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Published: July 19th 2008
7/12/08
There have been a few eventful days since the last time I wrote in the blog. Last week there was a ceremony in Old Tafo to signify the beginning of the two weeks of preparation for the Ohum Festival. The festival is an annual celebration that involves a few surrounding communities, but is centered in Old Tafo. There is a lot about the festival that I still don’t know so I will be writing about it more in the upcoming weeks as I get the info. For right now, the most important thing to know is that there is no drumming or dancing in the participating communities for the two weeks prior to the festival, hence the ceremony I attended. Sadly, we will not have drumming and dancing practice for our swearing-in ceremony for the next two weeks as a result. There are also no funerals during the two weeks because women are not allowed to wail (wailing for the dead one is so important that families will even hire professional wailers to mourn a deceased family member. I haven’t heard it yet, but apparently it is the loudest most exaggerated crying ever. It brings a whole new meaning to the title “town crier.” I think I may have found Melissa a new career in Ghana.) There is something important about the palm trees and it is possible it represents some sort of god/spirits/ancestors. The vast majority of the community is Christian so I think the spiritual importance is mostly a tradition, but like I said, when I get the facts I’ll let you know. I do know that once the festival begins people are allowed to eat the yams from this year’s harvest.
The ceremony its self was amazing to watch. B.J., one of the other trainees who is living at the chief’s palace, was part of the ceremony. There was a short procession through the center of town that included the chief, queen mother, and a number of elders. The streets were filled with people and everyone gathered around the chief and a pile of symbolic staffs and swords (what they symbolize I have no idea) in the middle of the street. A group of men presented a pole that is pulled out of the center of a palm tree from the top to the chief and the elders. Then all hell broke loose. I have no idea what was going on. A bunch of men were struggling to get a strand off the palm pole. I assume it has something to do with good luck for the next year’s harvest, but that is a complete guess. The festival is supposed to be a huge party, so I’ll keep you informed.
The next topic is one that I will probably be writing a lot about. If it is not in the blog to spare you the details, then it will definitely be in my journal. I want to warn you that what I am about to write about probably isn’t appropriate talk under most circumstances in America, but I’m roughing it in Ghana and this is my blog so deal with it. There is a little joke around Peace Corps Volunteers that “you won’t have a regular bowl movement until you go back to America.” There is also a club that current volunteers informed us about called the “crap your pants club.” Apparently the vast majority of volunteers in Ghana join this club by the end of their two years. Luckily for me, the first month breezed by without any health problems and no G.I. track issues in particular. My luck was bound to run out though. I knew I was in trouble when I had a dream that I joined “the club” and when I woke up I realized that I could have easily been inducted if I didn’t make it to the pit latrine in a timely fashion. I was up every couple of hours making my journey to the pit latrine to release the flood gates. In the middle of the night I made the observation that having diarrhea in a pit latrine is pretty nice because you don’t have any poopy toilet water to splash you in the butt. In the morning I felt fine apart from the uncertainty of the when the next “eruption” would come, plus the constant fear of joining “the club” before I even made it out of training. I had an hour and a half trip on a tro to get to GHANASS to teach… and I made it…barely. Teaching was fine, and it wasn’t until I got home that I got a fever and headache. The Peace Corps gives us a great health kit and I took pepto, advil, rehydration salts, and rested for a few hours. I felt 10x better when I got up. The diarrhea stuck around for another day before I had what I would consider a quasi-regular bowl movement; at least it wasn’t all liquid. I learned that it is always useful to carry a t-roll (t.p. for you Americans) with you wherever you go. Knock on wood; I made it through my first bout of the runs without joining “the club.” I don’t want any of you at home to be worried about my health. Everyone gets diarrhea here and it’s not like people don’t get it in the states. We have been thoroughly informed on how to stay hydrated, and what foods to eat when we get the squirts. Our PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer) is only a phone call away if things don’t get regular in a timely fashion. It really wasn’t very bad at all. I just thought it would be fun to prepare you all for the potential topics in the future and write about my first of many experiences with “running.” Ghanaians will ask you, “Are you running?” when they notice you making frequent visits to the pit latrine with a t-roll in hand and an frightened look on your face like you might not make it. I’m discovering that the best way to deal with “poopy” situations is just to laugh at them, especially when they aren’t serious. Even with the diarrhea, I’m still having a great time in Ghana.
