next story: I got a phone. This was a project and a half and is still not finished. So, we heard that the phones were cheaper in the official store. After asking many people for directions, we finally got a cab there and found out that they are cheaper, but they are locked and cannot be unlocked. This means that we could only use one service provider and never switch, which is very inconvenient here. So, we went to another store to buy unlocked phones. Well, those were locked too and the system to unlock them was apparently down. After a long hassle, we bought the phones anyway. Later, we find out that our phones will not receive calls or texts. A nice guy at an internet café fixed mine for me, but I still cannot receive international texts, which definitely sucks. I’m hoping to get that fixed when I get the phone unlocked. We’ll see, but for now, feel free to call me, I will put my number in my next mass email.
Today, my language group went to one of the neighboring towns to meet a Dagomba family, who speak Dagbani. We just showed up at their door unexpectedly and asked if they would help us learn Dagbani and, being typical Ghanaians, they invited us right in and were excited to help. It was great, except that we found out we were pronouncing some things totally wrong and they had other meanings the way we were saying them. This language is going to be very hard. For example, there are four words that sound very similar that mean: I reached my destination, thank you, my wife, and giving someone praise. Very different meanings, but very similar words. Luckily, the family said we could come over like once a week and talk with them, so this should help a lot before we get to site and realize we know nothing. They also gave us Dagomba names based on words that sound like our names, and mine meant something like “no one likes me”, clearly fitting for me.
And by Meredith's request, the new word is Gafarra, and it means excuse me or is what you say when you approach someone's house and want to know if they are home. The response is Garima.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
First update from Ghana
Sorry this is so long, but here goes...
Hello Everyone!
I’m sure you are looking for updates on my Ghana adventures. We are just now getting into the intense part of training. For the first two weeks, we got an orientation into Ghana, which included learning that nothing is ever on time and patience is seriously a virtue. We spent the first week or so in Accra, the capital, where we were introduced to all the Peace Corps staff and mainly got to know each other. During that time we went on an “Accra Quest” in which we were split into groups and sent into Accra on our own to find certain places. It was fun to learn about the public transportation here and actually be on our own for a while. My group went to the National Theatre, which is a beautiful building, and to a tro-tro station. We finished early so we decided to have a snack under a nice tree, but it started “raining”, which meant that it was barely sprinkling, and a worker at a bar (called a “spot” here) invited us to sit in there to get shelter from the rain. One thing about Ghana, and I think most of Africa, is life stops when it rains. I LOVE when it rains because it cools everything down, but they think that I am weird for that.
After our week in Accra, we were sent out on a “Vision Quest”, where we went to spend 5 days with a current volunteer in our sector to see what they do and how they live. We were supposed to travel to this alone too, but there were 7 of us going to the Northern Volta region, so we traveled in a group to that too. That region has the worst roads and the worst tro-tros in the whole country. It was ridiculous. I took a full day to get to my host’s site and by the time I got there my skin and clothes were a completely different color because of all the dust. I had to take three tro-tros and a car to get to her site. It was quite the adventure. In her site, she has the bare minimum requirements for housing. She has a bedroom, a kitchen, a courtyard, a latrine, and a bathing area. However, the courtyard is shared with her landlord and his wife who live in the room next to her and the latrine and bathing area are shared with about 15 people. Everyone in the town was very nice though and I enjoyed my time with her. The town has no electricity and is very small and remote. They have a primary school (elementary school), but the teachers only show up about once a week or less, so we went and taught a couple of lessons for fun. They have a clinic, too, which is good for such a small town. We got the kids to plant a Morenga garden next to the clinic one morning before school, which was a good health/environment project. Morenga is a tree that grows very nutritious fruit and can be used for many different things, and every part of the tree can be used. It is one of the things that peace corps is pushing a lot now to promote good nutrition and it is easy to grow around here. I also learned how to cook on a coal pot and learned a couple of good recipes. Overall, it was fun and I got to realize some of the struggles I will have at site, so I will be prepared to deal with those when I start.
