Cape Coast, Day 2

                 Tuesday we slept in until around 9 and called our cab driver from the previous day.  Diana worked out a fare with him that he would take us to several places for one fare; essentially we rented him as a driver for the day.  First we went to Kakum nature reserve.  After paying about 15 cedes (Diana paid 2, everything is more expensive for foriegners) we hiked up about 10 minutes to the canopy level of the forest.  We walked on a canopy walk that had 7 suspended walkways with trees at each stop.  There were no harnesses or anything but instead there was rope netting on each side so you wouldn't fall. 

Supposedly you could see lots of animals on the nature reserve, but there was a group of about 50 Ghanaian hair dressers right behind us that were yelling and screaming to each other, so any wildlife that was around would have been quite scared away.  It was still really cool though.

                After the canopy walk, we decided we didn’t want to buy any food there, and that there wasn’t a good chance of seeing animals if we did a different nature walk (the other option was one on the ground), so we left.

                On our way out of the nature reserve we saw a sign for a monkey rehabilitation center, so we had the cab driver pull up to the gate and honk.  A Dutch man came out and we asked if he was open and how much, and he said it was free but asked we give 7 cedes each for food for the animals.  The taxi drove in and we got out, and the guys assistant gave us a tour.  There were several monkeys, 6 crocodiles, a lot of turtles, 2 pythons, and some rodents that looked like raccoons and deer.  

We are cute and very sleepy.  You are bright.

 I am not comfortable being on this ledge.

Lots of different turtles, not the best place to display them. 

Do not like!  Please turn me over!!

The Dutch guy really didn’t want us taking pictures of the animals in the cages, and didn’t want to be called a zoo even though when I asked if they had any sick animals or animals they were planning to release his assistant said no.  It seemed a bit sketchy.  The guy was very nice and did let us take pictures of his pet monkey that he had chained to a tree, 

and I think his point was to teach the locals that monkeys and some of the other wildlife were good for more than just food.  I asked him why he came from the Netherlands to start a monkey reserve in Ghana, and he said he hates what his government is doing and he’s been here about 8 years.  He also says that he doesn’t have mosquito nets at all and gets malaria about once a month, which is no big deal to him.  He was interesting, to say the least.

                After we left the monkey place we stopped for lunch at a restaurant near the university in cape coast, and then headed to Elmina Castle around 4.  They were technically closed when we got there but they let us in and started a new tour for us.  It was similar to Cape Coast Castle but older, and Dutch instead of British.  There is a church in the middle of the castle, on top of the slave dungeons.  If there was ever an example of religion being in the wrong, we were standing on it.

                After seeing the castle we went back to the hotel and the drama began.  We had told the hotel the previous day that we were students and would like a cheaper room for the second night.  So Tuesday night Diana talked to a different person who said they didn’t have a cheaper room but they have a dormitory.  Diana was mad that they didn’t tell us about it the first night, because the dorm was 9 cedes a night per person instead of 24 per person.  So she said we would like to switch rooms, and we decided to shower in our old room where we had our own bathroom, and then switch rooms.  Diana told them I wasn’t in the room but when I came back we would eat and switch rooms.  So we sat down to eat around 8:30… and didn’t get our food until after 10.  Our waiter took our order and didn’t turn it into the kitchen, and then preceded to not check on us for more than an hour.  In the meantime 2 Ghanaian guys joined us at our table for what wound up being a crazy conversation of one of them hitting on Diana, and ticking her off instead of picking her up, and the other trying to explain why he wants to run for office in Ghana.  His reasoning was that he could do good and still make money off the top of federal projects, and we were trying to point out that its people like that that screw up politics.  He was also trying to explain American government to us, saying that Obama didn’t really make decisions as president of the US, there were 4 men that did instead.  But he couldn’t tell us the names of any of the men, so it sounded really ridiculous. 

                After eating we went to change rooms and they wanted us to wait until the next day, but we both complained about how long dinner had taken and they let us switch.  After moving our stuff into the dorm, which we had to ourselves, we were about to turn off the lights when I saw a rat.  And screeched.  Diana was already half asleep so I just climbed onto the top bunk and attempted to sleep.  I saw what I thought were more in the shadows after I turned off the lights, and I heard them rustling a plastic bag.  So I put in earplugs and hoped that the mosquito net would also keep out the rats.  I maybe fell asleep at 2; I kept jumping thinking one was going to crawl on me.  It was a good day overall, just could have ended better is all :P

On to the University

Diana and I got back to Accra from touring on Sunday night, and have been lounging around her parents house for the last 2 days.  Tomorrow afternoon we move to a house at the University of Ghana in Accra (less than 30 minutes away) and will begin training for the research we'll be doing.

