Two Messages to My Family

I sent two long messages this week.  The first was to my mom who sent me a Facebook message to check in and ask me about Easter.  Here's my response:

Hi Mom, I just stayed at Bodada for Easter. We had a church service Friday morning, and then I went to Hohoe on Saturday to pick up a package that Peace Corps had dropped off with Kate. She forgot the package at her house, so I went to her site to pick it up and had to stay there for the night because most of the taxis were also on Easter break.  I was about 2 hours late to church on Sunday morning because it was nearly impossible to get a taxi.

Luckily they were Confirming some kids so it was a long service, and I was still there for over an hour. Easter Monday is a traditional picnic day in Ghana, so I went with a lot of the church members to Jasikan to picnic with the EP Church there. They play games like musical chairs (known as chair dancing), sack racing, and pinatas (they use a clay pot in a sack), and they had an Easter egg hunt (but they call it "search for Jesus" because they put a little Jesus figurine in one of the plastic eggs). There was also an eating competition, so I signed up for that thinking we would be eating a lot of rice, fufu, or banku, but it turned out that we had to eat a big slice of bread that was tied to a string without using our hands. I actually won the contest quite easily and got a bar of soap for winning. There were also girls and boys football matches (Bodada EP vs Jasikan EP) and Bodada won both games. It was a good day overall and it was good for me to make friends with more people in Jasikan.

Today, I gave the primary school some of the books that would be more useful to them, and they loved it. They want to write some letters to thank people. Can you give me the address of some of the people who helped collect books? Could we send a letter to John Cline too? My students are also very excited about the new books, and I'll get them to write letters too.

The only thing I kind of want are some cucumber seeds and maybe watermelon. No need to go to Seed Savers just to pick up those, so if they aren't around, don't worry. In related news, my tomato plants have been totally eaten by grasshoppers, and my pepper plants are getting the same treatment. I know it's not the same, but I can see how devastating a plague of locusts would be. I'm going to prepare some soil at the compound for a small garden and grow those things here.

The next message was an email from my brother Paul.

Sup Petey.

So we've been talking about Ghanaian independence for the last couple of weeks in my History of Modern Africa class.  We had a debate about Kwame Nkrumah and the Volta River Dam that he so, perhaps unwisely, built.  Anyways, some experts claim that he was responsible for Ghana not really getting off its feet and that he sent it them into debt and so on.  On the other hand, other people thought he was the only person to take the blame for the failures that came about.  

So, I was wondering: how is he regarded by Ghanaians?  How do they teach history about him?  Is he portrayed as a man blinded by his dream of Ghana as a super power or was he just unlucky and was at least trying to advance Ghana?

If you don't know anything about the matter that's fine.  Just thought I'd ask if you did.

My response:

Ghanaians idolize Kwame Nkrumah (he's featured on the 2 Ghana Cedi bill and has a smaller role on the other bills).  Yes he build the Akosombo Dam without clearing the valley, asking or compensating the people, or realizing that it would change the environment.  I'm guessing this is what you talked about in class.  These are the main issues that people bring up, but the Akosombo Dam remains the major source of electricity for Ghana, Togo, Burkina Faso, and Benin.  That kind of planning and execution hasn't been seen since he was in power.  The roads, schools, factories, and buildings that Kwame Nkrumah built are still the best in Ghana.  This cannot be overstated.  He oversaw the construction and enforced a certain level of quality (and he was willing to borrow money from the USSR and the US to pay for quality, which is why our government didn't like him that much).  

All attempts to build things (roads, factories, schools, anything really) in Ghana have failed or have fallen woefully short of expectation.  Corruption, cost cutting, inflation, and foreign debt have been bigger problems with leaders following Nkrumah than they ever were while he was leading.  At the end of his presidency he did pull the typical African-leader move and try to stay in power forever.  That wasn't good.  But I don't know if there was anyone who could replace him and follow his vision (that's why I think he tried to stay in power).

Ghana really got screwed in the 30+ years of dictators and military coups that followed Nkrumah.  We're in the Fourth Republic now.  It was started by Jerry John Rawlings in 1992 during his second coup.  So far it appears to be stable, but every election people worry about violence or some candidate doing something stupid.  Most of the people are unaffected by national and international politics, and inflation was the only thing most Ghanaians had to deal as a consequence of the government changing hands.

In school the emphasis is placed on Nkrumah's positive achievements, and very few negative things are said about him.  They don't teach very much about the different governments which controlled Ghana after Nkrumah except the names and dates.  Those guys didn't do much for infrastructure or leave any legacies.  Most of the social studies classes focus the history section on the Fourth Republic and British colonial rule.

That's all for now.  Thanks for reading.

Second Term

Almost three months have gone by since I last updated this blog, and I'm sorry about that for the 20 of you who read this.  I'll try to give you a review week by week, but I have definitely forgotten a lot of things that happened.

Week 1 (January 7)

The first week of school.  As predicted, this week got off to a slow start.  I think all of the teachers reported to school by the second day, and by the end of the week, we were already teaching classes.  There was not much yard work for the students to do because the grass doesn't grow during the Harmattan.  In other news, I started my garden!  My mom sent me seeds from Seed Savers so I have some great heirloom vegetables to grow.  I used a big egg carton flat (the one that can hold 30) and planted German Pink and Italian Heirloom tomatoes, five different types of peppers (sweet bell, jalapeno, Chervena, Santa Fe, and Buran), and some herbs (basil, oregano, thyme, and rosemary).  I'm not sure when they started sprouting, but I was pretty excited when they did.  Of the herbs, only the basil and oregano have lived, and I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong with the other herbs (help me out if you have tips!)  I had a little trouble transplanting the bell peppers too, but everything else is doing really well.  Most of the things are ready to be planted in the ground, but I'm pretty sure I have to harden them off a little more because the sun is crazy hot here.

Week 2 (January 14), Week 3 (January 21), and Week 4 (January 28)

The second week of classes went well enough, and I'm just going to lump the rest of January together.  I bought some poster paper and made flashcards for multiplication (3 through 15) and turned that into a game for my math class.  The form one students were watching, so of course the next time I had science we had to play the flashcard game.  I also made some science hazard flashcards with great success (lightning bolt = high voltage, no smoking, highly flammable, etc.).  In science we have been studying soil, soil profiles, and the hazards and dangers of science.  In math we spent most of the time studying data and graphs.  Pie charts gave my class the most trouble, and I think that's because they aren't exposed to graphs and data as much as we are in the US via TV news. 

During the fourth week, I took a day trip to Accra to pick up some packages (four of them!)  I had to leave Hohoe as early as possible so I could make it back to Bodada before night fell and the taxis stopped running.  I was in the Accra van by 7am, and we were on the road 30 minutes later.  I think it took about four hours to get there and the last hour was spent in Accra traffic.  Coincidentally Pastor Jean-Paul was also in Accra, so after I picked up my packages and figured out how I was going to travel with 50 pounds of snacks, I called him and we met at the main office of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana.  I had a little trouble getting there because the Pastor said I needed to go to "OH-pare-a" Square.  I just repeated that to the taxi driver and he seemed to understand, but it took the sign "Opera Square" before I figured out what he was talking about.  Ghanaian English is different.  Anyway, we missed the bus to Bodada so we had to take a van to Hohoe and taxis to Bodada, but the trip wasn't so bad.

Also, the church elders told me that the ICT lab would be completed by the beginning of February.

Week 5 (February 4) and Week 6 (February 11)

Surprise, surprise!  The ICT lab isn't ready.  In fact, it's still not ready and it's the end of March.  All we need is a light, fan, tables, and chairs, so it really is close. 

In school, we did some review and then had a test in both science and math.  Class tests are always a little difficult because we don't have a printer or the funds to print tests, so you have to write the test on the board and then the students copy the test into their homework notebook.  To discourage cheating I usually get another teacher to come in and watch the students while I finish writing the test on the board.  They are much more scared of the other teachers because they walk around with a cane and are quick to give a rap on the head if cheating is suspected.  I excuse the other teacher and then walk around with a red pen to mark cheaters' tests.  I get at least five students flipping through their notebooks looking for the answers, and usually it's the same offenders.

