Chapter 52...The day of birth and a day in the life of...

Last Tuesday saw my travelling feet happy again as I packed myself off for a slightly longer than long weekend away! I like to think, after two years out and about in this big wide World, that I'm quite good at this packing light thing, but I still manage to amaze myself everytime at how easily I fill a 30L backpack for just five nights away! As I walked the five minutes from my house to the main road to catch a taxi to the tro park I was cursing myself for stuffing in those extra 'just-in-case' tops and shoes, as I could feel the sweat prickling on my back! I then found myself even more annoyed as I arrived at the tro park to see a Tamale tro pulling away full and en route to the one place I really wanted to be! The protocol here, in true GMT (Ghana Maybe Time) is that you just have to sit and wait for a tro to fill before it departs and it was just my luck that the next Tamale tro to pull up was a 35 seater (this is big)...needless to say on a Tuesday afternoon it took a long time to fill, around one hour forty five minutes to be precise!

Eventually after a nap, a fight (not me) and being dropped at the wrong place I made it to TICCS to meet the EWB for his birthday! We celebrated in style with some 'Western' food at SWAD (crispy noodles and pizza), a variety of beers (Shandy and Star for me, everything else for the EWB), conversations we can't remember and great company (too many names to list here)... 

The next day, after a lie-in and slightly sore head for the EWB, we ventured to my current favourite food joint in Tama - Luxury! We chomped more food and attempted a mass rehydration to prepare ourselves for the adventure ahead... 

Jana has been the home of the EWB for the past seven months since arriving in Ghana. It is the equivalent of a small village, located just outside Tama town itself. When we arrived at 3pm the compound looked like any other in the Northern part of Ghana - a mud brown maze of circular buildings and walls where women were busy cooking, cleaning and caring for children...

Aminatu who is four years old carrying Nasara who is nearly one on her back! She could not tie the cloth herself so some of the older girls had to help her! The EWB says he has seen even smaller girls carrying babies on their backs!

But this compound and this family hold a very special place in the EWB's heart, and rightly so, they have been his Ghana family since he arrived and they have all  worked to build up the most magical of relationships that feels so natural to every single one of them. As we walked nearer to the women who were sat outside  the compound  their faces lit up with joy as they saw the EWB with me in tow! The EWB greeted in Dagbani and engaged in a very impressive small chat with the women who at one point all looked at me and smiled, which gave it away that I had been introduced. They shook my hand with beaming smiles and asked lots of questions all at once, all of which I didn't understand so the EWB had to translate between English and Dagbani, no small task with lots of excitable women around! After enough small talk we excused ourselves to head to the EWB's room located a little further out from the compound, but as is always the case in rural villages in Ghana when a new person arrives, we didn't even manage to unlock the front door before we were swarmed with children ranging from a few months to around sixteen. They are all very used to seeing the EWB around the village, but seeing me for the first time caused quite a stir and we found ourselves spending the next three hours before dinner trying to control a group of fifteen to twenty highly hysterical Ghanaian children, which I secretly thoroughly enjoyed, much to the EWB's amusement and fear!

Some of the children who came to greet the EWB and I as we tried to enter the room!

Something you don't see often on TV back home - smiling, happy African children!

As if Ghanaian children aren't physical enough I decide to introduce 'happy slapping'

One of the girls who must have been around sixteen sat in the tree collecting leaves to be used to cook soup. There were at least three or four other girls in the tree doing the same with absolutely no ropes or form of protection at all!

Is it wrong to have favourites?! I think Aminatu may be mine! Judging by her face though, I'm not sure I'm hers!

