Happiness...

This entire past week has been amazing and I am seriously excited for the next two and a half months here. Wow wait. Let's get things straight... I've been here for a whole month? That's weird to think about. But okay, yea I've been in Ghana and this past week has been a true blessing.

It all started with this amazing woman Christiana. She cooks for the interns, and her children take over the food from her hours to the site. She is a true gem, and she is so funny and cooks the best food. Well Saturday she invited me to hang out with her family. It was fun! We just hung out in this cinder block building that had a dirt courtyard in the middle that connects all the rooms and we laughed about football and watched a "concert" show that had comedians and I had a couple marriage proposals, even by Christiana's own husband. It was all just funny and really helped me open up with everyone at the site. She just played along, ready to get rid of him and made me some of the most amazing noodles that night. If it wasn't for Christiana I'm not sure I could survive haha, her cooking is supreme and I couldn't cook a thing here. 

Sunday, the headmistress to one of the schools I teach at stopped by. She is intelligent, observant and perceptive about people. She nailed me instantly and said it would be a genuine pleasure having a hard worker like me at her school. She made me feel really good about myself. She was really communicative with me about what she wanted and what she thought I could do for her school. It made me really happy and I know that I could probably do good things for these kids. I just... I don't know, I felt good. I feel good. About this whole place. This village. Everything, seems a good fit. 

The site itself is hard to explain, but there's five rooms to one side of each building. All the rooms are small with a bed and a chair. Then we all open up to an outside courtyard. I'll have to try and post pictures because I'm probably not giving this place justice, but it's a great place. I'm glad I chose to stay here next to the locals instead of the guest house they expected us to stay at. Being around everyone makes the whole experience that much more fun. 

Well Wednesday was my very first real day teaching... I wasn't really sure of what I would teach because I figured I could bring up a few things but since I was going early I just sort of winged it and talked it over with a few of the teachers that sit at this table outside the school. The first school I teach at is a Junior School meaning its the middle of the road. So talking about their bodies developing, sex, safe sex, pregnancy, STI's, sanitation, and nutrition are probably the last things that they want to be lectured about... But we actually have a few girls who have already given birth at the school. It was interesting, I guess I expected it but still... Interesting all the same. But my students range from 13-19 but they're wonderful. Some speak English so well and others not so much. They love the fact that I'm progressive and that I don't make them sit at their desks and that I ask them questions that don't require definite answers. They make me happy too. I'm interested to see how all of this works out. Like I said I agreed to become their physical education teacher as well and we're hoping to create an after school program for the girls on self empowerment through education. I'm excited. So many things to do, and for the first time in my life I have plenty of time to get it all done. These kids seriously complete me. I truly hope I get into the Peace Corps... Something about this international education stuff really just fits me well. I'm happy here, but I can't wait to do things for these people. I mean the whole researching aspect is cool I guess, but these kids are really what make this internship tick for me. I went back Thursday to teach the other forms and this class was completely different but still just wanted to learn. A boy who lives in a room two doors from me (with his grandma) is in the class, and I love him. He's seriously one of the hardest workers I've ever met. Haha and he knows he's my favorite but whatever. 

Hailey the other intern came Wednesday too!! She's awesome :) we get along really well and she's a boat load of good information!! I'm glad she decided to live in the room next to mine instead of staying at the guest house too. It's nice also because she's a good conversationalist so we talk about everything. And every day since we've had some odd conversation or adventure together, haha. My favorite thing about her is even though she's a straight edge, she still goes with the flow. She's adjusted pretty well though, and I give her so much credit. She says I've helped, but I think she's just being modest. 