The results were not too good, and I definitely made the math test too hard.  Only seven math students scored above 50% and the highest score was 78%.  In science, I did better with the difficulty and most students scored about 50% and one student got 93%.

Week 7 (February 18) and Week 8 (February 25)

Week 7 was the first week without teaching.  We got our formal invitations to the social studies quiz competition, the Independence Day celebration on March 6, and the Buem cultural festival on March 15. 

The quiz competition happened first, and it involved all the schools in the Bodada school circuit.  Instead of the quiz masters writing their own questions, they accepted questions from each of the schools.  Naturally, each school used the questions they submitted to determine which students would represent the school.  Luckily for EP, every question we submitted was used in the actual competition, and our representative had memorized those answers.  Thus, I wasn't too surprised when we won, and I was happy, but we had a big advantage.

After the quiz competition we started practicing marching and dancing.  As my fellow PCV Kevin pointed out: on March 6, Ghanaians celebrate their independence from their colonial masters in the UK by marching in the traditional British style (straight elbows and knees, lots of arm swinging, and kicking their feet out as they step forward).  This style of marching takes a lot of work and is not nearly as simple as the roll-step style of marching we used for DHS Marching Band.  I would have hated practicing marching in this style for three weeks, especially since there was no actual teaching going on.  The same is true for the cultural festival.  We practiced marching in the morning, and then in the afternoon we focused on talking drums (Ewe is tonal so using two drums you can recreate some poetry), Twi poetry, Ewe singing, English drama, or traditional Buem drumming and dancing.

One of these days we had a bye-election to replace the Member of Parliament for the Buem Constituency, and most of the teachers worked at the polling stations.  We only had a half day of school on this day, and I used it to get the students to weed my farm.  I got ten boys to bring sharp cutlasses to school and they attacked the eight-feet tall saw grass that had overgrown the school farm.  It took them about three hours to clear my farm (20 meters-by-50 meters), and afterwards we went back to the house and ate rice and stew.  Rewards aren't necessary and most teachers wouldn't give the students anything, but that goes against my American values.  The students refused to take my money so I had to get some of the school girls to prepare food.

Under the supervision of another teacher, a few students also made a bamboo bench on that day.  They cut down some small trees and dug holes in the ground to plant the posts, and then split bamboo (which I forced the boys to collect as punishment for coming to school late) and nailed the strips to form a bench.  I'll post a picture of it on Facebook; I'm pretty proud of it since I played a big part in its creation.  Also, it ended up way too big, but it's cool anyway.

Week 9 (March 4)

Independence Day week.  We focused on marching all of Monday and Tuesday, and we were told that the schools should assemble at 7am on Wednesday.  I asked the pastor about this, and he laughed and said that nothing would happen until 10.  I went to the meeting place around 8:30 and no other school was present.  By 9:30 two of the other schools had shown up, and finally by 10 we started marching to the town football park.  We paraded through town, and in Ghana, everyone joins the parade as it passes.  A couple hundred people came to watch the festivities, but the sun was strong that day and lots of people left after an hour of nothing happening.  Eventually the chiefs and elders came and we were able to get started.

It took way too long for all the schools to march past the chiefs and education officials, and some of the schools organized fancy marching routines to salute the "big men."  We didn't organize anything fancy, but the students decided to spice things up a bit and somehow they pulled it off.  By noon they were finally finished, and I went to get some fufu with some of the other teachers.  To celebrate Independence Day even more, two of the schools were playing in a football match, and then the Bodada teachers were playing against the Bodada town team. 

I agreed to play and everyone was shocked to see me come out onto the field.  I had been standing in the sun for about four hours by the time the match started and was already sunburned.  Before the game, I put on more sunscreen, but my skin was no match for the sun.  After 30 good minutes, I was completely gassed and had to get a substitute.  Apparently, we were playing with the official three-substitution rule because when I wanted to go back in for the second half, there were a lot of complaints about it.  Eventually they let me go back in, but the other team wasn't happy.  I think they only let me because I have white skin, but I really didn't know they were playing like that (there are no lines on the field, it's on a hill, and the posts are made of bamboo, and I thought the game was just a friendly match).  The game ended in a tie 0-0, and everyone I saw for a week asked me about the match.

Week 10 (March 11)

This is the week of the cultural festivities, so we practiced the whole week.  However, the chiefs and elders decided to have a town forum about the poor performance by all students on last year's BECE and postponed the cultural festival.  The teachers were not happy about this because they assumed that this would just devolve into the elders and community members shouting at the teachers.  Miraculously this didn't happen and everything stayed very civil.  The town brought in some people to give speeches and they allowed each of the headmasters to talk about the problems they faced at school.  People talked a lot, but no one really said anything.  Everyone agreed that the students needed to study hard and do better.  The parents asked the teachers to teach better, and the teachers told the parents to discipline their children more in the house.  No one mentioned that there are teachers who don't come to school, and student attendance was hardly touched upon.  I suspect this would have come up if the open forum had happened, but the forum was thankfully cut short by a thunderstorm (it lasted 4 hours and could have easily continued into the evening).

Week 11 (March 18)

On Saturday March 16, the Ghana National Association of Teachers went on strike.  Most teachers belong to this union, so schools shut down all across the country.  I didn't hear about the strike until Sunday night, and I confirmed that the teachers would not come to school on Monday.  I don't teach classes on Mondays and was already planning on going to Hohoe to buy a bicycle, so my plans didn't change.  I called the headmaster and let him know my plans, and he told me that he would go to school on Monday and figure out what was going on because the cultural festival was supposed to happen on Tuesday.  He called all of the teachers on Monday afternoon begging them to come to school on Tuesday so we could compete in the festival.

I bought a great looking 1995 Marin Stinson hybrid bike in Hohoe for 130 Ghana Cedis.  It was easily the nicest bike in the shop, but I was still overcharged.  Most Ghanaians I talked to were surprised I paid more than 100 GHC, but this is a quality frame with quality Shimano parts.  It should hold up better than most bikes here, and I'll take good care of it.  I rode my bike back to Bodada, and all I can say is, "Wow."  This area is beautiful, and I think I'll bike as much as possible.  You can see so much more from a bike than inside a car and you're going slower too.  The annoying part of biking is dealing with all the people who have never seen you and shout "Yevu!" or "Obruni!"  I greeted most of the people who shouted at me in either Ewe or Lelemi, and they were shocked to hear me.  I only wish I knew someone else who would bike around here with me.

On Tuesday, all of the EP teachers showed up at the football park, but only three of the schools came.  The other schools' teachers decided that the strike was more important, but my colleagues agreed that this wasn't breaking the strike because we weren't actually teaching.  The festival/competition was a lot of fun, and I recorded video and took a lot of pictures.  Once I sort through them, I'll put them on Facebook/Youtube.  I was very impressed by the students, and I was happy that not all of the schools were there because it would have taken all day.  As it were, we closed around 4pm and paraded back to the school as champions.  Of the five competitions, we took first place in four; I think our play took second place.

The rest of the week belonged to the teachers' strike, and I just met with the form three students to review some math topics for a couple of hours.  The other teachers are not upset about this, but I don't think they are thrilled that I'm teaching.  Various groups have come out saying that the teachers should go back to school, but GNAT has not called off the strike yet.  I'm going to meet with the headmaster again on Monday, and we'll figure out what's going on.  The strike isn't as big of a deal for JHS students as it is for SHS students because last week was final exam week at SHS.  I'm not really sure what happened, but I'm sure they made do.  I just want to get back to teaching because it has been five weeks .since I have taught an actual class.  I'm very behind, and I wish we practiced our extracurricular activities outside of normal class time, but such is the system.