As the sun came down I really started to notice and appreciate the differences between my VSO home life compared to the EWB's. In Jana there is no electricity so no lights, fan or fridge.  No charging of phones, I-pods, laptops and cameras. No running water so no flushing toilet, but a long drop instead (luckily contained in a hut with a locking door, I was most impressed) and no powerful shower whenever you fancy it. Once again I found myself asking which Ghanaians I should be living among while I am here - the villagers like these in Jana or the doctors and lecturers like those in Kumbosgo? With that in mind, at 19:30 we strolled across to the compound for dinner using a small hand torch to light up the zig-zagged path back to the compound. We sat inside the coolest and biggest hut to eat our dinner of T-Z, soup and guinea fowl  with Hussain the head of the household  and some of his sons who were home after a long day of farming. I could just about see each thing that I was dipping my right hand into as I was collecting up enough food to fill my mouth full of interesting flavours! The guinea fowl was easier to rip apart than spooning T-Z and soup with your hand and even eating that highlighted such differences between my life of luxury and the EWB's 'down and dirty'/real way of doing things. I would pick up a leg or wing and eat a lot of the flesh from the bone then the EWB would practically consume the rest of the thing by chomping gristle and bone like a true Ghanaian, which just made me cringe! After working my way through what I thought was a decent amount of T-Z for a girl who only eats it once in a blue moon, I was told by Hussain that I must eat more otherwise the women will see it as an insult that there is more than half left. So I took my right hand back to the bowl and scooped up more T-Z rolled it into a ball then dipped it into the soup making sure I took a worthy amount to see some reduction in the pot. In my mind I wanted to leave more food behind so the women who worked so hard to make it and the children who used up so much energy entertaining me all afternoon would be really well fed tonight! I felt almost like I was going against my fellow women by sitting in the cool hut with the men chopping plenty of food when I had no idea what left-overs they would be eating outside, but as I have come to learn - to go against the well formed and understood system of hierarchy and gender roles is one you do at your own perel! So instead I did what I have come to do best in Ghana - bite my tongue and do things their way, which meant I left the compound to head for bed feeling fully fed and with a new found love of T-Z!

The EWB and I stood side-by-side outside the room (under the porch to avoid the start of the rain) brushing our teeth looking out into the village and that's when it really hit me, there were no lights anywhere as far as the eye could see! Not a single building was emitting light into the dark almost star-less sky! The only time this happens in Bolga is when we go through a temporary lights out, so for a split-second a sharp spike of fear ran through me that it is always this dark at night in Jana and no amount of emergency repairs would change that, but that thought soon left when the EWB told me how refreshing he finds it and I managed to see the darkness in a whole new light! Following an evening of rain we slept comfortably without a fan and woke naturally to sunlight shining in through the windows. It crossed my mind that the twelve hour countdown now began until the sun went down and the place was plunged into darkness again! Living by natural light for just one evening really did feel refreshing, not as refreshing though as outdoor bathing with a bucket of warm water, the sky up above, women and children chatting away in the compound and a slight Ghana breeze whipping past the drops of water on your body to cause a shiver! 

Once dressed and packed, my short visit to Jana was nearly over, but not before a breakfast of Koko porridge and kosay. I had never tried Koko before so this was a totally new experience for me and one that will take some serious getting used to! The sharp, spicy taste of the porridge is not one I would choose to start my day with, but luckily kosay being far blander I managed to chop enough of that to keep the women happy. The EWB and I then said our goodbyes and I was given many well wishes for my onward journey and told I must come back to Jana, which I promised I would. I jumped into the EWB's air conditioned work pick-up with the radio pumping some well known tunes and sped off back to Tama with it's lights, water, doctors and lecturers and very own different character to that of Jana! Leaving the compound; it's people; it's lack of English; it's rickety old tractor and a spectacular insight into a whole new way of life behind me, I really can see how that is home and how that is Ghana truly at its most raw and its best...until next time Jana...!

Chapter 51...The weekend with funerals to greet, books to be read, motos to be ridden and food to be fed!

Without trying to make everyone back home jealous, I have had yet another phenomenal weekend in Ghana and also managed to regain my feeling of peace and calm, which I am so thankful for! My stress over 'life changing decisions' is far behind me, after some amazing chats over the weekend in which clarity, faith and anticipation were found!

My 'hard' work last week was rewarded with a half day on Friday when I raced my moto to Diplomatt for lunch with the EWB. We chopped shredded chicken with rice and salad while sweating in the humid afternoon sun and catching up on life since we last saw each other. After the EWB's 3:10am start that morning to travel to Bolga from Wa we decided to head back to Kumbosgo to chill under the fan, cook pizza and chips for dinner and catch a blissful early night!

Saturday morning was spent contently perched on the edge of a patio chair, drinking tea in my hoodie, reading my book and soaking up the rare greyness of an overcast Ghanaian sky. As I sat looking up at the fast moving clouds I wondered whether those clouds had also drifted over all the people out there in the World who I love very dearly and miss even more! The EWB, after a well earned lie-in, came to join me in my intermittent book reading and day-dreaming on the front porch before we decided at 11am to start the day with an egg 'n' bread breakfast...

