Hakuna Matatta

Here's a shot from wandering around Anloga looking for mosquito nets. I spent a long time asking for "kodu" which I later realized meant rice. Nets are "kudo". - Chad

We had four guests this week from Global Brigades. They are Lumana’s fiscal sponsors and wanted to come check out the program. Their names were Steve, Vanessa, Allen, and O’ryan and were quite entertaining. We toured Anloga and Atorkor, and looked into a local volunteer organization where we met 4 more yevu’s (sounds like yahoo to me). We went to a fancy hotel that we had never seen before and paid 5-7.50 cedi for meal (3.5 to 5 dollars). Quite expensive considering we usually get lunch at the school for 30 peswas (25 cents). They came Wednesday late and left Friday morning to go back to Accra.

Here are some people in Dzita gathering shrimp that they've dried in the sand. At this point I should let you know that we only have two pictures that actually relate to this post.

We had a meeting in Accra so Duffy and I hitched a ride in the Brigades van and were on our way to the big city! It was my first time touring Accra and unfortunately, I would be happy if it were my last. The city either smells like exhaust or sewage due to all the vehicles in horrible shape and shanti towns. It was crowded and confusing and people were not friendly like they are in Anloga. We had our meeting with the Grameen foundation and were able to stay in their guest house for free! It was wayyyy nicer than the house we live in. Tile instead of cement floors. Luxurious eh? The next day we wandered the city until we found the market that I wanted to go to. It is a cultural arts market for tourists so although it wasn’t very crowded, you get hassled by every shop owner. Luckily I don’t mind being rude to people who are up in my grill. This guy kept telling me to buy his earrings and I said “tell me to buy them one more time and I will go buy from someone else”. He said “oh okay” and left me alone! After that we eventually found the tro-tro station that went to Anloga and 3 hours later we were home!

Bridget joined in our farewell photo with Kizito. As you can see he was already wearing his mp3 player. He isn't allowed to have any electronics at school so he'll only use it on holidays. Unthwared, he let us know that "It's still mine!"

After arriving from Accra we headed over to Atorkor to bid Kizito farewell. He is going to high school and will be boarding in Keta so we had to show him the final cut of his movie debut. He was very excited to see himself on film and was even more thrilled when Duffy gave him an old MP3 player as a parting gift. He practically tackled the boys and restrained himself to just shaking my hand.

She's a natural. We'll have to work on getting the video of her dancing up here for all to see.

Today was graduation for our first round of clients in Anloga. Duffy and I went to set up and when everyone got there Madame Beulah let the group in a song and a dance. They did the same dance that we saw in church. I learned it is called the “agbadza” and is almost like popping it but slower, and you put your arms out (as if you were pretending to be a chicken). Embarrassingly enough, Madame grabbed me and made me try in front of everyone. I need a lot of work.

I have been informed that it took me way to long to post this so hopefully we will have two a week from now on. I need to take more pictures!

Lame Bonus Picture! About 80% of the buildings here are unfinished. Here's an epic shot of one!