Sorry if this wasn't as entertaining as my usual postings, but I've been kind of sick for the last two weeks, I'm watching a Black Stars football match (they are winning 4-0), and it has been too long since I posted.  Thanks for reading.

VRF

Sorry it's been so long since my last post.  I'll update you on the last 9 weeks or so soon.  For now you'll have to settle by reading some parts of my VRF (Volunteer Reporting Form for those of you who don't speak Government).  The VRF is the main form of government oversight for volunteers all over the world, and it provides trimesterly proof that we actually do something.  I didn't include the activities section which has all the numbers and stuff, but there are 57 students at Bodada EP JHS, and about 63 in the primary school and kindergarten.  So here are my answers:

Community Integration

Integration requires work; simply living in a community is not enough.  I struggled with this during the first three months, and I felt intimidated by the rest of the community - not because they felt ill will towards me, but rather because they were so happy to have me.  They told us during training that volunteers become celebrities in their towns, but I did not know the effect that being a celebrity would have on me.  At first it was difficult for me to venture outside my house for simple things like groceries and toilet paper because everyone wants to know how you are and where you are going.  And you are bound to meet someone who has not met you yet and to whom you have to explain everything about your life.  I must have told the story about who I am and why I am in Ghana 100 times.  But you have to work at this, and after 100 times you get pretty good at introducing yourself.

I am happy to say that because of this struggle of putting on a happy face to meet people and walk around in the community, most of the community knows who I am (although the little kids still prefer to call me "obruni"), where I am from, and why I am here.  I should also mention that they speak a local language called Lelemi which is not closely related to Twi or Ewe.  This added to the difficulties because I was all set to greet people in Ewe (which I learned during training) and was capable of greeting in Twi.  Learning Lelemi has been difficult but also very rewarding.  I prefer to take notes and write down words and phrases as I learn them, but most of the people prefer to repeat the words at the same speed - making it difficult for me to determine the letters.  The trick is to find someone who has studied the language and build your vocabulary word by word.  I am fully capable of greeting, saying a few things about myself, and expressing my wants and needs.  The community loves that I can do this and everyone is shocked when I first greet them in Lelemi.  After the initial shock wears off they do one of two things: they either try to test my knowledge or they assume I am fluent and just starting chatting away.  The smiles that follow these interactions are very rewarding and helpful as I work to become part of the community.

Challenges

Integration has been a struggle, but I've outlined that thoroughly in the Community Integration tab.  At school my biggest struggle was classroom management; after the initial shock of having an American teacher wore off, I realized just how little control I had over my classroom.  I was too nice, and I should have been stricter enforcing my rules, especially during the first month of school.  I let students talk more than I should have, and I did not enforce the "English only" policy of GES. 

These problems were compounded by a lack of other teachers.  At the end of the first week, three of the four teachers received transfer letters and left EP JHS to go to their new schools.  As is common in Ghana, the new teachers were in no rush to report to school, and for three weeks my counterpart and I were the only teachers at the school with 55 students (thank goodness we have a small school).  The new teachers showed up one-by-one, and eventually we had a full staff of seven teachers.  Most of them have been good, effective teachers, and with their help and guidance I gained some control over my class.  A more important factor than the other teachers' arrival was the respect I have gained from my students by showing up to school every day (and not caning them).  Eventually the novelty of having a white man as a teacher wore off, and the students were able to look at me like another teacher.

Lessons Learned

I am not cut out to be a celebrity, and I prefer being able to retreat into seclusion sometimes.

Teaching is not easy. I have a lot more respect for all of my former teachers, and I feel bad about the times I misbehaved during class.

As a teacher I mean it when I say, "I care less about the scores you get and more about the effort you give." And "I do not judge a student's character by the grades he or she gets."

Learning a new language is not easy-oo.

My stomach is not the steel trap I thought it was in America.

Being polite and smiling can get you through 90% of the conflicts here.

Planned Activities

I will keep teaching my classes, but the PTA would like me to play a bigger role with the ICT center.  I will work with the Primary school's ICT teacher in developing rules and learner-centered teaching methods for the new computer lab.

I would like to talk with the church, PTA, and community about the possibility of writing a grant to repair, plaster, and paint the school.  It is a sad state of disrepair, and a little money would go a long way.  Hopefully we can a get a quality appraisal.

"To promote a better understanding of the American people on the part of the peoples served"

I speak in a normal voice and try to dispell myths that America is the promised land where everyone is beautiful and rich.  Compared to most Ghanaian languages, English is spoken in a higher voice, but someone planted the idea that white people speak only in falsetto.  This is the single most annoying thing I deal with when I leave my community, and I try to speak normally (okay, I actually speak a little lower than usual) and carry on the conversation.  After I respond in a normal voice, the offender usually changes to his or her normal voice as well.  Ghanaian and Nigerian movies have also created a unique sing-songy inflection in American English.  To show that they are smart and can speak "like an American," some people will use this tone with me as well.  While it is not as annoying as the falsetto, I do usually ask them to just speak normally.

America is a highly idealized place, and most people are shocked to learn that there are poor people who can barely afford to live, homeless people, and "mad" people.  Most of the things they see about America depict it as a great place where everyone carries guns and/or knives, and people are quick to escalate disagreements to violence.  I have to constantly tell very intelligent people that the American movies are not an accurate depiction of normal American life.  Also, the news rarely shows the way a majority of Americans live.  Whether they only say it to humor me or they truly believe it is hard to say, but usually these conversations end with, "Huh, America is a lot like Ghana."  And I say, "Yes, people are mostly the same no matter where they live."

Success Story

Students do not have a solid foundation of mathematics and English necessary to learn junior high level math and science (not to mention English).  I think this is a failure of the GES and not just a problem found in Bodada.  Instead of forcing students to learn the basics of math and English in primary school, students are promoted the next grade (sometimes against the teacher's wishes through social pressure from parents and the community).  I believe that having students repeat grades when they are younger would be more effective than having students repeat higher levels when the lack of knowledge was first noticed.

My solution was to spend my own money (only a few Ghana Cedis) to buy poster paper and create flashcards.  I made flashcards for multiplication and science, and I am working with the English teacher to create English word flashcards.  The multiplication cards have enjoyed the most success, and their favorite game is World Cup.  I split the class into four or eight groups depending on the number, and each group carries out a small "round-robin" style tournament where each student competes with every other student in the group.  The winners of the groups are put into the championship bracket and the losers are put into a consolation bracket.  Then we go through the bracket to determine the champion. 

The game takes a lot of time, but they all love playing and they even practice on their own now.  The results are obvious and the whole class is better at solving multiplication and division problems.  I plan on using a game/competition method any time memorization is required as that seems to be one of the most engaging and enjoyable activities.

"Winter" Break

It's been one full month since I last blogged.  As much as I would like to say, "I'll blog more." I have a feeling that this will be the norm.  Maybe as I run out of television shows to watch (currently watching Doctor Who and really enjoying it), I'll blog more, but who knows.  Luckily I have a pretty good memory, so I should be able to get into some detail.

Last time I wrote it was election day, but due to some technical difficulties (voting machines and fingerprint scanners breaking), voting continued on Saturday.  The election was really close, and the last constituency could have swung the vote either way, but in the end the incumbent John Mahama won.  Mahama is associated with the New Democratic Congress party (NDC), and leaned heavily on the votes from Volta Region, Accra, and the northern regions to win.  His main opponent Nana Akuffo Addo was the New Patriotic Party's candidate, and he didn't take the loss very well.  He made the comment, "All die be die." which some people took as a call for violence, and he made lots of claims about being cheated out of the election.  (My favorite theory was that the NDC hired Chinese hackers to change NPP votes).  Some NPP supporters protested in Kumasi and Accra, but I don't think anything turned violent.  Today is the Inauguration Day, so most people agree that this will end the talk of foul play cheating.