The biggest and best news of all is that practicum is over. It is all downhill for training from here on out. On my last day of teaching a fellow trainee and I paired up to teach our class about HIV/AIDS. The Peace Corps required us to teach one class period during practicum on HIV/AIDS. There were 3 of us trainees that were all teaching the same class, and one person had already given his talk earlier in the week. In order to not repeat the same information over and over, Serena and I decided to combine all of our periods and co-teach the topic. We had a condom demonstration and race as well as had a HIV/AIDS counselor from the hospital talk to the students. The lady was going to give HIV tests to all the willing students but that got shot down because there was no parental consent, which was definitely for the best. We still gave the students all the information they need if they really do want to get tested at the hospital. In Ghana condoms cost 1 pesewa and an HIV test cost 50 pesewas. One pesewa is roughly equivalent to 1 cent in American currency. It is amazing how cheap it is to get tested and to stay safe. The students had a bunch of questions and they handled the topic very maturely.
Here are a couple random bits of information you might want to know. I found out the other day that Ghanaians don’t use road flares to warn approaching vehicles of a problem on the road ahead. Instead of road flares, they used big clumps of grass and dirt that they place in the road. More about the transportation; there are usually lines to designate lanes on the paved roads, and vehicles drive in the right lane when they are passing oncoming traffic, but the main determinant of where a car drives on the road and how fast is totally dependant on the placement of pot holes and their size. I have found my weakness for any sweet craving. Boys with coolers on their bikes or with boxes on their heads carry frozen snacks that are called “fan milk.” There is fan choco (which is a solid chunck of frozen chocolate milk), fan yogo (which is a solid chunk of frozen strawberry yogurt), fan tampico (which is frozen tampico which tastes like sunny delite), and there is fan ice (which is AMAZING vanilla ice cream). Fan tampico is the only one I haven’t tried yet, but fan ice is BY FAR the best. Fan ice is the cheapest of all the options (30 pesewas) and it isn’t frozen solid. That is my guilty pleasure for Ghana. Until I have more time to type. I miss everyone. Later.
7/17/08
It’s about time I make another addition to my post. The first big event was the trip to see some local waterfalls. The trainers organized a trip to see some waterfalls near Koforidua for any of the trainees that wanted to go. The biggest downfall was that the trip was going to cost 8 Ghana Cedis, which is a lot on a Peace Corps Trainee salary, we only get payed 2 Ghana Cedis per day. I figure that this may be my only opportunity to see the waterfalls during training and I have no idea when I’ll be back in this region, plus I’m not hurting on money since I brought a bit from home, so I decided to pay the 8 GH (that’s how they distinguish the old currency “cedis” from the new currency “Ghana Cedis”) to see the waterfalls. The first waterfall we went to was Boti Falls. It had been overcast and raining when we left for the waterfalls but the weather cleared up and the sun was shinning. The falls were amazing. The small trek down to the falls was cool because you could see the falls through the forest and you could hear the water rumbling as you got closer. At Boti Falls the waterfall was fairly tall and it separated at the top so it was kind of like two waterfalls right next to each other. We were basically in the middle of a rain forest standing next to this beautiful waterfall. From Boti Falls we decided to hike to Akaa Falls instead of driving around. The “45 minute” hike turned into a “2 hour” hike but it was well worth it. Half way through the hike we came to Umbrella Rock, which looks like one rock is balanced on top of another. In reality the middle of the rock has eroded away over who knows how many years, and this amazing looking rock formation is left. The hike had some pretty steep terrain and we had some older trainees in the group, one of which was an 85 year old man, but everyone made safe and sound. For the first time, I actually felt like a tourist in Ghana. We saw the most breathtaking landscape. It is so different from anything I have ever seen before. Akaa Falls were very different than Boti Falls. The vantage point at the end of the trail set you right in the middle of the run-off from the falls. The waterfall was in a crevasse and the water fell from one side and ran into the cliffs on the other side. I took almost 200 pictures during the excursion so you will all get to see what I’m talking about sooner or later. And then the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow was the fact that we got 3 GH back so it only cost us 5 GH for the whole trip!
