Ghana in Reverse (Twelve)

Thankfully, someone picked me up at the airport, because the place I’m living doesn’t exist on any map I’ve seen and the house doesn’t have an address to speak of. This part of Ghana reminds me a bit of Central America. I’m surprised at how comfortable I feel here. It’s drier than I expected. Almost so dry the dust chokes me, but I’ve heard the rainy season is coming. For now though, it’s too hot to wear actual clothes, especially when the power goes out (which is a lot) and since I only see two other people living in the house on a regular basis, I wear as little as possible. Side boob for weeks. It pains me to put on clothes to leave the house, but I can’t take a taxi naked. The last taxi I was in ran over a goat. That seems to happen a lot.

There’s a cat. Why is there a cat? I feel like no one told me about the cat. The frogs come out at night and I love listening to them, but people wake very early in the mornings and are not shy about making noise. Sunday mornings bring a parade of singing and drumming men praising Jesus, which is fucked up in my opinion.

There is no coffee. I lied, there’s Nescafé, but that’s not coffee. This is a list of all the food obtainable in the market: miniscule light green apples imported from South Africa, mangos (seasonal unfortunately), pineapples, bananas, watermelon (also seasonal), avocados, plantains, white sugar bread, white non-sugar bread, gigantic white yams, white rice, tiny white eggplants, eggs with pure white yolks because everything the chickens eat is white, white onions, yellow onions, red onions, green onions, green peppers, cassava, the greens of the cassava plant that I can’t spell and most people are allergic to so we never eat, cabbage, tomatoes, carrots, maize (the tough, non-modified kind), okra, groundnut paste (peanut butter; the women at the market are all like ‘fuck yeah the American girls are here again, bitches clean me out every time’), black-eyed peas, goat, chicken, dried fish, sugar cane, ice cream in plastic bags (everything in plastic bags), chalky chocolate, box wine, and palm oil. I did find Marmite although it molded. I might have forgotten a few things, but that is a list of practically everything that could go into my mouth for the next eight months. I forgot cheap whiskey, that’s what I forgot.

Ghana in Reverse (Eleven)

There is a feeling I have about the food.

Obviously, I expected to make adjustments in my eating habits. Over the years, I’ve learned the difficult way to attempt not to be the one picky eater because I feel bad being a privileged pain-in-the-ass. A conscious one anyway. For someone like me this is very difficult (cue snare and splash), and the feeling I get is that I might be setting myself up. I’ve never seen so much sugar bread in my life, nor have I ever been fond of green peppers. The lack of running water doesn’t bother me at all, except in the kitchen. No wonder everyone cooks outside.

Theoretically I’ve got everything down, but I have a feeling my job will end up being largely reactive. That’s something, although lots of ideas seem good in theory. Do international non-profit organizations all run like this? My two roommates seem like their jobs revolve around sending emails to students or parents of students and I have no students (although I am grateful for this). We have a good time together, my roommates and I. It’s nice to have friends. I’ve heard there are other people who live in this house too, but I never ever see them so it remains a rumor. I do know that there is a cat. I did not invite him in, but apparently he was born in my closet and since the doors to the house don’t even close all the way, I can’t keep him out. Plus, he might get eaten out there. He just can’t sleep on my bed.

It’s very lush, so I was wondering when it would start raining. I’m not really surprised, but it rains a whole damn lot. It rained torrentially all day yesterday and now the road to the site is totally washed out. Of course we’re pouring concrete soon. Another bad omen. Now I take a shared taxi and walk the rest of the way, which is perfectly fine because I like to walk, but I don’t coo over children like other people and for obvious reasons they can’t help noticing the lone obroni girl walking through their village, and they have this totally adorable thing they do where they chant the same phrase at me in unison, over and over again.