More Pictures from the weekend

Here are a few more pictures from my weekend in Butre.

Looking back towards Busua

Crabs

Village Pulling in Fishing Nets

Most Epic Weekend of the Summer

I apologize for being such a slacker blogger. I’d like to say that it’s because I’ve been having so much fun these past few weeks I haven’t had time to blog, but that would only be mostly true.

I just got back from an incredible trip to Western Ghanaian beaches with three of my friends. It was a trip of extremes. In the span of 24 hours I experienced the highest point of my summer—and the lowest. Don’t worry I am alive and well, but it turns out things can get pretty hairy when you try to travel in West Africa and you don’t know what you’re doing.

Let’s start with the bad since that happened first and it’ll really just amplify how great the great was.

So excited for a trip!

We left the hostel here in Accra at 9:30 to catch a 10 AM bus leaving for Takoradi. We pushed it so close because it looked like two of the four of us were recovering from malaria (I was fine) and we needed to make sure that they were good to travel. We would have been late for this bus if there had been a bus leaving at 10 AM—the state transport doesn’t update their schedules online apparently. We waited for the 12:30 bus that didn’t leave until 2 PM. It was a four-hour journey to Takoradi and now it looked like we wouldn’t make it before nightfall. A great start to the day.

The bus took over six hours to get to Takoradi—six hours of tight seats, baby screams and a general lack of comfort. This travelling took so much longer than expected that when we arrived in Takoradi around 8:30 PM we had hardly eaten anything all day. Safe to say, we were not in a good mood. One more critical detail is that for the last two hours it had been raining pretty hard with no sign of letting up.

We took a tro-tro to a junction about 25 km away. One bright spot about this was that travelling had been very cheap up until this point—the bus had been 9 cedi ($6) and the tro was just a cedi (65 cents). We got to Agona junction around 9 PM and looked for a taxi to take us to Akwidaa—a small fishing village where we would cross a footbridge and go over a hill to arrive at our intended destination, “Ezile Bay”. Ezile Bay was going to be great—bungalows on the beach, surfing, a restaurant, a bar—what more do you need?

We never made it to Ezile Bay. The taxi drivers union made it impossible for one to get a reasonable fare and we got so flustered and irritated that we forked over 40 cedi for this guy to get us the 10 km we needed to go. Outrageous. He said the roads were bad. I didn’t care—just get me the hell out of here.

The roads really were that bad—I can’t believe this guy even agreed to take us, no matter the money. It was kind of fun at first. It took the taxi a few tries to get over the first hills, but as the rain continued to pour down and the dirt road got worse the three of us in the backseat had to start walking up the hills ourselves while the taxi heaved and sputtered up the incline. It was still funny when Jelena completely wiped out and got covered in mud.

Next Morning

It got really not funny when we got to the hill where our luck ran out. There were no lights, there were no stars in the sky, the rain was coming down, and the taxi rolled into a ditch while backing up—he had no taillights. We had to push him out, cover ourselves in mud, and I was starting to feel lightheaded from it all. We stood up at the top of this hill watching this taxi fishtail out only halfway up, seeing nothing but rain and darkness around us, thinking of the strange men in the little villages nearby—things were not looking good. Not only was I unsure whether the taxi could get back up the hills on the way back, but I thought the engine would roll over and die pretty soon.

After pushing the taxi out of a ditch one last time after a failed attempt at turning around, we headed towards a bail out Busua—a nearby beach town. I really felt bad for that driver. I mean, we destroyed his taxi—there were several inches of mud under our feet, on the seats, bugs flying in the front seat, most like a jungle than anything else. We made it to Busua around 11:30—well after dinner hours and finally found a “big room” with four sleeping pads on the ground for us. 40 cedi for the room? Fine I don’t give a shit please leave us alone. We went to bed that night tired, hungry, muddy. We failed to see the humor in the idea that out of all our days in Ghana this might have been the most memorable. Nothing was funny at that point.

