| Thanksgiving update, yes, we did have turkey. |
[30 Nov 2006|01:17pm] |
Hey everyone! I hope all is well and everyone had a good Thanksgiving with their family, and good "hey, we're all back from college now let's get drunk" parties up at Syracuse or whereever. I haven't talked to any of my friends since before Thanksgiving, and I miss everybody. Either no one misses me anymore, or they're just used to me being gone. Or my absence is too painful for them to speak about aloud. Either way, I can't wait to see everyone in a few weeks. Saturday, by the way, was our 3 week mark. Crazy. And I'm actually posting this long after I wrote it, so we're coming up on our two week mark! CRAZIER
The Mefloquine (re: malaria meds) are making me feel like shit now. I feel really loopy and confused, and I get mad because there are reasons why I don't do drugs, and here I am being forced to be on this horrible medicine that is basically the equivalent of an impending acid trip that is deciding to creep up on me just now.
Update: our dysfunctional family pulled off as successful a Thanksgiving as we could have given the circumstances (re: Ghana.) We had just about a million people show up, because our program director decided it would be in the spirit of the holiday to invite the CIEE kids (a different study abroad program here in Ghana.) They were really annoying though and they act as if they have to "rough it" and we have it "so easy." They made a lot of comments about us living in a palace etc etc and I just found it really obnoxious, like, don't try to tell me that you're experiencing "the real Africa" just because you take more bucket baths than I do and don't have air conditioning. I'm paying $1500 a month for room and board, I'm not going to be living in a hostel, thank you. They're just all bitchy because out of their entire program (about 40 kids or so like us?) there were only 3 guys. And I thought our boys were outnumbered.
We had actual Thanksgiving food: they made 4 turkeys in all, had sweet potatoes (deLISH with brown sugar goodness and marshmallows) we had mashed potatoes and spinach stuff, and other vegetable dishes that Mom would have made us eat had she been there. Katie made her crazy Mac N Cheese which was sooo good, and we busted out the desserts after our "guests" had left. Ari made some amazing melt in your mouth chocolate cake, Franny made all sorts of buttery delicious desserts, Emily made magic bars, and Lulu made really magic treats: Space cake (aka a giant weed brownie) Everyone was going nuts. If people weren't drunk they were stoned, if they weren't stoned they were drunk, and if they weren't either they were me, because I still wasn't feeling well and didn't indulge in any of those festivities. But I'm sober susy anyway.
Did I mention we had a bouncy castle? Pictures to come...
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| Happy Turkey Day! |
[23 Nov 2006|09:16am] |
Or Guinea Fowl Day...or most likely Chicken Day, whatever poultry they can cook up for us today. So Thanksgiving in Ghana. It's going to be really interesting. We're having it catered (and by "we" I mean NYU or maybe I should say the US dollar which goes a bit farther here in the Ghan where room and board covers things like vaulted ceilings and marble floors - and guards with AK40s at the front gate...) It's being catered by a Carribbean catering company, but supposedly we're getting the good ol' stables like yams and mashed potatos. For me personally, I am excited about the prospect of having food ready and waiting for me. I'm not the biggest baker/cooker unless I am throwing a dinner party or something, and I can really bust out the moves then, or if I'm making something yummy for someone yummy, because that's the kind of feminist I am-deal with it.
So anyways, I'm sure that my Mom is waking up early right about now back in the 'Cuse (where it is snowing unlike here where I'm sweating buckets even though I'm wearing cotton shorts and a tube top) and putting in her yams (with butter and bacon and cheese) and finishing her chocolate pudding pie that she only really makes for me and Bug because we are basically the only ones that eat it (although it's best the day after when the crust is a little soggy...) Then they'll go down the street to Aunt Maria's and finish cooking there and they'll have a huge delicious dinner.
And here, people are going to the markets and trying to find any ingredients that will somehow make our favorite mom-made dishes from back home, and soon they'll all start baking and cooking (some people are boycotting the fact that we are having dinner catered, me on the other hand, that's okay, I'm not one to dabble in the Thanksgiving day cooking, I'll be on the receiving end for this one like always.) I'm not going to say I have doubts on how these dishes are going to turn out, I'm just saying that there's 6 and a half hours of cooking time, I'll let you all know how it turns out! I'm taking on the primping and pampering aspect and doing manis/pedis and makeovers. Maybe drawing some hand-turkeys for decorations. Who knows.
I hope everyone has a great holiday (I know I know American genocide people's land being taken away etc etc) but I really do hope everyone back home has a good day with their families and friends, and I wish I could be with you all! But only like 23 short days away and i will be there :) So please get my Mom to make some pies for my return home.
I am thankful for:
Having met a whole new family here at NYU in Ghana
My family back in Syracuse
My family back in New York
Britney's comeback
*shout out to Barbie, so glad you're enjoying the blog during the long days in the library! Hey, remember this:
"Barbie, I'm going to Africa!"
"But...you're not black!"
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| Okay, not gonna lie... |
[21 Nov 2006|04:12pm] |
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...I'm feeling really sick all of a sudden, so get your rosary beads out and pray against the Malaria!
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| The bikini strike of '06 |
[19 Nov 2006|01:21pm] |
An ex-boyfriend used to always use the phrase, “Africa hot,” as in, “Hey, it’s fuckin’ Africa hot in here!” to describe any situation involving elevated temperatures. I would always get annoyed with him and the use of a phrase with such seemingly racist undertones, but I have to give it to him-now I understand what “Africa hot” is. Summer in Africa is like no weather I’ve ever known before. I blame it mostly on my Syracuse upbringing and the 18 years I spent wishing to wake up and see the familiar glow on the walls that signified a few feet of snow outside my window and the possibility of a snow day. When I was much younger, I would take the time to pull on snow pants and a giant winter coat over already stifling layers of wool sweaters and thick cotton sweatpants. I would tuck my gloves into my sleeves, and my pants into my boots and pull the hood tight over a knit hat. Enveloped in itchy wool and in my bubble of swishing nylon I would hobble on outdoors and play in the snow until it was time for chicken noodle soup and hot cocoa that Mom had waiting for me inside. (Yes, I did live one of the most normal childhoods possible.)
And now here I am...
and this is all I will be wearing for the next 27 days because I can't bear to be sweating through every single one of my articles of clothing. I used to complain about things like snow and having to wake up early to brush your car off to go into work or off to school or whatever, but fuck that. Sometimes I'm walking to the academic center or something and I really think that maybe if I look up the sun will be 5 feet above my head dangling above me.
So the heat is oppressive and disgusting, and I am no longer bringing sexy back to Ghana, but sweaty back. And there's no confusing the two. So for any of you who have questions about the weather here, there, my friends, is your answer.
I've been a jerk and haven't been writing at all and yet so much is going on! I don't want to jinx myself so I'm not going to talk about the good stuff that's going on at my internship but I'll just say one word...
Oprah.
And that's all I'll say for now. And after this week I'll have more to say. Hopefully. And this week is Thanksgiving! But not really for me, because of that word that I just mentioned, I won't be at the compound for our catered turkey esque dindin. I have a feeling that they're going to be really great and try and hook us up with the nicest Thanksgiving day celebration that they can muster up. But, I mean I guess in the end it's like what are we really celebrating? Genocide in America and department store sales the next weekend?
We are past the one month mark signifying our homecoming, an event that I know for myself in particular, I am looking forward to in one respect, and then totally dreading in another. These are the things I have to do in the next 4 weeks:
-write a million stories for the newspaper that they can use long after I am gone
-3 research papers totalling about 20-30 pages altogether
-2 final exams
-lots of other homework
-finish buying souvenirs
-pack (obviously my suitcases to go home, but also the whole "what do I leave here?" "what do I have room for?" "what do I need for the 4 days I'll be in NYC?" "What will I need to pack for my family to take home" "where do I pack my gifts for everyone?" etc etc!)
-somehow mentally prepare myself for coming back to NYC, the cold, Syracuse, the snow, work, etc...?
-Oh, and I need to email my schedule and whatnot to work (okay, now I'm just writing this stuff down to make sure that I do it or someone else reads this and reminds me to do it.)
-Oh, and stuff for the road trip (PS I have $739 in my account and I'm just about literally living on 10,000 cedis/$1 a day...)
And the four days I'll be in NYC will be insane, and on top of that the 6 days I spend in Syracuse, equally insane, then going back to NYC for about another 6 days. Then going on the road trip, then UM I don't know moving in to the dorm on the 13th, and no biggie, starting classes.