Then, we stayed in a hotel in Kukurantumi, a couple hours outside of Accra, for a few nights. During this time we had our site interviews, learned some survival Twi, and had a lot of free time. On those nights, we also went out to a spot a lot and got to really hang out socially. It was a lot of fun, and don’t worry mom, I only had one beer and mostly drank fanta. I don’t see the fun in getting drunk when you have to be up at 6am everyday. Oh yea, I forgot to mention that I have not slept past 6:30am since I was home, and typically wake up by 5:30 without an alarm, it’s kind of scaring me a little bit.
Now, we finally found out where our sites will be, who our neighbors will be, and what language we will be learning. I will be in the Northern Region, in a village called Voguu. It has a population of about 1600 and has no electricity in the whole town. I am learning the language Dagbani. There are four of us learning that language and I will have quite a few close neighbors. The other trainees that will be close to me are really great and I am guessing the volunteers who are already there are great too. I will be doing a lot of work with guinea worm and HIV/AIDS, so I am very excited about that. I will have my own house, which will be a cement house with a zinc roof. It obviously has no electricity, but has a bucket flush toilet and a bathing room to take bucket baths (which I really like, by the way). It has a bedroom and a living room. I don’t know about the cooking facilities, but I hope to get a little propane stove because I am not too far outside of a major city, so I will be able to refill the tank when I need to. Also, I’m almost an expert on a coal pot by now, haha.
We also are finally at homestay. I am living in an interesting house. My host mom is an older woman whose children are grown and live in Accra and Canada. There are no kids. She also rents rooms to a teacher and a driver. The teacher is a 22 year old girl who speaks English very well and is fun to talk to and hang out with. I am very glad she is living here. The driver is never around because he drives a taxi, but he is a nice guy about my age as well. Soon I hope to start cooking with my host mom so that I can learn to cook Ghanaian food, and learn to cook in general. Since I am still a guest, she makes me eat alone in my room, which bothers most people, but I kind of like it and don’t know if I am going to ask to eat with her anytime soon. Tonight I played football (soccer) with a couple other trainees and a ton of the guys in the town. The guys are really good and we looked like fools, but it was really fun and one of the other girls actually scored a goal. It was so nice to finally do something active again and I think I will keep playing with them a few days a week. Oh yea, one bad thing about my homestay is that there are GIANT cockroaches in my “toilet”, which is a toilet type structure over a latrine, so I had to sweep a huge cockroach into the latrine before I could squat over this thing to do my business. And for those of you who do not know what a latrine is, it is a huge hole in the ground that you build an outhouse over with a hole in the bottom and you poop into the hole in the ground, obviously a very pleasant place.
So, that is my life in Ghana thus far. I am sure there are a million things I left out, but I’m also sure you are tired of reading by now, so I will stop. Hopefully if I start updating more often, I will have less to write each time.
I miss you all, but I am very happy here and am looking forward to living here for two years. Please send me letters or cards. Packages are nice too. I was so excited when I my first letter, which was from Auntie Paula (thank you!). I am trying to write letters too, but it costs 1.5 Ghana Cedi to send a letter and right now we are making 2 Ghana Cedi per day, so don’t expect too many letters while I am in training. You can send me emails, too. I’ll leave you by saying “tin nya taba”, which means see you later in Dagbani.
Hello Everyone!
I’m sure you are looking for updates on my Ghana adventures. We are just now getting into the intense part of training. For the first two weeks, we got an orientation into Ghana, which included learning that nothing is ever on time and patience is seriously a virtue. We spent the first week or so in Accra, the capital, where we were introduced to all the Peace Corps staff and mainly got to know each other. During that time we went on an “Accra Quest” in which we were split into groups and sent into Accra on our own to find certain places. It was fun to learn about the public transportation here and actually be on our own for a while. My group went to the National Theatre, which is a beautiful building, and to a tro-tro station. We finished early so we decided to have a snack under a nice tree, but it started “raining”, which meant that it was barely sprinkling, and a worker at a bar (called a “spot” here) invited us to sit in there to get shelter from the rain. One thing about Ghana, and I think most of Africa, is life stops when it rains. I LOVE when it rains because it cools everything down, but they think that I am weird for that.