The end of school wasn't too eventful.  The continuous assessment forms for recording grades suddenly made their appearance, so all of the teachers had to scramble to record and calculate end of term grades.  I hope that this term we'll have them the whole time so I can record selected homework as I grade it.  The students spent the second to last day of school moving sand from the stream to a house so they can plaster the inside and outside walls to make my computer lab.  Since I haven't heard any word about it, I'm assuming that no more work has been done.  We raised money for the lab one day in church though, and I think we got over 200 Ghana Cedis.

I traveled around Bodada a little bit: jogging almost to Jasikan, jogging half way to Amenor, walking a little ways on the Teteman road.  It was good to get out of the house, but I still didn't do as much as I had hoped.  My walks on the Teteman road were nice because the pastor joined me in the evenings, and we had some good chats.  Another time I ran into the former headmaster of my school Gyamebi, and we went to visit his palm wine farmer friend named Ski-Doo (okay it's actually 'Squito -like mosquito- but it sounded like Skidoe, and I prefer to think of him as Ski-doo).  I'm fascinated by palm wine farming, and after asking a lot of questions and watching Squito intently, I asked if I could watch him tap some fresh trees that he had recently felled.  So one Sunday morning I went over to his house at 5:00am (he lives close to town so he has to collect it early because people will come and steal his palm if he lets it sit) and we walked to his farm.  As it turned out he didn't have all of the tools necessary to properly trim the fronds, so I had to settle for trying my had at cutting the tapped tree and drinking the sweet palm wine.

One day I went to the Ewe village of Awoma (about 15km away from Bodada going towards Kute) to visit one of my students Kofi Agamah Prince who also lives in the compound with me and the pastor.  Awoma is a small village with one school (primary and junior high) and a large Muslim population.  I got there in the morning because I had hoped to do some farming, but it turns out that they weren't going to farm that day, so I helped put the metal roofing on a kitchen.  That afternoon Prince took me out to his farm and gave me a bunch of ginger and papaya, then his mother cooked us a big lunch.  His mom was the happiest that I came to visit, so she took me around to visit all of the EP church members in the village.  We ended up walking around for a good two hours, and I was ready to fall asleep by the time we got back.  They were really disappointed that I didn't stay for dinner and spend the night, but I had already told the pastor that I would be back that night for fufu.  It was a great trip because I don't get to see true village life in Bodada; in fact people consider it a very big town (population of around 1,500, supposedly).  Awoma doesn't have any pipe water, electricity, or paved roads, but the people are no less friendly to a white person who can speak a little Ewe.

Christmas came next, and although I've heard it can be a difficult time for volunteers, it didn't feel too different to me.  I miss the cold and the snow, but because the Harmattan has set in I get chilly nights that have forced me to use a second sheet to keep warm.  Last night I even shut my door to keep out the breeze (I still left the window open, so it got nice and cool).  I've been loving Harmattan because the dusk-to-dawn temperature is perfect, but Ghanaians freeze.  Most people around me have broken out their sweaters and winter coats, and they don't understand how I stay warm walking around at 6:30am in shorts and a t-shirt.  If only they could experience a nice Midwestern winter...

I went to church on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  The Christmas Eve service was pretty short, and five different groups of people just sang songs.  The pastor had told me that singing was pretty much the only reason for the Christmas Eve service, so I told him that I would sing them my favorite Christmas song, "Silent Night."  When he announced that the congregation should expect a song from me before we closed for the night, the few people who were there (30 or 40 only) clapped for me.  I was pretty nervous since I was just going to sing it by myself, but I knew that people wouldn't mind the quality and they would just be happy that I was singing.  However, just before it was my turn, the youth group (of whom only 2 showed up) sang "Yen Agyen Kwa," the Twi language version of "Silent Night."  My thunder was instantly stolen.  The whole congregation joined in, and I sang along too.  Then it was my turn, and I stood up and walked to the front of the church and told them that even though they just sang my favorite Christmas song, I was going to sing it again, but in English.  Of course I started way off key, which wouldn't have been as much of a problem if I were singing solo, but the keyboardist knew the song and was playing along, so it sounded terrible.  I just laughed and asked him to restart, and I got it right the next time.  Everyone clapped when I finished and there were shouts of "Wofa Yaw!" so I just laughed and waved.  Then to top it off, we sang another song before leaving for the night, and guess what it was...yep, "Yen Agyen Kwa"...again.  So all in all we sang it three times that night.  Not to mention the time that we sang it the next day at the Christmas Day service, which by the way lasted a good three and a half hours.  I recorded the Christmas Day version and quickly made a movie with the pictures I took that day, and I posted it to YouTube.  Here's the link if you want to check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3pPhYbTfls

You'll notice that the end of the video is a picture of a respectable pastor and a goofy looking man from the '80s with a nice mullet and a terrible moustache, and I'm sorry to say that it's me.  Or at least me from two weeks ago.  The mullet looks the same now, but the moustache has gotten a bit thicker.  I've posted an updated picture on Facebook for your enjoyment.  If you were able to remember anything before that picture, you might have noticed some nice waterfall pictures.  That's the famous Wli Waterfalls.  Shortly after Christmas I made a quick day trip there and hiked up to the upper falls.  The hike is pretty steep since Ghanaians don't really believe in switchbacks, but the upper falls are pretty cool.  I'm not sure how high they are because the "guides" who go up with you don't really know much information about the area and mostly just try to get money from you.  That was a fun trip, and anyone who visits me can easily visit Wli.  Did I mention you can swim in the pools formed by the waterfalls?  Well you can, but as you get closer to the water, it gets windier and windier until the water is stinging your whole body.  It's what I imagine a hurricane to feel like.

My most recent day trip was down to the Gulf of Guinea near Keta for New Year's Eve.  I couldn't stay for too long because it's a long trip, but it was a lot of fun.  Great waves (I need to learn how to surf) and a beautiful beach.

The second term of school "starts" tomorrow, but who knows when we'll start effective teaching (aka teachers and students show up on time), it might be a while.  15 more weeks of school.  I think I'll become a dedicated ICT teacher and work on getting the computer lab open and the laptops set up so students can't destroy them.  Who knows.  You probably were drawn here from Facebook, but I've uploaded a couple more pictures there for your enjoyment.

6 Months in Ghana

I can hardly believe that I'm six months into my service.  Some days drag on, but overall the time flies by. Next week school is mostly just a formality, and all of the teachers will be recording grades while the students take their last couple final exams.  Before I get into retelling some highlights of the last month, I want to write about what I did today.

During the week I read The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac, and I became inspired to lace up my hiking boots (not a nice Italian pair unfortunately) and climb a mountain.   Since today is election day in Ghana, (and like most countries in the world, election day is also a government holiday) I got the day off from school, and I had the perfect opportunity to climb my mountain.  I wouldn't say that The Dharma Bums changed my life and turned me into a Buddhist hipster, but it did reaffirm my thoughts about nature and peace.  I had my own epiphany last summer; while kayaking by myself on the Upper Iowa River, I was struck by the beauty of the bluffs, trees, riverbanks, and river itself.  I just couldn't believe that all of this beauty and peace was so easily accessible.  All I had to do was take a 20-minute drive in my crappy, but lovable 1990 Toyota Corolla (more affectionately known as The Little Red Dragon Go-Kart), lock up my old Schwinn road bike (that I had turned into a pretty nice ride) and helmet at Malanaphy Springs, put in just downstream of Bluffton, and within 15 minutes I could be separated from the outside world by a shield of natural beauty.  After reading The Dharma Bums I wanted to have that again, and I knew all I needed to do was climb one of the many mountains around Bodada.