We then had to greet the funeral of Janet's brother, Janet being the woman who runs the local shop that I frequent at least once a day! The funeral service was most interesting and extremely different to traditional Western funerals. There was singing and dancing, speeches, prayers, money giving and the body in a windowed coffin in the middle of it all! Rachel, Hannah, the EWB and I then got invited/asked/ordered to go to Janet's house to chop meat. We chomped chicken meat and sank alvaros while sweating buckets in the small, very green room we found ourselves sat in. 

 The EWB and I then hopped on my moto for a road trip to Bongo, which is found 15km out of Bolga. As we rode into the 'village/town' my heart started racing slightly at the sight of rocks, greenery and views spanning into the distance! We rode through part of Bongo, which is around the same size as Zebilla and Lawra with the usual Ghanaian offerings of bike repair shops, spots, chop bars, shops, seamstresses etc. As we rode out of Bongo we saw on the right hand side a small dam and lake, which were just too tempting in the beaming afternoon sun to pass by! I rode the moto up to the water through small paths created in the surrounding farmland and we found some rocks to perch on under some small shade! 

We watched local women clean clothes as children splashed around in the cooling water screaming with delight as their body temperatures plummeted! To say we were chilled (but still sweating) is an understatement, but unfortunately this moment was crushed when a shouting man came rushing to the waterfront brandishing a stick and throwing stones at the children! It became apparent that he was father to two of the boys, aged around eight and ten, and he was most angry that the boys were having fun with their friends in the water, when he clearly wanted them to be elsewhere! On some occassions when I have witnessed a child being beaten with a stick, as I did that day, the person inflicting the pain has calmed down their behaviour or even stopped when spotting me watching them! I do not know the reason for this - shame, embarrassment, respect - but this man did not care at all that his actions were being witnessed by the two of us and he continued to chase the crying boys away from the water and in the direction of home! As you can imagine, witnessing something like that provoked a conversation on physical punishment and interrupting Ghanaians who are caning which sparked some interesting thoughts, especially how 'normal' it is becoming to witness children in Ghana being caned, smacked and physically punished and how frequently I am witnessing children themselves doing the same to their peers!

So as the sun came down we headed for home, with a quick stop for a beer and meat at 'Feel at Home.' We walked through the front door just as Rachel and Hannah were serving up a magnificent vegetable curry with rice and naan bread - yummy! Our spontaneous  Saturday night dinner party was much fun with Ellie having travelled in from Zebilla for the weekend and lots of talk of home! The EWB and I prepared a mango and Fan Ice (vanilla ice cream) dessert, which we served in a big silver bowl with seven spoons sticking out from the melting ice cream (no my 'cooking' skills have not improved)!

Sunday started brilliantly with a porridge, cinammon and honey french toast breakfast (courtesy once again of Rachel and Hannah), which was such a treat, but meant it was then the EWB and I's turn to cook dinner that night! So in the afternoon we strolled the short distance to 'Feel at Home' for a refreshing couple of drinks and some super hot, eye-watering meat kebabs! We purchased the things we needed to make bean burgers, then I found myself in charge in the kitchen with beans and rice on the boil, onions and garlic chopped and oil in the pan frying! The burgers went down well with some small suggestions for next time!

The end of the weekend was spent with a very fun Skype call to Canada and the usual 5am Monday morning moto ride to the Metro Mass station when it came time to say goodbye to the EWB for another week! I feel like I woke at 07:30 with my mojo back after a stressed out dip last weekend, which just goes to show the power of communication, time well spent and just calming down and ordering those racing thoughts in your mind! With lots to look forward to over the next month, including another two week holiday with Abbie, there really is only one thing I am dying to happen/hear about/find out about in the near future...

Chapter 50...The four month Ghanaversary!

As we all know the 'once upon a time' part of Hannahs volunteer story lets just skip right to the current chapter...

Hannah has been living in Ghana for four months now and month four was  definitely the most unexpectedly eventful so far! Hannah's life did a pretty good job of throwing her off the path she thought she was firmly set on and re-routed her to one that is full of uncertainty and unknowns, but with that adventure and excitement! Hannah started month four in a very tranquil, calm, peaceful place and ended it confused, stressed and unsure...but she definitely wouldn't change any of that for the World! 

