So, I've got this new blog...

I wanted to start a blog specifically for my experience volunteering with the Global Ghana Youth Network, so please check it out! I'll try to keep updating this one with stuff that's not related to GGYN, too.

http://stripedpurpleuniforms.blogspot.com/

Motorcycling in Togo, drinking with a chief, swimming in a waterfall and consequently having a pretty memorable last weekend as a twenty-year-old

As promised, weekends in Ghana are never boring, and the weekend before my birthday was even more remarkable than most. My friend Jamie heard that for 40 cedis (so, less than $30) we could hire a guide to take us around the mountains on the border of Togo and also get food and housing in a small village for the whole weekend. The profit from the 40 cedis even goes to building a clinic in the village, so the whole trip was quite a typical Ghanaian steal of a deal. I basically knew nothing about what to expect when I got on a tro-tro at 5 a.m. on Friday along with seven friends. We rode to a main station where we met our dreadlocked guide Yow, a native of the village where we were staying. The nine of us piled into another tro-tro for a bumpy three-hour ride to Hohoi and then finally took a tro-tro to a small village at the base of the mountain.

We waited a while at the base of the mountain while our
guide bought water, etc.

...and that's where we ran into a swarm of kids coming
from school. I couldn't not include this picture. 

Although that was our last tro-tro ride, we still had a three-hour hike up the mountain to the village where we were staying. We were met by a group of boys who were probably ages ten to sixteen whose job it was to carry rice and water up to the village. Considering that the hike required us to literally climb vertically up rocks at some points, its amazing to consider the consequences of living in such an isolated area – everything you want to bring into the village has to be carried on your head or back that whole way.

One of the porters carrying rice.

Almost at the village. I could get used to
these views.

Oh, hey village!

Mah friends! (Left to right: Jason, Elaine, Will, Rachel,
Caitlin, Jamie, Me! Jake took the picture.)

Meeting the locals.

A woman in the village gave us these

cloth wraps to wear for the weekend. We

met Amanda(far left) when we got to the

village. She's interning with the group

that's raising funds for the clinic there. 

The boys were jealous of our skirts,
so we shared.

All the traveling had made us pretty exhausted so when we finally got to the village, everyone fell asleep before 9 p.m. The next morning we had this delicious, spicy pasta dish for breakfast and then headed out with Yow and a sixteen-year-old guide named Eric on another trail toward the boarder of Togo. We ran into a few more villages before everyone we met on the trail replaced saying “Hello!” with “Bonjour!” I don’t think we ever marked exactly where we crossed the border and we definitely never had to produce any passports, but I can now proudly say that I’ve been to two countries in Africa and have entered two countries illegally (wooo first true humans!). After hiking for a few hours, we met five guys on the road with motorcycles that Yow had arranged for us to ride back up the mountain. Yeah. It was the coolest thing ever.

On the way to Togo.

And crossing the border!

Me and Jake being safe on a motorcycle!

But it was on Sunday morning, the day before my twenty-first birthday, that I had one of the most hilarious/memorable/awesome experiences of my life. We woke up around seven and were waiting around for breakfast for a while when Yow told us that the chief wanted to give us a formal welcome. We walked through the village until we got to a little place with an overhang between buildings where there was a group of about ten men, most of whom were in traditional African dress, sitting in a semi-circle facing a line of empty plastic chairs. Our group seated ourselves on the chairs and waited for something to happen. The seated men were all just talking amongst themselves and Yow was talking to someone else, so after a couple minutes of no real interaction between the two groups my friend Jake leaned over to me and said, “I feel like I’m at a seventh grade dance.” I lost it. I’m the worst person about not laughing where you probably shouldn’t, so I spent the rest of the meeting fighting a losing battle against not laughing out loud. I’m crossing my fingers that they thought I was just really happy to be there.