Well Friday we had quite the adventure...  It started when I woke up super early because I went to bed so early. Annoying considering I didn't have to work :( but it wasn't a big deal. Then hailey came back from work later than we thought but we left to Ho Hoe in good time. We were lucky the ladies were around because they told us how much the taxi fares would be to e towns and everything. Then as we were walking to Jasikan, some random guy stopped us and in his weird way asked us for money but we said oh no thank you and got lucky because a taxi just happened to finally pass us and we got in and said goodbye. We told the taxi driver to take us to the Jasikan taxi station then he asked if we were going to Ho Hoe and since we were he was going to take us, but pick up two more at the station. Yay good fortune! So as we're going to Ho Hoe we looked at all the amazing scenery and I declared that I am going to climb one of the mountains before I leave because it just looks so freaking cool. Probably an 8 hr hike at least but seriously this place is beautiful. I'm in love. Well we arrived to Ho Hoe and just sort of started walking and we just used our terrible senses of direction to figure things out. Haha well it didn't work out because we went the wrong way and of course met a "security" man who decided he was going where we were going  but then we stopped by a Vodafone place, and told him we'd meet him later (We didnt meet him unfortunately). The lady at Vodafone was really nice and told us how to get to the Barclay bank we wanted to go take money out. So we decide to take a taxi because we weren't sure where exactly it was. I knew it was only supposed to be 50 pesewas to anywhere in Ho Hoe so when the driver arrived at Barclays and tried to charge me 2 cedis instead of 1 for Hailey and I, I almost argued but hailey just got out of the car and so did I then he drove off without fuss. Well then we get to Barclays and the ATM was broken. But that's the only place that doesn't have crazy intl fees so we wanted to wait. So we waited there for about two hours then we decided we should try the other ATM which wasn't that far away and just walked. Well of course that one wasnt working either lol, our luck apparently. So we walked back but stopped by a little shop and bought a pop, well of course we saw one of the girls we saw at Barclays, and she explained the ATM was working again. So we got all excited and briskly walked back. Well by the time we got there it was broken... Again. And since it was about to rain and we didn't have enough money we just decided to wait it out. We stayed out there for probably another hour and a half at least. It was a good Ghanian culture lesson for sure, everyone is so go with the flow. Oh no worries, it will work. Oh don't fret, it will happen eventually. Ghanians just go with the flow, time doesn't seem like it means much. Well when it started to work again this one guy skipped us and after him, it broke AGAIN. So we waited again. It was maybe half an hour later and it rebooted and it worked FINALLY!!! We were excited to say the least. We waited a total of about... Maybe four hours. After I was hoping to eat so we stopped at a food place that had some good stuff on the outside menu and when we got in, the only word the lady knew was no no no we don't have anything...She only had banku and I didn't think hailey was ready for that just yet. So we left and just went looking for the Vodafone modem place because I knew I'd be running out of data soon on my Tigo account. Well of course I had to go pee, but I wasn't about to go anywhere there so I waited it out and we went in to Vodafone. The sim card didn't fit at first and then the modem wasn't working and it was just being an overall pain in the butt to be honest, but hailey was so awesome and stuck by me through it all. But I paid for it so he could scratch off the numbers to plug into the Vodafone card. Well I was getting impatient after we pretty much waited for an hour because people kept coming in and the associates kept taking care of them by giving them their Vodafone phone credits. So I take it and ask for a receipt so that if it doesn't work I can come back and get them to make it work. After that we were both just tired and ready to go home, it was def an interesting day of Ghanian culture 101. So we stopped by a little shop and bought the ladies at our site chocolate and I bought a tin of Milo (can of coco powder kind of like nesquik). So we go and we walk to the taxi station, so a group of guys comes up to us and asks us where we're going: I say Jasikan and one driver says its 40 cedis. Mind you it's only 2 cedis 50 pesewas to get there, just another day in the neighborhood. What wouldme day of an obruni be like if taxi cab drivers didn't try to scam us. I told him he was crazy and that it only costs above sed price. So one of the other guys grabbed me and said sorry and that he would find us a taxi which he did. The ride home was quiet, but we saw some crazy storm clouds abrewing.

It was quite a day for sure, if anything we learned that no day is a bad day. We learned a lot about each other and had fun just talking outside Barclays. Even though Hailey and I have nothing in common we just click really well. It's good to have someone else here. I'll admit, maybe I just missed having someone to talk to. She def makes it easier to be here. Even today, we met up with the other intern from Sweden, went to town to get ingredients to make no bake cookies with her, talked politics, walked home and ran into random guys who wanted to get our phone numbers and meet us back at our place tonight... After we kindly denied their requests, we went home, ate, took showers then e power went out because of the rain. Of course Hailey and I just read outside and talked for hours. Having her here is truly awesome. 

But the powers been out ever since so for about 5 hours now haha. Ghana is amazing, beautiful and wonderful. Even with all the weird bugs... Like the fact that there is probably 5 different species of ants, haha everything is fascinating here. I do miss the stars here though, it's started to rain so much at night I don't get to see them as much, but the rain makes it cool at night. Like right now, I don't have a fan but the room isn't that bad because it's really cool outside. Woo no power haha. 

Hope you're enjoying the blog. Sorry about no pictures :( hopefully ill add some soon!!