One month ago Hannah could be found perfectly happy spending a weekend cleaning the house, reading books, listening to music, drinking tea on the veranda and soaking in everything that her surroundings had to offer her. Her mind, for the first time in a very long time, felt de-cluttered! There were no thoughts and questions to do with her past or her future, she was content for the first time ever to just live a quiet life of routine in the here and now for however long that may last...

But in true Hannah style life had other ideas (maybe because it knows that peaceful, chilled and calm are not things that happen often to Hannah) that she did not see coming at all...a Canadian whirlwind entered her life and took everything she thought she knew, spun it around then plonked it back down again all jumbled up! At first Hannah's tranquil head space was fine with this, because with it came new-ness, excitement and wonder! But then the whirlwind turned into more of a tornado and her tranquil head space became disjointed, panicked and confused! 

Hannah suddenly had to think about her past and her future,  two things she had  completely given up spending time thinking about, she had to contemplate what she wanted from the next few years of her life as well as what she wanted in the here and now! Hannah was one turmoiled being as questions were being asked but her mind would give no straight-forward answers! She came to the conclusion that the Universe should answer the questions for her so Hannah finally found some space and time on the morning of her four month Ghanaversary to gather her thoughts and put her ideas for her life out there! Now she will just have to wait for the time when all those burning questions about the path her future will take are somehow answered...

In the meantime Hannah will try to find again that peaceful place she was at one month ago, but also enjoy and incorporate into that  the different type of calm and happiness that this new Canadian whirlwind brings to her life! And Hannah can do this quite easily because she trusts whole-heartedly that the right decision will be made in the end, as just like in the fairytales she read as a little girl, Hannah hopes that this long drawn-out version of her volunteer story will end with a 'happily ever after...'

Chapter 49...The weekend livin' it up in Lawra!

Lawra is the current home of a small town girl from Iowa who left Chicago four months ago to find herself a small town girl in Lawra, Upper West Ghana. Lawra has a population of 10,000, approximately one-fifth, one-sixth or one-seventh (depending on your source) of that of Bolga, making it a pretty small town in comparison! Lawra is infamous for it's musical instrument production, particularly the xylophone. Lawra town has a small market, bike repair 'shop,' seamstresses, spots, a Total garage, barbers, primary and secondary schools and on the edge of town is 'Lawsec' the secondary boarding school where this small town girl lives among 1,800 teenage boys and girls. Lawra is located on the very edge of Ghana bordering Burkina Faso. 

My long weekend livin' it up in Lawra started on Friday morning when Anthony and I piled his car high with our bags, a computer, Alomo Bitter, water and bread to start our road trip from Bolga to the Upper West. We filled the car with 50 Cedis of petrol and spent the next five hours trying to avoid the potholes of the newly improved Bolga to Wa road! 

After a short break in Tumu to stretch our legs we arrived in Eremon (15 minutes drive from Lawra) just in time for lunch - meat and kosay - fried beans. We/I decided that I should drive the last part of the journey to Abbie's house in Lawra after Anthony had (out of respect and courtesy) enjoyed a few calabashes of pito and alomo bitter whiskey! My first driving experience in Ghana faired well despite Anthony's cries for me to 'watch out' as I dipped the car into yet another pothole and to 'stay on the road' as I swerved to miss something! Personally I think his vision had been slightly blurred by all the alcohol and my driving was perfectly fine!

So my weekend livin' it up in Lawra consisted of...

• Food, food and more food - vegetable pasta, quiche, pizza, peanut butter and choc cookies (twice), mangoes and bread smothered with groundnut paste and jelly (jam for all those English readers out there)!

Tomato and alefu quiche - yummy even with burnt bits!

Tomato and alefu pizza - delicious!

• Bike rides into Lawra, visits to the market, bike repair shop, seamstress and spots.

The small market in Lawra, the main one is held elsewhere!

• A moto ride to the mushroom rocks, which turned out to be one mushroom rock surrounded by lots of other rather ordinary looking rocks!

THE mushroom rock! Not quite sure what pose I'm trying to pull off here!

And so as I enter my fifth month in Ghana I can say that it has truly been another brilliant weekend (topped off by a car ride home with 4 Ghanaians squashed in the back, a goat and two chickens) and I'm very much looking forward to the next one already...

Chapter 48...The 'life changing decisions!'

How cliche to start with this quote, but it really does sum up perfectly what my thinking is at the moment...

"Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get!"

