Ghana, Kumasi, Spandex and the Macarena Dance!

It has been over a month since I last updated this! I apologize! Ghana continues to be an amazing adventure!

School in Ghana compared to the United States is so much different! Each class only meets once a week for 2 hours and you are lucky if the teacher shows up on time and stays the whole class period! I’m taking a Gender Issues class and the professor shows up about 35 minutes late to every class and we get dismissed about 30 minutes early. I’ve never been one to be upset when we didn’t have class but I appreciate my education more than ever and I miss being busy with classes. We had a group project for this class and as a group we decided on a time to meet up. I showed up and not one other person showed up. So we figured out another time, and again, nobody showed up but me. I guess you could say that I was pretty irritated. When I told one of our advisors about it, she said that if there is ever an international student, the Ghanaians will always count on them to do the assignment. I ended up calling one of the girls and telling her that we had to do this project together and out of the 8 of up in the group, three people showed up. One other international girl did her part, I did mine and the others literally copied and pasted from the Internet. So we erased that and did it over. We turned in the paper and then our teacher assigned another group project with the same group… We will see how that goes.

A couple weeks ago, we went to Kumasi for the weekend and it was a crazy and hilarious weekend.  We went to the Kente village where they make beautiful cloth. They had such elaborate and amazing designs. I spent way too much money on fabric there but it looks exactly what you would picture Africa Print to look like. After the Kente village, we went to a place where they make ink for clothes and stamps. They explained how they are able to make the ink from a tree and showed us the process. It was super detailed and a long process but it was awesome to watch. We were given the chance to do some of the procedures and even stamp some of the cloth.

The following day, we went to a zoo, the largest market in West Africa,  a really pretty lake and then made our way home. The zoo had a lot of animals but the quality of the zoo was really poor. It was dirty, unsanitary and the animals didn’t look very happy. We were able to touch an elephant but overall, I wasn’t super excited about the zoo. It was pretty sad. The largest open market in West Africa is pretty large! We walked through it but nobody bought anything. It was super crowded and people would grab onto us and it was kind stressful. There is NO personal space in Ghana.

After the market, we went to a beautiful lake. Some people went out on the boat, and others just hung out around the lake. There were many kids who enjoyed hanging out with us. There was a boy named Joshua who asked me if I could give him a science book or pencils. It broke my heart that I didn’t have anything for him so I gave him a pencil and a notebook and he was so happy. It is cool to see how something as simple as a pencil can make someone so happy.

Aboglushie is one of the slums of Ghana and I went a couple weeks ago to help out in one of the schools there. Getting there was tough, and it was pretty sketchy once we got there. If you picture a slum, this is it. It was super dirty, smelled awful, very crowded and not the safest place. Once we got to the school, it was a big building with TONS of kids inside. As we walked in, the kids were so happy to see us. Upstairs, there are about 8 classes that are poorly separated. You could hear everything and see everything in each classroom. Emily and I started playing games with the students and they taught us some fun African games. I have no idea where the teachers were or if there were teachers. After a bit, I decided to teach them the Macarena Dance…. This might be one of the funniest things I have ever done and the kids LOVED it! After the Macarena Dance, I taught them the “Jump On It” Dance and then we did the Hokey Pokey Dance. Eventually we asked what they wanted to learn and they said Physical Education so we did some stretches and some exercise and then the students said they wanted to learn RAM which is Religious and Moral Education. This caught me by surprise but I ended up telling a story from the bible about Zaccheaas. They were all so interested and as soon as I finished, they started to sing a song about what I just talked about. It was super interesting and eye opening about how religious their society is. Here is a video of our Macarena Dance!

http://www.youtube.com/v/qaL7Xof5tXg?autohide=1&version=3&autoplay=1&autohide=1&attribution_tag=3BVoYrB9ZaHk6mkzX8yJ4Q&showinfo=1&feature=share
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So it is super hot in Africa and it is super important to drink water… and a lot of it. It would be super expensive to buy each bottle of water so in Ghana, they have little sachets of water for 10 cents. They are perfectly healthy to drink and it has the amount of one water bottle in the sachets. You drink them by biting into the little plastics bags and drink them. So I live on the 4^th floor in the dorms and I heard one of my friends in the courtyard ask if we could throw down a sachet of water to her. I knew this was going to be funny so I offered. I then threw down the bag of water, which reacted like a water balloon as soon as she attempted to catch it, and exploded. Moral of the story, I now have really easy access to water balloons to anybody in the courtyard.

