The Uni. of Ghana

---

After orientation was over on the 11th, we moved into our dorms/homestays. I am in a dorm called Ghana Hostel, or Pentagon by students. It is a dorm with flats instead of corridors. It is sort of like Ytterboe at St. Olaf but only has three double rooms connecting to one main common area that has a table and chairs, a "kitchen" which is more like a small room with empty cupboards and counter space, a small deck where we hang our laundry and two bathrooms. The 15 CIEE students that are living in Pentagon this term are the only Americans in this dorm. I do not have a roommate yet, but supposedly I will soon.... I do have three others living in my flat right now. They are Nigerian and are really nice. I haven't talked to them too much since they mostly keep to themselves, but they seem pretty friendly.
There are about 10 or 15 Americans in homestays mostly located in East Legon. East Legon is one of the nicest parts of Accra and has huge houses. There are two very famous football players who live in that community, one of them right next to one of the girls on the trip. The rest of the CIEE group is in another dorm called the International Student Hostel, or ISH. The majority of the students living there are international, with many from the U.S. Most of them are rooming with each other. Their dorm is more like a normal large dorm except it has a large courtyard in the middle with the rooms wrapped around it. The only downfall for our group being separated is that the two dorms are a half and hour walk apart, and since it gets dark before 7 pm and it isn't safe to travel by oneself after that, it makes it hard to visit everyone.
The campus is really large. Since it isn't in a city setting, I can't really compare the size very well, but it is relatively easy to navigate. There is one main drag down the center of campus, with Pentagon to the right and ISH to the left. Most of the department buildings are located down this main road along with one of the main cafeterias, Akuafo Hall, which has Odo Rice (pretty cheap and not too sketch), Tacobell (relatively expensive and doesn't sell any tacos...), and our favorite cafe where I tend to eat breakfast and lunch most days. The cafe sells oatmeal, pancakes/crepes with nutella, hot chocolate (milo), egg sandwhiches (which are delicious), along with some other good choices. It is really cheap and since we go there pretty much everyday, the women know who we are and have even decided to open the cafe on Sundays just for us.
My first reaction to the campus was pretty bewildering. We dropped off all of our stuff in our rooms and then went on a driving tour of campus and ended up at the JQ Building, which students often call Tingi Tingi, which supposedly means "Large building". This is also where the International Programs Office (IPO) is located with air conditioning and free internet. When we got there we were handed acceptance letters and told we were getting our student ID cards and registering as students at the University. This seems like an easy enough thing to do, but after an hour of waiting in line, I was told that I didn't have a pin number yet so I should just come back tomorrow. There were about five of us that didn't receive our IDs so we all came back the next afternoon. After another 3-4 hours spent standing in multiple lines and missing half of our program's lecture, we finally were registered as students and had our IDs in hand. This was our first really frustrating experience in Ghana and since then, I have learned that patience is not only a virtue here, but a necessity.

---

Photos

Outside Akuafo Hall
Levi and I drinking our first bags of water.

Commonwealth Hall
All men's dorm

Comments

[Tess]

:)
This looks amazing Alli! Im sure your having quite the experience, i miss you already! Have so much fun and be safe! Love you