One thing I have come to love most about life in the past couple of years is how it can seem so sorted and together one minute then so distorted and chaotic the next! The reasons for this are endless - work, love, family, the future - but the majority of them involve what we look at to be a 'life changing decision' that we must get right or the consequences will be tragic! Is it really the case that when we come to a crossroads in life, if we take one path and not the other then the regrets we may live with will eat away at us until we take our last breath of life?! I don't think so, because we can only ever be on one path at any one time and the reasons we used to rationalise our choice for that path were strong and full of confidence when we made the decision, making that path the right choice at that time!

I have battled with myself endlessly about some of the 'life changing decisions' I have made, but each and every one of them were the right ones because they have led me to be the risk-taking person that I like to think I am now! 'Life changing decisions' are put in our way at sometimes the most inconvenient of times, but we can only ever follow our gut instinct on them then never look back, which is easier said than done...I found myself looking back recently on some of my 'life changing decisions' and pondering the 'what ifs!' When I let my mind wander down the alternative path of my life I realised that was a path I would never have wanted to take anyway! Even though at the time I felt I was making such an important decision and I was weighing up every option, now it seems like all my decisions were so obvious to come to, because every one of them feels so right and I followed my gut instinct and my heart (even though I didn't know this at the time) on each of them! I have managed (for the time being anyway and I am fully aware that this could change in an instant) to stop searching for more and to stop questioning how I fit into societies plans for people, and I am slowly building up the confidence in myself and my decision making to take the time out to think about all angles and consequences, but to then run down the path that I have chosen with my heart wide open!

A lot of people do not understand my decision to live my life as chapters - Ghana being the one I am in right now, but it works for me and it means I am extremely excited already as to what the next chapter of my life will be post Ghana...!  This week I found myself describing my future as a blank canvas, because there are an endless number of places I can go and things I can do after Ghana and at some point something will happen to help me make my decision for the next chapter, however long that will be! Obviously I have a rough idea of what I would like from the next few years and then more generally from my life as a whole, but I am more than happy to be led through the next chapter by whatever force wants to lead me - work, love, family, the future!

Recently a new indirect 'life changing decision' has come my way and it has made me consider all of the people in my life who I would turn to for advise on it! I know exactly what the majority of you would say (much of it justified) and I know exactly what I would say to any of you in  my situation...that there is no one right way to live this thing called life! Each person has to base their decisions on the knowledge, information, thoughts and feelings they have at the time and once that decision is made they need to remove all potential for regrets and enjoy the path - good and bad parts - that they find themself on! There is no such thing as entrapment, we are all free to change our path in an instant if we decide it is not the one we want to be on, we just need to have the courage to go against the grain and live life for the here and now! So there should be nothing stopping us from following our heart, head and gut combined and jumping at the chance to make 'life changing decisions' then revelling in the initial unknown that comes with it! After all we are all here for such a short snippet of time when you consider what has come before and what will come after so we have to make that snippet of time the happiest, most courageous, most fulfilling that we can...!

Chapter 47...The weekend with homes to paint, feasts to cook, spots to visit and watchmen to cane!

What a weekend! This one started at 19:30 on Friday evening when a few of us vols plus the EWB headed to 'Feel at Home' spot for after work drinks! We sat under the stars in the pitch black chopping on guinea fowl and mixing our drinks!

After three hours sleep Friday night, Saturday needed to be a chilled one and what better way to start it than sat on the sofa wearing my hoodie with a fried egg sandwich and a hot chocolate while watching the rain fall! 

Laylo playing nice for once!

By lunchtime the rain had stopped and we decided it was time to 'start' the day so a trip to the market was in order. After rushing around the market in the scorching hot midday sun we popped into 'Good Taste' for a red red lunch then hopped on the moto to head for home! A DVD evening with pesto pasta dinner was the perfect way to end the day!

Yesterday started at 8am with a convoy moto trip to Sirigu Baby's Home  where a few of us vols decided to pitch in and help decorate some of the baby's rooms. The babies in the home all have no mothers, as they died during or just after giving birth. They are taken into the baby's home, where they are cared for with the help of a family member - grandmother or aunt, until they reach the age of three when they are then re-entered into their family home. 

The EWB and I were given 'Mr Tickle' to paint! 

Prosper helping me with the painting of Mr Tickle!

