baako bosome

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classes haven’t been too exciting but have gotten much better lately. i’ve gotten more used to having 3-4 hour blocks of classes and the lecture style of most classes. i really like the literature class -the professor used to teach at cornell so her teaching style is much different than in most of my classes. this is also the only class i’ve had an actual assignment in. drumming is probably my favorite and the rest of them are coming along.

on thursday we went to an irish pub for one of our friends birthday. there were more europeans and americans at this bar than i’ve seen in one place since i’ve been here. it's been fun going out with ghanaians but it was also nice to hang out with other foreigners for a bit. it’s hard to explain how different relations are with ghanaians. most of the introductory conversations we have are the same. it goes from, “where are you from?” to, “do you like it here so far?” to, “what’s your phone number?” within a couple minutes -this is usually said in a more-than-friendly manner. and the most common phrase, “one minute a stranger, the next a friend,” is usually said if you are hesitant to give anyone your phone number and is followed by, “but how will we stay friends?!" if you refuse. it was just nice to hang out for awhile without the ever-present cultural barrier. don't get me wrong though, i'm still working on the damn barrier.

my friend sarah and i made a trip to the post office to pick up packages from home (a couple hours by tro-tro, would probably be about 45 minutes in a car) on friday. i forget how much of a spectacle we are some places because on campus people are used to international students being here so we don’t really get stared at or targeted much. going other places is a much different experience. the post office is next to the main tro-tro station, so there were people lining the street for blocks. (i should probably explain that the people lining the streets are all selling things -food, bags of water, clothes, phones, phone credit, etc. you really can find anything from these kinds of vendors and they’re everywhere. they even stand in the middle of the road when there’s traffic and sell things to people inside the vehicles). we had to walk through the groups of people and all we heard from the time we got off the tro-tro until we got to the post office was “obruni” and “white girl” and were both grabbed a dozen times while passing people. it gets old really fast. the trip also got a little more irritating when we got to the post office and were told that they don’t close at five as we had been informed, but instead they close at 4:30 -we literally got there at 4:33 and all they said was to “come back monday.” it took a couple more hours to get back to legon so it took up the majority of the day -funny experience in retrospect but wasn’t very fun at the time.

on saturday my ghanaian friend angela took a few of us to OSU (a town about a half hour drive away where there are a lot of restaurants, shops, bars and clubs) to show us around. we go there pretty often, but I’d only ever been there at night. we stopped at some shops, an african clothing store and checked out a few restaurants. we also stopped by her mom’s shop, met some of her family and stopped by a beach. going to the beach was actually kind of depressing -it was the dirtiest beach i’ve seen and apparently there are a lot of beaches similar to that one in the area. the country doesn’t pay anyone to clean the beaches so it just doesn’t get done -except at private beaches that charge for entry. there was a ton of garbage on the beach and in the water. there was even a wild pig walking around in the garbage finding food -there was that much. we walked around for a little bit trying to find a cleaner spot but turned back after we saw a syringe in the sand. it’s sad that such a pretty place is so poorly taken care of but without resources dedicated to preserving the beaches, it isn’t surprising that many of them end up this way.

a big group of international students went to the ghana vs sudan soccor game on sunday. it was at the national stadium which was totally packed -our seats were right behind where the teams sit so we had a great view of the game. ghana won 2-0 so they’ll compete in the world cup next year. very good day.

one of my friends let me drive his car on campus. i didn’t dare going onto a main road but it was still fun (i’ll have to explain the driving and road situation here another time -it’s pretty crazy).

while i do like the food here, it is limited at some places. especially because i’ve been avoiding fried foods as well as meat so i’ve pretty much been eating noodles, beans and mango for the last month. buut, there’s a vegetarian cart that just opened at the night market. great food for about the same price as rice or red-red. i’ve missed fresh vegetables more than any other food so this was an amazing find.

i do miss some people a lot, even some i haven’t talked to in awhile, but i haven’t really gotten homesick except for one of the times i talked to my mom. can't help it though -i always miss my parents when i'm away from home. go figure. i guess i shouldn't speak too soon, but i'm very happy here.

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