I think I have more shoes than any other male Peace Corps Volunteer in Ghana: Chacos (can't be a PCV without a pair of Chacos), running shoes (I thought I would be jogging more), boat shoes (my brown dress shoes), black Adidas (soccer-inspired style, but I use them as dress shoes here), soccer cleats (I thought I would be playing a lot more soccer), flip-flops (known as Charlie-waters or shower slippers here because you wear them while bathing), and last, and until today least, my hiking boots (they're just so versatile I couldn't leave them at home).  I digress, but I think it's funny how many shoes I have, and I like to laugh at myself.  Anyway, I had hiking boots just like Japhy and Smith, so at 8:30am I laced them up, picked a peak, put my water bottle and camera in a bag, and started my journey.  After walking to my school, I realized that without a cutlass (machete for those of you who aren't privy to Ghanaian English) I was just going to have to follow the farm trails and hope I got to the top of a mountain.  So I looked around again and spotted a small corn field almost at the top of a peak that wasn't too far away.  So I followed the trail and turned onto a smaller trail when I thought it was time.  Just 20-minutes after starting my journey, I was in that cornfield I had spied from the school, and I loved it.  Looking around, all I could see was jungle, hills, and the occasional corn field.  I took some pictures, but they really don't do it justice.  Then I started back down the mountain knowing full-well that I wasn't finished with my morning adventure.

I got back on the main path (10 inches of packed and worn dirt, kind of like good single-track mountain bike trails) and continued away from town.  I ran into the first Ghanaian I had seen since I started.  Fridays are taboo days (no one is allowed to go to farm, something to do with local gods and resting, and you get fined if you're caught) so I hadn't expected to see anyone.  I greeted the man in Lelemi, and he asked me where I was going.  I shook my head and told him "Ni sa walk." which means "I'm going walk."  He just laughed and asked me if I was going "back-back."  I didn't really understand what he meant but said yes anyway, and we continued on our respective ways.  He just chuckled to himself and said, "Obruni."  I probably really surprised him.  He probably hadn't expected to see anyone, let alone a white man who greeted him in the local language.  Ghanaians don't really go for hikes, so he probably thought that was strange too. 

Shortly after that I started to walk through a cocoa farm, and decided to help myself to a cocoa pod.  There were tons of ripe pods, and no one was going to miss one, but I felt kind of guilty anyway.  I decided that I would ask around and figure out whose farm it was and befriend the owner.  Cocoa tastes nothing like chocolate, more like an intense pineapple/mango sweetness with the texture of snot, and I love it.  I just needed a nice coconut to top it all off, but I made do with my stolen cocoa pod.  I walked on, crossing a small stream (that the townsfolk probably call a river) a couple of times, and just enjoying the beauty and serenity of everything.  I came to a fork in the path and decided to go up instead of following the stream, so I climbed to the top of another "mountain" and continued along the ridge.  I came across a small pineapple farm, lots of peaceful looking bamboo grove, and eventually a palm wine and akpeteshie farm.  I was really hoping someone was at the palm wine farm because a couple calabashes of sweet palm wine and a chat with a local farmer would have topped off my adventure perfectly.  But alas, I ago-ed and no ame-s came back; the farm was empty.  

I walked on a little further, and I was hoping to find a trail that would take me down to the road or some other trail that I could loop back on, but I would have no such luck.  Judging by the big ridge on the opposite side of the road, I guessed that I had hiked almost three miles from Bodada, but it was a very pleasant three miles and I wasn't disappointed about having to follow my same path back to town.  My only regret was that I had no one to share my experience with, and I got a little lonely before deciding to write about it in a blog post today and share it with the world.  Bodada is truly a beautiful place, and everyone should come visit me here (fellow PCVs in Ghana and everyone back home with $2400 - enough for the plane ticket and 2 weeks of anything else you want to do). 

After hearing about everyone's stories from site at our three month Reconnect-IST (In-Service Training), I decided that I have no reason to complain.  I'm in a gorgeous area, I have internet access, and my classes are not too big (largest class is about 25).  I struggled with classroom management early on, but for the last month, things have been going pretty well.

The week before Thanksgiving (Nov 12 - 16), I wanted to have a class test in my math and science classes, but unfortunately the Ghana bug got me and I had to stay home from school on Thursday (when I was planning on giving the science test and grading the math review homework) so that pushed my test back until Tuesday, November 20 (my mom's birthday! Happy birthday Mom!).  On Monday I don't have any classes scheduled and enough teachers came that I couldn't sneak into a class and give my test, so I just planned on giving the test on Tuesday.  But just before we closed on Monday, the headmaster of the primary school comes up and tells us that our schools (EP Primary and JHS) get the honor of weeding (cutting the grass) the clinic which is about as far away from our schools as you can get in Bodada.  Also he tells us that we'll go over there at 8:00am and then the students are supposed to get the day off of school after that.  This honor was bestowed upon us by Chief Nana Abo IV, who is also the Ministry of Education supervisor for the circuit of Bodada, so there was no getting out of this work.  And while my headmaster said that I could give the tests to Godwin to administer on Wednesday, Godwin wasn't so keen on grading those tests for me.  I wanted to leave for Thanksgiving dinner with the Ambassador in Accra on Wednesday, so something was going to give.  We agreed not to tell the students that they were supposed to get the day off of school after the weeding, and we would give the tests when the work was finished.  This ended up working out fine,  but it's just an example of the planning and emphasis on time and scheduling in Ghana.  The results were encouraging, one student got 97% on the math test, and I think 80% was the best grade on the science test.

Thanksgiving in Accra was awesome.  I stayed with Dennie Ege who works at the US Embassy in Accra.  He's a State Department employee and gets posted to new places every three years.  It was so great to stay with him in his American style house with tv (I got to watch some NFL games!), air conditioning, running water, hot water, 2 fridges, a freezer, Doritos, cereal with milk, and hamburgers.  I couldn't have asked for a better homestay in Accra.

Thanksgiving dinner itself was fun because I got to see almost everybody from training and I met over 50 other PCVs.  And the food...two buffets full of turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, green beans (although no green bean casserole with those "fried onions" on top), cheesy cauliflower bake, and salad (which I didn't have room for on my first trip because it was at the end).  I had two full plates of food, and a third helping of turkey.  It was great although I don't know if it was quite up to par with my mom's cooking (mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and green beans especially).  Then came the dessert of pecan, pumpkin, and apple pie (once again missing Mom's apple crisp with ice cream).  It was great and I nearly ate myself into a coma.  But everyone else wanted to go out to a bar and party, so I tagged along.  We went to an Irish pub in Osu, and I posted up at the bar and watched the Lions' game and didn't drink a drop (even if I had wanted to, there was no room in my stomach for alcohol).  As soon as that game ended, I was in a taxi back to the Ege house where I felt reenergized, having finally allowed myself five hours to digest some of the feast.  So I watched a little bit of RGIII magic and went up to bed, did I mention the air conditioning?! I was cold that night and got to use a quilt.  I missed the cold more than I realized.

The next day I went to the Peace Corps Office in Accra to pick up my packages from my new favorite aunt and uncle (Cathy and Dave) and my always favorite mom (Mom).  After a little searching in the mail room, I found both packages and did my best to downplay the contents to the horde of once-again-ravenous PCVs who call themselves my friends.  "Oh just some food and stuff, probably nothing too good," I said, knowing full well that there was candy, meat, and cheese of some kind in there.  Everyone seemed to understand and backed off once I said I was going to wait to open them until I was alone.  Processed American food is worth its weight in gold among volunteers, so yeah, I wasn't about to open that up to the masses.  While at the office we were told to get our flu shots (mandatory) and any immunizations we still needed (final Hep-A for me). 

I also decided to weigh myself because that's kind of the cool thing to do.  Who has lost the most weight?  Wade I think.  Has anyone gained any?  I dont think so.  Who can gain the most weight when they visit America?  I think the record is 22lbs in one month.  I weighed in at 172lbs, down about 12 since I arrived in country, but I think I lost most of that during the first three months of training.  172 is the least I've weighed in a long time, probably since freshman or sophomore year of high school, and that was the day after Thanksgiving.  I do think my weight has stabilized since I've arrived at Bodada, and now that I have cheese and snacks for a few weeks I'll probably put on a little more.  Besides losing fat weight, I think I've lost some muscle mass too.  The diet here is mostly starch with some soup and oil, and since I don't really have a taste for smoked and dried fish, I eat vegetarian pretty often.  I try to eat beans as much as possible, and now that I have some beef jerky and beef sticks (courtesy of the care packages) I'll be eating very well.

