I’ve been in Ghana for two months now! I think I can say that I’ve finally reached the point where I’m really happy and comfortable being here. Once in a while theirs is still culture shock but I’m really content. I’m going to soak up the next two months the best I can. Some of my friends who have been here the whole year are keeping a count on how many days until we’re on American soil again. I think it’s 70 days now or something.
Last week, the water went out in our building for two or three days. I’m not exactly sure. After the water went out the power went out. After the power went out, the reserve water went out…. J Things are fine now but it got kind of frustrating last week since the utilities were so inconsistent. The biggest inconvenience was the reserve water going out because then I couldn’t even take a bucket shower. Ole well. Everything is fine for now and I’m going to savor it while we still have it.
Last week, I went to a mall with some of my friends. It was a different mall than where I go to use the internet. I had no idea that Accra even had two malls. We just went there to get some coffee and walk around. They have a grocery store there too which was fun to walk around in. At the grocery store I bought some cheddar cheese to split with a friend. I’ve had some melted cheese on pizza and sandwiches once in a while, but that’s the first time I’d had real cheese in Ghana. Trust me, it was awesome. They also had salsa at the grocery store but it was 11 Ghana cedis for one jar. I’ve been missing nachos a lot, but not enough to drop that kind of cash on salsa. Pretty much all the American food there is that expensive so it’s not really feasible for me to buy it.
I didn’t end up going to Adafoa beach this weekend. We decided to stay around town because this weekend was Ghana’s Independence Day. Ghana is now 53 years old. Ghana wasn’t even Ghana when my parents were born… weird. Independence Day was on Saturday but it was a celebration all weekend. On Friday night, a group of my friends (Amy, Allie, Emily, Michelle, Jenna, Kyle, Curtis – just for further reference) and I went out to a place on campus called Time Out. We just hung out there for a while and played King’s Cup. Time Out serves beer which I thought was really interesting since it’s a college campus. I can’t imagine the dorm halls at IU serving alcohol… After that we went to Osu to an outside bar that plays music called Lizzie’s. Osu was pretty packed with people. They put a stage in the middle of the main street and had a concert all night. We just danced at Lizzie’s which was a lot of fun but also annoying because a lot of the Ghanaian guys there were really intent on dancing with international students when most of us just wanted to dance alone. Also, since is it really packed, pick pocketing was easy. Kyle had his wallet taken but he felt it when it happened so found the guy, luckily. Later though, his phone was stolen. Allie had her wallet stolen also. L I kept a lot of my friends’ stuff in my purse because it was really safe. There was one pocket that pick pocket-ers couldn’t reach but one that they could. A couple times I found that pocket unzipped but all I had in it was pens and a bandana. We had a pretty good time though.
On Saturday, the President of Ghana gave a speech and there was a parade at Independence Square. I wanted to go but later I found out that it started really early in the morning. We probably would have been miserable anyways because it was really hot, and we heard that even the Ghanaians were dropping like flies from the heat. Saturday evening, we went to an Ethiopian restaurant. Later that night we went out to a sports bar called Champs. It was pretty much just the people I normally go out with, but a bunch of other people from my Hostel and from my program were there. I brought my friend Nana too because she took the day off from work for the holiday. Champs had Karaoke so Michelle and I sang “Ironic” by Alanis Morisette . J After Champs we went to a club called Mirage. We had a lot of fun there. They played more Ghanaian music than at Champs and there was a better mix of Ghanaians and international students than at Champs, which was a lot of Obrunis. The atmosphere was a lot better than Lizzie’s because since you had to pay to get in, most of the people were students and there wasn’t pick pocketing. Night life in Ghana starts really late, like 1 or 2am, so we were out dancing until around 5am. I still can’t believe I survived that long, but there were still plenty of people at the club when we left. I had a lot of fun Saturday night but I’m pretty sure that it was only something I can handle doing maybe once or twice more while I’m in Ghana.
On Sunday, we were all useless. But we went to Osu to get some Chinese food and a smoothy.
Yesterday, (Monday) we had the day off from classes because of the holiday. That was particularly nice because I have three classes and two tutorials on Monday. Instead of classes, Allie, Amy, Michelle, and I went to a beach called Kokrobite. I had been there once before. Yesterday the beach was packed because of the holiday. It was really nice and relaxing though.
This past weekend was pretty exciting so I think this week will be more low-key. I think I still need to catch up on some sleep…
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