This past weekend we went on our long awaited and once rescheduled trip to northern Ghana. Our primary destination was Mole National Park which is the biggest park in Ghana and has elephants. However, especially with the condition of Ghana's roads, it is quite a trip to get up there... and that is assuming your vehicles don't break down or things of that sort, things which our vehicles did.
We left Friday morning in our very nice, spacious air conditioned bus which even had a dvd player. Watching an American movie and then looking out the window and seeing a NPP political rally is somewhat of an odd culture shock. Friday was our short day as we only were going as far as Kumase, and we arrived around five at our hotel, had dinner and a relaxing evening just hanging out. All good so far.
Friday evening we decided to try and get an early start for our long day Saturday and so started out an hour earlier than was originally planned. It was good we did because at around 10 in the morning, our bus came to a stop, and we spent the next three hours stranded in this random village. Actually, being stranded was one of the highlights of the weekend because we just wandered around the village and entertained the villagers with our very broken attempts at Twi. I walked around with three other girls and everywhere we went people told us to come and talk, and women and children would gather around and laugh at us but not in a mean way for we were laughing at ourselves. They were all very sympathetic of our stranded state. Still, even with those perks, three hours got long. Another bus was supposed to come, but to nobodies real surprise, it didn't show up and after three hours they had gotten the bus running again... We have come to the point where we are surprised not when things don't work but rather when they do or when things really are when they are supposed to be...
Our next stop was at Kintampo Falls; waterfalls are one of Ghana's most spectacular attractions. This was my third waterfall, and they never cease to grow old. Kintampo also had the perk that at the third of the series of falls, and the biggest, it was safe to go swimming. It was a spectacular waterfall, and I was able to climb up the slippery rocks and sit for awhile under the waterfall, listening to its roar and watching others less succesful attempts to climb up. The slippery rocks seconded as a rather lucrative waterslide, which was fun going down, but posed the danger of some potential bruises.
Then after waiting another hour for Vivian, our amazing leader of the weekend who despite all the mishaps with vehicles and everything else always had a smile, to bring our lunch and our new transport for the final leg of the journey, we were packed onto two very rickety tro-tros, a sad second to our airconditioned bus, and spent the next four hours bumping along dusty dirt roads. By the time we arrived at Mole, everyone was caked in dust and ready for bed.
Sunday was our day to actually be at Mole, and it was an excellent day although we failed to see any elephants which was rather disappointing. We made the mistake of coming during mating season, so all the elephants were off doing what elephants do... Still, we got to go on two safari hikes where we saw baboons, different types of deer and warthogs, and even without the animals, hiking through the African bush and savanah is pretty awesome in and off itself. The biggest concentration of animals we found was around the piles of burning trash on the outskirts near a village... it was a strange and somewhat depressing sight to see them scavenging the burning rubbish...
Then, after our first hike we got to excursion into the nearby village of Larangba where we visited the mosque which is quite probably the oldest mosque in all of West Africa and certainly in Ghana dating back to at least 1421. It was built by the spiritual adviser to the king of that area(the name eludes me, for there were a great many kingdoms in West Africa; the Europeans made up the idea that Africa had no civilization prior to colonization and it was a lie...) The adviser himself had come from Medina in Saudi Arabia. We also got to visit the Mystic Stone which marks the place where this same adviser first settled, and which according to local lore refused to be moved when they tried and build a road through it and so remains. We were told that we should place our hands on it and pray for good husbands and they would be waiting for us when we went back to America, but we were skeptical and just in case they were right, most of the girls refused to touch it... most people in my program aren't in the market for husbands as of yet... we were a little more receptive when he said we should pray for the American elections... The mosque was super cool though, quite unique architecturally.
So yeah, Sunday was a good day even though our beds were infested with little bugs that were rather unnerving, and Monday we set out at five for the longest day ever! WE took our cramped tro-tros along the dusty, bumpy dirt road for four hours, and were almost met up again with our bus when one of the tro-tros broke down... go figure... so the bus came rather quickly and rescued us... Then after awhile we got a flat tire and spent a fun hour with a bunch of banana sellers. One of them decided I was her friend and gave me a lot of bananas and when her husband stopped by he said I should become his second wife(he was joking, but it was my first polygamous marriage proposal). Then we kept on, stopping for a very late lunch or early dinner in Kumase(it was supposed to be lunch) switching vehicles again from our original bus to another bus, and getting back to our hostel at eleven. Like I said, longest day ever. By the end of the trip, I was afraid everytime the bus hit a bump that it would blow a tire and everytime it stopped because of traffic that somehow the engine was dying. I mean, something else had to go wrong too, didn't it?