I've written most of what we did the past week, but internet is slow here and uploading pictures takes a while, so I'll sporadically post about our sightseeing when I have the time to wait on the interwebs.

Cape Coast Day 1

A week ago Diana and I got up and left by about 6:15am to ride into downtown Accra with her dad on his way to work.  It took us about 2 hours to get there because of the sheer volume of traffic and the condition of some of the roads. He dropped us off at a gas station where we bought some snacks for breakfast and got a taxi to the bus station.  We took an air conditioned bus to Cape Coast, I think it took about 2 hours.  Buses here, you buy a ticket, get on, and wait for the bus to fill.  It will only leave when it is full, so sometimes there is quite a wait.  Luckily on a Monday morning it only took about 1/2 hour.
When we got to Cape Coast, we got a taxi to Diana's old boarding school and walked around for a few hours, taking pictures (they are doing some building and renovations), talking to students, and talking to some of the staff she knew when she was a student there. The school was pretty big and apparently one of the best in Ghana.  The dorms looked small to me- I think they were smaller than the ones I stayed in at summer camp, and the girls weren't allowed to have a lot of personal items.  But that's apparently how boarding school works here; Diana loved the school and the girls seemed very happy, so it was a neat place to see :)

 Most places don't have city plumbing, so they buy large tanks of water, which are sometimes connected have running water, and sometimes you just go fill up a bucket for whatever you need to do.

 Some of the kitchen staff Diana knew when she was a student.

After 3 hours at the school we decided the next order of business was getting something to eat.  So we took a cab to Cape Coast Castle and picked a seafood restaurant right next to the castle and preceded to not order seafood.  I'm just not that bold with my GI system yet.  As tourists (and me being white) we had children flock to us when we got out of the bus trying to sell us things and asking our names to write on seashells. One kid entertained us as we ate, turning cartwheels on the beach, and constantly forgetting Diana's name, which she told him was Cecilia.
After eating it was late in the afternoon, so we took a tour of the Castle but didn't have time to see the museum- we caught that later in the week.

Cape Coast Castle is enormous, grand, and horrifying at the same time.  It's surreal to walk around in a place that is so old (1500s) and where you know so much suffering occurred and so many people died.  It seems impossible the amount of people that were crammed into the dungeons, and then made to live in their own filth for months without a bath or being allowed to leave the dungeons.  They have excavated some of the dungeons all the way to the stone, and left others with several inches of sediment on top that is blood, vomit, feces, bones, etc from the slaves that lived and died there.  We walked on it.  It was disgusting to think about. The indentures are canals for all of the above to run out of the dungeons.
 

This is out tour group looking into what used to be a dungeon, and is now a well.

We saw the door of no return, where slaves were led to the small boats taking them to the slave ships, never to return to their homes again

After seeing the castle we walked down the street to a resort called Oasis that obviously catered to foreigners since the first thing we saw at the bar was a pool table.  They told us the only room they had was an expensive one, about 48 cedes a night (32 American dollars, I know it sounds cheap but its expensive for here).  It was a little hut with a fan, a double bed, and a mosquito net.

The bathroom at least had running water though.  We ate at the bar and tried to sleep in the small bed- minimal success on my part since my body was still mostly on East Coast time. 

This is the view from the resort- that's Cape Coast Castle down the beach.

Ghana by Taxi and Trotro

Hello blog world!  In the past few days Diana and I have been to Cape Coast where we saw the infamous castles with slave dungeons, Kakum nature reserve to walk a canopy walk and see a zoo with monkeys, farther west than Axim to see a village on stilts, and are currently in Takoradi.

If you want to know where those places are, go here http://www.justworldmap.com/maps/Ghana-Map-2.jpg

Otherwise wait a few days and when I can upload pictures, I'll post them and more information on each place.

Mangos and roaches and cows, oh my!

I saw my very first HUGE roach a few minutes ago.  Diana said that when they fumigate the house, it clouds everywhere and roaches will come out to die.  Hopefully most of them will do that out of my eyesight :P

I'm still trying to get my body on Ghana time, but it really wants to wake up at noon and go to bed at 4am (there's a 4 hour time difference here).  This is sort of problematic as people go to bed around 11pm-12am and get up around 7am.  And the roosters get up way earlier.  At least I have these few days of downtime to sort out what time it is :)

Diana and her family live in a large single level house that is walled in, and there are lots of fruit trees in the compound.  I had fresh mango yesterday, and there are also coconut, cinnamon, and orange trees.  The neighbors have bananas, plantains, and tangerines.  It's like living in an orchard :)