I'm going crazy so I'm going to stop with the lists.
So with the four weeks left, it's interesting to see how things are here and see a sort of foreshadowing of what is to come. There has definitely been a shift, probably even from that post I wrote a month ago or so. Sometimes I think we're going to go crazy. Sometimes I think I am going crazy. There's a weird mixture of deprivation, culture shock, the oppressive heat, the Mefloquine and Larium, and the sheer and utter boredom all dealing with our 3 months here that is just hitting everyone in every way. Half of the shit that we do here, I can't imagine being normal in any other setting, yet here it has become a queer survival strategy. Last night we were so god awful bored that we played charades for a few hours and had a legitimately good time.
On any given night, you could come round the compound and see the van pointing its lights on the wall, giving Richie (one half of Snake Boxxx Productions) good light to shoot videos of me in red boots dancing in the shadows while Joe and Del do laps around me on Joe's motorbike. Or you could see Katie clad in her Tampico costume running around Thom who is outside in front of a camera and "The Rabbit" (no not the vibrator, I made the same assumption-it's a portable little television with antenna like lights in bunny-ear form) wearing a kente print hoodie and holding a bottle of Gin Harbor. No matter what time of the day (although it's most always nighttime) you can hear Luba drumming in the study room, with or without her instructer Sammy and an entourage of other aspiring musical talents. Follow the sounds of brainstorming, and you'll find Joe and Brandon discussing the possibility of selling akpeteshie (the moonshine they make out of palm sap here) in the US market. There will be groups oustide smoking with laptops in hand, girls writing feverishly in journals, working off of a buzz from the last joint they smoked outside someone's window. There's a group inside house 3, huddled around a table playing cards or on a different night, a different group is sitting around the same table reading passages from the Bible and discussing them at great lengths. Mikey and Sharah are usually in my room, cuddled up on Sharah's bed, which is nice, because there's always that option of going back to my room to completely chill out and lay down and talk with the two people I'll eventually miss the most here.
We all have different outlets here, different guilty pleasures and different forms of entertainment, all stemming from a variety of frustrations and temptations unique to each individual. Some people are rolling joints with the cheapest weed they'll ever be able to find, while others are drinking $2 liters of moonshine and finding the answers to life at the bottom of every bottle, and at the same time people are thanking Jesus, there are people condeming others for sins detailed to their discretion. While you could find two people napping in each other's arms in a bed barely big enough for one, you could look outside and make out the image of two people in the shadows pressed up against the back of one of the houses trying to find a few hours of intimacy in the most crowded of circumstances,
The compound politics seem to revolve around the different struggles that everyone faces. Everything is a crusade for companionship, or conversely, a great effort to find even the briefest solitude here. No matter how annoyed we can get at one another, (and it is very easy to get on each other's nerves here) we all want the ability to crash on someone's shoulder, pillow, lap, or whatever else, when we need it most. And I guess even in a situation where you're spending 4 months in a completely foreign land surrounded by strangers in your house, on your street, in your classes, out at bars, and where ever else you go, sometimes it's the most simple lessons of human behavior that you find out you are here to learn.
So maybe on my next foreign affair, I'll try and cover the larger lessons of life.
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| The Birds and the Bees and other Compound Politics |
[08 Nov 2006|06:34am] |
I’ve continued to slack in my writings, so I owe you all (Well, I guess Annie, Katie and whoever else is reading this…so, yup, Annie and Katie) a long post. Things with the newspaper finally seem to be coming together, for real this time! We have an editor, who is actually a really amazing soft spoken, polite, well-educated and informed man who’s not a sexist Ghanaian patriarchal bullshit kinda guy. So that’s nice, and finally there is someone to balance out the rest of the staff.
I actually had to conduct interviews with potential reporters the other day, which was intimidating for me but I think even more so for them. These poor guys who didn’t expect to see this little blonde girl ready to grill them on their past journalistic pursuits and future ideas when they walked into the conference room. I only found one person that I really liked, and again, this is a 32-page paper so we’re going to need more than 3 people on the staff. (Currently I’m writing articles for Women’s Affairs, the Teenage/University section, Lifestyles and the Sunday Interview, and the Where To Go section.) The deadline for the first issue of the paper (YES we FINALLY have a deadline!!!) is next Wednesday, but the first issue won’t come out until the first Sunday in December. Oh, and I also need to plan the launch party the Saturday before, and the Christmas party.
There is a trip planned this weekend for Tamale which is in the Northern region of Ghana, about a 12 hour bus ride away (yikes!) I’m not attending this trip and am instead going to try and get stuff for the paper and my two research papers done. It should be kind of fun and quiet on the compound because a good number of people are going to Tamale and another bunch are going to Ada in the Eastern region. People keep getting angry at me for not going on trips, but I’m running really low on my $$ (Only $200 in travelers cheques left) and this cute little MacBook that I am typing on right now basically embodies the trip to Morocco I didn’t go on for Fall Break, all the nice dinners that I don’t get to go out to with everyone, all of the drinks I pass up, and all of the weekend trips I skip. I’m going to try and go on a little weekend excursion before we leave though (which by the way seems in one breath so close and in another SO far.)
Sometimes it feels like, “Okay, it’s time. I’ve been here for about a million days. I’m sick of being ‘the white girl,’ I’m sick of being ripped off all the time, I’m sick of not ever being able to communicate with anyone, etc etc” And I think it’s okay to have those days. You also have the opposite days where you definitely feel the things that you know you will miss when you return to America, or at least things that you will appreciate more when you’ve been home for a little while and have had time to think about everything.
For the first months here, I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to hook up with someone else here. But as the days wear on all of us, I see how such relationships are an escape. They are, if nothing else, brief glimpses of something else, something different, something beyond the gates of our little compound.
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| Ghana's first Halloween |
[03 Nov 2006|06:39am] |
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mood |
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 working |
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Happy Birthday Annie!
So even though Halloween is not really a celebrated holiday in good ol' Ghana, we on the compound of course found it quite necessary to put on costumes and drink and play "The Monster Mash" and the theme song to Ghostbusters on Gerald's (our CRA) speakers.
My costume was pretty amazing, as I dressed up as someone here (definitely one of those "inside jokes" type of costumes where no one at home would really get the humor, so you'll have to take my word for it and wait for an awesome picture.)
Richie and the real snake box, fake Richie and the knock off snakebox.
This was the first year in FOUR YEARS that I wasn't one Ms. B Spears for Halloween, (Catholic School girl Britney, Slave 4U Britney, Madonna & Britney Britney, and Britney and Kevin Pregnant Britney) I was worried that the Spear-its would think that I had given up some hope in her. People were slutty pirates, ghosts, Mary Poppins, Ghanaian school children, each other (I was Richie, Sarah was Ben, Nate was Katie,) and then of course we had very specific Ghana related costumes, Noelle was an Orange Fanta girl - which, by the way, if you've never had an Orange Fanta in Africa then you've never had an Orange Fanta. Period. Katie was a slutty Tampico, or a Tampico-ho if you will, (Tampico is a type of juice that comes in a bag and is pretty delicious.) We all got dressed up and Noe toiled for hours in the kitchen making jello shots which never gelled in our fridge because of it's lukewarm temperature. (so now, three days later, we have three huge bowls of half-gelled bright jello reeking of $3 vodka because Noe refuses to lose faith in their ability to gell.) Katie even had the urge to go out and buy Solo cups and beer and ping pong balls to attempt the s second rounds of Beer Pong and Flip Cup that our compound has ever seen. We set up the ping pong table with cups and threw the obligatory insults at each other over beer pong skills and we waved our hands over the mouths of the cups before people shot and danced around to our Halloween music.
And then it started sprinkling. And then it started raining, and then it started POURING. Now, I think I've seen it rain about three times or so in the almost three months that I've been here, so maybe the overwhelming Christian vibes that are here in Ghana were just too much for our pagan rituals.
But then of course, because we go to NYU and because we're all fun and since no one wanted to ruin the party that we had so looked forward to, we ran about and danced, and it was as if the rain was almost an expected guest. Or maybe it's just that we're so used to accepting the strange events that hinder any sort of smooth sailing through plans of any sort here. Nate fiddled around with the IPod attached to the speakers that were safely tucked inside the studio, and all of a sudden we were all dancing and singing along at the top of our lungs to MMMBop in the rain. I'm sure it was a Halloween like Africa had NEVER seen before.
