Nkawkaw

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Sorry about the last entry, I could've made it so much better but it was my first real experience with electricity in three weeks and I was kind of overwhemeled with hearing from the outside world for the first time in a while. Sooo, I'll try again and I can't remember what I wrote the last time: The heat was pretty hard to get used to at first, at times I felt like I was in a sauna, almost short of breath. I was also a little dehydrated which was my own stupid fault because I was too much of a wimp to drink the water from the "Chicago" water sachets that tasted like plastic or rotten celery. Church in Battor was a good three times longer than I was used to. During the collection time, everyone sings and dances, and it's so fun you want to give more and more each time. A girl named Mary took time off of school to teach us how to handwash our clothes... Luckily they were having a general cleaning that morning so she didn't miss anything. She even brought her friend Nathan along. Can you imagine someone saying, "Hey, want to skip class and go wash some random foreigners' dirty clothes?!" Well, he did it and he did it without hesitation. And our clothes were pretty filthy because it was almost two weeks and we hadn't washed them up until this point. Afterwards we went to her school and we were just sort of told to go in front of the class and talk. We explained why we were there and then sat in for the rest of the lesson. Break time came and a boy named Michael enthusiastically took me by the hand and led me outside, past the students who were oooing. A photographer just happened to be outside and I got my picture taken with him... There is a cat at the place we stayed at with always wheezed really loudly when it breathed, and I think it might be because it eats charcoal. There was a boy at Ave Maria named Charles, who was really nice and his father was in the hospital. When his father got out of the hospital, he was pretty set on that I would marry his son and bring him back to Canada. The father even tried to work it out with Sarah, who's the oldest and the tallest so assumed leader, and the whole situation was all pretty awkward. Charles lives in Accra, so we might visit him when we get there, and his brother's pretty cute so I hope we do... Being called "yevu" constantly is something that's really hard to get used to. Here it isn't a racist comment or anything, it's just normal language. Whenever I hear it, I just want to say, "Learn my name or don't talk to me!!!" But no matter who you speak to, they all say that they really don't mean it in an offensive way, they're calling us white people because we are. I guess it's just hard to try to remember that when we're trying to experience this lifestyle so fully, you don't want to accept that you are different and you won't really ever belong. It's also hard hearing people say, "Oh, I love the colour of your skin! I want it!" Eeek, I really don't know what to say? Oh, by the way, read the book "Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. It's absolutely incredible and it really helped take my mind of being scared and homesick during my hospital days. I don't know how to tell you how much I love the village I'm staying in. It's completely fate that I ended up there, because it turns out my family was at the hospital the day I went, and they saw me and said, "We want the sick one to stay with us." We chose our villages by lottery, and I did! My family makes the best banku, no matter what anyone says!! I've been on two excursions so far. I went to Tema to watch a football game, which was a bust because apparently we got there late (8:30 am) and the team left, so the match was postponed and we didn't leave until 3ish. We hung around Tema and didn't really do much, it wasn't a very great day but I did make some friends. I felt really awkward because the coach kept buying me treats from vendors going by when he was supposed to be feeding his own team..ugghh but I had to be really grateful that he brought me along but I don't know I don't get the greatest vibe from him. Run-on sentence! The next excursion was really great though. I went to a school for the blind where I learned how to write my name in Braille. I personally think I have the best village 😊 I really enjoy the people there, they're all really kind and they're really good with helping me learn Ewe. I don't know what else to write right now because I want to check my email and I don't have lots of time. I'll add more Thursday. Peace. Now I'm in Nkawkaw, near Kumasi, for a retreat which is going awesome.

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Comments

[Caterina Lindman]

Ghana Blog
Thanks for writing the blog, Stephanie. I'm glad you are enjoying Ghana.