The next day I left Accra for Kumasi with ten other volunteers.  We stayed at the Kumasi sub-office (aka the KSO) for one night and then headed to Christian Village for the IST.  The KSO is awesome, and it's a shame that it takes me over 12 hours to travel from site to Kumasi because I would really like to spend some more time there.  It has a full kitchen, showers, comfy couches, and even wireless internet.  My only complaint is that the yard has too many trees to effectively throw a frisbee or football, and there's no basketball hoop. 

Christian Village is pretty nice as far as accommodations in Ghana go, but I prefer the State Dept. houses in Accra.  Everyone from my education training group was there; there are 22 of us now.  It was great to hang out with everyone, but the sessions during the day sure can drag on.  My counterpart never showed up, but on Thursday, my headmaster came.  I thought he would enjoy it, but mostly he was as bored as everyone else.  All of the Ghanaian counterparts had trouble understanding the American speakers, and even we were bored, so I can't imagine how they felt.  In truth though, the sessions were pretty useful.  You had to be active and participate to stay awake, but if you could handle that you would definitely learn something.  The first event lasted two days and was just a "How are things at site?" chat with possible solutions to some things.  Then we had one day of grants and HIV/AIDS stuff because that's how we get a lot of funding (and a lot of Ghanaians need to be educated about the truth).  The third event lasted two days and covered behavior change and a specific model that we should use.

Most of the fun happened after our sessions when we would go back to the dormitory and relax with a beer or throw around the American football or the frisbee.  After a little peer pressure and a couple drinks, I decided that it would be okay to get my hair cut into a mullet.  I immediately regretted my decision, but everyone was less enthusiastic about cutting it off and I decided to just own it.  The next day I got the sides trimmed up even more and added a little style to the whole thing with some lines.  It's pretty epic now.  On Thursday and Friday we (to be more accurate, a few girls) got the Ghanaian counterparts to play a game of frisbee with us, and then on Friday night everyone went to a big outdoor bar and restaurant in Kumasi called Echoes.  It was a lot of fun and they had a live band and we danced until a little after midnight.  I was supposed to catch a bus to Hohoe at 4am on Saturday, but decided that my morning would be better spent in bed.

On Saturday, with my day suddenly free, I decided to go into the city and visit the Vodafone internet cafe and just hang out in the city.  I can't say that I love Kumasi, but it's not so bad.  It's crowded and noisy and smelly, but that's what you get with cities.  Then that night I stayed at the KSO with three other people headed to Volta.  We decided to get up early and start our journey at 5:00am because it would take them ten or 11 hours to get to Ho, and it would take me more than 12 to get to Bodada.

We weren't really sure how we would get there exactly, but we knew the best plan was to get to Koforidua (capital of Eastern Region) and then get cars to Ho and Hohoe.  We decided to just play the trotro game where you stand on the side of the road and try to get trotros to pick you up.  The difficulty increases with the more people you have and the farther you have to go.  Luckily for us, the second trotro that stopped knew how we could get there and dropped us off at a great junction with a pretty big station.  We got a car to Koforidua from that station and even though it wasn't a direct car, we only had to take two cars from the KSO to Koforidua.  From Koforidua, I got in a car to Hohoe and had to wait less than one hour.  We got a flat tire near Have-Etoe, but other than that, the trip was great.  Then it was just two more taxi rides before I was back home to Bodada.  I had missed site and was happy to be back.

On Monday, I went to school and then to Jasikan to withdraw some money and stock up on groceries.  The pastor I live with is having surgery on his humerus, so he's going to stay in Ho for a while.  This means that I'm living alone again for the next few weeks which is fine by me because I get to cook any food I like.  And since I just got a bunch of cheesy things and spices from my mom, I have been whipping up tasty dishes like chicken alfredo, parmesan risotto, and marinara rice.  I'll tell you all right now that the 24-oz of grated parmesan cheese won't last nearly as long with me cooking alone as it would back in American with my whole family eating from it.

On Tuesday, as I was reviewing math with my form 2 class, the headmaster walked in and said that we just received the exams from the office and that we were supposed to start them an hour ago.  So unfortunately for my students, they didn't get much review with me, but I helped them out immensely by rewriting the terminal exams for math and science.  For some reason, they pulled questions from the whole syllabus instead of just the first trimester, so my students had only been taught about a third of the test.  I wasn't too happy about this, and neither were the other teachers, so a few of us wrote new questions to replace the topics we didn't cover.  This increased the grades, but still showed how much work I need to improve my teaching style to help the bottom quarter of the classes.

Next week is the ICT final which I personally feel is worthless, but I'm having forms 2 and 3 take the test so they can get used to the format and so I can learn what I have to teach.  I'm going to teach to the test in my scheduled ICT classes, and then focus on actually using computers in extra classes in our new computer lab with 24 new laptops.  We got the laptops from the government, and once we have a suitable place to store them, they'll deliver them.  The PTA would like to use my computer experience to run the lab, and focus my energies there.  And since we have plenty of math and science teachers, I think the students won't suffer too much without me teaching them.  It will be interesting to see how long it takes for this lab to get finished because my kitchen still hasn't been touched.  Also, I guess we're just going to renovate an existing room close to the church and turn that into a computer lab.  My guess is that it won't be done by September next year, but they might be a little more serious about this because we're getting free computers.  Who knows.  Either way, I'm going to try putting more pressure on redoing my kitchen as well as the lab.

That's all for now, and I hope you can tell that I'm doing pretty well here.  I think I'm settling in well at site, and I'm looking forward to break and getting out on the town more.  Thanks for reading.

Perceptions and Reality

This blog post was requested by a friend of mine who was a few years older than me and currently works at Lawrence University.  I didn't ask him if I could use his name here, so I'll just stick with his first name. Thanks Nate!  I'm going to do my best to comment on my perceptions of Ghana, and Ghanaians' perceptions of America.  Coincidentally, this post is exactly the type of thing PCVs are supposed to be doing.  Two of Peace Corps goals are: education of Americans about the host country, and education of host country nationals about America.

My perceptions of Ghana

I feel like my perceptions of Ghana were similar to other Americans'.  Ghana is in Africa, and it's hot.  But I also knew a bit more about it before I came.  I took an African history class my senior year at Lawrence, which doesn't seem like a whole lot of African history, but Africa is not an emphasis in the American educational system.  I also knew a handful of people from Ghana in college and was really good friends with one guy in particular, David. 

David and I were on the same intramural basketball team for all 4 years of college, but we never had any real talks about Ghana.  However, David was a smart dude, and I respected him a lot as a scholar, footballer, and person (not as a basketball player though. He might have been able to beat me sometimes in 1v1, but I was a much better team player).  I had no real reason to think that Ghanaian students would be any different from American students or students from other countries that I met while at Lawrence.  I generally thought that all students in Ghana were like him: hardworking and ambitious.  In reality, I don't think students in Ghana are very different from students anywhere else in the world: some care and want to learn and are willing to try hard, and others would rather do a million other things than sit in a desk.  My perceptions were shaped by my personal attitude toward school (why wouldn't you want to learn new things!) and by the smart hardworking international students I met while at LU.

The biggest difference that I do see between Ghanaian students and American students come from systemic issues like corporal punishment (caning), teacher apathy, and lack of parental guidance.  Those things are difficult to change, and it takes personal commitments and willingness to change.  I'm working on some of those things at EP JHS, but the going is slow.

