[wrote this for] Tuesday, June 7, 2011

HAPPY 50th BIRTHDAY, DADDY! I LOVE YOU!!

Location: Super Garden Hotel room NN3 in Takoradi, Ghana. NN3 should ordinarily indicate air conditioning, but there is a power outage due to the thunderstorm, and so I sit here with my battery-operated Netbook trying to stave off heat rash and sweat and the imminent mosquitoes. Local time: 6:36 pm, Tuesday, June 7, 2011. State of mind: agitated, yet mellow. I don’t know why I’m agitated.

First and foremost: Happy 50th birthday, Daddy! I love you. And this was for Monday. I regret that I am not present to share in celebrating your milestone of living for half a century! Here’s to another half. I hope that my lack of presence does not keep you from celebrating. I am not dead, I am not miserable, I am not unsafe. There is no need to worry about me. Please don’t feel as though you can’t go on with your daily life simply because I am in Africa. If I had known that my trip would keep you from carrying on with your celebrating and regular activities, I probably would have reconsidered my travels. In fact, there was a graduation celebration going on through the night in the hotel our first night here. Obviously this means that your celebration is ubiquitous! So, please, celebrate! I am there in spirit!

I miss my spinach smoothies. Before I had left I thought it would be a good idea to invest in huge quantities of foods I knew wouldn’t be accessible to me or safe to eat in Ghana, like green vegetables and many of the fruits I like to eat. I’m not so sure it was the greatest idea to indulge in my spinach and mango and spinach and strawberry smoothies, for I crave them so terribly and I cannot have them here. There is no spinach to be found, and, if I were to find it, I’d probably not eat it because I’d worry about the contaminated water in which it was washed or contained. My current roommate Jen just ate three corns that she bought from a street vendor, and she worries that the water wasn’t adequately boiled so that the bacteria wasn’t killed. I’m doing my best to ease myself into the Ghanaian lifestyle little by little so my mind and body are able to handle it.

For example: the maggots. Knowing that the hotel I would be staying at this week did not have the same breakfast accommodations as the Telecentre, I had thought it would be wise to come prepared with instant oatmeal to save a few dollars. On Sunday before we left I had gone out to the supermarket and I had bought 31 500 mL bags of water for only 1 cedis and 50 pesewas and a bag of what I thought was a trustable name brand of instant oatmeal for just 2 cedis. Monday morning while my fellow Elubo outreach volunteers were waiting around for their breakfast to be served, I had been bum chillin’ with my oatmeal and the bowl and hot water that with which the hotel had provided me. Little did I know that I would be the laughing stock of the crew when I looked a little bit closer into that bowl of hot and fresh oatmeal to discover that what had appeared to be less grounded oats were actually… dead maggots. I WAS SO GROSSED OUT! Then I looked into the instant oatmeal bag and there were plump flour beetles alive and crawling about. I was absolutely horrified. I spit out my food and promptly evacuated the scene.

After two good meals later that day and a hearty breakfast on Tuesday, I had thought my time with maggots would be over. Somehow two live crawlers made their way into my netbook case during outreach today. I am 2 for 2 with maggots on this outreach thus far.

Perhaps it’s just another effect of the Doxycycline? Apparently Doxycycline’s most well-known side effect is very vivid dreams. Last night I dreamt two unpleasantly vivid dreams, and I’d have to say since Friday I’ve been consistently feeling the need to record what I’ve been dreaming about. This does not help my sleeping that is already compromised by uncomfortable beds and pillows and mosquito nets and having to wake up super early every morning. Then today while admiring the light show that is the thunderstorm outside that has caused this city-wide power outage (and Ghanaian cities seem to be terribly inefficient at dealing with power outages, which occur frequently during the raining season. It has been hours since it began, and still no change), I told Jen why my sleep lately has been terrible and she told me that this is a common side effect for most anti-malarial pills. Boo.

Yesterday’s outreach was rather interesting. We were at the Shamam district of Emmanuel Methodist JHS. When the kids had gotten out of school, they spotted me and swarmed around me once I responded to their beckoning over to me. They all wanted to know my name and they all wanted me to know theirs. It was impossible to know all of their names because there were at least 50 of them, and some were more pushy than others. They sang their national anthem to me and then they made me sing the American national anthem, which was incredibly embarrassing as the other volunteers stood to the side and laughed at me. It was chaos when one touched my hair, because then all the others wanted to touch my hair and followed suit. I guess they have never seen blonde hair before? They, as all other Ghanaians do, loved my name and kept repeating it. Then they insisted that I come back to visit them. I told them I couldn’t make any promises, but that they could have my Ghanaian phone number. I figured that I’d only have that number for two months and once I’ve left from here they wouldn’t be able to bother me. So I gave out my cell phone number. THAT was a terrible decision. I’ve had callers all night yesterday and all day long today. There is actually a side of me that thinks it could be a great idea to establish some form of real contact with these children to mentor them as they grow older. I wonder how it would be if I gave them my e-mail address and remained in e-mail contact for years from now. Would I be able to change their lives? Would I be able to provide them with some form of adequate mentoring so they could live better lives and change the community they come from for the better? How much effort on my part would that really take? I am really giving this one a good thought. I have seven weeks now to settle this internal debate I’m having.

Sightings and experiences from the past two days that merit mentioning but that will not win my elaboration in blog writing: white breasted crows, boat-carving Ghanaians, falcon, pigs, fufu and eating with my hands, two “Chelsea Football” shopping bags, waakye and rice, Reggiecoco and Enoch and my champion volunteer translators, the sick vocalization from the bird just outside my bathroom window this morning, soccer game with my Manchester ball, learning how to take one’s visual acuity, second chop shop stop and the workers asking about me and remembering my name, learning that living with someone I don’t know very well is different because they don’t expect me to hang around without my clothes, the fruit juice, and, the “apple”.

Things I’ve realized I’ve forgotten to pack: flashlight, toothpaste, extra batteries, Miralax, knife and/or pocket knife, hand sanitizer, Ziploc bags, duct tape, athlete’s foot cream. How. Did. I. Forget. These. Essential. Things. Whoosh. I’m in for quite the ride.