MaLaRiA

Well now I have had the “true African” experience

On Monday I was feeling kind of sick in the morning…

Then later that afternoon I had a fever, body aches and chills

My first thought was…man I am going to die in Africa.

Haha

Not really but I really did not want to go to the hospital here

So my house mother made me eat red red( fried plantains and some red sauce)

This by the way is not what you want when you are feeling sick

So of course I threw it up about an hour later

But hey that was okay because my fever broke after that!

And I felt good after that... for the most part

They still made me go to the hospital the next morning… and guess what they said?

You have malaria. (Hahaha its slightly funny)

That is the one thing I think all volunteers worry about getting the most

I am not too sure that I really have malaria

They seem to think anytime you are sick here it must be malaria

But they gave me antibiotics for it

And some for my bowel movements..

So now I will be taking 4 pills 3 times a day.

Whatever makes me better

Cape Coast & Kakum National Park

Soooo this past weekend/week was pretty awesome

I had lots of African food.

Went to Cape Coast Castle

We also watched these guys pull in a huge net of fish just outside the castle

This is what Obama laid down in the castle... oh my gosh how they love obama here

They have Obama underwear, hotels, water and shirts everywhere.

Fishing area...

Ate at a resturaunt on the beach

Got chased by a little boy holding a creepy looking snake

Cut open my heel. Genius

Pet a wild crocodile while a lady kept it at bay with a stick

Went on an awesome canopy walk through the rain forest

yeah pretty freaking awesome

it was a rope bridge suspended between seven trees 30-40 meters high

I travel with lots of people from other countries.

Japan, Australia, Korea, Scottland, Canada, England, Germany and Russia

All awesome people!

I bought oranges from this cute little girl

And just so all of you know... GHANA won their last World Cup GAME!

Everyone was running out of their houses screaming their heads off.

PRetty hilarious. They started parades

 and some had painted themselves

So we got stuck in a spot bar because of a rain storm...

Everyone got a little tipsy and started dancing with the Ghanaians

while the Japanese guy (speaks no english)

was playing the drums and another guy shaking a maraca of some sort

pretty dang fun!

YUP! the the African girls taught us dances...

This is my host mom...

Agnus

These are the girls that work at the hospital with me!

Here is a random picture of a stream I walk over every day

This weekend I am leaving at about 3 in the morning on Friday to go on a

13 hour tro adventure to Mole National Park

We will be going on a Safari, and staying at a hotel that has balconys over looking a watering hole

Where elephants and other animals will be!

They say that you wake up with baboons on your balcony...

Rafiki I am going to find you.

Kumasi!

Second week

This is Bri, Sarah the younger, and Matt. ( yes I made up the name sarah the younger because there is another sarah who is older)

They live about 5 minutes from me and they are who I hang out with in Koforidua.

Precious isn’t it?

This meal is called Jolaff rice and chicken.

It’s been my favorite so far.

Probably because it is not far from an American dish.

Some of the Ghanaian women from work invited me, Matt, Sarah the younger, and Bri over for lunch.

She fed us Banku,(I think that is how it is spelled)

It is like eating dough that you dip in a fish and vegetable stew.

Pretty delicious and sits at the bottom of your stomach like a

ROCK

I started work at the hospital in the Physiotherapy Ward last Monday.

Things I have seen:

Someone carry what looked like to be at least 50 pounds of junk on her head.

A woman with all of the skin missing on her hand

Lots and lots of stroke patients

A woman with an amputated leg walk for the first time

AND LOTS of naked people.

Normal? In Ghana of course it is normal.

Things I have done this week:

Hand washed all of my clothes

(yes that is my underwear)

Taken bucket baths…. And even some running water showers! Which were glorious.

Taken a taxi to and from work everyday

Poured hot wax on 3 people causing them to scream

Helped stroke patients with their exercises

Ultrasounds, electric stimulation, “microwave” as they call it and infrared

Things I have learned this week:

I need to learn more of the Twi language

I need to almost always bargain for lower prices on things

But the most important thing I have learned is….