After our week in Accra, we were sent out on a “Vision Quest”, where we went to spend 5 days with a current volunteer in our sector to see what they do and how they live. We were supposed to travel to this alone too, but there were 7 of us going to the Northern Volta region, so we traveled in a group to that too. That region has the worst roads and the worst tro-tros in the whole country. It was ridiculous. I took a full day to get to my host’s site and by the time I got there my skin and clothes were a completely different color because of all the dust. I had to take three tro-tros and a car to get to her site. It was quite the adventure. In her site, she has the bare minimum requirements for housing. She has a bedroom, a kitchen, a courtyard, a latrine, and a bathing area. However, the courtyard is shared with her landlord and his wife who live in the room next to her and the latrine and bathing area are shared with about 15 people. Everyone in the town was very nice though and I enjoyed my time with her. The town has no electricity and is very small and remote. They have a primary school (elementary school), but the teachers only show up about once a week or less, so we went and taught a couple of lessons for fun. They have a clinic, too, which is good for such a small town. We got the kids to plant a Morenga garden next to the clinic one morning before school, which was a good health/environment project. Morenga is a tree that grows very nutritious fruit and can be used for many different things, and every part of the tree can be used. It is one of the things that peace corps is pushing a lot now to promote good nutrition and it is easy to grow around here. I also learned how to cook on a coal pot and learned a couple of good recipes. Overall, it was fun and I got to realize some of the struggles I will have at site, so I will be prepared to deal with those when I start.
Then, we stayed in a hotel in Kukurantumi, a couple hours outside of Accra, for a few nights. During this time we had our site interviews, learned some survival Twi, and had a lot of free time. On those nights, we also went out to a spot a lot and got to really hang out socially. It was a lot of fun, and don’t worry mom, I only had one beer and mostly drank fanta. I don’t see the fun in getting drunk when you have to be up at 6am everyday. Oh yea, I forgot to mention that I have not slept past 6:30am since I was home, and typically wake up by 5:30 without an alarm, it’s kind of scaring me a little bit.
Now, we finally found out where our sites will be, who our neighbors will be, and what language we will be learning. I will be in the Northern Region, in a village called Voguu. It has a population of about 1600 and has no electricity in the whole town. I am learning the language Dagbani. There are four of us learning that language and I will have quite a few close neighbors. The other trainees that will be close to me are really great and I am guessing the volunteers who are already there are great too. I will be doing a lot of work with guinea worm and HIV/AIDS, so I am very excited about that. I will have my own house, which will be a cement house with a zinc roof. It obviously has no electricity, but has a bucket flush toilet and a bathing room to take bucket baths (which I really like, by the way). It has a bedroom and a living room. I don’t know about the cooking facilities, but I hope to get a little propane stove because I am not too far outside of a major city, so I will be able to refill the tank when I need to. Also, I’m almost an expert on a coal pot by now, haha.
