Sky Mall Magazine, you complete me. Sometimes you give me purpose in life when I accompany my well-to-do I-banker Ivy League businessman husband from a political family who usually only lets me tag along as he golfs with his equally powerful and intimidating co-workers when I keep quiet and primp myself up with said materials from Sky Mall pages twelve and thirteen. Thanks to your “detachable golf bag cover that instantly converts into a fairway cooler,” when my husband and his colleagues demand that I make them sandwiches (a practice to which any and every housewife woman is accustomed), I am able to provide them with temporarily satisfying chilled beverages, which may not equal sandwiches in both their taste and splendor, but do achieve success in simulating the process of instant food delivery from unappreciated slave housewives. And, with said transpiration of events, my existence is validated (and so are my and my daughter’s fake boobs).
Thank you, Sky Mall Magazine, for never letting me down when my stereotypical white vacuous hole of loneliness is remedied by such products as “the Slanket siamese for two,” which is your Snuggie blanket that has two head holes for two individuals! You never fail to be the only reason my husband sits next to me as he watches The Game every night on television.
And of course, sometimes I feel trapped within the holed pocket that is my mid-life existential crisis, and I like to pretend that I am Hermione Granger attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for a moment, and so I lift up my wand that I ordered from one Sky Mall magazine that I encountered while on a flight to my two-week stay in the Bahamas, and, with a twist and a flick say “Wingardium Leviosa,” and, in that moment I am caught in a trance of vicariousness in which all of my fantasies are realized.
HAH, Sky Mall. You slay me and my drifting mind. Back to the real Chelsea. Where we at.
Meters above the ground: 20,000? Kilometers from Atlanta, Georgia airport terminal E12: 10330. Kilometers to Accra International Airport, my destination: 6860. Time to my destination: 7 hours and 48 minutes. Current date and time in New York: 11:13 pm, Tuesday, May 31st, 2011. Current date and time in Accra, Ghana: 3:13 am, Wednesday, June 1st, 2011. Time until my Netbook computer battery dies: 7 hours and 25 minutes. Minutes until I’ve lost all ambition to complete this well thought-out first travel blog entry: negative 22. Minutes until my neck muscles have lost their voluntariness and I will have been overcome by the pull into the lair of my subconscious: 13 (projected). Alas, I chug (chug, chug, chug, CHUG! CHUG!! CHUUUUGGGG1!!11!! ok done) along.
So, if you’ve made it this far (which is an accomplishment, because I am terribly verbose when I'm pensive), I think you might have already arrived at the conclusion that, yes: I am on a plane. I am seated in my “comfort economy” seat in 11D, which I was happy to re-select as I was printing my boarding pass for my first flight, which was from JFK to ATL. My current flight is from ALT to ACC. The way the configuration appeared on the touchscreen in the Delta check-in at JFK, it seemed as if selecting seat 11D would have resulted in me having unlimited leg room and the circulated air not from the rear of a passenger in front of me. Instead, I am squished by the confines of two seats to the left and right of me, the left one with a passenger in it and the right one with my stuff. My life is truly a tragedy, especially because I ended up sitting next to a really kind gentleman named Bill from Liberia who was troubled by his nomadic lifestyle between California and Texas and Liberia which is what apparently happens when you’re an altruistic guy who works on development projects for communities that are weighed down by the hopelessness experienced after war crises. I was engaged in conversation with him, and I think I’d like to have his e-mail address before I step off of this plane, for his work has been trending towards the directions of farming and planting, which are inherent to community development processes. That is quite interesting to me, and, who knows, maybe I’ll end up despising my medical mission in Ghana and want to find myself in some other discipline. If that’s the case I’d love to have someone like him to call up to talk about such options. But I’m not all about networking. I’m really enjoying the warmth I’m receiving from his arm that is pouring over into my chair space. He is sleeping right now, but I am still thinking about his recommendation to see the Ghanaian beaches and to eat the “red-red,” which is apparently a plantain and bean mixture soup type thing. I’ll definitely seek it out.