Playing basketball in Ghana is so different than the states. The team I am on is mostly international students who have played AAU, Club, Travel, and Varsity Basketball. So in other words, we are super good. We finished our “season” by going 6-0 and beating most teams by over 40 points. We were approached by one of the heads of Sports for the University of Ghana and she told us that we would be representing Ghana in a tournament in a couple of weeks. This is pretty cool but also extremely sad considering none of us are from Ghana and we are representing the entire country. Apparently they will recruit a couple Ghanaians to add to our team but we are the “starters.” Our coach is one of the best players in Ghana and is the captain of the National Team so if they qualify for the Olympics, he would be the captain.. pretty cool stuff!

Our coach invited us to go to the beach a couple weeks ago. We thought he was going to pick us up but instead he sent cars to pick us up from our dorms. We were sitting in the lobby when 2 big buff men come in and ask if we were going to the beach.. without asking questions we said yes. Thankfully, they were the right guys!

We also thought we were going to a beach in Accra…. Nope they took us about an hour away to a beach resort. We arrived at this resort and were fed really good fried chicken that came out of a box with Aladdin from Disney on it. We then played volleyball and I became thankful that I never joined a volleyball team cause I am awful!! We swam in the ocean that was warmer than any shower that I have had in Ghana! So in Ghana, they don’t really have bathing suits. So our coach went swimming in spandex, I think he must have watched Michael Phelps on TV or something.

We decided that we had to get home because of homework and such. Our coach offered to drive us to the main road where we could get a taxi. . Also, in Ghana… nobody wears seatbelts. So as we were driving, we somehow ended up in a HUGE ditch. After I face planted into the seat in front of me, we got out and assessed the damage. Many of the local villagers decided to help us basically pick up the car and get it out of the ditch which was very nice of them but they kept looking at us kinda funny because there were 3 white girls and a big Ghanaian man just wearing spandex. And then it gets weirder..So we continue driving and we get stopped at a police checkpoint…. I’m pretty sure it was because there is a large man still ONLY wearing spandex, after he tells the police man that he couldn’t “have” one of us, we are on our way. We get to the main road and Mimi (our coach) says he will get a taxi for us and we should wait in the car. Picture this, a large Ghanaian man in the middle on the street, in the dark, and ONLY wearing spandex.. lets just say that no taxi stopped for him and most swerved to avoid him because of how awkward he looked! Alex, one of my friends, decided she was going to try and within 3 seconds, a taxi stopped and we were on our way home!

Last Saturday, we decided to take a daytrip to Elmina Castle, which is another slave castle in Ghana. We took a Tro-Tro there and got there in about two hours. Once we were there, we stopped at a little restaurant right by the castle and there were about 5 things on the menu. (Fisherman’s Soup, Tomato Sandwich, Egg Sandwich, Fries) All of these items are fairly simple but it took about 3 hours to get our food. Shea who ordered a tomato sandwich literally got 2 slices of bread with ONE slice of tomato. This is an example of how things that could literally make you mad but instead it is just funny. We have a slogan we say often that is T.I.A. (This is Africa)

 

After lunch, we had a tour of the castle. The castle originally was a port for trading items such as sugar and cocoa but then turned into a slave castle. It was super sad walking through the dungeons but very eye-opening. The castle is located right on the beach and near a busy fishing boat area. There were TONS of boats near by and it was fascinating to watch.

Ghana is absolutely incredible! I highly recommend visiting this amazing country at some point of your life!

Sorry this blogpost was so long, I need to update it more often!

Feel free to email me or skype me!! I LOVE hearing about my friends and family back at home!

Love you all,

Janae

Soccer Games, Castles, Canopies and Cool Kids!

          It has been six weeks into my adventure in Ghana and we are officially 1/3 of the way done with this incredible journey. The past couple weeks have been great and filled


with adventure and finally-school.

            The teachers finally ended the strike with no time to spare. I really did think that the semester was going to be cancelled but luckily the professors are back! I’ve gone to all my classes and they are much different than classes in the United States. My first class is an African Traditional Dance class and I LOVE it. I’m an awful dancer but the class is nicknamed “Obroni Dance Class” which means “Foreigner Dance Class” and it is totally true. I think about 60% of the international students are in this class. I have never laughed so much in a class and I love it.  Often Ghanaian students will stop by and watched and they are constantly giggling at our skills. Good stuff. Some of my other classes include Victimology, Gender Issues, SGP (Society, Gov’t and Politics) and Service Learning. All of them are great except my Gender Issues Class. I think some of the facts that we learn in America about varies topics (gender verse sex and those topics in general) are basically not existent in Ghana. There is one other international student in the class and we both were in surprised about the statements the professor made in class. It will be interesting to step back and learn things that are opposite of what I have learned in the States.