After initial introductions were over, though, we had a real excuse to feel unreasonably giddy. One of the chief’s advisors suddenly pulled a big bottle of clear liquid and a small glass cup out of nowhere, walks over to my friend Rachel and pours her a very, very generous shot of what’s basically the local moonshine. My friend Elaine says aloud, "Wait, are we seriously taking shots right now?" and Jamie responds with "Well, it's eight o'clock somewhere." I looked at my watch and he was right. It wasn't even 8:15 a.m. What a way to start a day of 7 hours of hiking, right? Anyway, the advisor goes pouring shot after shot for every one of us and we all politely take them.

After that first round, we all stood up and introduced ourselves individually to the chief and his advisors before Yow presented what he had brought as a gift on our behalf - a bottle of beer and a bottle of gin. The chief and advisors were all happy about it, so they opened the beer and pulled out that little glass cup again. Jake, who hates hard liquor, says, "Oh good, I can handle a shot of beer." Surprise! The beer bottle was actually just holding more of the moonshine. The advisor again offers us the glass one-by-one and we again politely take our second giant shot of the morning. Our guide had taught us earlier that when you drink anything in the village you are supposed to pour the last little bit on the ground as an offering to your ancestors. When the second shot came around to Jake, he sipped maybe half of it before dumping the rest out into a big puddle. After we had finished that round, the chief didn’t even give us a break before opening up the gin. My friends and I were familiar with this particular brand of liquor because we always point out at the grocery store how funny it is that one bottle of it only costs 3 cedis, or about $2. Needless to say, the third shot was not an enjoyable one.

At this point I felt like our group’s mindset was divided into two: those who were focusing on not throwing up and those who were laughing at the thought of someone throwing up in front of all of the village elders. One thing I’d like to reiterate is that we went to meet the chief while we were waiting for breakfast, so not only were we taking three giant shots (probably around five drinks) with no chasers within 30 minutes, but we were doing it before 9 a.m. without having eaten or drank anything for 14 hours. I know being pressured to take shots on your twenty-first birthday is a pretty typical thing, but how many people can say their birthday drinks were poured by a village chief and under those circumstances? If I had to miss having my twenty-first at Tombs, this is probably one of the best alternatives I could hope for.

9:00 a.m.

After saying good-bye to the chief and stumbling over to where we finally had our breakfast, we headed out on our planned hike to a nearby waterfall. The hike was about two hours each way and led us through jungle, over mountaintops, and across rivers. There was one point where we had to scale a mud wall for fifteen minutes by grabbing tree roots and rocks. When we got to the waterfall, we all immediately ran into the water and spent the next half an hour just yelling about how incredible it was.

A decent view on the way to the waterfall.

At this point Elaine says, "I have never felt
so much like a hobbit."

We could see the waterfall from a distance
before we got to the bottom.

Bottom of the waterfall!

Catching all sorts of parasites.

This was supposed to say "Hi Mom."

We returned to the village after the waterfall and began the three-hour hike back down to the mountain base. Once we were in the village at the trail's end, we arranged with a tro-tro to take us back to campus – a four-hour ride that cost 13 cedis, or about $8-9. Ghanaians have this birthday tradition called “ponding” which I think originally involved throwing whoever’s birthday it was into a pond, but it has fortunately been reduced to just pouring water on the person. Since we didn’t get back until after midnight, my friends ponded me and sang “Happy Birthday” on the tro-tro. My actual birthday the next day was not too eventful (although I did get an ice cream cake), but the weekend was definitely more than enough for a memorable twenty-first.

At the end of the last hike, we were a little tired.

A group shot before we left the village with
Yow front and center.

Being in Africa + Failure to blog often = Lots to write about

Starting this second post is tough because so much has happened since the first post I wrote. Also, I promised to write about stuff from before my last post, so I’m just all kinds of failing on the blog thing. That being said, I’ll try to say as much as I can here without writing a novel.

First I’ll start with the basics in case anyone doesn’t want to read everything:

1.   I’m still in Africa.

2.   I don’t have malaria.

3.   My friend had malaria and she’s fine, so don’t worry, Mom and Dad, it’s not that big of a deal.

Aaannddddd I’m not really sure where to go from there, so I guess I’ll just touch on everything a little bit. I’ll even continue making a list because there’s no way that I’ll stay on any track otherwise.

