My New Home Hello from Bologna, home of the red (la rossa), the learned (la dotta), and the fat (la grassa). And the 196 students from the Johns Hopkins graduate program in advanced international studies. How has my new home been so far? Well, it’s made me homesick for my real home, especially since there is no fall better than a New York fall. It’s made me very Italian in how I greet passersby on motorbikes that decide they have right of way on the sidewalk: “Vaffanculo!!!!” It’s made me really miss the technology of the modern worl [View Full Entry]

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Reunion in the Rockies Most of you know me as a globetrekker, but what you don’t know is that back at home, aside from traveling to California, I have only gone as far west as Ohio. “America the Beautiful” was a song I used to sing in elementary school every day after reciting the Pledge, but until a few weeks ago I had no idea what a plain or a prairie looked like! And mountains? According to my roommate, the Appalachians are like hills compared to the Rockies. So to see the prairies, plains, and vast mountainsides that our national songs [View Full Entry]

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Mishaps Abound It started the first day I arrived in Peru. Tracie and I had a joyful reunion at the airport where we promptly got ripped off by our overly aggressive taxi driver. After some confusion as to when Pam was supposed to meet us, we decided she would be arriving at midnight to our hotel, and we would have a long awaited reunion and go gallavanting into piranha and anaconda infested waters the next day in the Amazon to commence our Peruvian adventure. Alas, it's about 2am, and we hear the elevator door open onto our floor. Tracie jumps out [View Full Entry]

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Back to Civilization The first day in Cape Town, my brain experienced total sensory overload from all the sights. And we’re not talking Table Mountain or the Cape of Good Hope, although they were awesome sights. We’re talking about simple things, like seeing houses out the airplane window; savoring my first fresh sandwich and my first café latte with fresh milk; ordering room service; and taking a shower with hot running water!!! Simply amazing. That was my first day - just getting used to “normal” life again and really being so thankful for havi [View Full Entry]

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A Caveat Before You Read Apologies for the delay in posting my latest blog entry, but getting access to affordable internet was a bit difficult once I reached South Africa. But don’t worry, reflections on my experience in Ghana have only been heightened by the experiences I’ve had in the few weeks since then. As you read this, keep in mind that these are my personal opinions and do not in any shape or form represent the views of the NGO I worked for, and that I’ve only had a few months’ time working “in the field” and have a lot [View Full Entry]

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The Elmina Master Chef Meet Elizabeth. She is my closest Ghanian friend, and it’s pretty obvious she would become my closest friend considering how she cooks me these wonderfully scrumptious dinners and endlessly supplies me with Star, a Ghanian beer. Every day after work I head over to Eli’s place to chill out and watch her prepare meals. My favorites? Definitely Elizabeth’s Special Egg Stew (ask me when I get home and I’ll make it for you!), palava (a sort of fermented spinachy dish), ground nut soup, red red (sort of a chili like dish), fried plantains, t [View Full Entry]

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Greetings From Buswa The Parrot So in my first entry I mentioned the host of characters we have in the backyard and their supposed identity crises. Well I’m happy to report that at this moment they’ve all resumed their roles as proper parrot, goat and dog. Buswa, the parrot, can now speak more languages than I can. He speaks a mix of Fante, English (American and British mind you!), Dutch, and hopefully will be speaking some Korean by the time I leave! Every morning he greets us with a “Hellooooo! Bek houuuuuuuuuuuuuuden!” (which means “Shut Up” in [View Full Entry]

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Life and Musings in Ghana As I mentioned in my last entry, my travels in Ghana are over, and now it’s back to work! Aside from accounts of touristy travels, I haven’t really explained much about what it is like to actually live here. Let’s start it off with what is probably, at least in my opinion, the most interesting aspect of living in Ghana… religion. ”I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE JESUS!!!!” It’s amazing how fierce the Christian culture is here. There are prayer meetings that can last all night long, and church is a whole day aff [View Full Entry]

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Mid-Project Break! This past week I took leave from work for my mid-project break, and traveled to the eastern central part of Ghana with my roommate Sarah. For those of you who sent me emails wondering if I had fallen off the face of the earth or had gotten lost amidst all the refugees coming through from Togo, I wanted to say thanks for your concern, and all is well over here! And here are the highlights from the past week… Cruising Lake Volta at 10 Miles an Hour We kicked off our journey with a ferry ride (read: cargo vessel [View Full Entry]

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Following Moses the Snail Last Friday, my roommate Sarah and I took off towards the West Coast to visit Nzulezo, the stilt village in the Amansuri Wetlands. Meeting very helpful and kind people along the way, we were able to trek across unmarked dirt roads to a tiny footbridge where we set off on a canoe trip to Nzulezo. This village is odd, considering the people are not actually fishermen, but rather farmers, so most men have to take leave during the week and live on land anyway! Talk about inefficient! But when asked what the point of living on water [View Full Entry]

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