Well anyway. Thus far my trip is not proving to be as ominous as perhaps what could have been predicted by the bad omen that occurred while on the car ride to JFK airport in my family’s black Toyota Prius (the only exception being the presence of biohazards for syringes in the airplane’s restrooms… what). Doxycycline is a version of the highly recommended and Malarone malaria prophylaxis medication, which is a level of expensive that gives even the most grizzliest of men the goosebumps. Unlike Malarone, Doxycycline is known to have its unfortunate baggage of side effects, including an upset stomach. I took a Doxycycline pill on my way to the airport and was lucky to have found a sturdy enough bag that would capture a more liquidy and visibly unappealing and less tasty version of my lunch. Yeah. I booted. In the car. On the way to the airport. I hoped this would not mean doom forever. Ew ew ew!
Things started to turn around with my first flight to Atlanta. I had packed three suitcases and one backpack (one of the suitcases was a carry on). One of the bags I was checking was twenty pounds overweight, and to leave it as such would have cost me (ahem, my parents) $150. But, THANK YOU BEAUTIFUL WOMAN BEHIND THE TICKET COUNTER! You were ever too [ok, sufficiently] generous with your allowance of about nine pounds in excess and ever too [adequately] patient in waiting as my parents and I scrambled to shuffle about my heavy items in my suitcases. Needless to say, I will not be accompanied by an extra shampoo bottle and a handle of laundry detergent. But I think I will make it.
Then came the boarding onto my Atlanta flight. I had a super maximally stuffed backpack and a super maximally packed rollie luggage. Thanks to my laziness and crappy seat, I was at the end of the line to board the plane. Mid-step onto the plane I was confronted by a flight attendant who had informed me that there was no more room for rollie luggage in carry on, and that my luggage would be put with the rest of the checked luggage free of cost. So, laziness and crappy seat equaled me having one less bag to worry about when I was making my connecting flight from Atlanta to Accra. Sounds like a win to me!
Then came the discovery of two unexpected Unite For Sight volunteers who were also on my flight to Accra and who were also connected to me in some way. I am traveling on the same flight as four other volunteers: Sophia, a fellow Yale sophomore on my research team who has been my rock and traveling buddy since we were planning our trip together in March; Jonathan, a Yale Masters in Public Health student also on my research team; and Naima, a fellow Yale sophomore and Tagious (no idea how to spell his name; he said it’s pronounced as the “tagious” in the word “contagious”), who just finished his sophomore year at Duke and who apparently lives about 5 minutes away from Naima in Saint Louis, Missouri. Cool. Very cool. They seem like splendid people.
And of course, the six chicken McNuggets with barbeque sauce and the medium-sized fries and diet Coke and Oreo McFlurry I had to calm the storms of my every last craving before I departed from the United States for two months. Still haven’t taken care of that White Castle craving that is hanging around inside me. Ahhh. I can’t complain. Life is good. But there is simply another dimension to my life since I know what it means to indulge in White Castle when you have The Craving. I must embrace my level of understanding that is apparently much less encountered than I would have ever expected. White Castle is really only a prominent force in a few states in the United States. I am blessed to come from a place where White Castle abounds. Ok, major tangent. I’ll stop. Actually. No. I won’t stop until I get my White Castle. Which I will. I am determined.
Ok, update. Time in Ghana: 4:03 am. Oy. I am totally awake. How will I ever adjust to this time difference? Do I stay up until my flight is over at 11 am-ish, or do I sleep now and wake then? But then I won’t finish this! Ahh!! Cognitive dissonance, shoo yourself!
I thought it would be interesting to make note of some of the key items I packed for this trip, and why. Everyone loves bullet points for their conciseness, ease on the eyes, and indentations (and hence less text)! So I’ll use bullet points to introduce them.