So yeah, overall, a good, long and at times challenging weekend, and I think this weekend the plan is to hang around Accra because I for one don't feel up to travelling again just yet, and I haven't done everything around here anyways and really should...
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Thursday, October 23, 2008
some midweek musings from a trip to the market
Yesterday, being Wednesday, was one of my freedays, and after a lazy morning, I went to Makola market located in central Accra with two other girls. None of us had been there before, as the other market Medina is a short ten minute tro-tro ride away, but we had heard it was better and had some good fabric. Ghana has beautiful fabrics whether patterned, tie and dye as they call it, or my personal favorite batiks... You can buy two yards for a cedi and get beautiful clothes made for very reasonable prices from any of the local seamstresses, and at markets, it gives one something to shop for and a purpose for being there which keeps one from being completely overwhelmed.
Anyways, the first musing stems from the tro-tro ride down, which definitely makes the list of most memorable tro-tro rides, up there with the flat tire and the time the door got stuck shut. Anyways, we caught the Accra tro-tro and all was well until we were quite near the Accra station and we hit traffic. There were police officers directing traffic, but despite the direction, our driver chose to blatantly disregard the officer and was pulled over. I think they were writing him a ticket, or checking to make sure he had a license and insurance... I never really know whats going on... One of the men on the bus though started talking and arguing with another officer out the window, something about how we were all being held up, how he wanted to get down and get his money back, again the details weren't clear... Eventually he and half the passengers decided to get down while we decided to stay on, not knowing exactly where we were... Apparently though when he got off the tro-tro the arguing men shoved a police officer, for the next minute all four of the officers were grabbing him and struggling with him(For he was sturggling quite fiercely) and forcing him, accompanied by one of the officers, back onto the tro-tro. By this point the man was apologizing profusely, but I think the officer was taking him into to report assault of an officer. It all happened very fast, was quite intense, and left me wondering if it wasn't an access of force... It certainly left me wondering what the relationship between the people and the police is here. I asked a friend once as a police station is located accross from campus, and she said at least as far as students were concerned, it wasn't so good, but she didn't explain...
The second somewhat bizarre occurence had to do with a cross-dressing market woman. Now some context is needed to explain why this was bizarre. Homosexuality is strictly illegal here, and in general people seem to have some pretty bizarre views. A girl in my program's Ghanaian roomate said it was a white man's disease, for example... There supposedly is an underground gay bar, or so I have heard, but this man was obviously a man(he had a beard) wearing a dress and selling wears off his head and being a woman... I am not sure of the technicalities of that sort of thing, but one had to wonder if he was endangering himself? Its illegal, but would people turn on you, or is it simply socially ostracized. I don't know, but it was bizarre...
Otherwise, Makola market was more crowded feeling than Medina and some people were quite aggressive, grabbing our wrists firmly to get us to look at their wares. It is quite daunting really. The woman are better than the men, but that is because you aren't afraid that they will hit on you and ask for your number or ask to marry you which honestly got old some time ago...
Fun fact about Ghanaian politics. The election to be held December 7 is drawing nearer, the candidates have drawn lots to determine their place on the ballot, campaign signs are everywhere... I heard on the radio the other day that the electoral commission is creating a provision which will allow any of the Muslim population who will be undertaking the Hajj, which overlaps the election, will able to vote by proxy(in other words, have somebody they establish beforehand and trust absolutely cast their ballot for them). Ghana doesn't have our system of absentee, rather others like the military or people wth the UN or students are also able to vote by proxy. It is a good sign of religious pluralism being alive and well in Ghana even if at least in the south the culture is overwhelmingly Christian.
In other news, I am heading north this weekend to see elephants and other sites of northern Ghana. What fun!