David was one of the more religious people that I knew (granted that doesn't say a whole lot because I went to a small, non-denominational, liberal-arts school), and I guess I didn't know what to expect when I got here, but almost everyone is pretty religious.  Traditional religions and the people who practice them are not nearly as prominent as they used to be, but interestingly enough, everyone respects the power of traditional religions and the magic associated with them.  The people of Ghana are overwhelmingly Christian, and Islam is the second largest religion, but only the most devout people who have truly put their faith in God don't believe that traditional religions have the power to hurt them.  The same goes for witches; everyone believes in their existence and takes witch threats seriously.

Probably my most incorrect perception of Ghana was that Ghanaians would always be trying to rob, scam, or cheat me.  I just assumed, thanks to the American media, that Americans who travel to third world countries are always in danger all the time.  This is just not true, and I find 98% of Ghanaians to be extremely nice and helpful.  Ghanaian hospitality is more than a saying, it's a way of living. 

I was also unsure of how people would look at me considering that I'm a white man coming from a country which participated in the slave trade.  I whole heartedly believe that all people are equal and should be treated as such regardless of skin color, gender, wealth, sexual orientation, or any other differentiating factor among human being, but I still felt guilty and sorry about slavery, discrimination, racism, and the struggle for civil rights that black Americans had to deal with in America (and still have to deal with today).  Gay rights is a pretty big issue in America right now, and I just don't understand how people can be so ignorant and closed-minded about such an issue that obviously is exactly the same as all the other civil rights struggles from the past.  The great Charles Barkley said this one night on TNT's Inside the NBA show, "I'm all for gay rights. As a black man how can I agree with discrimination of any kind."  Ghanaians are also extremely homophobic to the point that it's illegal, and I don't think they will be changing their minds too soon because of their strong religious beliefs.  This paragraph was supposed to lead into the section about Ghanaian perceptions of America, but instead I went on a rant.  Sorry, but I'm not going to delete it.

Anyways, 99% of Ghanaians have stopped blaming Americans for the slave trade, and I haven't been harassed about it yet. (Or maybe they never blamed Americans too much.  The British colonizers are still referred to as "colonial masters" and I think they took a lot of the heat.  And it's important not to forget that kings and chiefs in Ghana were usually the people selling the slaves to the slavers and making money.  And slavery was practiced in Ghana by Ghanaians before the Europeans came to buy slaves.)  Slavery was terrible; everyone acknowledges that.  I had a really great conversation with my new headmaster a few weeks ago about all kinds of perceptions and beliefs people have in America and Ghana.  In the end we agreed that generalizing and assumptions only lead to problems, and there is no way to undo the past; we can only learn from it and try not to make the same mistakes.

Ghanaian perceptions about America

Ghanaians really do believe that all Americans are rich, and they believe that if you have a job in America you also live in a mansion and drive expensive cars.  I work all the time to dispel this myth.  Yes, it's true, the average American is wealthier that the average Ghanaian, but the way wealth is distributed is similar to Ghana.  There are super rich people, people who have plenty of money but not boatloads of it, people who earn enough to get by, and people who really struggle.  The difference is that America has more of a middle class than Ghana, so a greater number of people are able to live comfortably.  Something that is hard to explain to my students is that living in America costs a lot of money.  A person can live in Ghana on very little money, but everything is more expensive in America (except imported goods like electronics which cost the same or even more here).  So to just afford basic things like food, water, shelter, etc, you need to make a lot more money than most Ghanaians.  I've been told that even when families send someone to America to go to school or work they think they live a lavish lifestyle because they are able to send back enough money to support the rest of the family.  The exchange rate and cost of living are the two biggest factors that allow this to work.

People do ask me for money, but not so much in Bodada (they know I'm a volunteer and I'm here to help them) .  Usually when I just say no people will leave me alone, but sometimes I have to explain that I'm a volunteer.  Occasionally that isn't even enough, but then other Ghanaians will step in and get the person to stop bothering me.  Ghanaians have a lot of pride, and they don't want visitors or outsiders to think that Ghana is full of beggars and robbers.  It's surprising and really nice how often I'm helped by strangers here.

Switching it up a little, Ghanaians also love Obama, but he's the only pop culture icon from America that most people know.  I already talked about the Obama shirts, but there are lots of other shirts that people wear that are originally from America.  They buy big crates of clothes that were donated, and sellers sort through them and then sell the nicer articles on the streets and in clothes kiosks.  Just the other day I saw someone wearing a Gustavus Adolphus t-shirt, and I've seen lots of other t-shirts that I recognize.  Most people don't know what their shirts represent back in the states, and there's no discrimination between colors and genders.  I see guys wearing women's shirts, sweatshirts, and shoes all the time.  It makes me smile.

 I'm sure in Accra there is a greater influence of American culture and media, but in most parts of the country, people don't listen to American music too much (some like rap and pop but they love country music) or watch American movies.  Some radio stations will have an hour of American music each morning, but mostly they play local music and the DJs talk a lot, like wayyyyyy too much.  More affluent people have TVs here with a satellite dish which gets a few channels for free because you pay for the dish itself and the converter box, and occasionally an American movie will be on.  But most of the programming is either Ghanaian or Nigerian.  They also have a few international news stations like BBC and Al Jazeerah.

Most people here have a lot of respect for Americans and I get the impression that we are thought of more highly than Europeans.  I like to think it's because of programs like Peace Corps which offer more substantial aid than some other volun-tourism groups, but it's probably because they know American money is good and that Americans are rich and nice.  

I'm kind of running out of steam now, so let me know if there's anything that I should elaborate on by commenting, Facebooking me (I uploaded more pictures!), or sending me an email.

School Update

Well, it's been a very long time since I last blogged, and once again, I have failed to write another blog about the food here.  This is now the 8th week of school, and I am behind schedule in all of my classes (I'm thinking and hoping that this is typical).  I'm going to give you a brief recap of everything I can remember from each week of school, but after such a long time who knows how well this will go.

Week 1 (Sept 4 - 7): This is the week of manual labor at almost every school in Ghana.  Our trainers warned us about how much the teachers just sit and do nothing, but I was thinking that maybe I could get some real work accomplished.  HA! Only about half of the students show up, and the ones that do are put to work sweeping and weeding the compound, and making it presentable and ready for "effective teaching and learning."  I've heard from other volunteers that this is a good time to review previous tests and determine how much the students remember/know, so I'll try that in the future.

Week 2 (Sept 10 - 14): This week I went to school bright and early at 7:20 so I could prepare for my lessons and show the students that I was serious about teaching and helping them learn.  I was the only teacher there until at least 7:50 every day; some days the other teachers wouldn't come until 9.  Morning assembly (think lining up in your class like you do in elementary and middle schools) is at 7:45, but some days it doesn't happen until almost 8.  Classes are supposed to start by 8:00 every day, so to the culturally insensitive observer arriving to your job at 9 when it is supposed to start at 8 would seem absurd.  Good thing our trainers told us that tardiness was commonplace in Ghana, even by teachers and other professional workers; it's just part of the way of life.  Sign-in times are adjusted somewhat so it doesn't look so bad that a teacher missed the first hour or two of school.

On Monday, the new Form 1s arrived from the primary school, and that was a treat.  Only half of the 10 students promoted could read!  I'm not really sure how the ones who can't read were promoted to JHS, but I guess it's pretty common because there are still some Form 2 students who struggle reading.  On my first day of teaching I met with each of the classes and introduced myself and had each of the students introduce themselves to me and the rest of the class.  By my second class we started serious learning.  I thought things were going well and I had lots of energy and positivity. 

Friday the 14th brought a serious message: three of the four Ghanaian teachers at EP JHS were transferred to new schools!  The letters were from the district office and they were signed and dated September 6th, and they informed the teachers they should report to their new schools by September 1st.  I thought this was funny in a terrible sort of way.  I was sad to see the teachers go because I had gotten to know them and had just finally memorized their names.