So, Akwaaba (welcome to) Maddies’ African adventure presented in list form!!!

1.     School – I feel like this one is supposed to come first (weekends comes later).

Here’s what my school looks like!

Just kidding, that’s the gift shop at the botanical garden. My school actually looks like this:

A picture of the library that I stole from a friend.
I'll add more of other parts of campus later!

It turns out that the University of Legon is a pretty big deal, so I’m really happy to be going here. It’s apparently the best school in West Africa and I’m pretty sure it has the biggest library on the continent besides one in South Africa. I already mentioned that I’m taking a class in Twi with my study abroad program, and I’m taking a class called Development Studies through the program as well. That class is linked to an internship that I have with United Way Ghana, which I’ll talk more about later. My other classes include “Ghanaian Literature,” which is a big lecture with a good number of foreign students, and “Contemporary Issues in Modern Philosophy,” which is about 30 people, four of whom are girls.  Those classes meet only once a week for two hours each time. Finally, I’m taking two super exciting classes, too: drumming and traditional African dance. I had no plans to do either until a friend brought me to her class, and they are probably the coolest classes I’ve ever taken. Not that I’ve had any real improvement in my not-dancing-awkwardly skills, but those classes have been a really fun way to meet people and to pretend that I kind of know things about Africa.

2.     Housing – not only do I not go to school in a hut, but I also don’t sleep in a hut.

My room, mosquito nets and all.
The back part is our screened-in porch.

I’m living on campus in the International Student Hostel (or “ISH” for short) and I absolutely love it. My roommate Caitlin actually coincidentally goes to Georgetown, too, but I didn’t know her beforehand. The dorms are actually pretty nice: the building has a giant courtyard and each room has a balcony. Because we’re on the ground floor, though, Caitlin and I have basically a screened-in porch instead of a balcony.

3.     WEEKENDS – I capitalized this one because it’s the most exciting so far.

If weekends in Ghana are anything, they are not boring. Whether you have accidently become a part of an evangelical Christian organization or you got a job bartending where you’re paid in wine and peanuts, there is always something interesting to do here. I’ll start chronologically from the weekend before the weekend before last, as that was the start of the bartending thing that you’re worried about now, Mom. I need to preface this story by saying that Ghanaians are very amused by white people, especially when we’re in atypical places for oburunis to be. About a ten-minute drive from campus (which is literally a $2 cab ride) there’s a small local bar called Jerri’s. Caitlin (the roommate) asked the bartender if we could bartend just because she thought it’d be funny, so he directed us to Jerri (yes, with an “i”). It turns out that Jerri is a super nice, hilarious and usually tipsy old man, meaning that when Caitlin asked him if we could bartend, he was totally into it and said that we should come at 9:00 next Friday. When we showed up the next weekend around 9:40 we were pretty sure that he would have forgotten about it, but he actually called us out on being late and then showed us everything we needed to know about running Jerri’s. That night was one of my favorite experiences ever: customers loved that there were two random, obviously foreign white girls running the counter, Caitlin and I are now buddies with the famous Jerri of Jerri’s, and we made friends with the other bartenders which was super exciting because I hadn’t met that many Ghanaians. Also, like I said, we got paid with a bottle of wine and a jar of peanuts. Akwaaba Jerri’s.

Me at Jerri's with Robert (an actual bartender there)
and Caitlin in the background.

It seems as though nothing could live up to the glory of bartending in Ghana, but the following weekend (so the one before this past one) was also incredible. On Friday I went with about 40 friends from my program (and a Canadian and his Ghanaian roommate who snuck on the bus) to the Ghana verses Swaziland soccer game. There were tons of different large fan groups throughout the stadium that were all cheering and dancing in different ways, and right next to us there was a group of maybe 50 people who were almost all playing traditional African drums or some other instrument. They played for literally the whole game – so a whole two hours – while singing songs in some language I don’t know. Basically, it was awesome.

Caitlin, my friend Rachel and me at the game.
Somehow I still have a farmer's tan.