The painting was already there on the wall so all we had to do really was touch up the colours! Somehow though with the help of Prosper I managed to smudge most of my side of 'Mr Tickle' and lose the competition for best paint job!

After such a busy morning, the afternoon and evening consisted of listening to music, deep and meaningful conversations, sheep kebabs, Star and alvaro at 'Feel at Home' and tomato and alefu risotto! And what better way to end the weekend than with a 5am orange and pink sunrise moto ride this morning to drop the EWB at the tro park!

Chapter 46...The bane of my life!

This award goes to none other than Godwin, the night watchman who over the past few months has done nothing but irritate and anger me! Some of my frustrations are simply because he is a drunk, annoying man who doesn't even do the job that he is paid to do and continuously abuses our kindness! The flip side of this is that he is clearly an intelligent person who for reasons I will never know, has slipped into a way of life where he eats scraps of food from our bin and cannot survive a day without drinking!

Godwin (who's age varies on different documents he shows us from 30 something to 50 something must be in his 40's by our guess) has recently married a young woman/girl who he refers to as either his 'wife' or 'small girl.' She speaks no English and has spent the past few nights sleeping outside our house with her new husband! Prior to her arrival into our bizarre 'family' we had to endure a month of various animals living in the compound, all of which were intended for use as a dowry. The birds had their own body clock that was never in sync with sunrise or sunset so at any time of the day we could get the fright of our lives as one of them would erupt! 

Godwin also has no hesitation in asking us for money on a very regular basis. When I joined the house he was nearing the end of paying Vic and Rach back 70 Cedis that he used to buy a bike. I was cautious at first to join or start such a process, especially after witnessing how drunk Godwin can get, because it meant he would be tied to the house for as long as it would take him to pay the money back! But against my better judgement Rach and I leant him 65 Cedis, which he will be paying back until September. 

Now anyone who knows 'the rage' or fiesty side in me can imagine pretty well how this scenario went last night... As Rach and I were sat in the living room chatting away Godwin's wife strolls into the compound along with another woman who we've never seen before! Having made it very clear to Godwin last week that no-one other than him should be entering the compound without letting us know beforehand, I could feel my blood starting to boil! His wife started to cook his dinner, which in itself infuriated me, because he is perfectly capable of cooking it himself instead of heading off to drink himself into a stupor! So when he finally decided to grace us with his presence, stinking of pito, I couldn't contain myself any longer...I ran through with him in a heated discussion the list of things that he had done recently in which he was completely abusing how kind Rachel and I had been to him, how he had gone against every single rule we had set and how he had not spent the money we leant him to buy seeds on seeds, but on drink and his wedding instead! I told him that I would have no problem in firing him and telling him we never wanted to see him again!

Following this conversation I then found myself feeling so angry, but not at Godwin, at myself! Had I completely lost sight of where I am? Had my Western side taken over my more compassionate and thoughtful Ghanaian side? Had I just told him that his wife cannot stay here to cook for him, when he has been known to eat meat from our bin that is green and beyond edible? But then I remembered the times Godwin has been so drunk he hasn't noticed people coming and going from the compound or even me riding my bike straight past his head one evening! I remembered how he tried to trick us into putting his pay up after Vic left and how clever he is with numbers! I remembered how no other house in our neighbourhood has to talk to their night watchman, as they don't drink, ask for money and invite strangers into the compounds where they work! 

So it seems my constant battle with myself over what to do with Godwin will remain, as will my constant battle with Godwin! But all I know is that for some reason he has been put here in my life right now, so I must be learning something from him, even if I have no idea what that may be yet...!

Chapter 45...The Tamale 'Triathlon!'

Running (stomach), Tennis and Swimming were the three components of my energetic weekend with one of the EWB's in Tamale! On Friday afternoon, after spending the morning running back and forth between my bedroom and the toilet then downing water and rehydration sachets, I braved the three hour tro journey down to Tama where a super chilled, super fun weekend lay ahead...

Friday evening consisted of the EWB boys cooking dinner, which meant portion sizing was completely off, around twenty chilli's were used, but a great tasting meal was made and we all left feeling well fed (having discussed extensively the pronunciation of 'oregano' and the ruthless-ness of English women)!