Week 3 & 4 (Sept 17 - 21 and 24 - 28): These two weeks merged together in my mind because it was mostly the same thing for both of them.  The three new teachers who were transferred to Bodada EP JHS trickled in and said hello and logged that they visited the school.  Of course none of them did any real teaching because they had just been transferred and were just trying to figure out what will happen moving forward.  (In my mind this was honestly excusable, but I did feel pretty bad for the students.  I even gave each of the classes some English assignments just so they would have something to do.)  I was still full of energy at this point, and each morning I hoped that the other teachers would start showing up for real. Yeah, it sucked that they were transferred to a new school, but they all only lived 5-10 min away in Jasikan...is it really that hard to commute? 

It was damn near impossible for me to control all of those students.  There was one day when my counterpart Godwin had to go to a meeting with the Form 3 students, so I was left with the Form 2 and Form 1 students all to myself.  That was too much for me.  They don't fear me because I don't use the cane to discipline them, and at that point they all thought my accent was hilarious.  (Note: I'm sure they still think it's hilarious sometimes, but they don't make fun of it when I'm around as much.)

I also had my biggest crisis to date during the 4th week.  The night before my crisis I was reading one of the A Song of Fire and Ice books (which are awesome by the way) on my Kindle Reader program and when I finished I closed my laptop and set it on the ground.  I didn't drop it, but I didn't particularly like the way it sounded when I set it on the ground.  Whatever, it had definitely taken bigger hits than that in the past.  Then next morning when I pressed the power button, nothing.  I was crushed.  I tried to plug it in, and I pressed every button that should have made some light come on, but all I got was more nothing.  I took as much of the case off as I could comfortably do without freaking out more.  I actually took quite a lot off because I'm a jack-of-all-trades/handyman and I know more about computers than most people.  (My bicycle mechanic and car mechanic skills are my most valued random skills.)

Nothing I did changed the fact that my computer showed no signs of life at all.  That was definitely the lowest I've felt during my four and a half months here.

Week 5 (Oct 1 - 5): The new teachers all arrived and on Monday we hashed out the new schedule.  We had to change a few classes around to accommodate the classes each teacher would teach.  Apparently when the transfer people, they don't pay any mind to the teachers' preferences and specialties.  Last year Godwin was the only math/science teacher, and they didn't have an ICT teacher, so they got me.  After the transfer, we had four people (myself included) who taught science, three who taught math, and two ICT teachers.  I was posted to Bodada EP JHS because they needed help teaching math, science, and ICT, but now they would be fine without me.  Luckily for me, the teachers were pretty cool about changing their subjects, and we ended up with a teacher for every subject except French.

This week the teachers were all very good about attendance, and one morning three teachers beat me to school.  I was really looking forward to working with the new group of teachers because all of them were [Aside: should I use "are" here? Someone please help me out. I've switched it at least 5 times now, and it still doesn't look right. Also, I don't proofread this so sorry about the other mistakes.] under 40 and seemed to be looking forward to starting classes.

On Oct. 3 I decided to try turning on my computer again just for the hell of it, and as if by magic, the thing started right up.  Elation!  It came on and acted like nothing had ever happened, except the speakers don't work, but I bet I can fix them with a little elbow grease.  I was feeling awesome heading into week 6.

Week 6 (Oct 8-12): Test week in science and math!  I gave large review assignments on Tuesday, we reviewed during the second class, and had tests on the final class of the week.  In science the best score was 64% and the worst was 8%; in math the best score was 83% and the worst was 12%.  In both cases I graded extremely generously and gave out tons of partial credit.  Also, I thought the science test was quite easy, but if you can't read "See Spot run." how can you answer questions about science?  Anyway, I gave the top half of both classes stickers, and the people who did very well got more than one.  I think they really liked the stickers. 

This week was when I started to lose my energy and positivity.  At school my students were failing, and at home I felt pretty isolated.  The other teachers don't live in Bodada except for Godwin who stays here 4 nights a week, so I don't get out of the house nearly as much as I should.  It sounds so simple to just take a walk, but it's so much more than that here.  It is really quite draining to walk around.  It's not that anyone is mean, if fact it's the opposite, everyone wants to talk to me.  Even just walking a few houses down to the store to buy some bread can take me 15-20 min.  I'm not the most naturally outgoing person ever, but I can put on a pretty good front.  However, there's only so much positivity a person can have when he has the same conversation with every person he sees because he can only speak a few lines of the language. 

I should mention that this is a common feeling among PCVs.  The first 3 months at site are pretty rough once the honeymoon wears off.  Some days I just don't have a lot to look forward to, especially when my students are misbehaving (which happens a lot), and the teachers decide that they only need to come to school three or four days per week.  That being said, I know that it will get better, and the most important thing I can do is stay positive.  Thankfully, I have a great support group of family and friends who will let me complain when I call or email them.

Week 7 (Oct 15 - 19):  I was feeling pretty low last week.  All of those things I just mentioned were still with me, I was catching a cold, and just not feeling good in general.  I needed to talk with an American.  Unfortunately, I didn't until the weekend. 

So what did I do during this week when I wasn't teaching?  I tried to print off and send in my absentee ballot (failed because the power was out and no one wanted to fire up their generator to print off 4 sheets of paper).  I watched seasons 2 through 4 of "Parks and Recreation" which is hilarious, and my favorite character is Ron Swanson.  I've also read a lot during my time here.  I finished the five published A Song of Fire and Ice books; I read the last 2 books of the Hunger Games series (not as good as the first book); I even started reading The Bible.  I'm really looking forward to my Kindle Paperwhite arriving in the package my mom sent to me during this week.  I'm hoping that it arrives in early November even though I won't pick it up until Thanksgiving when I stay with an American family living in Accra and have Thanksgiving dinner with the Ambassador and all the other PCVs.  It should be a good Thanksgiving.

On Saturday night the pastor came back.  He had been staying with his family in Ho because he broke his arm when I first visited Bodada.  He wanted to be close to a hospital until he got the cast off, and on Friday the cast was finally removed.  He's got a bunch of rehab to do because he broke is humerus and his arm is more or less frozen in place right now.  I'm glad he's back, and it will be nice to have some other people around the house now.

Also, I've gone to church every Sunday except for one.  Church officially starts at 9:30am, but in reality starts closer to 10, but it lasts until at least noon.  I now just head over at 10:30 because none of it is in English, and that way I don't have to sit there for more than three hours even if it's a really long service.  They usually have three donations (one time there were five), and everyone gives something each time.  There is a lot of dancing and singing to accompany the long services, but the pews are very uncomfortable and it can get quite hot in the church.  But going to church is a great way for me to participate in something, and everyone gets to see me at church.  They love the fact that I'm there every Sunday.

Week 8 (Oct 22 - 26):  Yesterday, Monday, I went to Hohoe to print off and mail my absentee ballot.  GO OBAMA! I also visited the market there and loaded up on vegetables and peanut butter.  I searched for an Obama shirt, but apparently they are only available in Accra.  For those of you who haven't been to Ghana and seen the Obama shirts, they are awesome!  They are red, white, and blue; they have a bunch of stars; they say "44th President of the United States: Barack Obama;" and they have a great picture of Mr. President himself right on the front.  I was really hoping I could get a sleeveless one just because they're so good.

Today, I woke up with a pretty sore throat after a night of fitful sleep.  I was feeling chilled and feverish, and I genuinely thought I would be sick this morning.  After drinking some water and eating an egg sandwich, I made enough of a recovery to get psyched up for school.  Classes actually went pretty well today, and I laid down the law in my math class.  Almost half the class now has a nice sized portion of grass to weed because they were being a little too talkative.

So phew! That's a brief synopsis of the last eight weeks.  Thanks for reading, and it's great to hear that people enjoy my blog.  Please let me know if there's anything in particular you want to hear about because I do take requests :)

PS. I bought some chicken sausages yesterday in Hohoe and cooked two of them last night.  I ate them with ketchup and onion on some bread.  I'm pretty sure it was the best hotdog I've ever had.  I miss American food.  Especially meat and junk/fast food.