GHANAIANS TAKE FOREVER TO DO ANYTHING!

If you ever go to a restaurant you should expect to get your food at least an hour after you order it. We have waited up to 3 hours for our food.

Their sense of time is much different than ours in the west… more they just do whatever whenever.

Anyways…

This weekend we went to a town called Kumasi

It has a huuuuge market.

The Market is also extremely crowded

We had people grabbing us from left and right trying to get us to buy whatever they were selling.

For example one man yelled at me “OBRONI OBRONI! Very pretty, buy my pants, very pretty!” then the man threw the pants at me and so I threw them right back… trying to hit his face.

He sure knew how to get me to buy some pants…

False.

We went through the meat section of the market… it was soooy disgusting.

Animal intestines sprawled everywhere on slabs of wood sitting in the sun.

There were also GIGANTIC snails.

Our next stop was the cultural museum for the Ashanti region.

Needless to say it was not worth the 2 cedis we paid for it.

But we did go to an old military fort which was pretty awesome!

Next we bought some paintings from a man on the street!

I love them

Roommates… can we please use them in our house next year? Yes?

Good!

That night we were lucky enough to eat at a restaurant where they had hamburgers and fries

HAMBERGURS AND FRIES!

We were in heaven.

This is our hotel room.

We slept three to a room. In my room it was me, Nieve and Sloane.

We may or may not have broken the already half broken door so that it no longer locks.

Don't worry dad we stuck a table in front of it every night so no one could get in :)

Here is a little positive poster for you guys at home.

Trip rating: Pretty darn good 

This next week I will be going to the Wood Market, Bead Market and then…

Cape Coast for the weekend! YAAYY

P.S. here is a preview to what I get to ride in and see every weekend...

Love you all!

Last week/ This weekend trip!

Okay… Well sorry about the last post, my computer died before I could finish it!

So I will explain the photos now.

So on the weekends everyone takes a break from work and  travels to different parts of Ghana.

We take big vans called tro tros to travel around.

They are extremely squishy with sometimes up to 22 people in the van.

So I got on a tro with some people I had met for an hour 2 days before.

No big deal eh?

There were 5 Canadians, 1 Scottish, and 6 Americans.

It was a 2 hour drive to Accra from Koforidua, then 4 hours to Ada Foah where we went last weekend.

Loooong drive in a cramped van.

But it was fun!

As you can see in Ada Foah the Ghanaians live in mud huts right on the beach.

It was beautiful place to stay!

Of course the doors to each of the huts we stayed in had different countries’ flags painted on them…. Normal right?

I stayed in a hut with Switzerland’s flag painted on the door.

 And shared a room with my new friend Sloane.

Saturday we sat on the beach and drank coconut milk from a freshly picked

COCOnut.

Then we had a little water polo type game against some rich Koreans.

The Koreans kept on making bets that the loser would buy winners one beer… then they upped it to 2 beers etc.

We told them we do not have that type of money… So then they said “Is okay we have lots of money, we buy we buy!”

So they bought everyone beer… and water for me!

It was pretty freaking awesome.

The second morning me, Sarah, Ashley, Mark and Kelly watched the sunrise. As we watched fishing boats were starting off their day so we were able to watch them maneuver from the Volta River to the Ocean.

It was awesome!

We all wanted to ride in one of their boats….

And so guess what we got to do?

Yes, you guessed right we got to ride in one of their boats!

 A Ghanaian man offered to take us on a boat tour around the Volta River.

(The picture with people looking back at the camera was Bri, Sarah the younger, and Matt.

Where people are looking forward.. it is Mark, Sarah senior, and Kelly)

He showed us where all of the rich white people live…

Then he took us to a rum factory where everyone got a free shot of homemade RUM!

The rest of the group was super happy.. and I was ya know just ecstatic… you know me, bring on the alcohol! NOT haha

But overall the boat ride was great!

And then I made it home in time for dinner.

Trip rating: Fantastic