The speakers cut out soon after, and we tried to find something Halloween-oriented to do, but people just got really drunk and really wet and played drums and sang music. I went to bed sober and early because of my internship the next day, but all in all it was a really great night. It made me miss home a little more but a lot of things are doing that lately, I think it's because I see an end in sight, and yet everything seems so far off and when things seem like they should be getting easier or more familiar here, something just kicks your ass and makes you frustrated, or angry, or sad, or just homesick. One of the boys in our program went to New York to take care of some things on Wednesday and he'll be coming back on Monday. It felt so weird to hear that someone was going home, and when he asked me if he could bring anything back for me, I actually drew a blank. More or less because I couldn't pinpoint just one thing that I wanted, and then in the same instance it was as if I realized that a jar of peanut butter or a bag of Trader Joe's peanut butter filled pretzels was not even really what I missed and wouldn't fill any actual voids. I think just knowing that my homecoming isn't going to be as I had hoped it would be/planned it to be/was looking forward to has had me a little bummed as of recent.
BUUUUUT, I have gotten back three papers in this week, two A's and one A-!! And things with the paper are actually going well. I'm in my usual area of "overworked underpaid," (even though one of my bosses gave me 500,000 cedis or around $50 in an envelope which was the biggest help ever!) I'm working on Women's Affairs, the Teenage section, Lifestyles, Sunday Interview, and Where To Go. And I'm helping edit and proofread. Hello, good resume, and after that hello, good job!
Speaking of working hard and hardly working I'm at my internship now, and I am writing a piece on Breast Cancer in Ghana so I'm going to get back to that and hopefully find time to post later!
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[31 Oct 2006|08:23am] |
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left, right, left, right, left |
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Despite the many promises I’ve made to myself to stay away from men in uniform, I found myself at a Ghanaian military base this weekend. Forced by my internship through a passive aggressive memo referring to the event as compulsory, I found myself packing bags and signing ominous indemnity forms that cleared Global Media Alliance in the event that I shot off my arm or acquired malaria.
You can imagine my surprise last week or so when I found out more about what the weekend was to entail. It was originally introduced to me by the CEO as a series of workshops and teamwork building exercises. I was picturing a weekend retreat at a fairly decent, if not beige and sterile, hotel with a conference center that housed masses of corporate sluts in name tags and business casual. I was wrong.
Ryan and I showed up to the offices last Friday with our packs, Ryan dressed for the occasion in a bandana and a shirt with: “I’m too sexy for this t-shirt” emblazoned on it. We all piled onto a nice air-conditioned bus, me in a window seat listening to my IPod, desperately grasping onto the last level of comfort I could reach. After less than an hour drive, we pulled into what seemed like a very beautiful little area with a long dirt road leading to a compound of small circular huts with brick walls and thatched roofs looking more modern than traditional. Among the brick structures, there were small houses with single rooms with double beds, desks, air conditioning, and bathrooms.
I remember walking into one of these rooms and shuddering to myself about a giant grasshopper and small mass of other insects that congregated on the door.
We were greeted by men in camouflage fatigues who instructed us to choose a set of fatigues and a pair of boots. I chose the smallest I could find, a thick black jumper with matching hat, a pair of high wool socks and a pair of men’s size 8 boots. (I’m about a men’s 5, but most people had boots even larger than those.) We were split into four groups of four, my group consisting of Benjamin a tall soft-spoken man I didn’t know well that works outside of the office, Pamela, a rather annoying but sweet girl that is working on graphic design and layout for the newspaper, and Sennah a larger man that usually works in the production room in the back of the office building. We were the last team to leave on our first task of running the 3 mile stretch back up the dirt road, down a paved road lined where miles and miles of African bush stretched out on either side of us interrupted only by the occasional herd of long-horned cattle until the mountains in the distance. We were carrying backpacks over packs we already had strapped onto us that carried water bottles and other containers up and down our chest and back and around our waist. Despite the heavy uniform, bulky packs, and oversized boots that offered no support, this was an easy task for me, but our team was “only as strong as our weakest link” and poor Sennah had a terrible stitch and I ended up having to jog back and forth trying to set the pace, and trying to pull Sennah along and encourage him. We made it to the training camp where we would be staying as the sun was beginning to set.
I felt good, I like running, I hadn’t been keeping up with my workouts since I’d been here, so I was happy to be forced to burn some cals.
The captains told us to line up in threes (and not for the first time throughout the weekend did they then proceed to yell at us about form and fidgeting and other sorts of conformities that we were lacking.) We marched, yes, marched, to where we were to set up camp. There was an uproar, as we were under the impression that we would be staying the night at the pretty Ghana-style bed and breakfastesque village we had just run from. Rumors flew through the group that this was just a test and a tease at that to make us think that we would be setting up our living spaces here and then actually living in them for the weekend. The sun had set completely by the time we began putting up the three tents. We all were instructed to grab poles and follow the blind instructions of our leaders to set up the structure that reminded me of “graduation party, I hope it doesn’t rain, but if it does the presents and food can go here” tent. This is where all of the boys stayed. We then set up two smaller tents where the girls split up into. Halfway through the construction of the first tent, the realization hit me. We were setting up these tents to sleep in for the weekend. This is where we’d be staying – no protection from the bugs, no shelter from the tremendous heat, hopefully a bathroom but not definitely. We then had to carry heavy twin cot frames the 1/3 of a mile or so between the camp and where they were stored. I ended up cutting three of my fingers on the frame and could barely fit my arms around the thick foam mattresses that came next, but decided to take my bedding to the farthest tent, as I knew that the older/annoying/bitchy women would end up taking the closer tent. I finished setting up my bedding long before the other women did, but it was of course a process filled with lots of kicking and swearing and pounding my-at that point bloody-fists on anything I knew wouldn’t collapse and cause me more work. We were given a meal of field rations which came all packaged up in a brown plastic bag. It was what I would assume astronauts and the like eat - sealed food that lasts up to 10 years. My package contained a hamburger patty, bread, cheese sauce, BBQ sauce, COMBOS (highlight of the weekend) and powder to make an "orange flavored drink." It all came with basically a plastic bag with mercury in it that you poured a small amount of water into and waited a few minutes for it to start "boiling." I ended up just eating the hamburger patty cold with the cheese sauce and a piece of bread. And of course the "nacho-filled pretzels."
I haven’t lived a privileged spoiled life, but I have just never been camping. The option was never seriously offered to me, and I never personally pursued it. I’ll work and put myself through college, and I’ll go to Africa for my first trip abroad and feel like a big stupid sore thumb everywhere I go and Ill put myself so far out of my comfort zone that I have to lie to myself about how much fun I’m not having, but I just want to pee in a toilet. I don’t want to be swatting mosquitoes from my ears all night and waking up with all sorts of foreign pink bumps all over my body
But, I did pee in the woods for the first time, and I did take a bath out of my mess tin in the corner of our tent and I almost passed out from the heat and lack of food and water. And THIS was the first night.
We were woken up at 5:00AM by a gunshot and lots of screaming by our captains, but I had been awake and listening to any “soothing” music I could find on my IPod since a little before 4AM and sporadically throughout the night, so I was ready to go. We did the sort of bootcamp bullshit, running in groups of threes and being yelled at to pick our knees up higher. I'm a runner, I can run, I can do that shit after being forced to wake up, and I'm not even going to complain. We then were finally allowed to shower - wait, I mean we were finally allowed to take bucket baths in shower stalls - and were given breakfast of a hard boiled egg, bread, and oatmeal.
We donned our fatigues and packs and got started on the navigation exercise where we bumbled around a field with compasses until the sun was just high enough for us to be sent out on the mission of finding our own food for lunch. We were back in our group again, Sennah and Benjamin were Navigator and Co-Navigator respectively, I was the Pacer, and Pamela brought Snappy's along and fed us. We set off through the African bush, seriously, we were wading through knee-high rivers in grass that came up to my shoulders and roaming through fields and plains that were only used by cattle and small farmers. The entire journey ended up being about a 5km trek, and this was all between the hours of 10 and 12.
Our team ended up winning though, arriving back to base about an hour before everybody else did. No biggie.
We then had to cook our own lunch, which all of the not so nice older women took to doing. So we just sat and baked in the sun forever and then had what turned out to be dinner after it took about 4 hours to prepare. Later, we were told that we could now move from our campsite into these rooms about a half mile away-which was great, except that we had to carry our beds and mattresses the whole distance in the dark. The rooms were at least near showers/bucket bathing stations we should really call them, and I took a Benadryl that night so that I would pass out, it was fabulous, and I only woke up with thirty million more mosquito bites.