Me and Jamie, the Canadian

The next day I went with Caitlin, Jamie and my other friends Elaine and Jake to go to a music festival in Cape Coast that we heard about from Iggy, one of the bartenders we met at Jerri’s. Iggy is originally from Cape Coast but is living in Accra to go to school for graphic design (and of course to work with his uncle Jerri), so we met up with him there and he showed us around. It was SO great to have a real local show us around and not do only all of the touristy things. I’ve decided that if I ever moved to Ghana, I would definitely live in Cape Coast. It is the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen: it’s got beaches with palm trees and white sand, hills covered in colorful houses, and decorated fishing boats docked all along the shore. At the end of our three-hour drive along the coast of Ghana in a tightly-packed public van called a tro-tro (which only cost about $3 per person), we got to Cape Coast with no idea where to go. However, we almost immediately ran into a gigantic parade where the chiefs of several different regions were being carried on those reclining-chair type things. There were people preceding and following them that were dancing or playing drums and horns in traditional African clothes. Some of the chiefs were throwing out candy as they passed and the crowd was going crazy. Again, it was awesome.

Chief of something. I wish I were less ignorant.

Eventually we met up with Iggy and had lunch at a restaurant right on the beach. Besides the parade experience, the festival we went to that night was pretty similar to what you’d see in the U.S., although we did get to dance on stage at a small concert (again, Ghanaians thought this was funny). The most prominent musical genre in Ghana is what is called “high-life,” which is traditional Ghanaian music that’s kind of jazzy and reggae-esque and really fun to dance to. In the past decade or two, high-life and Western hip-hop merged to create “hip-life” which is also extremely popular. Some of my oburuni friends and I have grown particularly fond of this hip-life song in particular, much to the amusement of our Ghanaian friends.

Caitlin, Elaine and I stayed with our friend Maggie at the Mighty Victory Hotel, which not only has the best name of any hotel in Cape Coast, but it also had one of the only remaining available rooms. Because of the high demand for rooms we had to pay the steep price of 45 Ghana cedis for the night – I say “steep” sarcastically because although that’s more than you would normally in Ghana, it meant that we each paid about $7 for a night at a really nice hotel. Akwaaba Ghanaian prices.

Now, this past weekend is when the aforementioned accidental evangelical Christian incident happened. Although I like my internship a lot, it’s more time spent in an office than I hoped for. One day, though, I went with my boss to a rehab center that United Way was working with and they said I could come volunteer anytime. I was really excited to see another part of Accra that I would not see otherwise, so I went on Friday and worked in a slum by handing out food, clothes and antibiotics. It was a really great experience and I’m so glad that I did it, but the other part of the volunteer work was, well, awkward. I knew beforehand that the rehab center was Christian-based, but I didn’t really know to what extent until they handed me a T-shirt saying “ONE MINUTE, ONE PRAYER, ONE SOUL” really big on the back. For the several hours when we were handing things out, there was a pastor doing some very evangelical style preaching, and some drumming and singing in other languages. They kept having me participate and wanted me to even lead stuff but I was for sure the only one who really had no clue what was going on. Yeah, awkward. I didn’t really expect my internship to involve saving souls. However, that night I got to bartend at Jerri’s again where there is no such thing as awkward. Caitlin and I introduced Jerri to our friends and that small, sweet old man came to their table and said, “MAKE SOME NOISE FOR JERRI’S! MAKE SOME NOISE FOR FRIDAY!” which of course was followed by a lot of noise from all of us oburunis who have become Jerri’s personal fan club.

I spent Saturday and Sunday in Cape Coast again but this trip was with my study abroad program and was therefore much more touristy. Cape Coast, as beautiful as it is, has a really painful history in regard to the trans-Atlantic slave trade. There are still several castles that were used as holding docks for slaves until they were shipped off. We toured one on Saturday and the castle was, of course, really terrible and eye-opening, but no one can deny that the castle itself is also incredibly beautiful. For some reason my pictures from the castle aren't saving onto my computer, so I'll put those up once I figure it out. In the meantime, here's a picture of me with a crocodile that I met on Sunday:

I just like to make you nervous, Mom.

