Not much going on...

Last few days have been relatively uneventful. Got back from Kumasi on Friday afternoon after spending basically the whole day on a bus with screaming Nigerian movies. That's one thing I won't miss ... Anyways, a bunch of international students who will be studying at Legon in the fall are moving into the hostel, and I was lucky enough to meet several of them. Oh, I remember being a Ghana newbie...

Yesterday I had lunch at Chez Afrique, which is a fairly new pan-African kind of restaurant out in East Legon. Had some classic Ghanaian chicken with fried plantains and red-red (a concoction of beans and rice in a spicy tomato sauce) that was very tasty. Really need to get some more Ghanaian food in before Thursday.

Today (Sunday) has been predictably slow since the entire country basically goes to church. For the whole day. However, I was able to see part of the voters' registration going on at Legon. Ghana is having national elections this December for the 5th time since the start of the Fourth Republic in the early 1990s, and, despite having a fairly good record, still has its share of growing pains. Voter registration being the most major one.

I saw a story on the Ghana Broadcasting Channel a few days ago about people who had waited 16 hours in line because the camera taking the photos for the voter ID cards had run out of battery. So it had to be charged. But then power went out in the district. So the Electoral Commission (which is already of questionable competence to put it lightly) people went to get a generator. But they forgot the petrol. So had to fetch that. By which time it was 5pm. Time to go home for the officials! Of the 100 people queued that day I think 30 might have been processed. The people left decided to stay the night and try their chances the next morning. Now that's what I call commitment to democratic process. To my American readers (which is almost all of you), do vote this November. You would not believe what people will go through here in Ghana (i.e. no food or sleep for the whole day) just to have the chance to vote, even though they know that one vote is inconsequential.

I just sent off an application for data to the Centre for Democratic Development which would really help my thesis. This is my final week in Accra, and I've got one final meeting tomorrow at the Trade Unions Congress but then I'll be bidding farewell to my friends at the Ministries and around Legon. I think, above all, that'll be one of the hardest parts about leaving Ghana. Doing research here has been surprisingly easy, and making contacts went much more smoothly than I had anticipated. Everyone is just so connected either through family connection or friendship or something else. Definitely one of the things I like most about Ghana.

But I'll certainly be glad to get home and watch the Olympics. I am counting down the days to departure in terms of the number of cold showers left (3). I was also just reading about (SPOILER ALERT) Michael Phelps's gold and world record, which is not quite the same as actually watching it. That guy is insane ...