Recap Part II

Okay this post is gonna be a bit of stream-of-consciousness--the days just blur together here anyways.

Before I start proper, I must say that it is entirely possible to get a lot of diseases in this country,
many with overlapping symptoms. Therefore, I feel an umbrella term is needed to cover all of them. I propose: Ghana-rrea.

I know. Terrible.

I'm plugged into a wired connection at Akuafo Hall where the Internet is decent, so I may camp out here for most of the afternoon.

Oh, I should also mention that there are a bunch of Harvard Summer School students here. Yay, familiar faces! Shoutouts to Emma and Romeo. And to Esther, who's working at a newspaper.

Sunday Afternoon

Probably the most exciting day of my summer so far! I went with a bunch of students from Harvard and the University of Alberta to the World Cup qualifier match between Ghana and Gabon. We (Ghana) owned them!

Getting to the stadium was an adventure. I mistook the Alberta tro-tro for Harvard's so I ended up chasing it down the parking lot--they let me on, but I was like passenger #21 in this van/deathtrap built for maybe 10. I sat backwards on top of some part of the front seat, no seatbelt, totally possible to fly through the windshield. Awesome. Of course, this tro-tros full of obrunis (white people ... I guess I'm white now ... whatevs) attracted a hell of a lot of attention as we went down the main road. When we'd stop guys would wash all of our windows, much to the dismay of the driver and mate, and I think most of the Canadian (or as Romeo calls them, the Ghanadians) girls got a few marriage proposals.

We got to the stadium about an hour early, and purchased our tickets "together". And yet none of our seats were next to each other. Oh, Ghana. I also had my first Star Lager, which is like the most popular local brew. It was pretty good--anything to take the heat off the West African sun.

If you thought the obruni attention was insane, upon entering the stadium, the Canadian contingent got a standing/cheering/singing/chanting/screaming ovation from an entire section!! Ghanaian guys were blowing horns, calling for us to come over and making entire rows of room to sit with some of the Canadian ladies. There was quite a bit of stroking and groping. It was crazzzzzy.

The match itself was awesome, with Ghana having the game in hand, 2-nil. I've got some video/pics on my camera, but bandwidth here won't let me post it up. Afterwards, our RA, Dennis, walked with us to Osu so that we could have dinner. I had to play rear admiral on this one, and make sure no one got abducted from the back.

Enter sketchy truck-load of horny Ghanaian men. Yeah, these guys were definitely harassing the ladies in our group, and they weren't too happy with getting rebuffed. It was really dark out, so we were probably in a good bit of danger. Eventually we got past them, but soon traffic cleared up, and they soon caught up with us.

AND THEN THEY STOLE MY HAT. WHO THE HELL STEALS A HAT?! Right from the passing vehicle, out of my hand. AHHHH. It was just a cotton full-brim hat, but it was perfect for keeping the hot African sun off my head/neck. Still need to find another one. Oh man.

Monday

Yesterday I went to Tema Port to meet with the General Manager of Administration. He kind of interrogated me, so I was afraid I wouldn't get the go-ahead. I knew coming in that ethnicity in the workplace is probably not the most openly talked about, but eventually he cleared me through. I just sent him my draft survey (10 pages ... eeek), so hopefully I can start sample selection (about 40 for pre-test) tomorrow.

Also, I hired a research assistant/interpreter (yeah, Weatherhead grant proposal!). Woooohooo! He's an MPhil Psychology candidate who is fluent in English, Twi and Ga, and he used to work at Tema Port. Kind of weird having a research assistant older than you.

A couple of days ago, a bird shat on me. Last night, Romeo got shat on on our way to dinner. Emma says that the Italians consider getting shat on by a bird to be good luck.

I've nothing against the birds. In fact, I'll just let bygones be by Ghana.

Okay, I'll stop now.