Today after Diana's parents came back from Mass, we went to the PramPram beach about an hour from here. We picnicked and played in the sand and let 4-year old Kate splash in the water.  I learned a new card game that seems to be a combination of hearts and something else, playing with Diana's father and her brother Andy.  Also Diana, Andy and I played the spelling game on the way home where you start with a letter and the next person adds a letter, except we could only spell countries.  This might be a new way to get my uncles arguing over geography at Thanksgiving :)

And my first TIA- This is Africa- moment: Driving back from the beach today with the whole family (Diana, Andy, sister Nat, her mom and Dad, neice Kate, and me).  We stopped at a toll at dusk, went under a bridge on a major highway, and Diana goes, COW!  cow cow cow!!! and we swerve to miss several large cows meandering across the road, and then look behind us hoping no one else hit them either.  And everyone in the car starts going, they should NOT be crossing the road there...

Made it to Ghana!

                 Well, I made it to Ghana and have been here about 24 hours.  After some relatively unexciting flights (the best kind), I arrived in Accra about 8pm last night.  Several stops to check visas, luggage, and customs later, Diana found me as I was leaving the airport, about to get enveloped into a throng of people.  Diana is a George Washington University student working on the same project I am.  She is from Ghana and her parents are nice enough to let me stay with them before we travel and before we can get into the house we are staying in at the University of Ghana.

                After dozing most of my 2 flights, I was somewhat awake when I got to their house and then stayed up until 1am playing scrabble with Diana and her brother Andy.  There’s a 4 hour time difference between here at the east coast, so it felt like I went to bed at 9.  It also felt like I woke up at 8, but it was noon . Oops.  Diana and I slept in the family room where there is a big fan, and I migrated back to my guest room around 8am.  Today we went shopping around 3, picking up Kate, Diana’s 4-year old niece from school, and then getting groceries and some other things including a fan for my room. 

                Currently I’m listening to a wonderful African rainstorm outside, a real gully-washer.  That itself might cool things down a bit.  It’s very muggy but not actually as hot as I thought it would be- low 90s I’d estimate.  There’s no air conditioning in the house, which is quite large, but there are screened windows in all of the rooms for a nice airflow.  And since they just had the house fumigated, I don’t have to sleep under a net either.

                I’ll be hanging around their house a few more days before Diana and I travel around the coastal and western regions and maybe as north as Kumasi for about a week.  Later in the summer we might try a weekend east towards Togo, and a weekend north if Diana’s parents will come with us.  Research begins on June 1^st through the end of July.  More on that later.

                Happy to be in Africa :D

On my way...

Leaving for the airport in about 30 minutes, and arriving in Ghana sometime tomorrow night.

Will be staying with a woman in my project for a day or so, and then traveling around for a week before the project starts.  Internet may be spotty, but there will be pictures at some point :)

I'm going to Ghana! and other random news

It's been forever since I've updated this- graduate school eats all of my free time and then some.
So...
7 Quick Takes:

1. I'm going to Ghana!  In 2 days!  For my practicum for grad school I'll be helping conduct a survey about baseline water and sanitation usage/access in a small fishing village outside of the capital, Accra.  Much more to come on this later.

2. I survived another semester of grad school.  This one seemed to be about 3x as much work as the first one, but it was great and I learned a lot.  And worked a lot.  Maybe I'll post on classes at some point.

3. I got back to Atlanta last night after spending a week and a half at home in MD.  Note to self: driving most of 11 hours on about 3.5 hours of sleep is not the best plan. Made it, but so very tired.

4. I have such good friends in many places.  I managed to drive up to Delaware to see Meghan, hang out with Matt and Babs in Gaithersburg, see a bunch of college friends at Julie's wedding, -be- at Julie's wedding!, and see lots of friends at church in Gaithersburg and Blacksburg.  Also got to see youth Sunday in Blacksburg and hang out with the Hunters over lunch.  Good times!

5. I got to see lots of my family too- Dad's side of the family came over for lunch last Friday, minus Stephanie and Arlene in California.  Kate was right, we should have tried to call or Skype them with everyone there. :)

6. My cousins are a lot of fun.  It was extra special to have Kate in town and we got to hang out a lot driving to and from Arlington and at our parents houses.  I'm an only child, but she's the closest thing I have to a big sister, and although I'm sure I get on her nerves like little sisters do sometimes, she's awesome.  Spending time with Charlie and Allison was also great (more cousins), including gallivanting around the Rio shopping center and making our own puppet show with the stuffed animal golf club covers.  Its the closest I've come to being kicked out of a store since college I think :)

7. It's weird being in Atlanta and not in school, and weird that I'm alone in my condo.  I know in a few days this won't even cross my mind, but the few days between visiting home and leaving for Ghana are this weird limbo of feeling like time is crawling yet having tons of things to do.