Two marriage proposals, some dancing, and one Auntie Grace

Greetings,

For the most part this past week has been great-filled with fun times with family and friends and a few eyeopening moments with other foreign students.

Last Monday, was my second day at our internship it was slightly better than the week before but not by much…we still sat there doing not much of anything. Luckily when we went yesterday after a boring 3 hours it finally was good when we taught the students about the similarities and differences between the US and Ghana. The best moments were when we blew their minds by telling them about the poverty, homelessness, and unemployment in the US and the illiteracy rate in inner-city schools. We want them to know that the average American does not live the life of the Kardashians and other celebrities they see on TV, we have money problems just like the people here…just on a different scale. After class the kids helped Jessalyn and I study our Twi which was very entertaining.

Tuesday morning I got up early enough for a run before it got too hot. Unfortunately, I found out soon after getting back that our water was off…and not only was that off but our water holding thing (kind of like an old school well, we pull water up in a bucket) had no water in it because they needed to recement the bottom of it because it was leaking water. Luckily I was able to still get a bucket of water to wash up because you never want to walk around in this heat and dust without showering after a run…ick.. I had two classes and lunch with my friend Evans and then came home for dinner. Siril saw me working on homework and asked me to teach him to write in English because he can only write in French and maybe Ewe.

Wednesday was day 2 without water, which actually doesn’t seem like that big of a deal to me anymore but thank goodness I brought baby wipes! After class we had a reflection session in the CIEE office. This was meant to be a time for large groups of us to reflect on our first month in Ghana and the highs and lows so far. I was a little frustrated after the meeting because a lot of people have been walking out of classes because they don’t like what they’re hearing and personally I think they are being oversensitive. Many complaints were made about feeling like people here are forcing their opinions down our throats…the same people then start judging the Ghanaians for various things that they say and how that isn’t ok to say in the US. After a while I raised my hand and tried to remind everyone that we are not in the US. We are in Ghana. People, opinions, and ideologies here are different…isn’t that why we’re here? When considering where to study abroad I chose two places that are nothing like the US precisely for that reason, I don’t want to pay one year’s worth of tuition for one semester if it’s going to be just like home. I realized that nothing that I see here really surprises me and I think it’s just because I came here with the mindset that it would be nothing like home…and that is perfectly ok with me. I hope that other students start realizing the opportunity of a life-time we have before their sensitivity damages their experiences here because they won’t take in the differences but are instead rejecting them.

Every Thursday, Remi and I try to get a group of my friends and his to go out to clubs because ladies can get in for free at one but it never seems to work out so we went to Jerry’s with Rachel instead so it was a fun night of a drink or two with my host siblings. Something interesting that is happening is that the country is rationing electricity so it is going out more often.  I’m not sure yet why the rationing is happening but my sister Rachel said that if the dam is low they might ration the electricity because it is run by hydropower. Somehow I ended up with a family who has a generator so we usually don’t sit too long in the dark.

Friday, I went to my internship for the first time alone. The tro tro dropped me off too far away so I had to walk back through the construction zone to get to the path that would take me to the center. Along the way I received my first marriage proposal. I always get the best...the ones with no teeth and who must be at least 40 years old, but at least he has a job as a construction worker! At my internship I watched the students do presentations which were very impressive and then made friends with another intern, a Ghanaian named Lydia. She helped me practice Twi and made me feel better about the internship overall. Friday evening Rachel and Remi wanted to take me to a club called Hollywood. We met my friends Paige, Anna, and Jessalyn at Jerry's for a drink before hand which was fun since the girls had been drinking for awhile before we got there. After some pictures we grabbed a taxi to go to Hollywood. I'm not a fan of dancing but here it's part of everyday life...I'm adapting. Let's just say that it was a fantastic time. In my time here my friends and I have come up with a bunch of strategies to keep unwanted men away from us and having my host brother there didn't hurt. This ended up being my latest night out in Ghana and Paige and I were able to represent UW when the club played Jump Around haha

We dropped the caps of our beer in our cup..twinsies!

Paige, me, Remi

This is the cloudless sky and crazy strong sun we were dealing with resulting in a very hot game.

Saturday, I went to the Ghananain national football team (the Black Stars) game against Malawi. Unfortunately, they almost left without us to the game because they told me the bus left at 1:45 and it really left at 1:20..thank goodness we were early!! I don't really know anything about football (soccer) but it's like a religion here so I decided to go and it was pretty fun! I got my second wedding proposal, this handsome devil was also old and missing teeth and tried to win me over by saying that he'll be the president and I'll be the first lady...obviously he doesn't know my feelings about me wanting to be the president with the first "first sir" for a husband...hahaha Another interesting thing about the game is how incredibly loud it was...vuvuzelas are blasting for the entire game and by the end I found myself shouting "what?" even more than normal. They also sell just about anything in the stadium including women who sell fried chicken by the piece from a tray on their head. In the end Ghana won 2-0 and it was a great time. Here's a very brief clip of the game:

Malawi in red and Black Stars in white.

Gideon's face demonstrates the enthusiasm Ghanaians have for the game.

The best part of the day was when I got home from the game and finally met my host-mom, Auntie Grace!! It was dark and I followed her in our gate and she held the house door open for me. When I walked in and thanked her she said "Hi girl!" just like my Auntie Mary so I was thrown off the rest of our greeting went like this:

-Hi girl! What's your name?

-I'm Tera. What's your name?

-Well, I'm the mom of the house

-(ahhhhhh) I'm so sorry it's sooo nice to meet you finally!! (could I have been any cooler?)

hahaha luckily she thought it was funny and gave me a big hug. I think I'm going to love her! Pookie's sister Stephanie also came back to Ghana with Auntie Grace after visiting the US for one month. She's 15 so we have some more teenage girl attitude running through the house.

Sunday, I did my laundry and then went to church with the girls and this weekend it was a Catholic mass which was pretty cool. Then I spent some time doing homework until my friend Jessalyn came over to study. My family loves her (especially my brothers) so she's always welcome at our house. Charlie (my host-dad) offered us a beer but in true mom fashion Auntie Grace said "not until they're done studying!" haha. I also got to skype with some family this weekend which was fantastic, especially hearing from my three younger cousins who had fantastic questions for me :) I ended the weekend showing Siril and Remi how to do Sudoku puzzles which was fun and they're going to start teaching me more card games.

Sorry for the long post but lots of things happen here all the time!

Hope you're all doing well, don't forget questions are always welcome!