The last day we got up again for our morning run/yelling, then played a game of tug-of-war. Our team didn't end up winning that, but the other team although slower in the running, was much heavier, and so we weighed the loss on account of this rather than our lack of strength. Although we all know that I have useless Barbie arms.
Then we were taken to the shooting range, and of course I went all left-wing anti-gun on them and was like "I refuse to shoot a gun, I don't think that guns solve any problems blah blah blah" And of course they tried to scare me into it, saying things like "what are you afriad? You think you can't do it" And to myself, I thought "what you think I'm some idiot 14 year old boy that's going to buckle to your lame peer pressure?" But I am a New Yorker, so I did at least learn how to shoot that shit. Just in case.
At the end when we rehashed the weekend, I had definite mixed feelings. When Sennah raised his hand to make a comment and thanked his team, especially the girls on his team - holler! me - for helping him through the first night's challenge it definitely warmed my heart. I did get to know a lot of the people at the office on an entirely new level, and it was good to see everyone in a different light. I really bonded with the girls that I shared the tent with and a lot of the younger guys that were there. I just couldn't shake this feeling though, that anyone in the media is not supposed to be taught to conform to authority or even society. And ties with the military? When someone was giving a toast they said something to the likes of, "Here's to a great future with Global Media Alliance and the alliance with the Ghanaian military." And I was like Oh nooooooooo! I just think that journalists are supposed to question this kind of authority as opposed to buckling to it. But, I guess it's also good to be forced to work in teams sometimes...?
On the way to my internship today, the clock in the cab was in NYC time, four hours behind. First, it made me smile and then it made me miss home.
Written on October 25, 2006
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| Good news and Bad news! |
[13 Oct 2006|10:30am] |
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music |
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kind of in love with Christina's new CD |
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So lots of both kinds of news today, but that's alright because thats life. This Sunday will mark the halfway point - we'll have been here for two months and we'll be leaving in two months. Everyone here has been going through their own weirdness the past few weeks. I think we're all experiencing different highs and lows and it gets to a point where we can't relate to each other on every level and have an even harder time articulating the shit that we're going through to people at home. I feel like this week has been a little better. But then I fell in a sewer gate (basically all throughout Accra there are gaping sewers on either side of the road, some covered, some not) last night and banged up my leg leaving something that looks like I got in some sort of domestic abuse spat with a lion. So that's super attractive. BUT this morning started off on a good note. On my way to my internship the cab driver denied my 25,000 cedi fare for the cab, so I said, "Sir, everytime I'm with a man we get charged 25,000 cedis but when I'm by myself I get charged 30,000 cedis" which is true. So he conceded and let me get in for 25,000 cedis (It's still overcharging me because I'm white, the fare if I was Ghanaian would be probably 20,000 cedis but whatevs) So I kind of felt like the score was tied this week: Ghana 1 Lisa 1, and I can deal with that.
We had a build with Habitat for Humanity this weekend, but that was cancelled, which is kind of nice because next week we have midterms and the week after is fall break, so I have lots of stuff due next week and I'd like to just chill out this weekend. ALSO I would reeeeally like to go out tonight/Saturday since I haven't been up for it lately because of my internship/trips on the weekends. I'm not going anywhere for fall break (yup, I'm the only one, welcome to Life as a Poor NYU Student in Ghana Population: 1, maybe 2) but also to save up for WEST COAST ROAD TRIP '07.
I feel maybe I should tell you guys about things like the food here and living conditions and all that sort of stuff which I've been lazy about talking about. Either that or things like stalkers and silk nighties were just muuuuuch more interesting.
 Me and the roomie
We live in some sort of wierd Florida California looking compound made up of 4 houses and 29 students in total with 2 CRAs. There's another residence with just one house and the other 10 people about a ten minute walk from ours. I live in House 3 with the most amazing Sharah Marwah. I really lucked out Shar's great and clean and not annoying and when I talk in my sleep and am delirious from my Mefloquine (Malaria meds) she just laughs about it. She's currently canoodling with one Eugene Michael "Mikey" Santiago, and sometimes we all cuddle in Sharah's bed and watch my Friends DVDs, so basically we're a great threesome. The other girls in the house are wonderful. There's Franny "Egg Salad" Olajide who's basically fucking awesome and is from Xavier and will do things like go to the supermarket and come back and make cookies or cake. She has the sweetest roomie Sharity, who I hope doesn't hate me for talking openly about things like sex and masturbation and for doing things like sexually harassing the gay boys here. In the other room upstairs are Katie "CP" Weindler, Noelle "Noe" Esquire, and Delmeshia "Meesh Meesh" Haynes. I LOVE THEM. Noe is awesome and I love her because she has amazing patience and grace and does things like write me notes when I'm sad to encourage me to listen to Britney if I want to.
 Me and Noelle at Cape Coast
Yeah, we really lucked out with the best house. It's also the cleanest and never smells bad. Resident funnyman Nate "Nate-Ums/Dirty Kroch" Koch does great impressions of everyone and especially of our house; our key phrases, some improvised by Nate-Ums: "I'm going out!" "It's the SAME AS A BATHING SUIT" "Skinny girls are always cold, but they don't know! They just need to eat!" "I don't ask for permission, I ask for forgiveness" "Where are the trannies supposed to go to the bathroom?" "In Hong Kong..." "I took a shower, I'm going to put on makeup and a push-up bra and I'm going to look fucking hot tonight." I'll let you all assume which phrases are supposed to be me.
 Del and me
 Meesh, Linda (our CRA) Me, Franny
But anyways, there are amazing people in other houses more specifically my gay boyfriends: Benji and David (pronounced Daveed) basically all the girls in House 1 and then there's Ryan, fellow intern/corporate slut who's a lot of fun. The girls and Brandon at Buf Buf (the other residence whose real name is Abufun pronounced Ahboofoon, but lovingly referred to as boofboof) are sooo wonderful. I spent all of yesterday afternoon dying of laughter to She's the Man with MOLLY (I LOVE her and we should be living together next semester NYU dorms what what) and Lulu and Susan. There's definitely a great deal of community and love and respect for everyone here.
 Me and Daveeeeed on the Kumasi trip last weekend
 Me and Benji
Left with nothing more to do than make out with each other and drink .80 cent beers at any and all times of the day, we have learned to find joy in Ghana and life's simple pleasures. Ben introduced our now collective love of the card game Nertz we are seen playing here:
 Us playing Nertz: Intense and COOL.
Food! Overall, I really enjoy it. Really, really even. Breakfast is always delicious in House 3. Sometimes (always on Sundays for brunch because we're so adorable like that) we make a big meal with french toast crafted from the local bread which is deeeliccciouuuussssss and sweet and so yummy and about .70 cents a loaf. Also, eggs with pepper, onion, tomato, and cheese. Then we usually go and get a watermelon and/or a pineapple. So good. Throughout the week I'm pretty lazy and usually just take a handful of cereal or a granola bar if I'm on the go, so that's not too interesting. (also the milk situation is just kind of weird here and soymilk is SOOO expensive - nope, no lowfat Vanilla Silk :( sadness) For lunch we usually go to one of the Ashesi canteens and for $1.00 (10,000 cedis) we can get a meal of rice (jollof rice is made with hot pepper and tomato and is the best, but fried rice and senegalese rice are often served and also delish) coleslaw and chicken. Sometimes beans and sometimes fried plantains. Plantains are basically a staple here with most meals (I just ate a lunch of kelewele which is friend plantains with ginger and hot pepper) Sometimes for lunch I mix it up a bit and get kenkey with fish and hot pepper. Kenkey is a ball of cornmeal mush that's actually much more delicious than it sounds. You break off pieces of it (you're supposed to use your hands) and dip it into the sauces and vegetables. For dinner we have a "meal plan" throughout the week where we go to Tante Marie a really nice restaurant here in Accra and only a little bit from where we live. The dinner there usually consists of some kind of plantains, french fries (or chips, as they say) some sort of salad and/or veggies in some sauce, then either chicken/steak/fish kebabs or some sort of interesting chicken dish (curry, grilled, fried, etc) oh, and some kind of rice with red red. Sometimes they are really sweet and do things like make us little pizzas, or give us bread for makeshift sandwiches. If it's somebody's birthday we get cake, but usually it's fruit salad or ice cream or - if we're really lucky, crepes for dessert. The food in Ghana is generally spicy and flavorful and pretty starchy, although they are starting to make things with brown rice and whole wheat bread more often. On the side of the road at basically any moment you can get Snappy's (fried peanuts) kelewele, meat pies or scones, sweet bread, fried potato hashbrown sort of things, and fruit. Sometimes you can get something strange on your dish, I've eaten my way around many a fish head and seen people eat goat's nipples and other delicacies.