Anyways, the first musing stems from the tro-tro ride down, which definitely makes the list of most memorable tro-tro rides, up there with the flat tire and the time the door got stuck shut. Anyways, we caught the Accra tro-tro and all was well until we were quite near the Accra station and we hit traffic. There were police officers directing traffic, but despite the direction, our driver chose to blatantly disregard the officer and was pulled over. I think they were writing him a ticket, or checking to make sure he had a license and insurance... I never really know whats going on... One of the men on the bus though started talking and arguing with another officer out the window, something about how we were all being held up, how he wanted to get down and get his money back, again the details weren't clear... Eventually he and half the passengers decided to get down while we decided to stay on, not knowing exactly where we were... Apparently though when he got off the tro-tro the arguing men shoved a police officer, for the next minute all four of the officers were grabbing him and struggling with him(For he was sturggling quite fiercely) and forcing him, accompanied by one of the officers, back onto the tro-tro. By this point the man was apologizing profusely, but I think the officer was taking him into to report assault of an officer. It all happened very fast, was quite intense, and left me wondering if it wasn't an access of force... It certainly left me wondering what the relationship between the people and the police is here. I asked a friend once as a police station is located accross from campus, and she said at least as far as students were concerned, it wasn't so good, but she didn't explain...
The second somewhat bizarre occurence had to do with a cross-dressing market woman. Now some context is needed to explain why this was bizarre. Homosexuality is strictly illegal here, and in general people seem to have some pretty bizarre views. A girl in my program's Ghanaian roomate said it was a white man's disease, for example... There supposedly is an underground gay bar, or so I have heard, but this man was obviously a man(he had a beard) wearing a dress and selling wears off his head and being a woman... I am not sure of the technicalities of that sort of thing, but one had to wonder if he was endangering himself? Its illegal, but would people turn on you, or is it simply socially ostracized. I don't know, but it was bizarre...
Otherwise, Makola market was more crowded feeling than Medina and some people were quite aggressive, grabbing our wrists firmly to get us to look at their wares. It is quite daunting really. The woman are better than the men, but that is because you aren't afraid that they will hit on you and ask for your number or ask to marry you which honestly got old some time ago...
Fun fact about Ghanaian politics. The election to be held December 7 is drawing nearer, the candidates have drawn lots to determine their place on the ballot, campaign signs are everywhere... I heard on the radio the other day that the electoral commission is creating a provision which will allow any of the Muslim population who will be undertaking the Hajj, which overlaps the election, will able to vote by proxy(in other words, have somebody they establish beforehand and trust absolutely cast their ballot for them). Ghana doesn't have our system of absentee, rather others like the military or people wth the UN or students are also able to vote by proxy. It is a good sign of religious pluralism being alive and well in Ghana even if at least in the south the culture is overwhelmingly Christian.
In other news, I am heading north this weekend to see elephants and other sites of northern Ghana. What fun!
Sunday, October 19, 2008
A homestay, a waterfall, and a mountain...
My weekend was really good; Ghana is a beautiful country. We had a program trip that involved homestays in the town of Liati Wote which is by both one of Ghana's most beautiful waterfall, Tagbo Falls, and Ghanas tallest freestanding mountain, which we hiked this morning and was quite a hike. Ghana apparently doesn't believe in putting switchbacks in their trails, so the trail went practically straight up(and straight down which was more harrowing). It was a spectacular view from the top though! We could see the village down below and all the surrounding countryside. My pictures, as always, fail to give it justice.
We got to the village Saturday afternoon, were fed a delicious lunch, and then headed to the waterfall which really was spectacular although again my pictures failed to give it justice. Then we went back, met our host family. I stayed in a house with two other girls, and our host parents spoke rather patchy English but their son was in secondary school and he showed us around and I think showed us off a bit, introducing us to all of his friends. It was a pretty small village and Francis, the son, said one easily knew everyone. Saturday night they had a bonfire in the center of town for us, and traditional drumming and dancing. It was very festive, and while the dancers were good, my favorite people to watch were the children.
The hike this morning was, like I said, harrowing, and I am definitely sore from it. It took about an hour to get up, then we spent an hour at the summit, and then we hiked down again which was the hardest part and which we did at least in parts slipping and sliding...
Then the drive back which was uneventful; on the drive there our bus got a flat tire and the last stretch of road to Liati Wote, which was a dirt road full of potholes, seriously dented the bus and one could in places here the bottom scraping the ground which is never a good sound... actually, the road was there on the way out too, but Isaac, our driver, did a phenomenal job and once we finally made it to the pavement we all cheered.