- Medications and vaccinations were perhaps my most expensive necessities for this trip. My doctor at the Yale Travel Health Clinic wanted to take every precaution with my trip, and I ended up having to charge almost a thousand dollars to my student account for all of the shots and consultations I needed. This is only further encouragement for me to travel to Africa again, because I will have had all of these expenses covered. Anyway. In my yellow slip that is taped to my passport for immediate indication of my yellow fever vaccination [required if you’re traveling to Ghana], my doctor at the Yale clinic took the liberty of noting all of the other vaccinations I had received as follows: “Tdap” (tuberculosis), “HepA #1” (Hepatitis A, “#1” because I will need to follow-up with a booster shot in six months), Typhoid, Rabies – Pre #1, #2, and #3 (series of three shots over the course of 21 days [though 28 is more desirable]), IPV (I think this is tetanus), and influenza (for this year’s flu virus). She also prescribed to me a buttload of medications, including a malaria prophylaxis (the Doxycycline), an anti-diarrheal (Ciproflaxin), a skin infection ointment (Mupirocin), and a yeast infection medication (Fluconazole). In addition to the prescribed medications I made sure I was adequately supplied with my seasonal allergy saver, Claritin D and Benadryl allergy, and pain medication Tylenol for your everyday headaches.
- Books for pleasure and summer studying. I’ve been telling myself for the longest time that I would pick up some books just to read them for the pure enjoyment of reading, and, since I never let myself do anything for pure enjoyment, I had to pack them away with me to Africa to force myself to read them so I would justify the space they are occupying in my already stuffed up suitcases and as rite of passage for me to begin to pick up my MCAT books and EMT textbook that I also brought along with me. That means I won’t allow myself to begin studying for the MCAT until I’ve read these books. I’ve made them a prerequisite. Sad that I have to do this to myself. Anyway. They are books that I genuinely want to read. They are The Man Who Lives With Wolves, by Shaun Ellis, Joseph Heller’s Catch-22, The People’s History of the United States, by Howard Zinn, Charles Darwin’s On The Origin Of Species, and The Curious Cook, which I found during Spring Salvage hunting activities and is supposedly about the science of cooking. These are a nice balance. I think I’ll be content with the fact that I found a way to guilt trip myself into devoting the time to reading things I actually want to read. Yay.
- UV light water purifier. Gotta watch out for those tap water bacteria. Mmmm.
- Voltage adapter and outlet converter contraption (so gnarly). Ghana’s outlets are apparently the same as Europe’s, with 220V and 50Hz as the standard output and a funky three pronged input that does not typically house U.S. electronic plugs.
- Netbook in protective Hello Kitty sleeve. I didn’t really feel comfortable bringing my laptop abroad with me for the slightest chance of theft and losing all of my valuable files, so I thought it was a worthy investment to buy the cheapest netbook I could find. I’m using it right now, and it’s a definite strong choice if you’re a traveler and looking to have the basic functions of a computer at your fingertips while also feeling comfortable with losing it if ever it were to happen. The Hello Kitty sleeve was the cheapest of all of the netbook sleeves by far (and also the cutest), so it was a win-win purchase for me. Best Buy. Toshiba netbook. $279.99. Hello Kitty sleeve. $12.99. Go. Get it. Words. Getting. Choppy. Because. I. Am. Sleepy. Zzzzzz……
- Eyeglasses – 500 of them, ready for use, packed into one suitcase. Needed them as a requirement for Unite For Sight. These eyeglasses I obtained essentially for free from the Lion’s Club of New Jersey, which is an organization that recycles eyeglasses and distributes them for free for such purposes as Unite For Sight’s missions. But I had to pay shipping. And I had to commit an entire suitcase to transporting the glasses over to Ghana myself. And that’s a lot of space. And that’s not really OK.