 Luba, Molly, me on the boy's porch
Mexican food is basically unheard of here, although there are many attempts at pizza. Some of them are really good. One night Molly, Noelle, Ben, and I went out to search for mexican food and found pizza instead at a bar called Champs that had really great live music (although that's pretty standard here) Boneless meats are a thing of my past. There is no actual peanut butter here, but they do have groundnut paste, which is basically just natural peanut butter that is a fair substitute, but I could really go for a JAR of Jiff or Peter Pan right about now. There is an overpriced import market that sells European (which I like to buy because I can't read the ingredients/nutrition label and therefore do not know how bad it is for me) and American goods. Molly just bought a $25 British Vogue there - insanity.
The local alcohol consists of apeteshie (bathtub gin that is in big plastic containers and funnelled into old glass bottles and then sold for under $2.00) and palm wine which is made from liquid within the trees. Apeteshie has a pretty nail polish remover esque taste/smell and the boys in our group are always swearing that they get wasted off of it, but so far i've only ever gotten a bit tipsy - but I am sober suzy after all. Palm wine doesn't have as many followers, people here refer to it as either too sweet, or too sour, or tasting like salad dressing. I actually think it's pretty good. You can get these drinks at any bar, but the most authentic experience comes from the palm wine bars on the sides of the road usually somewhat hidden by trees and consisting of a small thatched roof hut and benches. To buy something like Smirnoff or Malibu etc, it's really expensive, but there are of course cheaper alternatives that make Georgi look like Grey Goose. The prize for Best In Show most definitely goes to the packets (think ketchup) of shots of gin and whisky that I saw in the "impulse" area of a gas station.
So there's the food/people/living/etc at NYU in Ghana. I'm going to get back to my internship and working hard and all that - this just in: I was just told that we're waiting on an e-mail from CNN but I might get to do something with them, actually and not just hopefully! Soooo yeah, keep your fingers crossed for me :)
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| Pastor Daniel strikes back! |
[05 Oct 2006|02:19pm] |
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So just FYI I have a stalker. That sounds much more fun than it actually is. My homestay "brother" infamously known on the compound as "Pastor Daniel" decided to figure out where I live (I definitley did NOT tell him where I live nor does he have a car and did not come to pick me up or drop me off) This was yesterday when I was at my internship until late, but I heard about it last evening. Apparently he showed up to find me, and called to Annette whom he remembered meeting and she immediately went in and told Gerald the CRA in house 4. He wouldn't leave when the guard told him to leave, so Gerald went outside telling him that if I wanted to contact him I probably would have by now. Pastor Daniel finally did leave, but now we're all wondering if and when he's going to come back.
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| The Corporate world - Ghana style |
[05 Oct 2006|02:13pm] |
*written on October 4th at 3:00 PM*
Well, not surprisingly all of the NYU in Ghana staff were up in arms about my homestay experience from hell, and I had to have lots of meetings today and try to keep a straight face when saying things like, "Yeah...she forced me to wear her silk nighty. Yeah, no, it was silk. And it was pretty short. Yeah, I was pretty uncomfortable with the situation." or things like, "Um, yeah, well he tried to get me to watch adult films with him-yes. Yes, he referred to them as movies that people have sex in that he watches when he's lonely or sad." There was a lot of awkward laughter to try and alleviate how fucking weird the experience was. But now it's a funny story and a good post in my blog, and it wasn't some traumatic event that will give me nightmares for years or anything.
I'm at my internship now, with my own computer though-I like that much better. Because then I can easily get away with things like: posting on my blog, talking to dear-oh online, and writing e-mails-which I am finally almost caught up on! The newspaper has gotten out of hand, it's engulfing my very existence in Ghana. No, actually that's only half true. It's funny, just like everywhere in Ghana, some people here look to me as if I can do SOMETHING for them whether it be create a newspaper, or buy a necklace from them, or take them "to California" (I assume a lot of them think blonde = Cali and only Cali) while other people here look at me like, get the fuck out of my country you white bitch. When the President and the CEO of GMA are in here, I get all sorts of jobs and responsibilities and then when they leave to go "to meetings" this older gentleman that they hired to work on printing and "logistics" (I love big companies and their fun phrases) he takes over and doesn't listen to anything I have to say. And I'll let you decide how those confrontations go down: 55 year old traditional Ghanaian man vs. L-Rap, little blonde gender studies/journalism major obruni.
And the thing that I have realized in my internships in America that I realize here as well is that businesses barely know how to function. There are always too many people buzzing around one computer trying to get something done when it could actually be accomplished in a couple hours on my little laptop with just an orange Fanta and a sentence worth of guidance.
I just went to find Ryan the other intern here who's also in the NYU program, (he also has a blog, africazweng.blogspot.com which kicks the ass of my blog except that his never mentions Britney Spears, but DOES mention his Ghanaian princess Lisa-don't get us confused) he was off in the production room on another laptop watching football (soccer, duh) with the guys that work there. He just laughed and guestured towards the screen. On the television out here today we have watched Nigerian soap operas, cartoons, and the Ghanaian American Idol called Mentor.
This weekend should be fun and eventful-and full of cultural experiences don't you worry. We are going to Kumasi, the Ashanti region from Saturday-Sunday. Friday Jay-Z is playing, but fuck the ticket prices, we're getting in for free with fake press passes. Not through GMA, but some of us just think we might wear padded bras and pretend we work for some underground nyc newspaper.
Everyone here seems to be going through what I coined "the six week slump" which actually is now turning into the "seven week slump" but regardless just means that everyone seems to be hitting some sort of wall and having little freak-outs. I think I'm over mine, and I thank Katie and Annie and the ordering of our road trip tickets for that. 2 weeks traveling the west coast, see all of you there!
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| Silk nighties and Nigerian porn |
[01 Oct 2006|03:44pm] |
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music |
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I need some super-Lisa music to combat this weekend's events |
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UMM okay. So, this weekend I was supposed to go and stay with a Ghanaian family to do a "homestay" while in Accra-you know, to feel more cultured and "one with Africa" and all that FUN STUFF that I'm [supposed to be] experiencing here, but this was of course going to be more of an AUTHENTIC AFRICAN EXPERIENCE. And these are all of the reasons I was guilted into thinking it would be a good thing to do. I know that the air is alive with sarcasm, but just you wait, my Obruni friends, this story is quite magical.
My Friday didn't exactly start off on a good note, so there was no actual mental preparation for the trip. We were supposed to go from Saturday to Sunday but on Wednesday at our meeting, they told us that we would be instead leaving Friday night and staying until Sunday to truly get every juicy morsel out of the homestay. I have my internship all days on Fridays until anywhere from 5 or even as late as 7, so I told 4 of the co-ordinators at all different times and opportunities that I would not be able to make it on Friday, also writing e-mails to them on Thursday JUST TO MAKE SURE to tell them that I would be able to make it Saturday morning instead. Of course, I get a call at 5:00 while I'm at my internship from the receptionist. It's Esi telling me that it's actually not going to be convenient for me to go on Saturday as they forgot to relay the message and my family has been waiting for me at the AFS office since 4. I get out of there and catch a taxi home, which takes about 30 minutes, and then I throw things into a bag and I'm on my way all disoriented and crabby. (And also, I had had a really bad day, hitting some sort of brick wall, 6th week slump or something, and I had gotten in a fight with the cab driver on my way to my internship at 7:30 in the morning, and being overwhelmingly frustrated with being constantly taken advantage of and cheated out of money because I'm white I burst into tears and had to run into the Global Media offices straight to the bathroom where I sobbed uncontrollably for 20 minutes.) I wasn't really looking forward to the weekend anyways, because I had received a description of my family and I knew there was a pastor in the family and they were self-described as quiet and religious, seemingly a bad combination for me in a land where people already have views completely different than my own. If most Republicans weren't also somewhat racist, I would tell them to come to Ghana, because they hate the ho-mos too!! (even though Accra is rampant with closeted homosexuals.)