I don't think I blogged last week, so a quick overview of random highlights like discovering that their was a vegan/vegetarian vendor in the nearby night market where I buy all my meals(tofu burgers are a nice break from rice...) and American politics, I stayed up until three the night of the debate and then Friday went to the American embassy and gave them my absentee ballot to mail in(I was told it was more reliable than Ghanaian post, and I want my vote to count!) Go Obama! Truly, it is quite strange being so far away when so much is going on at home with the election and now the economy as well! Other highlights probably include baby barf(just the normal white goo) and getting to simply hold the baby(his name is Barack; the children named him after Barack Obama I do believe).
Oh, this actually is almost worth of a post unto itself, but I'll attach it on the end. Friday night I went with a friend to the school production which was Lysistrata by Aristophanes which is essentially a play about women going on a sex strike to make their husbands, the Athenians and Spartans, form a truce and the men's ensuing agony over this deprivation and eventual compliance, and being Aristophanes it was decidedly crude. Now Ghanaians seem like a very conservative culture, but on Friday the audience, and the outlandish things they said in response to the play(not conservative at all) were just as entertaining as the play. Even though I struggled to understand the actors much of the time, it was a truly entertaining, and interesting, cultural experience...
Monday, October 13, 2008
Halfway...
So yesterday was the halfway point where I had been here two months and a day and still had two months and a day to go. It feels like it is going by fast, but it also feels like it will be the perfect amount of time. I know I won't want to go home until I do, but that I will be very glad when I do.
That said, I really haven't blogged in awhile, but I have been quite busy, or by busy perhaps I should mean away, for the last two weekends I went to the beach and that is anything but busy, rather relaxing and lazy and wonderful. With those two trips and then going to Boti Falls, I feel like I have been away from Accra more than in it recently, but that was the point.
Two weekends ago I went to a place called Ada Foah which is where the Volta River meets the sea and five other girls and myself stayed in grass huts(with mosquito netted beds) on the beach. I got sunburned, most painfully my lips... I didn't know one could sunburn there lips, but I now know that it is very unpleasant. This past weekend though I managed to avoid sunburn altogether.
Ada Foah was beautiful. We went Friday and came back Sunday which meant a full day at the beach. We had to take a canoe to get there, and because we arrived later than we had planned and after dark, that meant a canoe ride at night on the Volta River which was rather glorious. We probably made the boat driver think we were crazy with all our goings on, but I am pretty sure we provide a pretty constant source of amusement to Ghanaians. The beach right out side the place we were staying was pretty clean, but Saturday morning I walked down to where the river really does meet the sea and back again, a two hour walk, and we saw so much trash. It just washes up, but it was definitely discouraging.
Sunday morning was probably one of my favorite moments, for we got to witness the villagers at work pulling in their fishing nets and some men tryingn to get a boat out to sea. Whole families, men, women and children, would come out to pull the nets in. I wasn't quite sure how they were connected to both the land and the boats unless somebody swam the rope in, but that could easily be what had happened.
Another interesting thing about Ada Foah was the Peace Corps volunteer we met there. She had been in Ghana for more than a year and was at Ada Foah for a weekend away with her Ghanaian boyfriend. Her volunteering work was in a school in Tema(a city not very far from Accra with a big industrial port) and it was interesting to hear her talk about the schools. She taught JSS, Junior Secondary School, and she was pretty discouraged about the educational system. She said Ghana had only recently implemented educational reforms, but they did very little besides add additional demands to the teachers and students without reforming the educational system. To go onto Secondary School, the students needed to know a mass of information, and how they were taught it and learned it was pretty much direct memorization. There was next to no critical thinking, and seeing how so many of my classes are at university, it is not a very effective way to learn. however, she also said that if teachers or headmasters complained about the reforms, they were often demoted as had happened to one headmaster she knew in Tema. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she said she felt like all she could do was simply teach her students well; the only difference she was able to make was in their lives.
Skipping ahead, I came back Sunday, went to class Monday and Tuesday, and then Wednesday headed back to the beach with a different group of friends and a different location. Tuesday, like good Americans, we even watched the debate, staying up very late to do so; it started at one in the morning our time, ending around 2:30. It is crazy to think in a month we will know who are next president will be. I await my absentee ballot to do my civic duty. It is also crazy to be so far away when so much is happening in America both with the election and the economy. I am very thankful for my little radio and the BBC which do their best to keep me informed.
