The Rainy Season and Much More...

---

Hello All,
Not much happened this week. Classes, registering for next semester, midterms, etc. However, I did have an inspiring experience at my internship. Wednesday's we hold praise and worship due to the fact that the school is run by a reverend and his wife. Usually there are some songs, a sermon, and a lot of praying, although, on some days we are graced with a performance by the choir. This past Wednesday, the choir sang three songs and they were all enjoyable in their own ways, however, the last song was sung by a soloist. She is a girl appropriately named Happy, and one of the girls I've become close with at the school. I am used to some of the girls getting emotional during praise and worship services, however, when Happy began her song, something in the room changed. The mood became more solemn, rather than the usual excited and energized feeling. She started off quiet and meek, and as she sang, beautiful tears began to glisten down her face. Even though she was singing in Twi and I couldn't understand a word she said, I too felt the passion in what she was singing. As I looked around the room, I realized that Happy was not the only one with streams forming on her cheeks; the pews were dotted with faces that produced graceful rivers of emotion.
I've always considered myself a spiritual person rather than that of religious, not to say that I don't appreciate very much the religious background I was presented with in my childhood, but there are precious few times that I've felt the presence of something greater than me in the air. However, that Wednesday afternoon, looking into Happy's shining eyes and feeling the the overwhelming message hope that the rest of the girls were exuding, I felt something stir deep within me. Whether it was life force, the spirit of mother earth, or whatever God please you, I felt it shake me to the core and the tears began to flow. I realized, as the girls began to sob and pray, that hope is really the only thing that they have. All of them coming from extreme poverty, some of the recovering from prostitution, rape, years of abuse, and the loss of family...hope is all they have to keep them going. For some of them their faith that God will one day take pity on them and give them a better life is the only thing between them and ultimate despair. Now I truly have an appreciation for the special ways that religion works.
And with that the rainy season continues. On Thursday we had another raging tempest. This time the clouds amazed me even more. Standing out on the porch my housemmates and I could see the dark clouds flying across the sky, swirling and twirling like purple wisps of cotton candy. All of a sudden there was an opening in the sky and for a moment the clouds whirled around the blue forming what looked like an upside down whirlpool. We could seen the rain falling like gray sheets in the distance and so we moved everything off the porch, grabbed the still damp laundry off the lines, raced to shut every window in the house and waited until we could hear the liquid drops hammering down on our tin roof, which sounded like machine gun clatter. I'm usually in favor of rainy days, seeing as how it makes the dust settle and cools things down for the night, however, when the power immediately turned off, I cursed at the sky which responded with a comeback of lightening and thunder.
This weekend our CIEE group went on a trip to the Volta Region (where lizzy and I climbed Mt. Adklu). All of us groggy at 6:30am we climbed into the bus and tried to get as comfortable as possible before what ended up being a four hour ride. Sadly, no sleep came to me as our bus barreled down the pothole filled roads. After seeing the scenery change from dusty brown to blossoming green, eating a packet of Malt n' Milk crackers, listening to my music, and playing ridiculously juvenile car ride games with my housmmates, we arrived at the Tafti Atome waterfalls. We all stretched getting out of the bus, went to the bathroom that neither contained TP or a flushing apparatus, applied sunscreen and bug spray, changed into our bathing suits and were off on our 45 minute hike through the jungle. After crossing 9 bridges, seeing lots of butterflies and colorful bugs, and pretending to be artistic photographers, we arrived at the waterfall. I've seen many waterfalls in my life, but this one was right up there with the best of them. The cool water sprayed us the closer we got, and I noticed the beautiful rock formations lining the gorge. Many students whipped off their closes and dove right in. I was however, more interested in taking pictures, exploring the gorge, and avoiding schistosomiasis; although I'm glad to say that no one has gotten sick from the water...yet that is.
As I walked around I noticed all the lizards and butterflies that were drawn to the water. Then all of a sudden there was a huge noise and what seemed like thousands of bats flew into the sky and started flapping around in a frenzy. It must have been all the noise that the students were making in the water, because when they quited down, the bats returned to their resting spots which I had not noticed was the rock face of the gorge. After everyone was tired of swimming we hiked back to our buses and had lunch at a local hotel. Right away we headed to the Tafti Atome Monkey Sanctuary. I was extremely excited about this seeing as how I took a Primate class last semester.
We pulled up to a village in the middle of nowhere and a few very young looking men approached our group. They introduced themselves as our tour guides and began to walk us through the village into the nearby forest. As they walked, they explained to us how some American and Canadians had visited the village sometime ago and over a few years had turned the local monkey troop into an eco-tourist attraction for the village. After traipsing through the forest for a while longer we came upon a mango grove where we began to see movement in the trees. Everyone squealed with excitement as one by one we picked out the monkeys among the leaves and branches. They were fast little furballs and were possible the most adorable things I've ever seen. The tour guides pulled out a bunch of bananas and began handing them out to everyone. Everyone started holding out their morsels of fruit and bouncing from branch to branch the monkeys soon came down and began to snatch at the banana pieces being held out for them. When the monkeys had had their fill they lounged in the trees looking down at us with curious eyes. When the mosquitoes became to much for us to handle, we traipsed back out of the jungle and headed to our hotel for the night.
Again, we were graced with hot water, cable T.V., and a lovely free meal. Lizzy and I laid in bed watching BBC World for a while before passing out in our wonderfully air-conditioned room. This morning we enjoyed another free meal and were allowed to relax at the hotel before being packed back into the bus for the journey home. I took advantage of the time and like everyone else lounged by the pool. It was a very nice vacation from life in Accra. However, now I'm back in the city, getting ready to face another week of school and the like.
As always, thanks to you who are reading and I hope all is well.

---

Photos

Lizzy crossing the bridge that was falling apart
I was the first one to cross...the lamb for the slaughter...I'm glad to say I survived!