Anyways, I get out of the van with everybody at the AFS office around 6, so our families have been waiting to pick us up now for about 2 hours. The minute I get off the van Annette comes up to me and grabs my arm and says, "Just to warn you, your guy is really creepy." And that's when I REALLY knew. He comes up to me and introduces himself as Brother Daniel (he is the pastor, and he is 30 years old) He has this dumb sheet that we filled out about us, and asks me, "So, you are respectful to your parents?" And I'm like, "um, yeah." And he goes, "Well, then you will be respectful to your Brother Daniel." And just leers at me and LICKS HIS LIPS. I started to panic and had to bite my lip from punching him or crying, but more likely the latter because I was so worn out from the emotional rollar coaster that is traveling abroad. He informs me that we will be going to a club and I will be dancing with him and that also we will go swimming. I shot down both of those options, because I didn't want to be fondled in a club (aka: tin roof held up by tall sticks with dirt floor, beaded curtain, and nothing but a radio blaring Ghanaian music and a bottle of Hennessy behind the bar) and also didn't want to go swimming with him. I tried to be optimistic, and once we got to his house - he actually had built his own smaller house next to his "father's" house which was actually quite nice and definitely one of the nicest in the village. He took me to his small house and was very dissapointed when I wouldn't go in. He had talked to me briefly about how he was looking for a wife and whatnot, and I knew that I was a prime candidate for the job by the way he told me that I was very bright, pointing to his head and nodding in appreciation. He also, at one point, grabbed my calf calling me "hefty" which is actually a compliment, and I assured him that I was very strong from working out and jogging, mostly though so that he knew that I could kick {his} ass.
So, we were at his father's house, and I was able to meet his sisters Ama and his mother (who was really old and spoke only Ga, and I can only speak a little Twi and barely even that) and then there were three little kids Kojo 12, Candy 8, and Tabitha 5 that followed me around because that's what the kids here do. When the kids tried to give me a tour, I was ordered to instead get comfortable and take a bath (bucket bath, where you fill up a bucket with water and use it to bathe) by sister Ama 26 who was kind of hanging out in the room that I thought I was going to be staying in, and on the sheet it had said that I would have my own room. Now, I'm not opposed to having to share a room or even a bed, but Friday night's events were extremely bizarre. I decided to stay in the room and not go back outside because I was afraid of running into Daniel and also very tired as I had been awake since 6:00 AM. Ama informed me that she would be sleeping with me in the little double bed with mosquito nets draped all around it. She told me that her husband was in Italy and she wasn't able to get a Visa to go visit him, so she was basically just stuck in Ghana missing him. When I went to go to the bathroom and get ready for bed, she said, "What are you doing?" And I said "...well...I'm going to go get ready for bed." And, thinking that they would be very conservative, I brought sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt to wear to bed. But, Ama grabbed them from me and said, "No, you will wear this. You will wear one of my nightgowns" and shoved a SILK NIGHTY into my hand. After much discussion, she was adament, so I reluctantly put on the short, silky, Walmart-sexy nighty and got into bed with her.
I was supremely freaked out, nervous that perhaps she was going to try and do something with me, and this fear along with the TV and radio that she kept on all night, caused me to stay up all night tossing and turning and desperately pulling on my nighty.
I "woke up" around 6:00AM and my day began with a fresh bucket bath and the kids hounding me to go out and walk with them. I went with Kojo and Candy to their "internet cafe" (it breaks down to a penny a minute and the internet connection speed is actually pretty fast) and I saw Kojo's chatroom habit. He opened up his e-mail account, which was filled with about 30 e-mails from sites with names like, "Koreansingles.com" or "singleparentlove.com" and asked me if I knew about these websites. Very strange. He also downloaded Jay-Z/Linkin Park's Numb/Encore on Youtube.com and played it for the whole 30 minutes we were there. This makes me sad that Jay-Z is playing in Ghana on Wednesday with ticket prices $60-$100 US dollars that even some of us can't afford.
Daniel was very upset that I wasn't paying attention to him and acted wounded and quiet when he saw me. We went to see one of his friends and I decided it was time to go. They were talking too much about God and about gender roles and how homosexuals are all evil, and how I should let all of my gay friends in on the truth about their evil lifestyles so I faked sick (but really not, because I hadn't been feeling well all week) at first Daniel just told me that I could pray about feeling better in church tomorrow, but then I told him that I was pretty sure I was going to leave later that night instead because I also really needed to get work done. He finally relented into letting me go home and use the bathroom. I tried to dissapear with the kids again but he found me and made me go with him to see his friend who lived 2 miles away.
On the way there, he started to ask me if I liked movies, and quickly informed me that we would watch his favorite movie when we got back to the house. With his description of the movie, I figured out that it was actually Nigerian pornography and he seemed very excited to watch this movie with me "where two people have sex the entire time while two people in another room also have sex" as he had only ever watched this movie when he was "sad and alone." Ruining his plans I'm sure, I told him that I was actually going to be leaving when we got back, and he finally relented after a considerable amount of pouting, and silently we walked home.
I caught the first of 3 tro-tro's home, and I've never felt more alive in my life. Tro-tro's by the way are large vans with many seats in them to transport a lot of people for very cheap. The total of the 3 tro-tro's along the almost hour drive turned out to be about .60 US cents, a Ghanaian taxi would have cost around $7-$10 US. Even after the cramped, sweaty ride, fragrant with the smells of my fellow passengers, and arriving home to a house without any electricity, I just was happy to be home.
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[22 Sep 2006|11:07am] |
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mood |
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 stressed |
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music |
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Sexual Healing ringtone from the desk next to me |
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Today at Global Media Alliance (I'm writing again from my internship,) I'm preparing a presentation for the CEO, no biggie. The other day, they told me a little more about what I'm going to be doing, get ready! They want me to be the project manager of their new Sunday newspaper that I am now helping to develop. Kind of a hefty task for someone who is in college, and is definitely not being paid. I understand how amazing this opportunity is, but at the same time I understand how INSANE this opportunity is. Besides working on [creating] the newspaper, they also want me to help revamp the radio station that they just recently acquired. This, I have even less experience in than starting newspapers in developing countries. They made me go on the radio Wednesday and talk to "Black Rasta" their reggae-playing DJ. Safe to say that I made an ass out of myself, but in the classiest way possible. I'll be prepared for next time.
Is this post sounding very pessimistic and grouchy? I don't mean it to be. I am excited about this internship, but it is one of those things that I really have to psych myself up about, and also put extreme emphasis on the positives of the experience. It also didn't help today that the cab driver had no idea where I was going (and OBVIOUSLY I hardly have any idea where I'm going at any point while I'm here, road signs aren't really explicit here like the Avenue's, numbers, letters, and landmarks of the city.) Also, I have a giant mosquito bite on my forehead. No, really, it's HUGE.
Everyone here is fairly well-dressed and always dressed in beautiful elaborate outfits. Now, when I was thinking, what am I going to pack in my 2 suitcases for a 4 month stay in Africa, the farthest thought from my mind was, "I better pack blazers and anything business cas'!" So I've had to do some closet shopping for the past couple days. I also found out that there is no such thing as "Casual Friday's" here. Instead, every Friday people wear more traditional African clothing and prints to work. I bet you can guess how many traditional African outfits I own. Okay, actually I do own one right now, and I did get a dress made since I've been here. But one is too slutty and the other I already wore. So last night was reminiscent of Devil Wears Prada, but more Devil Wears Kente. (Kente is the traditional and I guess we could say stereotypical, African print.) I ended up with this American Apparel bright blue number (slinky tube dress, not appropriate on its own) and then a long black button up shirt dress over it. H.O.T.T.
Later today we're supposed to have a meeting at The Daily Graphic (one of Ghana's top newspapers) to talk about the status of the Sunday World (or Sunday Express, or Sunday News.) Not given much guidance, I typed up a little somethin' somethin' to make it look like I know what's going on. Today has so far been really fun, instead of just driving around and meeting with middle aged men, I was with the younger girls in the office today. It's good to see young women working for these companies, because it means that if there is a glass ceiling in developing countries, people are trying to break throgh it (sorry to sound like a feminist, but it's true) As a Gender Studies major, I definitely came to Ghana thinking about women's issues as well as issues and rights of homosexual people here, but it's just not like in America. This is still a very traditional land, (as well as a very religious nation) and those groups just don't have strong voices right now. But definitely someday soon.
They're telling me I should go get lunch right now (they all ordered from a restaurant, but I just brought the equivalent of a few American $'s) so I'm going to walk up the street and find something, more later!