 

            Last weekend, we went to watch Ghana play Zamia in the World Cup Qualifier. It was such an awesome, scary, funny, crazy, and exciting experience. We boarded a bus to get to Kumasi at 7 in the morning, thinking the game started at 12. We got to Kumasi at 12 and then found out the game started at 4. So we just hung out as people slowly started get to the stadium. These people have Ghanaian pride! We finally got our tickets and made our way into the stadium.  had a big group so we went in groups of ten. As soon as we got into the stadium, my friend Emily and I were walking around to find something to drink and we saw facepaint. Immediately, we knew that we needed our face painted. We lost the rest of our group right away and they took our tickets at the door so we had no idea where to go. We ended up paying about $1 to get our face completely painted. It was awesome. As it was being painted, many people were walking by taking pictures of us. Once we were done, we made a guess to where we were supposed to go.

            As soon as we were actually in the stadium, people were SO excited to see that two international people were showing Ghana pride. No joke, people were screaming, yelling, taking pictures from far away, grabbing us, taking pictures with us as we walked away, whole sections would stand up and scream for us. It was hilarious. We just walked by the crowds screaming and dancing. I felt like such a celebrity. I think it is the same feeling  Justin Bieber gets when he walks down the Red Carpet with girls screaming, taking pictures, grabbing him, trying to take pictures of him ect. I wish I could explain it better but it was so funny. 

            We eventually found part of our group- they kinda stood out. The whole stadium was PACKED. There weren’t assigned seats and people were sitting everywhere. Once the game started- nobody stopped screaming until the end. It was so much fun. There were times where I would be sitting and people would tell me to stand up and cheer. SO MUCH FUN. Ghana beat Zambia 2-1 and THEY ARE GOING TO THE WORLD CUP! We got home at 2 in the morning because of the traffic and we had to be at the bus to go to Cape Coast at 7 with our group. I think it was safe to say that we were all a little bit tired.

            Cape Coast was pretty awesome! Our first stop when we got there was the Cape Coast Slave Castle. This is the biggest slave trade port in West Africa and it was built by Europeans to collect Africans and send them across the Atlantic. Ove 25 million slaves left Africa and once they left, their name was taken away, their dignity, their freedom, they left their family, friends culture and their life.  I stood in the male dungeon where 1,000 slaves were held. The dungeon was small, dark and filthy. It was the size of about 3 small bedrooms and the only light they saw was through a little window. I was in this dungeon for a couple minutes and I was hot and sweaty. I can’t even imagine what it would be like with 1,000 other men in   The most emotional part of the tour was going into a cell. If a slave misbehaved, he was forced into a cell behind three large doors. Behind the doors, there was no windows and no ventilation. The man was not fed or given any water. He would be sentenced for a week in the cell but he would never survive over 3 days. There would often be another inmate in the cell and because of no light they were unable to see each other but once one of the died, the other would just have to wait till he died too. It was torture. The castle was extremely eye opening and emotional. I learned so much- more than I ever learned in school which is another story but it was a great experience.  

            After the castle, we went to a festival they were having in Cape Coast. We somehow got in the middle of the parade. People were cheering and clapping for us and I danced with this elderly woman to “Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas. Once we realized that we were in the parade, we got out to actually watch. Chiefs from villages around came through the parade. They were being carried and many of them had people fanning them or holding an umbrella. They were all dressed in beautiful African attire. It was super fun to see because everybody was so energetic. Men were holding HUGE drums on their head and the music was awesome. As we were walking back, it got a little chaotic- you really couldn’t walk without getting bumped, grabbed, or pushed around.

  

     We arrived at the hotel later that night and it was amazing. It was right on the ocean! We stayed in little huts. The hotel even had a crocodile pond. It was cool but I’m convinced the crocodiles were fake because they didn’t move at all while we were there. We had an outstanding breakfast and swim in the pool and later that day, we made our way to the canopies.

 

            After a little hike, we got to walk on canopies in the middle of the African Rainforest. It was so awesome! We were super high in the air and on super sketchy looking bridges. They would creak and wiggle with every step. I decided it would be fun to rock the bridge, I guess not everybody was as thrilled as I was about this. J The view was amazing. There were 7 different bridges and I felt like a monkey the whole time! After the canopies, we made our way home.

            I’ve been volunteering in the orphanage and it really has been a joy. The kids are so great and they are always excited when anybody gives them attention. I’ve even learned some of the 

traditional African Games from them. I’m excited to teach my friends when I get home. I’ve been working with one boy a lot- he is blind and has pretty severe mental disabilities. He is unable to talk, communicate and do much by himself but I’ve been working with him a lot. This week, we worked on the difference between a fork and a spoon. And I think he is slowly making progress. It is awesome!!!!!!!!! Next week, we will work on the differences between pants and shirts.

            This adventure is life changing. Feel free to write me, skype me, email me and say hi!

 Much Love,
Janae

 Here is a little video of a play we saw a couple weeks ago:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-mRvEh5iPI&feature=player_embedded