OH GHANA

OH GHANA is what we say when something ridiculous happens or something gets messed up,so we say this a lot, and I am saying it with regards to the last attempt at posting, which didn't post, a prime example of when to use the Oh Ghana expression.

So anywayyyyy... So let me try and catch up. I have been teaching now for almost a month, I have two classes, Jr High 1 and Jr High 2, I teach them English, Social Studies and Library (reading time). The Love school is my new Monday to Friday place I am teaching at, I must be

at school by 7:30 and teach till 3pm. I wake up every weekday at 5:30am right before the sun comes up. It is better to get up early and do things before it gets too hot. This is so the case (getting up early) that I think I sleep late on Saturday and Sunday when I wake up at 7am! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Ironic fact: it is about 96 degrees on

average during the day so when it is night and about 75-77 degrees I am FREEZING wearing pants and a long-sleeve tshirt.

Since I wrote last I went to Labadi beach and saw crazy stuff! Hope the beach pictures worked, but Labadi is known as Pleasure Beach, even though "Labadi" means bad...

Teaching is really cool, the students had to come around, but I love teaching the Jr High 2 students,

and the Jr High 1 class is slowly coming around. The headmaster is an ass but his daughter Harriet is super cute! I will try to remember to bring my camera to school next week and take pictures of my class; it isn't likely that the pictures would even load though since Ghana's internet is slower than the internet

used in the early 80's!

What else, o yea Ghana is a petting-zoo with goats, chickens, ducks, all wandering around... in fact a goat followed me home the other day. Dogs and cats also walk around here randomly, no leash, no rabies shots or collars. It is great when a dog or cat runs by or a chicken and scares the crap out of you! The men here are also like animals, calling out marriage proposals and screaming "obruni" which is "white girl" and cat-calling

(kissing noises or tssssssss sounds) it is super great, yea side note sarcasm is non-existent in Ghana.

So far I have not traveled THAT much, went to a beach in the Eastern Region called Prampram - it was gross men were just squatting and pooping all over the beach... I did not go swimming!

Also this past weekend I went to a place North of Accra called Aburi, pretty and very different than where I live in Nungua. I had gone to Aburi to see a tribal festival but my new roommate, Nora, and I missed it... o well! So we walked around and saw a different view of the area, it was seeing the real town, not anything a tourist would see. (Overall I am not really seeing the "tourist"

Ghana but rather have seen the real and truthful Ghana. I won't get into it in the blog about all that I have learned but basically it has been making me really think about going to grad school for some

sort of international type of work...I know I was at

GW and did Art History IRONIC!) When I get to travel and even just talking with the people here and with my new friends I can't help but to get upset at the mistreatment of the Ghanaian people and the corruption of the government. But back to Aburi... after leaving Nora and I headed back home on the tro-tro (a broken down old old OLD OLD mini-van) to Accra, went to Makola market to get fabric to take to the seamstresses to make clothing and such... if anyone wants African clothing send me your measurements!

But on a positive note, my host brother is super chill, and he has taken me as his sister and I have met his friends who are all super chill too and watch out for me while I am here (Mom be happy - you too Nana). Two of them (Joe and Martin) took me to a football game this past Sunday, Accra won, and it was my second football game I have ever seen (first was Ghana versus Brazil in the Under 20 tournament - whatever that means!) I hope to add pictures of the game as well. The stadium and the rules are sooooooooo different from at home, people smoke in the stadiums, don't sell alcohol, the people carry the food and water on their heads in buckets (different buckets from the ones I use to shower with - yea remember no running water, that even means no water to flush a toilet with).

Upcoming plans are a funeral next weekend on Thursday or Friday, camping the rest of the weekend at Coco Betei on the beach with new friends (no I have no ex-pat friends just Ghanaians hahaha). Jeez waiting on these pictures to upload is costing me way too many cedis!!!

P.S. When I get chances I will continue to upload more pictures