4. Obama - This isn't that related to the rest of the post, but I really want to include it.

Ghanaians love Obama. I wish there were a stronger word for “love” to use there, because the presence of his image here is right up there with white Jesus’. There’s an Obama Hotel by our campus, several murals with him and Kwame Nkrumah (the leader of the Ghanaian independence movement), a political candidate with giant billboards of him and Obama, and even an Obama College. One of my favorites, though, is Obama Biscuits, which are kind of like Nilla Wafers. Mmm the taste of America. I feel like they’d be even better fried.

Tastes like home.

Several of my friends and I have also invested in notebooks with pictures of Obama printed on the front (definite copyright violations) under the title “Ghana Schools.” For my Twi class I use one that has a picture of Obama shirtless at a pool and for my Development studies class I have one with a picture of the first family getting off the plane while a photo-shopped Ghanaian flag waves gallantly in the background. I may or may not be bringing a stack of them back for Christmas presents, so brace yourselves.

So, I think that’s definitely enough for one post! Sorry about really dwindling on details outside of Jerri’s, but I just realized that I have to run to Twi class in a bit. If you read all of this, I’m seriously impressed, so thanks for being so dedicated. 

On this coming Wednesday I will have been in Ghana for one month.

And of course I'm just starting this blog. Due to a lot of pressure from home (coughmomcough), I'm planning on blogging for the rest of this semester to keep everyone at home updated on my African adventures. While I do think this is a great idea, I've put off starting it because 1. I'm the biggest flake ever and 2. I only get free internet in a building that's a half an hour walk away from my dorm. I'll definitely try to update this often, but "often" will probably mean once, maybe twice, a week.

I guess the best place this to start is by explaining the title of the blog. This semester I'm taking a class in Twi (pronounced like "trwee" or "tchwee") and "oburuni" is a Twi word that basically translates to "white person." Of all of the Twi words that I'll encounter, "oburuni" is definitely the one that I least need to take a class to learn: while I'm walking down the street, little kids will yell "OBURUNI, OBURUNI, OBURUNI;" when I'm at a market, someone will say "Oburuni! I'll give you a good price!" when they know you'll pay way more than a native would; when I'm on a bus, when I order pizza, and virtually whenever anyone wants my attention, I take on my new identity, "oburuni." The word isn't derogatory in anyway at all, and it's not entirely about race, either. A friend of mine from my program has parents who are originally Ghanaian so he definitely fits in looks-wise, but as soon as a native Ghanaian hears him talk, he too becomes an "oburuni." The whole title "#OburuniProblems" comes from the pop-culture reference (I guess that's what you'd call it?) to Twitter's common hashtag, "#WhiteGirlProblems."

Despite the title of the blog, my problems here have been very minimal! Hooray! I am having such a fantastic time and I can't believe that it's already going by so fast. Problems so far have been limited to some expected discomforts like food that makes my body hate me and zero hope of ever not standing out in a crowd; and of course to some unexpected problems, too, like an inability to hand wash all of my clothes well and a lack of toilet paper in public restrooms. Overall, though, I've been extremely happy with my choice to come to Ghana. A lot of the past month has been consumed by my American program's orientation so I'm sure I have yet to encounter the real challenges of studying abroad, since thus far I haven't really felt much culture shock at all.

To be honest, I guess the lack of culture shock is something that I actually find problematic. I want to branch out as much as possible and get to know what another culture really feels like, but so far I've made friends mostly with other Americans and Canadians who are studying abroad here, too. Well, there are some Ghanaian students that my program employs to be our friends, but despite how awesome they are I feel like I they don't really count as "branching out" to make friends. The good news is that I have only been here for one month so I've got plenty of time, but hopefully later I'll be writing about challenges that truly have pushed me to grow. After all, learning about another part of the world and consequently about myself is why I'm here willing to endure toilet paper shortages.

I'll try to write a lot over the next week to catch up to where I am at the end of month one, but my mosquito-netted bed is calling me to take a nap before Twi class at 3:30. Hopefully I'll be able to put pictures up soon too, but I forgot to bring the cord that connects my camera to my computer. #UnsurprisingDisorganizedMaddieProblem