Anyways, moving on again, while my trip to Ada Foah took me east along the Ghanaian coast, my second trip took me west. Our ultimate destination was a place called Green Turtle Lodge, but we stayed the first night in Cape Coast. One of the guys I was travelling with has friends there who own a hotel, so we stayed in their hotel which was fun. They have a lake with crocodiles in it, so Thursday morning before heading out we were able to pet a sleeping crocodile which was pretty unnerving and also watch them get fed chicken scraps(they have sharp teeth!). Also, to add to our sighting of very old animals who have been around longer than the rest of us, we also were able to take a ten minute walk to a nearby ostrich farm. I have a very fond place in my heart from ostriches, probably from my time in South Africa where we got to visit the ostrich capital of the world and all attempted to master ostrich impersonations. Ostrich farming is not a very big industry in Ghana, but on our walk we also got to pass a lot of other farms, largely Casava which is a staple in the Ghanaian diet, making up both the beloved Fufu and Banku. My Twi teacher talks about Fufu all the time.
Green Turtle Lodge was amazing, the kind of place you don't want to leave and you want to go back to. It was quite far to get to. Our return trip took 10 plus hours, but mostly because we had to wait three hours for a bus because the one we were trying for was already sold out when we arrived. Our tro-tro also got a flat tire which was a first for us though obviously from the speed and ease that the mate and driver changed the tire, not for them. It was on one of the most rickety tro-tros yet. I think my favorite tro-tro moment was the time that the door was falling off so they had to tie it to the rest of the vehicle and then when the mate tried and open the door to let us out, it wouldn't open for five minutes... I digress...
It was also the cleanest beach I have yet seen in Ghana. Ada Foah was very much trash strewn. Probably part of it was that we were quite remote. The last leg of the journey was over a dirt road and so remote that they piled people on top of the tro-tro, a practice which is illegal but then when one is that remote, there are no police check points...
Here too there were a lot of intersting people to talk too. There appears to be a rather large population of obruni students and volunteers and we joked the other day about how we all thought we were so brave and cool and original to come to a place like Ghana... its all good though. There was a group of Australians who were volunteering as teaching assistants in a village and they had a lot of the same observations as the Peace Corps volunteers about the challenges facing the educational system. One girl I talked to said that the curicculum didn't teach phonetics which is the building blocks of reading...
Mostly I just listened to the ocean, went swimming, and read my book in the sun and shade depending on my mood. It was very relaxing and a wonderful get-away.
Now I am back to class and studying and the idea of doing homework and I will probably try and go to the oprhanage sometime this week. I decided to not continue trying to volunteer at the other place in Accra that did the reproductive rights education not because it wasn't amazing and I didn't want to but because it really didn't work with my schedule. I am trying to go to the orphanage more now though because they really do need the help, which was not true of Cencosad and was one reason stopping at the other place wasn't too hard of a decision.
In other news, the next few weekends I have ISEP program trips which should be fun and provide more for long and rambling blogs...
That said, I really haven't blogged in awhile, but I have been quite busy, or by busy perhaps I should mean away, for the last two weekends I went to the beach and that is anything but busy, rather relaxing and lazy and wonderful. With those two trips and then going to Boti Falls, I feel like I have been away from Accra more than in it recently, but that was the point.
Two weekends ago I went to a place called Ada Foah which is where the Volta River meets the sea and five other girls and myself stayed in grass huts(with mosquito netted beds) on the beach. I got sunburned, most painfully my lips... I didn't know one could sunburn there lips, but I now know that it is very unpleasant. This past weekend though I managed to avoid sunburn altogether.
Ada Foah was beautiful. We went Friday and came back Sunday which meant a full day at the beach. We had to take a canoe to get there, and because we arrived later than we had planned and after dark, that meant a canoe ride at night on the Volta River which was rather glorious. We probably made the boat driver think we were crazy with all our goings on, but I am pretty sure we provide a pretty constant source of amusement to Ghanaians. The beach right out side the place we were staying was pretty clean, but Saturday morning I walked down to where the river really does meet the sea and back again, a two hour walk, and we saw so much trash. It just washes up, but it was definitely discouraging.