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| Annie Gaudet is my hero. Katie Dero too. (DUH) |
[20 Sep 2006|12:01am] |
Love Song of a Girl [For Annie]
The far-off mountains hide [Annie] from me,
While the nearer ones overhang me.
Would that I had a heavy sledge
To crush the mountains near me.
Would that I had wings like a bird
To fly over those farther away [and give Annie a hug and have girl talk with her.]
Lisa (New York)
Well, I've been slacking a bunch on this whole journal thing, which was inevitable because even as a little girl I was never able to keep a diary for very long because of this hardcore slacking. I'm at my internship now-it's very interesting, I will post more about it later. But I just wanted to give a little shoutout.
Sunday marked our one month anniversary here (and 3 month countdown until when we will leave for home) and I miss NYC more than ever-annnnd I am missing a very important part of one of my best friend's LIVES. I hate not being there for things. I guess I'll make up for it though with the two week road trip where my attendance is mandatory and my unbought tickets are non refundable - PS Katie and Annie we need to talk about that and just get our damn tickets before we start thinking rationally.
I've been very busy this week. The homework is piling up-we think that the classes and professors are feeling a crunch to add more to the usual workload because of students complaining in the past that the classes were too easy here. THANKS PAST PROGRAMS FOR THAT. For one class alone this week I had to read a novel, short story, analyze poems, and do other assorted readings, crazy! But really only crazy because today I began my internship with Global Media Alliance, which-according to the CEO, will completely engulf my life and take up every spare minute I was foolish enough to think that I would have while I was here. But, I'm excited. I was supposed to also be doing volunteer work with New Horizons Special School, a school for children and young adults with mental dissabilities and handicaps. I think I'm just going to try very hard to find the time to volunteer there at least one day a week as I feel I will get a lot out of it. Okay, someone is looking at me like he needs to use the computer so I'm going to peace out and get back to you guys later. Love and miss you all!
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| Will Smith sends his regards! |
[06 Sep 2006|10:28am] |
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Dur, Britney. |
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Well, this past weekend was really amazing. While some of you guys (Katie) were worried about my safety as I had not contacted you all in a little while, it just so happened that acccctually I was on a weekend trip to Cape Coast and Elmina! Throughout our time here we have little weekend trips to places around Ghana - that are already included in room/board thank you very much - and this weekend was supposedly our nicest one.
FIRST OF ALL we stayed at the Coconut Grove Resort:
I'm cheating and stealing this picture from the website, because I really need to put up my photos on some sort of website other than the fbook so that everyone can see them. So this is temporary and still awesome. So yeah, this is where Will and Jada got married, no big deal. (Although our suite was still only about $80 a night, weird?) I'm considering also getting married there, so we'll add that to the list along with The Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. Annnnnyways, it was absolutely gorgeous there and on Saturday we ended up going to a festival in the town that was suuuper fun and mostly just included a parade that anyone could be a part of/was a part of/was drunk in. It was just a little bit more cultured than say, an East Syracuse village type parade. (haha) So one of the things that I absolutely love about Africa is definitely that no matter where you go there is a beat to dance to, and the parade was certainly no different. Being white, I think that Africans don't think that we can dance-which is sometimes true, but let's break the stereotypes people!-so whenever I would start dancing or a fellow obruni, people would start cheering and pulling us in to dance with them, as if we were paraplegic and had just begun to start walking again. Here is a GREAT picture of a little instance when I was dancing down the street and suddenly I felt someone grab me from behind. Thinking it was a scary man, I was like "ahh!" But then when I turned around, it was just a drunk woman who wanted a dance partner, and was quite forceful about it. So I danced with her.
When we got home we went splashing into the ocean, which was absolutely beautiful. Definitely beats Green Lakes (for all the Syracusans out there!) And then it was time for a little dinner buffet on the beach-hands down, best food I've had since being here, even though all (okay, most) of the food has been amazing. We also had palm wine (which I should reference more specifically in a later post all about the food and drink here) I thought it was a delicious drink, kind of like a Smirnoff Ice in consistency and color. Definitely a weird sweaty taste, but whatever, it's Africa, I'm experimenting. Then we had a bonfire and danced around it until we all passed out. Sounds like an OC/Laguna Beach good time, yes?
Sunday was a little more intense than our silliness the night before as we visited the Elmina Slave Castle, that the Portuguese had built on the coast in Elmina at one point for general trade which then turned to the slave trade. It was a difficult afternoon for everybody there, and I had no choice but to view the experience as a human being. I didn't want to be there as a white person or an objective person, I just wanted to think of the entire situation as a human, and when we walked through the slave dungeons and stepped onto the little section where the slaves would then walk onto the boats, there wasn't a dry eye in our group. It's one thing to read about in a textbook, but to actually walk the same path and mentally immerse yourself in thoughts about what had once taken place here, it was very real, and I'm thankful for the experience. Here is a picture I took of this beautiful orange flowering plant that was in the courtyard of the Catle. Much like the architecture itself and the occasional little green plant poking through a crack in the wall it was quite the visual paradox to see something so beautiful in a place so ugly.
After the castle we had a lunch at a crocodile pond, (RIP Steve Irwin) and then went on to the Kakum National Park where we walked on suspension bridges through the canopy of the rainforest-aka THE MOST TERRIFYING EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE THUS FAR. I always forget that I'm afraid of heights until I put myself into situations where I'm dangling 200 feet in the air (or 350 meters which was the case with the bridges) And everyone else, (except for my girl Molly Mol at Bouf Bouf aka my fellow news correspondent here in Ghana) was like having the time of their life, yelling my name from other bridges in order to get my attention. Insanity. So they all have some great pics of me doing my now infamous duck walk (I thought I was going to tip and fall off the edge of the bridge, so I would crouch down and pull myself along, trying very hard the whole way not to pass out-often it was like one of those dreams where you're in a hallway and the hallway just keeps getting longer and doesn't end. That's how it felt. And again, I was dangling 250 meters in the air above the rainforest.)
The Duck Walk:
Me trying to pretend like I'm having a good time, but notice the veins popping out of my neck, I've never had to try so hard to smile for a picture in my life:
Hilarious. Okay, I need to go do some work on the Ashesi University newsletter - check back soon for some posts about my academic endeavors here in Afreaka, local cuisine, and more!
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| I'm a snowbunny in Harlem and an obruni in Ghana. |
[28 Aug 2006|04:24pm] |
So, the most amazing thing about Ghana is its children. This sounds really cheesy, (especially since I've heard that song, you know, the collabo with like a million 80's celebs called "We Are The World" or whatever, well, I've heard that just about every day on the radio since I've been here) but they truly welcome you to the country. We were told that all of us, even the African-American in our group, would be greeted by the word, "obruni," when we were out at times. Obruni means "white person" (or stranger...but basically white person) and isn't an offensive term at all.
We were at the Kwame Nkrumah (founder and first president of Ghana) Memorial Park and we were walking up the stairs towards our tour group when this other girl and I were stopped by two little boys who ran up to us. Their eyes were wide and they looked very anxious and excited. We smiled at them, and their mother said to us, "They're very excited to see you. Let them touch you." We crouched down and they ran up to us and ran their hands along our arms and fell to the floor in excitement, laughing and smiling at us, then getting back up to give us hugs. It was an experience I can't fully describe in any way that an online journal can do it justice, but it felt really amazing, and it was my first real feeling of being in Ghana, being in Africa, and not in the negative sense that I sometimes felt being bussed around, staring out the windows, and having people run up to our cars.
When we visited one of the markets, two little girls in pretty linen dresses ran up to our group to say hello. My CRA Linda that was showing us around at the time, said to us, "watch this!" and crouched down with the girls and asked one of the girls in our group to take a digital picture. We brought up the image on the screen and then showed it to the girls, and they squealed and clapped. It was the first time they had ever seen their image like that!
I think these experiences really helped to inforce the fact that in our quest for unity, we need to be able to accept each other's differences and celebrate them.
And now I'll get off my soapbox :)
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| These are a few of my [most missed or not] things... |
[28 Aug 2006|04:07pm] |
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I miss:
duh, those people that I love
trashy celebrity gossip
constant internet access
PEANUT BUTTER - this could seriously discourage me from traveling abroad ever again
MEXICAN FOOD - along with this
whole grains
Whole Foods
Trader Joe's
Campus Cash
tap water
my music
MTV
reality TV (most def Project Runway)
text messaging
Things I surprisingly don't miss: cell phones (except as a time piece)
Things I OBVIOUSLY don't miss: Work.