- Passport with Visa. Yes, I am talking about the same passport and visa that arrived to my house on Thursday, aka 6 days ago. Thank you, sudden wave of anxiety that drove me to fret about my visa and call up VisaHQ in a panic, and for hitting me at just the right moment so that I wouldn’t be completely screwed with my flight. Next time, I will NOT send my passport to the wrong place. Never putting myself through that stress again. Sum of the story: if you use VisaHQ.com to process your visa [which is a totally legitimate and recommended service], make sure you mail your passport and other offline materials TO VISAHQ, NOT TO YOUR DESTINATION COUNTRY’S EMBASSY!!! Because you might not know where your passport is for a while. And your required documents for your visa might be found in two separate places that are out of your immediate reach so you cannot mediate the situation. And you might have to spend hours waiting on your destination country’s embassy phone queues just to be redirected to people who can help you who are only available by voicemail message. Here’s a hint for you. Just send your damn stuff to the right place and you’ll damn well have a lot less stress than I did.
I have been trying to sleep on this flight for the past hour. I am NEVER not able to fall asleep. But I’m antsy and I feel so so itchy. I think I have mosquito bites on my legs from home that are for some reason starting to really bother me. I’m feeling really uncomfortable. I’m feeling as if I need to break out and scratch my whole body. WHY AM I SO ITCHY?????? Does this happen to people on really long flights? Do they become hypersensitive to even the most nominal of feelings and sensations they have? What is my deal? I want to take my pants off to scratch but that would obviously be completely inappropriate. Five hours and thirty six minutes until my battery on this thing dies. The bigger question is: how many more hours will I be able to handle on this flight? What am I going to do to stop feeling so uncomfortable and making time on this plane pass by so slowly? What am I doing wrong? I don’t hate flying or anything. I was actually thinking about when the last time I flew was, and I actually couldn’t remember. I’m thinking it was to Washington, D.C. during Thanksgiving break, but I actually don’t remember how I got there. If I didn’t fly then, then this right now might be the first time I’m traveling by plane in years. I used to travel so much in high school for gymnastics. When I went to college there was no such traveling. No money and no reason to do so. Until now. AND I’M SO ITCHY AND UNCOMFORTABLE!!!
I really want to be able to exercise while I’m in Ghana. That’s what I do over summers. Every summer over the past four years or so I’ve whipped myself into shape. I love doing that because of the beautiful weather and the time I’m able to devote to being fit and healthy. However, this summer my schedule might be messed up because I doubt that I’ll feel safe to go out for casual jogs on a regular basis. I’m probably antsy for that reason as well. Oh and maybe that coffee from an hour or so ago is not helping either. Crap. Ahhhhhh.
Back to actual blogging and not ranting about my current unpleasant state of being. I finished reading my Culture Smart! Travel Guide to Ghana during the span of my two flights with plenty of time to share what I’ve learned and many of the things I underlined that I found to be unique to Ghana and aspects of the culture that I hoped I would get the chance to fully experience. I am literally going to spit out the most important information surrounding Ghana and its culture that I underlined in those 150 pages. Here they are. Commence bullet form.
• “The most mountainous area is in the east along the Togo border, where several green peaks rise over 2,438 feet (800 m) to give an impressive view of Lake Volta. This is the largest artificial lake in the world, at 2,100,400 acres (850,000 hectares), fed by the White Volta, Black Volta, and Red Volta rivers and serving the Akosombo hydroelectric dam, which is 1,214 feet (370 m) wide and 400 ft (124 m) tall.”
• Ghanaian flag “consists of red, gold, and green horizontal stripes with a black star in the middle. Red signifies the blood of those who died in the country’s struggle for independence. Gold represents Ghana’s mineral wealth, and green denotes its lush forests and farmland. The black, five-pointed lodestar is the symbol of African emancipation and unity in the struggle against colonialism.”
• “Older people are accorded massive respect in Ghana. It is believed that they have reached old age through living in harmony both with the ancestral spirits and with natural forces.”
• “Ghana’s many French-speaking immigrants, especially from the poorer countries of Togo, Mali, and Niger, tend to be viewed as second-class citizens.”
• “Bakatue (July, Elmina): A regatta to usher in the beginning of the fishing season.” I will try my very best to make it to see this extravagant festival in northern Ghana.