Don’t worry it gets better! 

Big Rock

As terrible as the travel was, the location was that great—maybe better. I mean, this place could not have been more picturesque. We hung out at the Black Star Surf Shop with the white sand and the rolling surf and the warm water and the great food and the Apples to Apples they had there. It’s hard to work off such a horrible travel hangover, but this place really did it.

The place we were staying was not ideal so in the afternoon we headed towards a more ideal spot. Ezile Bay was now out of the question. We made some friends on the bus who were headed to ‘The Hideout Lodge’ in Butre, which turned out to be the next town over. All we had to do to get to Butre was walk two miles down the beach, get over a hill and we were there.

Kickin It

Coming down the hill was quite a sight. Butre just popped out of nowhere. We walked through the thousand-person village, across a rickety bridge over a river flowing into the ocean, and one hundred yards down the beach was the Hideout.

The Hideout could not have been better. It was straight out of my dreams of a remote getaway to a Ghanaian beach. We stayed in a cheap four person bungalow, ate great cheap food, drank rum out of a coconut, bodysurfed, read a book, went on some walks, just everything.

I could not have asked for a better last weekend of this trip. I’m headed home on Friday and while I’m looking forward to a lot of things back in the States I will miss this place.

Two Stars

America Sundays

Sorry I've been slacking on the blog recently. I get so many emails everyday with people like, "hey, you need to write more! I love your stuff!" Hard to have so many fans sometimes.

The past few Sunday nights I have indulged in some very non-Ghanaian food. The Paloma Hotel, where I watched the B's win the Cup, is generally an ex-pat haven and they have a nice restaurant filled with comfort food. Tonight I took part in the two-for-one pizza deal with my friend Prince. Usually I get a great white sauce pasta dish--excellent when doused in hot sauce.

It's nice to feel like I get away every once in a while. It's still not the same--small pizzas, always out of buffalo wings--but its a refreshing injection of Western culture into my week. Eating Ghanaian food is a part of the experience, and its surprising how much one can enjoy eating chicken and rice after a while--but I can't do it seven days a week. I just can't. The taxi ride to good ol' Paloma Hotel is sometimes just what I need to cap off another week in Ghana.

Less than 3 weeks left now. I'll be plenty ready to go home when the time comes. Until then, I'll get my America with a big, fat, slightly unhealthy Sunday dinners at Paloma.

Running

The biggest change to my life this summer is that here, in Ghana, I'm a runner. I've never really had the habit of running--or considered running a thing that I could enjoy--but that's changed. Instead of my normal summer schedule of late nights and late mornings, recently I've been early-to-bed, early-to-rise because most mornings the first thing I do is run around campus before it gets too hot.

It takes a lot to get me out of bed early and do something I have always resisted, but I have a great motivator and running partner in Will Brophy. He's on the swim team at Harvard, and he's got it in his head that running every morning will help him swim faster. I don't really care about swimming faster, but being a better runner could be a good thing. So I've been up early--6:30 usually--with sore legs (usually) wishing I was still asleep (always) to take advantage of this really motivated athlete, hoping it will rub off on me.

The first few days were absolutely miserable. I could tell myself to keep running all I wanted, but my body wasn't down with the idea. It hoped I'd get the message during a big hill on my first day out when I chucked a half-digested Powerbar on the side of the road. It tasted like vanilla. Trust me--I got to taste it twice.

Then you know what, I started to get it. My stomach began to behave, my legs were still sore, but I got the hang of it. Quickly. There's a great 5 mile run here that spins around a huge hill in the center of campus, and it gets easier to make it up that hill every day. I still grumble and bitch when I wake up hours earlier than my roommate Cesar, but I've learned to love the euphoria of the post-run feeling. I've got this idea that even if I'm lazy and don't do anything of real value the rest of the day, it feels like I did something because--damn it--I went RUNNING this morning.