We also are finally at homestay. I am living in an interesting house. My host mom is an older woman whose children are grown and live in Accra and Canada. There are no kids. She also rents rooms to a teacher and a driver. The teacher is a 22 year old girl who speaks English very well and is fun to talk to and hang out with. I am very glad she is living here. The driver is never around because he drives a taxi, but he is a nice guy about my age as well. Soon I hope to start cooking with my host mom so that I can learn to cook Ghanaian food, and learn to cook in general. Since I am still a guest, she makes me eat alone in my room, which bothers most people, but I kind of like it and don’t know if I am going to ask to eat with her anytime soon. Tonight I played football (soccer) with a couple other trainees and a ton of the guys in the town. The guys are really good and we looked like fools, but it was really fun and one of the other girls actually scored a goal. It was so nice to finally do something active again and I think I will keep playing with them a few days a week. Oh yea, one bad thing about my homestay is that there are GIANT cockroaches in my “toilet”, which is a toilet type structure over a latrine, so I had to sweep a huge cockroach into the latrine before I could squat over this thing to do my business. And for those of you who do not know what a latrine is, it is a huge hole in the ground that you build an outhouse over with a hole in the bottom and you poop into the hole in the ground, obviously a very pleasant place.
So, that is my life in Ghana thus far. I am sure there are a million things I left out, but I’m also sure you are tired of reading by now, so I will stop. Hopefully if I start updating more often, I will have less to write each time.
I miss you all, but I am very happy here and am looking forward to living here for two years. Please send me letters or cards. Packages are nice too. I was so excited when I my first letter, which was from Auntie Paula (thank you!). I am trying to write letters too, but it costs 1.5 Ghana Cedi to send a letter and right now we are making 2 Ghana Cedi per day, so don’t expect too many letters while I am in training. You can send me emails, too. I’ll leave you by saying “tin nya taba”, which means see you later in Dagbani.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
News From Julie
Hi,
I am doing well. I am having fun and getting ready to really start training now. We are on our way back from vision quest where we got to stay at someone's site for about 5 days. I was at a site way out in the middle of nowhere with no electricity or running water. It was fun and opened my eyes to a lot of the issues I will have to deal with. I will be fine with the living conditions, but we'll see about dealing with the community issues because there are many. I am excited to find out where my site is next week. We have our site interviews in the next couple of days, and then we find out where we are going and start learning the language. I don't have much time right now, but thought I should let you know that I am doing well and having fun. I dont have my address book with me so I don't have other email addresses, so please spread the word that I am doing well and I am happy. Mom, you can update my blog if you want. Oh yea, and I think I am getting a phone sometime in the next week or two so I will let you know my number and all that.
Love and miss you all!
Julie
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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I am doing well. I am having fun and getting ready to really start training now. We are on our way back from vision quest where we got to stay at someone's site for about 5 days. I was at a site way out in the middle of nowhere with no electricity or running water. It was fun and opened my eyes to a lot of the issues I will have to deal with. I will be fine with the living conditions, but we'll see about dealing with the community issues because there are many. I am excited to find out where my site is next week. We have our site interviews in the next couple of days, and then we find out where we are going and start learning the language. I don't have much time right now, but thought I should let you know that I am doing well and having fun. I dont have my address book with me so I don't have other email addresses, so please spread the word that I am doing well and I am happy. Mom, you can update my blog if you want. Oh yea, and I think I am getting a phone sometime in the next week or two so I will let you know my number and all that.
Love and miss you all!
Julie
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Tuesday, June 9, 2009
News From Ghana
I just found this email from the Peace Corps FINALLY!!!
Hello to all friends and family of Peace Corps Ghana. I sent thise-mail to you last week. Unfortunately, I have learned that many of you did not receive it due to internet problems here in Ghana. We have created this gmail account to send e-mails like this only until the problem is fixed, so please do not respond to this address, as I will not be checking it regularly. We can receive e-mail at our Peace Corpse-mail address, the problem is limited to sending e-mail only. Thanks for your patience.
