"Caking"

Sorry for the delay in posting… let me get straight to it! Well my uncle Richie brought me a cake last week from one of my aunties… it was a really nice gesture! It made my day and week to see it! The cake looked GORGEOUS… I cut it open to find… well raisins! Raisins baked inside with this fruitcake type cake texture Lol. That just saved me 10lbs in Ghana. Oh well. Apart from the cake… I had also been “caking.” You can look up the definition on urbandictionary.com while in Ghana. I will just leave it at that… like the raisins—Well, I will save the rest of the story for “rambling girlfriend emails,” phone chats and in person coffee and lunch dates back State side. :-) .

Cake, I have been also enjoying delicious pastries! I’m addicted! “The original cookie monster has found her Ghanaian addiction of choice. I just need to calm down so that my aunty doesn’t have to keep altering the clothes she makes :-p . My good friend Milly said I should shed it all while state side… I hope so :-/ .

Photos: Me with cake before heading off to banks for the day...

Getting in Touch with Nature...

Today I walked around the corner to buy phone cards (MTN, whoop whoop), and I saw the most BEAUTIFUL thing, a momma chicken protecting her newly hatched chicks. It was so beautiful (in my opinion anyway) because in the midst of the rough patches of grass, garbage, clay road.. was this momma chick and her little ones frolicking around. I tried to get a good picture, but the momma looked like she wanted to attack me.

Hmm... It's interesting... I always gripe about how the problems with sewage, transportation, health-care systems etc. can be fixed by the bright Ghanaian migrants who leave to work in the UK, USA, EU.. etc. I gripe to my good friend Mildred aka Milly aka Mildew, who is one of these brilliant "Diasporians" who has incredibly gifted friends at all the top university in the United States. One of the things that comes up with cousins, and with my friend is that those who are doing well, are almost immune to the poverty that they experience day to day. They are immune to it; and well, behind the high barbed wire fences of your home.. you have all the ammenities you need--proper garbage/waste disposal, filtered clean water, air-conditioning, internet, cooks, everything you need.

So when I drive off to my meetings at BoG, ARB Apex Bank... etc. I will NOT become immune. I don't EVER want to become immune. I am going to become best friends with the little girl who is a squatter behind the house next to my families, so that I will wake up thinking... well, "Ghana doesn't have free public education system in place... how can I get her to school or in a place where she doesn't have to carry around that ratty toy and wear those dirty clothes?" and wake up asking what can I do about this... everyday. WHAT will I do about this. Maybe I will harass all the Ghanaian engineers I know (that are my peers) and tell them to get to work on the roads or sewage system, versus some of these U.S. based jobs. Accra.. Ghana... is like a HUGE ball of potential. Its actually kind of confusing... I keep asking Why? Why? Why? And now I'm think How... how... how?!?! Am I going to make some changes happen.

Peace and Love Ya'll

P.S. If you didn't notice by now.... this blog will not be a place for grammatical correctness... after looking at these questionnaires, Twi vocab, my research documents my brain is FRIED by the time I get to the blog writing :-p .

Night life...

My cousin, her boyfriend, and her two friends studying at Legon and another American student from Tennessee studying abroad in Legon went to this bar called CHAMPS, last Friday night. It's a sports bar with Karaoke, a dance floor etc. It was loads of fun! We sang, we danced, we were merry! My cousins friends have been super sweet and hospitable. I loved the Karaoke, it would old school night so i heard a lot of Pop, and light rock throw backs, that was A lot of fun. I even got on stage (after a eensy bit of liquid courage) to take the mic. This was a little bit of one of the better performances of the night. All in all, fun night.

Food!

The food here is absolutely amazing! Fresh mangoes, pineapples, watermelon, soursop, coconuts... Ok I'll stop. It's safe to say that I have been having my fair share of fruits and veggies! I LOVE the red red (it’s basically like beans in a stew like a semi-spicy tomatoes based stew--hence the name) with fried plantain, and kontomire (spinach) stew with bayere (yam)... [I'm gaining fluency in written and spoken Twi by the way ;-) ]. It is great! Overall the food in Ghana/Accra is fantastic I love it!

Cultural point so I don’t get killed. My family here is sooo nice! They took me EVERYWHERE because they didn’t think I knew my way around (the routes are pretty simple :-p, at Legon and the way home). I know how to get around. The other day though, we ran out of eggs at the house and usually make egg sandwiches when I go to the Bank of Ghana, etc. for interviews. There weren’t any left, so I told my cousin, not to worry! I will just buy some food “off the street” aka street venders selling fried yam etc. He gave me blank stare, and then began to chuckle. Wait, you are kidding right?

Me: About what?

Cuzzo: You know there is Typhoid in Ghana right?

Me: Yea! I got the vaccine for it before I came.

Cuzzo: Don’t ever buy food off the street. You don’t how it’s been prepared. Only take food from the house. A good friend of mine, who is rich and everything just died of typhoid this past weekend, not to scare you or anything.

Me: Oh, wow. Right, I will just take some jeloff for tomorrow.