Sunday morning was probably one of my favorite moments, for we got to witness the villagers at work pulling in their fishing nets and some men tryingn to get a boat out to sea. Whole families, men, women and children, would come out to pull the nets in. I wasn't quite sure how they were connected to both the land and the boats unless somebody swam the rope in, but that could easily be what had happened.
Another interesting thing about Ada Foah was the Peace Corps volunteer we met there. She had been in Ghana for more than a year and was at Ada Foah for a weekend away with her Ghanaian boyfriend. Her volunteering work was in a school in Tema(a city not very far from Accra with a big industrial port) and it was interesting to hear her talk about the schools. She taught JSS, Junior Secondary School, and she was pretty discouraged about the educational system. She said Ghana had only recently implemented educational reforms, but they did very little besides add additional demands to the teachers and students without reforming the educational system. To go onto Secondary School, the students needed to know a mass of information, and how they were taught it and learned it was pretty much direct memorization. There was next to no critical thinking, and seeing how so many of my classes are at university, it is not a very effective way to learn. however, she also said that if teachers or headmasters complained about the reforms, they were often demoted as had happened to one headmaster she knew in Tema. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she said she felt like all she could do was simply teach her students well; the only difference she was able to make was in their lives.
Skipping ahead, I came back Sunday, went to class Monday and Tuesday, and then Wednesday headed back to the beach with a different group of friends and a different location. Tuesday, like good Americans, we even watched the debate, staying up very late to do so; it started at one in the morning our time, ending around 2:30. It is crazy to think in a month we will know who are next president will be. I await my absentee ballot to do my civic duty. It is also crazy to be so far away when so much is happening in America both with the election and the economy. I am very thankful for my little radio and the BBC which do their best to keep me informed.
Anyways, moving on again, while my trip to Ada Foah took me east along the Ghanaian coast, my second trip took me west. Our ultimate destination was a place called Green Turtle Lodge, but we stayed the first night in Cape Coast. One of the guys I was travelling with has friends there who own a hotel, so we stayed in their hotel which was fun. They have a lake with crocodiles in it, so Thursday morning before heading out we were able to pet a sleeping crocodile which was pretty unnerving and also watch them get fed chicken scraps(they have sharp teeth!). Also, to add to our sighting of very old animals who have been around longer than the rest of us, we also were able to take a ten minute walk to a nearby ostrich farm. I have a very fond place in my heart from ostriches, probably from my time in South Africa where we got to visit the ostrich capital of the world and all attempted to master ostrich impersonations. Ostrich farming is not a very big industry in Ghana, but on our walk we also got to pass a lot of other farms, largely Casava which is a staple in the Ghanaian diet, making up both the beloved Fufu and Banku. My Twi teacher talks about Fufu all the time.
Green Turtle Lodge was amazing, the kind of place you don't want to leave and you want to go back to. It was quite far to get to. Our return trip took 10 plus hours, but mostly because we had to wait three hours for a bus because the one we were trying for was already sold out when we arrived. Our tro-tro also got a flat tire which was a first for us though obviously from the speed and ease that the mate and driver changed the tire, not for them. It was on one of the most rickety tro-tros yet. I think my favorite tro-tro moment was the time that the door was falling off so they had to tie it to the rest of the vehicle and then when the mate tried and open the door to let us out, it wouldn't open for five minutes... I digress...
It was also the cleanest beach I have yet seen in Ghana. Ada Foah was very much trash strewn. Probably part of it was that we were quite remote. The last leg of the journey was over a dirt road and so remote that they piled people on top of the tro-tro, a practice which is illegal but then when one is that remote, there are no police check points...
Here too there were a lot of intersting people to talk too. There appears to be a rather large population of obruni students and volunteers and we joked the other day about how we all thought we were so brave and cool and original to come to a place like Ghana... its all good though. There was a group of Australians who were volunteering as teaching assistants in a village and they had a lot of the same observations as the Peace Corps volunteers about the challenges facing the educational system. One girl I talked to said that the curicculum didn't teach phonetics which is the building blocks of reading...
Mostly I just listened to the ocean, went swimming, and read my book in the sun and shade depending on my mood. It was very relaxing and a wonderful get-away.