• “The outdooring, as its name suggests, is the occasion when a new baby is taken outdoors for the first time to be shown to the community, traditionally on the eighth day.”
• Apparently my Ghanaian name is “Amma” because I am a female and I was born on a Saturday.
• “It is believed that after death the soul of a person enters a spirit world, from where it maintains contact with the living and can protect or punish its descendants depending upon their behavior on earth. ‘Real fun’ is a fitting anagram for ‘funeral’ in Ghana.”
• “Do not smell food brought to you… If accepting a drink of alcohol, pour a little on the ground as a libation for the ancestors before drinking… Don’t sing in the shower… Don’t whistle at night.”
• “If you are the one to invite someone out, you will be expected to pay.”
• “People love it if you greet them by name. A ubiquitous one is ‘Charlie,’ meaning ‘my friend.’”
• Homosexuality “is taboo and illegal in Ghana.”
• “A wife’s major role in a marriage is to bring forth children. Childless marriages can be seen as a curse, and a childless marriage is seen as the joining of two incompatible souls, and is not recognized as a ‘real’ marriage.”
• “Popular foods among tourists include red-red (fried plantain with bean stew),jollof rice (rice cooked in a meat and vegetable stew), waakye (spiced rice and beans), rice balls with groundnut (peanut), borfrot (doughnut), mpotompoto (mashed yam with palm oil and fish), kelewele (spiced fried plantain), and the fresh fish, shrimps, and “one-man-thousand” (tiny fried baby fish—one man can eat a thousand of them) straight from the Volta around Akosombo.”
• “The nation’s favorite beer, Star, is used as an acronym for ‘Sit Together And Relax.’”
• “Among women, cigarettes are reserved for prostitutes.”
• “When buying foodstuffs, you can try your luck by asking for a reduction in price (te so) or for the addition of some extras (to so). Ask them if they are charging you obroni (foreigner) or obibini (Black man) price.”
• Kumasi is home to the “biggest market in West Africa.”
• Hiking – “Ghanaians do not understand the idea of walking for pleasure.”
• “Too many cars and not enough roads, unintelligent traffic light systems, police barriers, accidents, street parades, construction, and herds of animals can all contribute to some critically bad congestion in the cities. Traffic is a common excuse for Ghanaians’ lateness, and is usually a justifiable one.”
• “A common Ghanaian practice that foreigners usually do not like to adopt is the storage of used toilet paper in a box in the bathroom, burning it rather than flushing it away.”
• “One Ghana cedi is currently just less than one US dollar.”
• “Expect meetings to be late, cancelled, or forgotten. Ghanaians themselves bemoan their own unpunctuality and jokingly refer to their own version of GMT: “Ghana Man” or “Ghana Maybe” Time.”
• “Pointing at somebody with the thumb, or biting the thumb and then flicking it toward the person, is the equivalent of raising the middle finger in the US… It is most often seen between irate taxi drivers, and can be accompanied by the very rude “Wo maame!” (Your mother)!”
This is a sign that I am tiring of writing. I would ordinarily comment on the aforementioned butt ton of material copied straight from the book, but I am exhausted, and I have reached my seventh non-doubled spaced page and 3,895th word in Microsoft Word. This might be considered to be too much for any blog entry. All I could say is that I wish it were this easy to write a paper for a college class. Wow. I actually have so much more to say. But I’ll stop because this is pathetic.
This entry was highly important to me because it marks the last piece of writing I will have down before I have experienced a new continent, which I am sure will probably change me in some way. This is the last piece of writing that reflects the pre-Ghana Chelsea, which, who knows, may be a completely different person than the post-Ghana Chelsea. Only regular and detailed written documentation of her journey and an in-depth analysis of her post-Ghana visit cognitive self will tell. Stay tuned! And thanks for reading. I love you all.
New York time: 3:02 am. Ghana time: 7:02 am. Kilometers to destination: 3135. Kilometers traveled: 13933.
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