To Market, To Market

Just on the outskirts of the kumasi market

A lady that was trying to get me to buy her peppers. Too bad she doesn't know that those things would make me so sick. We are told time and time again not to eat any vegetables or fruits off the street here.

The chaos of the market. This was in a less crowded area. I was too afraid to pull out my camera in the crowded areas.

Beautiful African sunset about 5 minutes walk from my home base.

Mine and Joe's canoe ride with the little boy on lake Volta

Some of my cute kids I teach at the school.

Sister and Elder Jorgenson, the missionary couple I stayed with in Ho

The chief  of the ashante region coming in with the entourage

Tro tro station

The road leading to my home base. I walk home on this every day.

the little boy that paddled us all the way around a huge island.

Just one of the many ladies selling food at the market.

I just spent another awe-strucking week in Ghana. 5 others and I traveled to a town called Kumasi and took a 4 day weekend this past weekend. These past 4 days have been, well, quite the Africa experience. I wouldn’t say weekend trips here are like a nice vacation, but more of a complete learning experience. Traveling to Kumasi this weekend was a very long journey, but I have found that I enjoy traveling via public transportation here. It’s actually kind of nice, in the fact that it’s a good time to just sit and look out the window with the breeze blowing and ponder life as we pass through many different small villages on the notorious bumpy roads. Despite being shoulder jam-packed in the tro tros and hitting my head on the celing with every large bump we hit, I enjoy it all because it’s all part of the African experience. The first leg of our journey was a 4 hour tro tro ride to Accra. From where the tro tro dropped us off, we had to find a taxi to the bus station. Being 5 white girls, we got ripped off big time and paid 4 cedi each for a ten minute txi ride, when our entire tro tro ride was only 6 cedi each. Oh well. We met up with my friend Joe in Accra. He came along with us to Kumasi. Luckily, we got there just in time for the 2:00 bus to pull out and drive off on a 5 hour drive to Accra. The roads were even more bumpy there. I swear the windows were going to shatter into pieces because of how hard the bus was bumping, but the bus was relatively nice compared to tro tros. It actually had air conditioning, and it was huge! We finally rolled into Kumasi around 8pm and took a taxi to our hotel. Shoving 6 white people and the driver into a small 5 person taxi really causes a scene here. People point and laugh as we sputter down the road. We were happy to find that our hotel actually had air conditioning and hot showers and even a TV! The TV of course, didn’t work, but the fact that there was a TV was a feat in itself. Our hotel rooms were the first place I have been able to walk around without shoes on since arriving in Africa. No joke. The floors are always covered in dirt here.
Our first morning in Kumasi, we got up early to venture out into what is the largest market in all of West Africa. When I say it is huge, I can’t even explain how big it is. There are rows and rows and alleys of switch backs that go for miles. The market is REALLY overwhelming, especially because we stand out as much as we do as foreigners. We navigated our way through a maze of piles of really smelly fish, mounds of raw meat sitting in the hot sun, old used clothing for sale, knock-off products like purses and watches that sport labels like Louis Vuitton and Dulce and Gabbana, but sell for dirt cheap. It’s insane and chaotic everywhere you look. I can’t even describe it. The market has so much energy. There are women walking with giant bowls of everything from eggs to water bags to peanuts or kids toys on their heads. Everyone is yelling out their prices. If you even so much as glance at a seller, you are immediately approached and haggled to no end about the product, so I try as hard as I can not make eye contact with anyone and just walk fast. If we stop walking, suddenly we have 10 people in our face holding their product to sell. It’s really stressful. Most of the time, I just tried to look at the ground and keep my arms closely tucked to my sides, otherwise I would be pulled over to someone’s booth. I did buy a soccer jersey, and a sweet obama watch extremely cheap.
We also were able to attend a festival that goes on every 6 weeks in Kumasi in honor of the chief of the Ashante region. Members of the community come and offer him fits and goods one by one and it is a huge deal. The chief entered with a whole entourage of people holding things like Hennessey, more alcohol, rams on leashes, fancy knives and golden cups/plates. Drums were beating loudly most of the time and there was a lot of shouting. The chief had a massive umbrella being carried over him to block the sun and people fanning him with banana leaves. Everyone was dressed in togas made of black and white fabric. It was all really surreal to watch. We couldn’t understand anything they said because it was all in Twi, but it was cool to watch. Every bathroom experience here is quite interesting. You never know what you are going to get when you pay your 20 peswas to go in and use the restroom here. The one at the festival had a host (a man) at the front who collected the money and showed me to my toilet, passing other women peeing openly in their stall that has no door, and he handed me a piece of newspaper as toilet paper. This one luckily had toilets. That is not always the case. Often times, it is just a hole in the ground or a tray on the ground. It is interesting.
Most of the rest of the weekend included more market experience. We spent a lot of time just walking through the market. Even though it’s overwhelming, it’s also a rush of energy to do. I bought a really cool painting at an arts center that I will frame when I get home. We made the long journey back yesterday (Monday) and returned to the home base safe and sound and were greeted by new volunteers in the house. They are all really nice. There were 5 new ones that came this weekend. New ones come about once a month here. I also got a package from home that was sitting on my bed when I came back from Kumasi. My family sent me awesome American candy and comfort food. I was so happy to get it! It really made my week. Thank you family 
I have to write about my school going to the recording studio for the radio briefly. It has probably been my favorite day of volunteering so far just because the kids were so excited to go. Once Hannah and I arrived to the school on Wednesday, the teachers gathered up all of the students who were chosen to be in the performance. They were the best singers and the best readers. We walked to the radio station, about a 15 minute walk on the busy road with taxis and tro tros narrowly missing us. I had about 3 kids hanging on to each of my hands and arms. They always fight to hold my hand. Even like the 12 year old boys. Haha. We got to the radio station (Side note: from what I gathered, Suzy, the owner of the school paid the radio station to let us air. She is already very low on funds because parents haven’t been paying their fees, so I am amazed she did this. The school is suffering from lack of students interested in her private school, so we were somewhat advertising by going to the radio station) and ten we sat and waited for a little bit outside before they called us in. All 25 of us crammed into an extremely tiny room that was lined with bed padding to make it sound proof and absorb echo, and we shut the large glass door behind us. It was a little claustrophobic. Luckily, there was air conditioning in the room, very unheard of in this town. A lot of the kids got cold fast. The children sang about 10 group songs. It was so cute. The DJ would have us listen to playback and the kids would get so excited and start giggling. They also quoted bible verses and recited memorized poems, stating their name and age before each one. When they put the large headphones on each child, even the really outgoing children got really shy and spoke so softly. Hannah and I also led them in a few songs we had taught them. We didn’t finish everything, so we have to go back on Wednesday again to finish the rest of the recording. It took us around 3 hours just to do 20 minutes of recording. Once we were done, we stepped out into the heat. The kids were complaining that my hands were too cold to hold. We walked back to the school singing songs the whole way. Everyone was in such high spirits when we returned. As we got to the school, all of the other kids that didn’t go came out laughing and cheering and rushed out to hug us all and welcome us back. (They say “Wae Zo! Wae Zo! (Welcome! Welcome!) and we reply “Yooooooo”) Suzy had popped popcorn for the first time for all of us and she had gotten Hannah and I a Fanta soda. It was so so so nice of her considering their budget. It is days like those that make me never want to leave. Everyone was so happy to have had that once in a lifetime experience at their school.
I hope everyone is doing well at home. I have been missing home a lot more than usual this week, but I am sure it will pass. Being in a new culture is exhausting, but exciting. Have a nice week!