Things I forgot/need:
hand sanitizer, (extremely crucial here)
Dove body wash
Microsoft Word
a good scrubby mesh sponge
unscented lotion
suntan lotion
Things I WILL miss:
Katie's Birthday
Annie's Birthday
Ashley's Birthday
weather below 75 degrees
perfume
high heels
paychecks
the subway
Justin Timberlake at the VMA's/his CD Launch
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| Malaria & Maschettis |
[28 Aug 2006|02:55pm] |
Written on Sunday August 27, 2006
It’s been a little overwhelming being bussed around a foreign country, and I can’t help but feel very much like a tourist in these big vans housing a bunch of white kids staring out the windows at their surroundings.
Today, we were supposed to go to church, which is supposed to be an amazing ceremony here, and I really do want to attend, but I feel that religion should not be a spectacle. For me, it’s not like going to a museum, observing how other people worship sucks out all of the spirituality of something that should be real. I’m going to attend church another time while I’m here though I’d rather it be by myself or in a small group of my close friends. And I would appreciate finding spiritual guidance again or at least rediscovering a different aspect of my spirituality and faith.
I also decided to stay in today with some of the girls, because of the events that took place yesterday.
***Warning, whatever you are about to read is in no way news that should be relayed to my parents or other family members that might tell my parents. I don’t need them worrying, because it won’t make it any safer for me, and it will just give them unnecessary stress.
With that said…it was just a really calm night last night, most of us were planning on staying in as Saturday was the last day of Orientation and thus the last day of strict schedules and early mornings. I had planned on staying in that night. The first piece of bad news came when we found out that one of the girls in our group has MALARIA, (Which we have talked about almost everyday since we've been here. We're all taking our malaria meds and I know that personally I spray insect/skeeter spray on all the time) So this is a huge proverbial slap in the face of reality for all of us. My new practice has been spraying my naked body (hot, right?) right when I get out of the shower (just like getting a Mystic Tan!) and then later in the day whenever I'm outside. So that kind of frightened me, but the good news is that her case wasn't severe, and she is just going to feel like she has the flu for less than a week.
We were about to go to sleep about an hour after that news around 1:30 Sunday morning, when Arielle knocked frantically on our window motioning for us to come out. Everyone was in the courtyard and a Safetech (The security people) van was outside the gates. We were quickly informed that four students in our group had just been mugged when walking home from a bar down the street. The details or kind of because I don't remember that well/wasn't there: four of our peers were at a bar down from where we live and they noticed that certain people were acting strange and being a little too pushy about trying to get to know them and when they left, a cab went by them honking its horn and 2 or 3 men got out and split up. The cab driver tried very hard to get the 4 NYU students into the car, but they were so close to the house that they refused. They realized that the 3 men were now following them and had maschettis with them, (yup, that's right, giant knives,) and the cab pulled up and cut them off. The men were now chasing them and grabbed one of the boys and went through all of his pockets before they found his wallet. They dropped him and ran away. By this time, the other three had made it to the dorms, but the guard didn't even think they were serious and hadn't pushed the panic button. Another guard at a different compound had told one of the other boys not to run in the direction of the dorm because, "there's another one waiting there for you." (So neither our guard nor any of the neighboring guards in any way helped the students, that's less than reassuring about how safe we are here) Finally the Safetech people showed up, but only in time to hear the story and not at all to catch the muggers.
And of course all of the stories began to pour out as all of us realize that we've encountered or almost enountered similar situations that thankfully didn't erupt into a robbery. This is the fifth year of the program, and it's no mystery to anybody where we live and attend class, which is very frightening, and the fact that all of the things we were trying to do to protect ourselves, travel in groups, travel only with boys, stop at any Safetech establishment for help, etc, were completely negated has made everyone reevaluate "what's next" in our safety and what new precautions we need to take.
Since this happened on Saturday night/Sunday morning, the level of panic has subsided, but our awareness is still at an alltime high, which we all agree is definitely good. Rumors are that we will have to pay for Safetech taxi services if we want to go out at night.
Again, please don't let this travel the grapevine to my parents or others who will worry and/or lose sleep for the next 3 months/3 weeks.
Other than that everything's great here! :-P
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| Playing a quick game of catch-up |
[28 Aug 2006|02:38pm] |
Written on Thursday August 24, 2006
Well, I'm really behind, and I know that if I don't GET ON IT I'll completely lose track and start forgetting things. First of all, let me start off by saying lots of things that are cliche yet true: this is completely surreal, it feels like I'm in a whole nother universe, yes, it's an incredible adventure, and I will come back a changed person. Okay, now that that's out of my system... :) To explain our schedule this entire week has been crazy orientation. Basically everyday we have gotten up at around 7 in the morning to make breakfast and whatnot and board the vans by 8:15 or so and we have been shipped out to different locations around the city of Accra. (Begining next next weekend we will begin taking trips outside of Accra, but for now we've just been exploring the city itself)
I have decided to explain everything in sections and groups with each post being about something specific. I will be here for four months, and within them I will take what I have done in the first week and really enjoy it and savor each experience. So if I even try to tell you all of the things I have done this week, I won't do them all justice. And I know you all (um, or just Annie) really want the gritty details. So from here on out, expect explanations and...PICTURES! (K Dearo I might need help on that) Enjoy :)
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| From the top! |
[24 Aug 2006|12:06pm] |
Well hello from Africa, everyone! First of all, I need to thank the lovely redheaded Katie Dear-oh, for creating this lovely AMAZING BRITNEYTASTIC setup for my blog (okay, it's a livejournal, but i can call it whatever i want, deal) So crazy props to her, because it would have looked super lame otherwise.
SECONDLY, SECONDLY, SECONDLY (okay this is going to be filled with inside jokes and direct shout outs to all of my lovers and friends back home, so sorry about that) let's start from the beginning of this journey, which would have to take us all the way back to my partay in NYC, which, let me say, was probably the best Pre-Ghana going away party anyone in the world has ever had. Although, perhaps not enough dancing, but the focus was mainly on [me] goodbyes [to me], mingling [with me], telling [me] how pretty I looked. Okay, okay, I'm just being a jerk, but seriously thank you all so much for coming it was the best night of my life, and I miss you all so much!
Then it was family/flying time. Well, let's just say my parents didn't take the whole "our daughter going to Africa" thing as well as they could have-but, perhaps much better than I ever thought they would. At the airport they were super parent-like (or maybe it's just my parents that are this bad?) and were taking pictures of me (no lie) at the security points. Yes, that is illegal, and yes, people were telling them not to. It was really obnoxious, I would be trying to focus on things and then I would happen to look back and see them staring at me from the sidelines, and waving frantically. hilarious. But, I get it, I get it, this is a big deal, and I really appreciate that they never took the opportunity away from me out of fear, and overall they're really excited for me, so that's great, and I love them very much.
The flight(s) were the most hellish experience thus far. The flight from JFK to Milan, not so bad, but once I got there I felt like the biggest tourist ever, and I had an 8 hour layover there, so the comfort level was at an all time low. I had to exchange money there because I needed food, (I was also on my Malaria medication which completely messes up your central nervous system and makes you feel like absolute crap, so that didn't help) Instead of changing money they should just give you some lighter fluid and matches, and have you burn your dolares americanes, because the dollar is the Euro's bitch. (as warned by Ms. Annie Gaudet) More on the exchange rate in Ghana later...
After the flight to Milan, I jumped on another plane and we took that to Lagos in NIgeria (um, not on the itinerary, but, it was one of those types of never ending nightmares anyway, so the extra two hours waiting in the airport was just icing on the cake. But then after a 40 minute flight I was here! And little Linda (my CRA kind of like an RA but COOLER, perhaps that's what the C stands for) was waiting for me with an NYU sign. I said, "CAN I PLEASE HUG YOU AND KISS YOU BECAUSE I JUST GOT OFF A MILLION HOUR PLANE RIDE." and she said, "...what?"
So that's all for now, I'm giving you guys all the details that you want/I promised! Wireless will be in the dorms soon, so I'll be writing more and keeping up with this, lots of great stories to come!
Much love from Ghana,
Lisa
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[23 Aug 2006|12:54pm] |
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britney spears |
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hi, my name is lisa
i love britney spears and my awesome friends
SECONDLY
i am in africa holy crap
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