Now I am back to class and studying and the idea of doing homework and I will probably try and go to the oprhanage sometime this week. I decided to not continue trying to volunteer at the other place in Accra that did the reproductive rights education not because it wasn't amazing and I didn't want to but because it really didn't work with my schedule. I am trying to go to the orphanage more now though because they really do need the help, which was not true of Cencosad and was one reason stopping at the other place wasn't too hard of a decision.
In other news, the next few weekends I have ISEP program trips which should be fun and provide more for long and rambling blogs...
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Travelling adventures
So I finally got to travel without the umbrella of ISEP this week. Tuesday morning I ran into a couple of girls in my program who said they were going to Boti Falls and I should come. I didn't need to be told twice even though I had never heard of the falls before, I had been itching to travel and get out of Accra. Ten minutes later we were heading out, yay for spontaneity! I love being spontaneous, and it was definitely worth it!
We took a series of tro-tros to get there; it took between three and a half to four hours in all and about three cedi... not bad at all. At Boti Falls, we hired a guide who led us to umbrella rock, a rock that truly does look like an umbrella, and to the palm tree with three trunks(I got cool pictures of both). It was very beautiful and the path seemed quite treachorous at places. By the time we finished the hike, my legs weren't the only ones shaking from the exertion. We were all quite photo happy which I thihnk annoyed our guide Joseph a little because it slowed us down.
The falls themselves were by far the best part; I could not help but wonder at the glory of God witnessed in His creation. There were two falls probably fifty feet high cascading into a pool below, a constant roar. Words don't give it justice. We stayed at the falls awhile, soaking up the beauty and resting our weary legs.
From Boti, our plans were more tentative. We planned to stay at a place called Shai Hills Resort which is by a nature reserve, but it apprently was not as close to Akosombo where our tro-tro ended as we though. It would have cost fifteen cedi to get a taxi to a place that may or may not have had room, and by that opnt, we were all five of us tired and hungry. The driver offered to take us to a place closer by.
When travelling, one puts incredible trust in their agents of transportation. First of all, it gets dark in Ghana, really dark, and quite early. Because we are so close to the ecuator, it gets dark year round sometime between six and seven or so I've been told. Moreover, because Ghana is still a developing country, outside the cities there is very little electricity. We would pass family compounds and whole villages where only the shops seemed to have the one electric bulb. I remember the other day coming back from Volta how we were driving on a road where there were streetlights, but none of them were lit. Like I was saying, dark really is dark in Ghana, which brings me back to the taxi...
When travelling, we have to trust. At tro-tro stations we are led around like sheep by people offering to help us find a vehicle to the right location; indeed, we would be lost without this ever ready help. Still, one always wonders if they wouldn't just lead us somewhere remote and mug us. It is the same with taxi drivers, and last night we definitely left he the main road and were on a dirt road that was seemingly going nowhere. A certain doubt flashed in all our minds...
However, he really was legit and took us to a hotel where we could get wo rooms for seven cedi a person and where despite our arriving after the restaurant closed, they took pity on us and made the best fried rice and chicken I have yet eaten in Ghana. We all took showers using the one towel that somebody was smart enough to bring and went to bed, exhausted from a busy and full day! The hotel was nice, clean and without any uninvited guests like cockroaches or anything; they even brought us a complimentary breakfast in the morning. It also had the nicest roof terrace where we sat and soaked up a bit of the countryside in the morning.
From our hotel, moreover, we could walk easily to our second destination of a nearby bead market(which apparently turned out not to be the bead market we meant to go to, but as far as I am concerned it was a bead market so does it really matter?). We got there again with help. We asked two men we were passing how to get there and when we seemed unsure of their directions, one offered to tak us, leading us along this backtrail which basically cut through people's backyards and over a rickety bride taht spanned a ditch full of trash. Again a moment of trust but of course we arrived without mishap. Ghanaians are very welcoming and hospitable, especially the further one gets from the cities...
From the bead market it was only and hour and half tro-tro back to school and we were back in time for a late lunch. Overall a most enjoyable adventure.
Oh, a quick note of two things I forgot to mention; one cool and one bizarre. The first is simply lightning, for on the tro-tro to Akaosombo Tuesday night dry lightning was illuminating the sky. Not having grown up with proper lightning(although Spokane has some decent thunder storms) I thought this very cool. The second thing was in Kofiridua(sp?) where we caught the tro-tro to Akosombo there was a parade of sorts of all these cars, mostly trucks with platforms, loaded down with Ghanaians dressed up as and impersonating the American gangster image and blaring American rap music. We couldn't figure out waht the occassion was, a Muslim holdy day seemed unlikely, but it definitely was bizarre. One car had a banner saying Black Americans, another something about pirates... Who knows...
