I’ll start on September the first, where I happened to be on my weekly sojourn in Accra to visit friends and surround myself with all things familiarly Western, including shopping malls, pizza, and ice cream. Let’s not confuse the fact that I like my site, my job, and most of the people around me; in no way am I unhappy in Otumi. Volunteers are normally discouraged by Peace Corps staff to travel outside their site on a regular basis, so it must look bad to see my name written in the headquarters logbook every 7 days. Staying in Accra overnight means a phone call to my APCD cajoling her to let me stay the night at the designated hotel for PCVs- more about this later. Getting back to my journal entries, a lot of events have either been omitted or embellished in order to maintain the sanctity and entertainment value of this journal. Some things might border on the fantastic, and you might doubt they really happened. That’s fine. These things will keep readers on their toes at all times. On with the story… Monday 9/1/08 Woke up at 2AM to get ready and catch a bus bound to Accra. The bus comes through my town every morning at around 3AM, blasting its horn and banging around the pocked dirt road. After successfully boarding the bus at 3, and getting the usual stares of wonderment from passengers, I finally arrived in Ghana four sweaty, dark, cramped hours later. I drop at Circle, a bus station about 45 minutes from Peace Corps HQ, and take a tro to 37 Station just outside HQ. A tro is a van that is driven on a set course to somewhere, picking up passangers and packing them in to get maximum profit. I’ve yet to see a tro driver turn off the car while filling up for gas, and I’ve heard people put everything from goats to heavy industrial equipment under the seats or on the roof. I furtively watch the usual propane tank bang around in the car, hoping to god the thing won’t explode on me. After catching a tro at Circle and taking it to 37, I signed in at the front desk of HQ at 8. A sign outside explained that the office will be closed Monday on account of it being Labor Day. The guards were in though, so at least I could use the internet and get some food at Max Mart, the best place for getting Westernized groceries. My main reason for being in Accra was to see the doctor, and luckily he came despite the holiday to check on someone who stayed overnight in sickbay (a concave building at HQ just beside the doctor’s office). After seeing the doctor, I saw my friend Roxanne who was also at HQ, and we both made plans then and there to go to the mall. Accra Mall is a good-sized shopping plaza, and inside, one can easily mistake being in an American mall. There are electronic stores, an excellent barber shop, stores that are Target- and Wal-Martesque, a Nike and Puma store, and several others, along with a really nice food court. The catch is most of the things are insanely expensive. Want an iPod Classic? That will be $700. Roxanne and I had tons of fun there, and I bought up almost everything I needed for my home back in Otumi. After escaping the mall, Roxanne and I headed to Max Mart to stock up on junk food, then went back to HQ to watch the Office (US version) and relish in our purchases. It was a first time in a long time that I was actually sitting and watching an American TV show, and it slightly made me miss home. The TV room, located in sickbay, has couches, a fridge, a toaster, and a dining table- the perfect place to find solace. HQ, to me, is the most comfortable place in Ghana thus far. Roxanne and I stuffed ourselves sick with everything from cake icing to pizza, then when we were too tired and lethargic to talk, we went our separate ways to get a good night’s rest. Tuesday, 9/2/08 Woke up at HQ feeling refreshed save for pancreatic discomfort from the hot cross buns I overate. I called some friends from my group to see if they wanted to join us for “Two for Tuesday” pizza across the way. Pizza is a hot commodity in Ghana, and some days at site I think of nothing but little pizza triangles circling round my head. Of the people I called, Kyle, Matt and Sara were able to show and we all went to grab some pizza. Roxanne pointed out that the manager on duty was Gifty, which is funny to the both of us because Gifty is the name of the woman who would harass my friend Jack at every opportunity. She owned a food shop just outside the home my language group learned Twi. She would incessantly chide him for not greeting her proper or coming to see her, and to lift Jack’s spirits, I would chide her for paying more attention to Jack than me. I’d tell her thing’s like “Nevermind Jack, what about me. What about us?” One would say she ignored me despite my public pining for her. Back at the pizza place, the five of us finished up 6 large pizzas, Kyle and I eating ourselves sick, and headed out to the mall. Roxanne and I tried to get internet on our phones, while Matt managed to purchase a shiny new one for his own internet browsing needs. We all split from the mall, and I helped Roxanne find her tro before getting my own back to Otumi. The ride back, like usual, was long, dark, and heart stopping. Thursday 9/4/08 My counterpart came over today; we’ll call him Mr. Mhm from here on out. Without any notice he stopped by, and althou we were not really “pally” with each other, I wanted to at least be on good terms with him being that he is my colleague at the school. But the guy has no manners, and is almost childlike in nature. He came in, and when I tried to steer him away from my room, he went right in anyway. I picked up almost everything I had, complained that it was dirty (which it was, but I was planning on cleaning it, and he should not at all talk), and laid down on my bed stretched out and laying his sweat soaked head on my pillow. It is almost impossible to find me openly glaring at a person, but here I could not help myself and I languished in the situation for a good half an hour before I convinced him that I was tired and about to get some shut eye. What I really did when he left was nothing of the sort. My first order of business was to wash the pillow, cursing with contempt at my counterpart for being so insensitive. I then got into the zone working on my teaching