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Published: September 30th 2008
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cool cat
This is Shadrack- he's wearing my sunglasses... before another kid walked off with them This past weekend I went to an orphanage in Koforidua. We are going there again next weekend to help with a program where they are honoring all the donors that contributed to the orphanage. The whole group did not go this past weekend, just a few of us.
I left on Saturday morning around 8:30 or so and did not get to the orphanage until around 1, but that is to be expected. We took a tro to Madina and then from there we took one to Koforidua. Once we arrived at the orphanage we began painting one of the buildings. There were more of us than the work we had to do because we were also supposed to be helping put up a roof but the man that was supposed to show us fell ill. So we only had to paint. It was hard to keep my roller, there were only 4 of them and once it got set down, it got picked right up by someone else. I called it a bust for painting so I played with the kids. We played soccer, and they are good. Have you ever played soccer with a bunch of little Ghanaian
Me and Sandra
This was during a program at Basco orphanage... she came up to me and sat on my lap and later fell asleep in that position. boys? They will stick it to you good. They were fun though. People are always amazed when they see that an Oboruni female can play soccer. We played for a few hours in the African heat, it was awesome. After that I let the kids take my camera and take pictures of each other, then it ran out of batteries, so I’ll post what they took. They took a lot, thank goodness for digital, right?
They rang the bell for dinner, and the girls in the orphanage brought it to us. We ate in their library. It is a very nice library that a company donated to them. They had Harry Potter in there! I could only find the first one (it was the British version) but that was truly exciting! They also had a lot of academic books along with classics such as the Berinstein Bears. After dinner we played Uno with some of the kids. By time 8 o’clock rolled around I was beat. I was out by 9. We slept in their computer building. Some organization from NJ donated brand new Dells to this orphanage. There were about 7 or 8 of them in this room.
Kids at Basco
I played soccer with these boys We slept on mattresses with no blankets, but fortunately we planned ahead and brought our own.
Sunday morning I awoke around 5 to a goat trying to break down the door and a rooster cawing (do they caw?) outside the building. Yes, there were plenty of goats, chickens, and roosters just doing their thing outside. I was reminded of the time I got chased by the rooster at Gram’s house so I steered clear of those things. After I woke up I had a lovely shower outside with a bucket behind a tin wall. I did not have a full shower because somewhere in the back of my head was this vision of a goat coming and knocking down my wall and me just being in a very uncomfortable position in front of these Ghanaian children. They had breakfast for us (egg sandwiches) and then we went to church.
The church service was Baptist I believe. I stayed for a while (enough to hear some of the message and some of the praise and worship), until I could feel a very unpleasant rising in the pit of my stomach so I rushed off to the bathroom. I was
Basco Orphanage
The center of the orphanage... big field. To the right in the far corner is a yellow building which houses the toilet facilities. The green building next to it are the showers. The building to the left is the central pavilion where classes and other activities take place... there is more but this was the only picture I got before the kids trying to avoid these bathrooms, because, well, there was no indoor plumbing at this orphanage. The bathrooms consisted of a hole in the ground. Let me just say, getting sick and having to use those facilities, in African heat, is by far one of the most unpleasant experiences I have ever had to encounter. One of the girls happened to be back in the room when I was going through this and I asked if she had any pepto or anything for an upset stomach. To my great surprise, the pastor was in the room right next to us and heard me say how I was sick. He was a very nice man, but I didn’t really want to discuss my bodily functions with him. But apparently here, people get sick all the time like that so it’s really not that uncomfortable to talk about, especially with members of the clergy. He told me to go lay down and he would go get some Coke for me to soothe my stomach. I did just that. I unfortunately was of no use that day since after I laid down I was out until we left. I think I had a fever
He was funny
He took a good majority of the photos which I now have on my camera and it broke at some point.
We left the orphanage around 3 and got back to campus around 6:30. The pastor sent me back with 3 more bottles of Coke.
We are getting really good at these tros. They like to take advantage and over charge us sometimes, but we know enough now what the prices should be like. The trip back from the orphanage was 2 cedis and 15 peseaws in total.
I am fine now, it was a 24-hour thing. I get those a lot here. Just part of being in this environment I suppose.
We are going back next weekend to help with the program. Not sure what we are doing, but it’ll be fun. At least I’ll get to see those kids again, they are great. Then the following weekend we have a free one. The last two weekends of the month we have trips planned. The first we will be staying in a village in the Volta region with a family. The next weekend we will finally be going up North… unless the bus breaks again. You just never know here.
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Sara
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Roosters
From my experience, the roosters should Crow... like Cock-a-doodle-doo.. and not Caw! So glad to hear that the trip is going well.