In other news, I hope to travel again this weekend although that remains in the works... Possibly more in my next blog entry.
We took a series of tro-tros to get there; it took between three and a half to four hours in all and about three cedi... not bad at all. At Boti Falls, we hired a guide who led us to umbrella rock, a rock that truly does look like an umbrella, and to the palm tree with three trunks(I got cool pictures of both). It was very beautiful and the path seemed quite treachorous at places. By the time we finished the hike, my legs weren't the only ones shaking from the exertion. We were all quite photo happy which I thihnk annoyed our guide Joseph a little because it slowed us down.
The falls themselves were by far the best part; I could not help but wonder at the glory of God witnessed in His creation. There were two falls probably fifty feet high cascading into a pool below, a constant roar. Words don't give it justice. We stayed at the falls awhile, soaking up the beauty and resting our weary legs.
From Boti, our plans were more tentative. We planned to stay at a place called Shai Hills Resort which is by a nature reserve, but it apprently was not as close to Akosombo where our tro-tro ended as we though. It would have cost fifteen cedi to get a taxi to a place that may or may not have had room, and by that opnt, we were all five of us tired and hungry. The driver offered to take us to a place closer by.
When travelling, one puts incredible trust in their agents of transportation. First of all, it gets dark in Ghana, really dark, and quite early. Because we are so close to the ecuator, it gets dark year round sometime between six and seven or so I've been told. Moreover, because Ghana is still a developing country, outside the cities there is very little electricity. We would pass family compounds and whole villages where only the shops seemed to have the one electric bulb. I remember the other day coming back from Volta how we were driving on a road where there were streetlights, but none of them were lit. Like I was saying, dark really is dark in Ghana, which brings me back to the taxi...
When travelling, we have to trust. At tro-tro stations we are led around like sheep by people offering to help us find a vehicle to the right location; indeed, we would be lost without this ever ready help. Still, one always wonders if they wouldn't just lead us somewhere remote and mug us. It is the same with taxi drivers, and last night we definitely left he the main road and were on a dirt road that was seemingly going nowhere. A certain doubt flashed in all our minds...
However, he really was legit and took us to a hotel where we could get wo rooms for seven cedi a person and where despite our arriving after the restaurant closed, they took pity on us and made the best fried rice and chicken I have yet eaten in Ghana. We all took showers using the one towel that somebody was smart enough to bring and went to bed, exhausted from a busy and full day! The hotel was nice, clean and without any uninvited guests like cockroaches or anything; they even brought us a complimentary breakfast in the morning. It also had the nicest roof terrace where we sat and soaked up a bit of the countryside in the morning.
From our hotel, moreover, we could walk easily to our second destination of a nearby bead market(which apparently turned out not to be the bead market we meant to go to, but as far as I am concerned it was a bead market so does it really matter?). We got there again with help. We asked two men we were passing how to get there and when we seemed unsure of their directions, one offered to tak us, leading us along this backtrail which basically cut through people's backyards and over a rickety bride taht spanned a ditch full of trash. Again a moment of trust but of course we arrived without mishap. Ghanaians are very welcoming and hospitable, especially the further one gets from the cities...
From the bead market it was only and hour and half tro-tro back to school and we were back in time for a late lunch. Overall a most enjoyable adventure.
Oh, a quick note of two things I forgot to mention; one cool and one bizarre. The first is simply lightning, for on the tro-tro to Akaosombo Tuesday night dry lightning was illuminating the sky. Not having grown up with proper lightning(although Spokane has some decent thunder storms) I thought this very cool. The second thing was in Kofiridua(sp?) where we caught the tro-tro to Akosombo there was a parade of sorts of all these cars, mostly trucks with platforms, loaded down with Ghanaians dressed up as and impersonating the American gangster image and blaring American rap music. We couldn't figure out waht the occassion was, a Muslim holdy day seemed unlikely, but it definitely was bizarre. One car had a banner saying Black Americans, another something about pirates... Who knows...
In other news, I hope to travel again this weekend although that remains in the works... Possibly more in my next blog entry.
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