The next note worthy event was the trainer vs. trainee football match. Excitement and anticipation has been building for the past couple of weeks and the trash talking has been back and forth. None of the other trainees played organized soccer so they all thought we were going to get demolished by the Ghanaians. You all know how competitive I am, especially when it comes to soccer, so I wasn’t having any of that. I informed my fellow trainees that we were going to find a way to win. I didn’t care how, but we were going to win. It would have been nice to have my soccer cleats, but they were in the mail at the time of the game and I hadn’t received them yet. I also should not have played soccer for the first time in months the previous Sunday with a bunch of Ghanaians at my home stay, because my groin was still extremely sore. But the game must go on. To my pleasant surprise, we played pretty well as a team despite no one other than I played soccer. I played alright at best. I had moments of brilliance followed by moments of dissatisfaction. We played well enough to record a 2-1 win over the trainers though. I’m looking forward to our next match against the trainers when I’ll hopefully have my cleats and be in a little bit better shape.
There is nothing else too groundbreaking to report for now. If anyone has any specific questions, just send me a message and I’ll try to answer it in the blog if I have time. I’m not in desperate need of care packages yet, but I know a couple of items you can start loading up on if you want: powdered cheese packets so I can make mac n cheese at site, gatorade powder cause water gets old and beer is expensive on my budget, and finally chocolate candy bars (i.e. snickers, twix, kit-kat bars, reese’s penut butter cups, milky way, rolos, caramello, m&m’s, baby ruth, 100 grand, etc.). I’m sure I’ll have more specifics to add in the future when I really need some comforts from home, but I know these are a couple things that I’m already starting to crave. I’m really excited because on Saturday I’m going into Koforidua to go to an internet café/restaurant that has cheeseburgers and french fries. Perhaps I’ll post this entry there and I’ll let you know how good it was. I’m not a picky eater and I don’t mind the food here, but I really do miss some (more like all) of the food from home. Bye for now.
7/19/08
Well I’m in Koforidua at the internet café on my computer waiting for the rain to stop and killing time until dinner so we can walk over to the other internet café that has cheeseburgers. I’m discovering that the time it takes to receive mail from the U.S. is a crapshoot. I received something yesterday that was mailed a month ago, but sometimes it only takes about 10 days. Like I said earlier, I’m learning patience. I’m too excited about my cheeseburger to think about anything to write… Keep sending me messages, please. And if you really love me, send a care package with lots of good snacks (see above, plus cheese-its, trail mix, chocolate candy, or any other good snacks). Lots of love.
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Mom
non-member comment
Wow!
I'm certainly glad that you are always looking for things for Melissa to do if the occasion should arise! I assume that she will send you a personal "Thank You"! Everything sounds extremely interesting. I know how hard it is for you not to dance or drum, especially for two weeks! Did you take pictures of the ceremony? I know I'm not suppose to worry when you are sick, but I'm certainly glad that you are feeling better. This wonderful new club, CYPC, that you joining, are you an active member for the whole 2 years? Hopefully not! The trip to the waterfalls sounds beautiful. Can't wait to see your pictures. Glad to hear that you got to play your game! Yes, your shoes are on their way! We will put together a care package soon. The chocolate items may not travel very well in the heat, but we'll try sending them anyways. Take care-I love hearing from you-Miss you so much. Mom