Life Update

I’m sorry it has been a while since my last entry, but the internet has been down a lot at the Tamale office and I don’t have a lot of patience for slow internet cafés. Things have been going very well though. I did some HIV/AIDS work in the community for a couple of weeks. I taught about the biology of HIV/AIDS and how HIV is transmitted in the junior high school. I did a bunch of condom demonstrations, and we had a testing day where 98 people got tested, which is really good. I was excited that it went so well.

All of the HIV work was in preparation for the testing day and for a film showing that we also had. The girl that I replaced at this site was a videographer and made a film about Kayayo when she was here. Kayayo is a term for when young adults travel to Kumasi or Accra (the big cities) to work in the markets. They do this because there is not much work for them in the north and there is not much money in farming like their families do. In theory it is a good idea, but in practice it can be very dangerous. They live near the markets in very poor areas that have high crime rates and frequent fires that destroy dozens of their homes at a time and often kill people. They also tend to find significant others while they’re there and may come back with an unwanted pregnancy or an STD.

Alicia, the girl I replaced, came to show the film and another RPCV (returned Peace Corps volunteer) who is a photographer, and took photos of Kayayo, came to show his photos with the movie. They also brought a crew of singers/actors to put on a show for the village before the movie. Literally half of my village showed up to the movie and then we had the very successful testing day after. It was a very eventful two days, but the village loved it and I was really happy to see that people here are very willing to work with me.

Another project I am working on is the Village Bicycle Project. This is an organization that gets bikes donated from the US and Britain and fixes them up for people living in poor villages in Africa. They sell them to the villagers at about half the price of a normal bike and have an 8 hour workshop to teach bicycle maintenance. It’s great for the villagers because they can farm in areas farther away and therefore have bigger farms. It also makes life easier in general, considering our closest market is at least a 20 minute bike ride away (if riding fast). It is turning out to be a lot of work already though, and I am just starting it. However, if I successfully do this, I think my village will love me forever.

Outside of work stuff, I went to Accra for Thanksgiving, along with about 70 other volunteers. The US Ambassador invited all of us to his house for Thanksgiving dinner. It was incredibly generous of him and a delicious dinner. We had all the traditional Thanksgiving foods, along with an open bar with beer and wine (and sangria that the Ambassador kept making). He also let us swim in his pool before the dinner. He also invited some people who work at the embassy and Fulbright scholars that are working here.

The peace corps was great about getting accommodations for us when we went there, too. We were all hosted by Peace Corps or embassy workers. I ended up staying with an embassy worker who I have a connection with from home (not by coincidence, I called him on my way down). It turns out that my pediatrician’s son works at the embassy, and since my mom is a labor and delivery nurse, she is still friends with my pediatrician. So, she got his contact information for me and I called him to say I would be in Accra. He offered to let me stay with his family at their house, which is gorgeous, and they were wonderful to me the whole time. I was worried that I would be sad to be away from my family on Thanksgiving, but it was actually a great holiday.

That’s it for my update, but I have heard that people also want to know what I would like for Christmas packages. People have done really well with sending good packages so far, but here’s what I can think of off the top of my head:
Candy (chocolate especially), cookies (not homemade, they don’t travel as well), parmesan cheese, mac-n-cheese packets, drink mixes, snack foods, spices, any food items you think will travel well, photos of all of you, news magazines (not celebrity gossip), and random surprises are always good.