Greetings! The 67 newest members of our Peace Corps Ghana family arrived safely in Accra yesterday morning. More incredibly, every piece of luggage arrived as well! They all are a bit tired from the trip, and we have them fully engaged in the first phase of training here in Accra, so Iwanted to take this opportunity to let you know that although you may not have heard from them yet, they are doing well. During the first few weeks they will be very busy and will have limited opportunities to access the internet and phones. Usually after the first week or two, our Trainees begin to establish regular communication with family and friends back home. Yesterday, they enjoyed a traditional welcome ceremony with staff and religious leaders, and then uttered a collective groan as they had to fill out yet more medical and administrative paperwork. Today, they are completing the required paperwork, touring our offices, and obtaining photo ID cards. This weekend, they will have a chance to explore Accra, Ghana's capital, under the watchful eye of some of our more experienced Volunteers. On Monday, they will attend a welcome reception at the U.S. Ambassador to Ghana's residence (Ambassador Teitelbaum) and will then enjoy their last evening of "hotel-style luxury" before venturing out to some of the more rural areas of Ghana to visit currently serving Volunteers. They will see first hand what kinds of experiences await them ten short weeks from now when they "swear-in" as Peace Corps Volunteers. Peace Corps Ghana staff are very energized to have the new group here and we are looking forward to getting to know them during the next 10 weeks of training. Thank you for providing moral support to your friends and family members as they embark on their Peace Corps service here in Ghana. We are very excited that they have arrived safely and in good spirits! I hope that you are looking forward to sharing the experience with them. All the best, Mike Koffman
Michael KoffmanCountry DirectorPeace Corps -
GhanaP.O. Box 5796
Accra-NorthOffice
Tel. 233-21-773-831
Mobile Tel. 233-27-755-0027
mkoffman@gh.peacecorps.gov
Hello to all friends and family of Peace Corps Ghana. I sent thise-mail to you last week. Unfortunately, I have learned that many of you did not receive it due to internet problems here in Ghana. We have created this gmail account to send e-mails like this only until the problem is fixed, so please do not respond to this address, as I will not be checking it regularly. We can receive e-mail at our Peace Corpse-mail address, the problem is limited to sending e-mail only. Thanks for your patience.
Greetings! The 67 newest members of our Peace Corps Ghana family arrived safely in Accra yesterday morning. More incredibly, every piece of luggage arrived as well! They all are a bit tired from the trip, and we have them fully engaged in the first phase of training here in Accra, so Iwanted to take this opportunity to let you know that although you may not have heard from them yet, they are doing well. During the first few weeks they will be very busy and will have limited opportunities to access the internet and phones. Usually after the first week or two, our Trainees begin to establish regular communication with family and friends back home. Yesterday, they enjoyed a traditional welcome ceremony with staff and religious leaders, and then uttered a collective groan as they had to fill out yet more medical and administrative paperwork. Today, they are completing the required paperwork, touring our offices, and obtaining photo ID cards. This weekend, they will have a chance to explore Accra, Ghana's capital, under the watchful eye of some of our more experienced Volunteers. On Monday, they will attend a welcome reception at the U.S. Ambassador to Ghana's residence (Ambassador Teitelbaum) and will then enjoy their last evening of "hotel-style luxury" before venturing out to some of the more rural areas of Ghana to visit currently serving Volunteers. They will see first hand what kinds of experiences await them ten short weeks from now when they "swear-in" as Peace Corps Volunteers. Peace Corps Ghana staff are very energized to have the new group here and we are looking forward to getting to know them during the next 10 weeks of training. Thank you for providing moral support to your friends and family members as they embark on their Peace Corps service here in Ghana. We are very excited that they have arrived safely and in good spirits! I hope that you are looking forward to sharing the experience with them. All the best, Mike Koffman
Michael KoffmanCountry DirectorPeace Corps -
GhanaP.O. Box 5796
Accra-NorthOffice
Tel. 233-21-773-831
Mobile Tel. 233-27-755-0027
mkoffman@gh.peacecorps.gov
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Travel update
Julie left for Philadelphia Tuesday morning and has officially begun her Peace Corp orientation.She has met up with other voluntees who are very supportive and lots of fun. They are driving to New York where they will take a direct flight to Ghana (11 hours). Her flight leaves at 6PM so once again when you think about her say a little prayer for her and all of her new friends. They are beginning a wonderful life changing experience.
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