It's not just an activity--it changes the whole course of my day. I'm probably definitely not as fun as I used to be. I regularly get to bed by 11 every night, something I haven't done since high school, maybe. It's because I'm tired from running that day, and because I know in oh-too-few hours I'll be out running again. A vicious cycle.

A perk--our professor is out running six days a week at 6 am. If we go the normal route--if we're not out killing ourselves with a speed workout on the nearby track--we get a great 'good morning' from Prof somewhere around that huge hill. It gives us something to talk about. I swear, he thinks more of Will and me because we're out there sweating in the early morning along with him. It makes me more active in class, too. I'm wide awake by the time we settle into class by 9 am--instead of sipping coffee, leaning on that caffeine like some of my classmates.

I'd be lying if I said that I'm definitely going to keep running when I get home--but it's been a big part of my study abroad experience thus far. Africa--far more than America--is a place that rises and sets with the sun. I want to make the most of my time in Ghana--so running just makes sense.

Monkey Monkey!

I fed the monkeys

Finally a glimpse of some real animals in Ghana! I was beginning to think I wasn't in Africa--aside from a few things that tipped me off. But really, it's always great to see some monkeys.

Monkeyed

This monkey sanctuary near Techiman has Colobus and Mona monkeys that live alongside a village of people who consider them spiritual beings. I think the monkeys get the better end of the deal--food for the taking in the village, visitors feeding you bananas, and monkey priests giving you a proper burial.

Hanging with my boy

It was pretty wild how close we got to the monkeys. There is a lot of discussion in class of people coming back to Africa to find their roots. Found mine with the monkeys. Cross that off the list. They would actually come up and grab a banana out of your hand! They look like little humans--so cute I debated how hard it would be to sneak one in through customs. It would be pretty hard.

Nephew

 

If I ever get back there though, you can figure out anything with a little time. That monkey is mine! 

Rocks and Shrines

It turns out Techiman does have some redeemable qualities. The other day I headed out to the nearby village of Bono Manso to see a shrine. After a somewhat interesting walk through the village to a Baobab tree where they honor their ancestors, we went to the Sacred Shrine in a nearby nature reserve.

Rocks!

The journey to the Shrine was wicked fun. Back in the days of tribal warfare, the religious leader was a sought after prize, so the shrine was protected by a series of really impressive rock bluffs that we had to scramble over. I always get a real kick out of climbing around, and it was great to get to the top of every big rock I could.

This place was an old lookout for an old African state--they could see enemies coming at them from over 30 miles away up here. Many of the pictures are from this lookout area.

Next post: Monkeys!

Forest!

Lion King!

Phallic!

Kumasi: Home of Cool Thingz

I’ve found the source of all the cool things that fill up the markets around Ghana: Kumasi—the heart of Asante country. This city used to be the center of a powerful empire, and all the surrounding villages have specialized in a particular craft that used to supply the kingdom. We headed out to the Ghanian textile villages this morning to get some quality goods.

The first village we stopped at specialized in kente—a woven cloth that has symbolic patterns. The more expensive of the two common textiles, it can take a weaver a full day to create a two-yard length of cloth. Unlike other markets, every person I dealt with had woven all their own material—I even got to try my hand at weaving kente on their machines. I got two kente cloths—one for the kitchen table at Mom’s request, and a bigger blue kente that would make a great gift—or a pillowcase for me.

Where the Magic Happens

Web Gem

Homies 

Our second stop was at an Adinkra village. Adinkra is cheaper, larger fabric that has various signs and symbols printed on it with black ink. At this village, we got a walk through of how they extract black ink from the bark of trees—a pretty remarkable process. We got to make our own adinkra, I had to buy the Obama cloth, and I got another big one at a great price.

Tree bark

He liked my hair

Who could resist!

In more important news, our room here has A/C and I took a hot shower last night.

Shout out to my family in Humarock! We’ll be trying to celebrate the 4^th of July in Techiman—a tall task. Hope the fireworks and bonfires on the beach are better than ever.