Work and play

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Right, so last week we actually did some proper work. On Monday I called all of the local schools and organised to go in and do talks to them over the coming weeks on HIV and Malaria/Animal Bites.

On Tuesday we went into the maternal health centre as usual, although again nobody turned up (which was also the case today - we are going to try one last time this Thursday and then give it a break for a month.)

We did 3 talks in total last week, 2 on the Wednesday and 1 on the Thursday. On Wednesday morning we went into one of the schools in our village and spoke to them about HIV (as it is one of the few local schools not done yet.) I enjoyed giving this talk, the teachers and the kids listened and were receptive - and none of them new any of it before we started. So, all-in-all it was successful. Unfortunately, the second school wasn't quite so good. At this school we gave a talk on Malaria/Animal bites and the kids just didn't seem interested. The school was noisy so we had to shout above the noise of that plus half of the kids were just doing their own thing and the teacher was standing at the back uninterested. We gave the talk anyway, but how much went in I have no idea and even if it did, I don't really think they cared.

The school on Thursday was again on Malaria/Animal bites, but this time was a lot more successful. We spoke first to the teachers and then gave a talk to about 120 kids. They all paid attention and asked questions (although this may be due to the fact the teacher stood at the front with his cane and kept asking them questions about what we said), but I didn't mind this - as far as I was concerned they paid attention, asked questions, and seemed to take it all in. Then at the end of the talk, as we were leaving, one of the kids got up and said to all of the others 'Tomorrow we all are bringing in machetes', which I found quite entertaining.

So, during the week we actually worked and therefore at the weekend we obviously had to travel. This weekend we went to Volta region (in the east) to go to Wli falls (highest in west Africa) and we went to a monkey sanctuary. Christa and Rus live in Kpandu, which is in Volta, and their host mum was nice enough to say that we would be allowed to stay. Kpandu also had a direct tro from Kumasi for a mere 16 Cedi, and only took 7 hours! Although, about 6 hours in the radiator in the tro did explode into the tro, pouring scolding hot water over all of the people sitting further forwards - everyone jumped out pretty quickly and nobody was hurt, but I think that just tells you the nature of the vehicles we have to travel in!

On Saturday we went to the monkey sanctuary in the morning, which was really cool as you fed an entire troop of monkeys bananas - you could just hold them out and they would peel them whilst you held the banana and some would sit on your arm whilst they did it! So we did that for about 30 minutes and then went to Ho and just relaxed for the rest of the day. Not really much to say about Ho, it's quite big and spread out with little in it.

Sunday was the day we went to Wli. There are 2 falls at Wli, the higher and the lower falls - naturally we went to both. The upper falls were, however, a long 2 hour trek up quite a horribly steep hill. Completely worth it! The falls were incredible and we could swim in the pool at the bottom of them to refresh ourselves. The lower falls were also quite amazing, and the cliff face next to them was covered in bats! I guess both falls were similar, just with the higher falls you got an amazing view along the way.

On Monday we had to go home, but this time there was no easy direct tro, as that left in the evening (for some unknown reason). So we left at 8, to get a tro to Kpong, then to Koforidua and then finally home. Needless to say this took a long time! It was fine until Koforidua but then we ended up on a relatively large tro with absolutely no space at all for the longest leg of the journey (a 4 hour stint.) The tro broke down after 15 minutes. We had to wait an hour before it got going again and all they seemed to do was take a wheel off and then put it on again, but it worked so I guess there wasn't much to complain about - it could have been far worse!

We finally got back to Kumasi at 8pm, and on the way into the tro station (the tro dropped us just outside) I had my wallet pick-pocketed - which had my bank card in, driving license and a fair bit of money. This is a tad annoying I must admit, as I wouldn't have had my card or as much money in it if I hadn't just been traveling - but these things happen and I guess it will make me more careful in the future and makes it a true gap year! And it can always be worse.

So, that is my last week - sorry I have written so much but it's been quite a week. I shall end by saying that Tom is quite a cool guy -21 year old just graduated from uni and there is a girl who came at the same time of him from London, doing the HIV project I should be on, on a gap year, going to Edinburgh next year and on the same flight home as me. Weird. We also met another English guy called Dec, who Rus met a few weeks ago and stayed in Kpandu with us. Also on a gap year, and has been to Rwanda and Kenya before Ghana and is also a cool guy - what else can I say?

Until next time (which won't be as long next time!)

Sam(uel) x

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