Home and food and such

---

So I've described a bit my surroundings and work, so here's a bit about my home. I live in a very convenient area of Accra called Labadi. It is a short distance away from my work, an internet cafe, a grocery store, restaraunts, and even the beach. Accra is such a big bustling city, I often forget it's right on the coast.
I'm lucky enough to have a great house shared currently with four other volunteers, although we could expect more at anytime. The house is not luxurious by any means, but it is clean, has electricity, and even a real shower (which is fairly unusual here). The house belongs to a single woman, a retired teacher, who we all call "Aunty". She has a housemaid type person who comes and helps her go to the market and helps fix the meals.
The food here is good, but there are only a limited number of dishes that you just eat over and over. A common lunch dish is called red red and is made of beans in a tomato sauce usually served with fried plantains. Another common dish is called Jollof rice and is a rice with sauce and chicken. A dish very different from home is called Banku and is a doughy ball that you must eat with your fingers and dip in a spicy sauce. Groundnuts, which are much like peanuts, are eaten here often in soups, sandwiches, or just plain.
On the streets you can buy some of the "junk food" of Ghana. This includes crispy plantain chips and fanice (ice cream in a bag) which is sold by vendors of bicycles honking horns all day.
The volunteers in my home and in general are from all over the world. There are quite a few people from Holland and Australia, but plenty of other people from Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Canada, Chile, Denmark, England, Germany, and just one other person from the United States. The volunteers have quite a community and there's something going on nearly every night of the week. It's really a great group.

---