plans for the first term of the semester, my classroom management plans, grading schemes, and codifying everything into a large folder for daily use. Later, the doc from HQ called me with good news about that thing I saw him about. Friday 9/5/08 I found a good spot in my room for making phone calls. Since the MTN tower directly behind my home is nonfunctioning, the signal is at times unbearably nonexistent, that means calls lasted a good 30 seconds before being disconnected. A spot just at the bottom right corner of my bed is conducive to two bars on my phone, and leaning acrobatically off my bed, I can actually get a good conversation in now to family and friends. Saturday 9/6/08 Went to Kade, my main market town about an hour’s away from Otumi, to use the internet and go to the District Education Office (DEO) for the Kwaebibirem District. I got there around 8, and when I noticed the internet café was closed, I decided to wait around an have a Malta at the bar across the way. Let me ‘splain to you my predilection for Malta- Malta is the best beverage I’ve ever had in my entire life. Hardly refreshing, it makes up for it’s non-ability to quench thirst by instead tasting like liquefied raisin bran. And if that’s not enough, then it’s made by Guiness and I look somewhat cool holding what looks like an alcoholic beverage but actually isn’t. I waited at the bar for hours waiting for the internet café to open, but it never did, despite the bar lady telling me it was strange it hadn’t opened at two. I found out from someone else on my way out that the place didn’t open until 2, so at least I got a few hours of reading in. I gave up on the internet café and left for the DOE to inquire about possible scholarships available to Ghanaian students and about information on high schools my students can go to after completing JHS. On my way there, my friend had texted me she was hit by a motorcycle, and heart pounding, called her to find out more than just “Got hit by a motorcycle.” Turns out she was alright, but I did not have a regular heartbeat the rest of the day. At the DOE, I managed to find the man who could get me the information I needed. Unfortunately, he did not have any of the info on hand, and told me he would get back to me. I spent the remainder of my time in Kade getting food from the market. Tuesday’s and Friday’s are market days in Kade, but you can always get tomatoes, rice, and peanuts on non-market days. So I got tomatoes, rice, and peanuts. Sunday 9/7/08 My landlord’s brother, who lives in Otumi, invited me to church today. I normally go to the Presby church by my school, but today I had to go to the Catholic Church this guy Appiah normally attended. The people were nice, although there was a ton of raucous for 3 and a half solid hours, and I was introduced again to the community, this time by the Pasteur of this church. So now I can’t lose if I have two churches blessing me. The entire time at church though, I was restless knowing the chief wanted to see me about something. One of the subchiefs had caught me the other day and told me to be at the chief’s at noon for something I didn’t fully understand (the conversation was in Twi of course), and I told him I’ll be there. Church took so long though that I doubted I would make it on time. When it finally ended, Appiah was adamant that I go and visit his home and family. I obliged grudgingly, knowing that I would be late to the chief’s but not wanting to offend my landlord’s brother. So he bought some Malta’s and took me to his place which was a lot farther than I thought. No one was home, so I did not get to meet his wife or kids, and so I sat talking for 15 minutes to my convivial host. I got to the chief’s palace late, of course, and apologized about my tardiness. He didn’t really mind, nor did I think he would, but I still don’t like being late. He told me he understood I was looking to get power and computers to my school, and he told me he would do what he could to get us those things. Ostensibly we should have these things by the end of Term 1. The chief is incredibly nice to me, and we talked about much more than just getting computers to the school. The man lived in the Bronx for 14 years, and let me slip into my Newyorky accent since his English was just fine. He told me about his reservations going to a funeral because a head chief was there and didn’t know at all about him coming back from the Bronx. The chief said he was going to spend some time settling in again after the long journey. Some of his luggage he had shipped by ship never came, so he was a bit angry about that, but otherwise he acted quite avuncular to me- he even invited me out to the mountains dotting the upper part of the Eastern Region once school gets out. I like the guy. When I left the chief’s place, I was making a phone call to my friend Stephen when I noticed I had full bars on my phone. Looking up, I saw the tower lights were on. Sweet Jesus, I got a normal signal! I later planned a trip to Accra with my friends Jack, Roxanne, Kyle and Stephen. I wonder what my luck would be like if I had three churches blessing my stay here in Otumi. Monday 9/8/08 Since I had used up all my minutes on my phone the previous day, I had to go into town to purchase more units for my phone. This led to an entire day of talking with the people in my community. I had to pass the market square, which is about the size of a small high school football field, to get to the MTN unit retailer. Everyone was milling about, and everyone wanted to talk. I neglected working on preparing to school to talk with everyone and get to know them more. My Twi is getting better, and I definitely get practice the more I go out and face the town. I get the sense that I am both welcomed as a guest and marveled at as a spectacle. Since I got the chance at both churches to introduce myself as Darren Fleischer or Kwazi Boateng (the name my host family had christened unto me), I winced when some people shouted out “Obruni!” to me. Obruni, which means white man, or obruni kokou, white man with red skin, is common for anyone who looks remotely foreign and light skinned. Common comebacks are “Yenfren me obruni”- “My name is not white man”, and “Obibini!”-“African!”.