Saturday started after a well-earned lie-in followed by lunch - baguette, salad and pizza at Luxury (definitely a new Tama fave of mine)! From there it was off to VRA tennis courts where we planned for me to test out my tennis knee to see whether I could even play! Unfortunately it wasn't my tennis knee that let me down on the day, but my complete lack of practise over the past few years, which resulted in the majority of my shots going either long or into the net! Luckily though when there's a tennis coach on the other side, most of my shots were salvaged to allow play to continue and I wasn't made to run around too much in the midday sun! 

My post tennis glow!

After 45 minutes of sweltering hot tennis we hit Bigiza Hotel where we paid 5GHC (the best money I've spent so far in Ghana) to use the swimming pool! I was literally squealing with excitement as I dipped my toe into the not-too-cool, yet refreshing water and as my head went under that was the moment I had been waiting three and a half months in Ghana for - heaven! We found ourselves unexpectedly included in a game of 'volleyball' with around 15 Ghanaians who were already in the pool and we had a brilliant afternoon listening to them joking and chatting ("you swim like a tilapia"), having underwater swimming competitions and lobbing the ball over the fence  to get a breather from the intensity of a Ghanaian mans throw (especially when trying to catch the ball while treading water in the deep end)!

Leaving the pool had to be done in stages so as to lessen the blow!

 So after a breath-takingly energy consuming day we walked back to TICCS Guesthouse... 

...in the cool evening air with every good intention of showering, getting dressed and heading out for dinner! Instead we found ourselves flaking out on the bed for a couple of hours sharing I-pod earphones as we laughed and cried our way through Shane Koyczan's album of poems. Eventually around 9pm with rumbling stomachs we strolled the five minutes to SWAD fast food restaurant where we ordered chicken massala and a chicken burger then it was back to TICCS for a much needed early night after such a late one the night before!

Sunday earned us another lie-in (waking up after check out), an egg 'n' bread breakfast for the EWB then it was the end of a terrific triathlon weekend in Tamale and the start of the three hour tro ride back to Bolga for me! As I was tro-ing it back on the monotonous Bolga-Tamale road I found myself reflecting on life and it's funny way of surprising me exactly when I think it can't anymore! I received this quote as a text last week and at this precise moment in time I couldn't agree with it more...

"Sometimes the slightest things change the direction of our lives, the merest breath of a circumstance, a random moment that connects like a meteorite striking the Earth. Lives have swivelled and changed direction on the strength of a chance remark..."

Chapter 44...The reason I'm here!

Recently there has been a small miracle in Ghana - I have actually started to slowly make some progress at work (I know can you believe it?!) Now this progress has been very small indeed, but in Ghana, and especially at the GES any progress at all is considered a great achievement (in my eyes anyway)! This week I have... 

...met with two people (there should have been six) from my newly formed CPTeam (Community Participation Team) and we have put some dates in the diary to meet to set baselines for PTA's and SMC's and to plan a week of refresher workshops for some or all PTA's and SMC's in Talensi Nabdam district. 

...helped a newly appointed colleague to type up a 21 page report on a school he recently visited to assess.
...attended the districts Educon (Education Conference) at Gbeogo School for the Deaf. This is where the GES is given the opportunity to share some facts and figures on how schooling and education is working out in Talensi Nabdam with their schools, communities, chiefs and elders. 

One of the paramount Chiefs in Talensi Nabdam!

Some local school boys providing some music and dancing entertainment! It seems they forgot to get changed out of their pyjamas in the morning though (I know this is such a daddyo joke, but I couldn't help it)!

Some school girls from my local school 'St Martins' who put on a flip-flop dance for the top table!

Me with one of the girls from the school who loved my camera and teaching me sign language!

...finally (only six weeks late) held my JIM (Joint Introductory Meeting) with VSO, GES and LCD (Link Community Development)! There should have been around 20-25 people at my JIM, all there to discuss me and my plans for the rest of my time in Ghana! However instead of the expected 25, we started with five and eventually grew to a respectable group size of eight! I myself was two hours late so I could not be annoyed with others for not showing up at all! The reason for this was the rain, which I have now discovered puts a holt to life entirely when it comes during the day! We have mainly had evening and night storms so far, which haven't effected moto riding, but when the rains come during the day being on a moto on a dirt track road is not the wisest of moves so most people do not travel around until the rain has stopped! The day of my JIM it rained from 08:30 to 11:00, which meant a morning of finishing my book, another one I would highly recommend - 'Don't Lets Go To The Dogs Tonight.'
...facilitated the first of three days of Girl Child Training at Pelungu Primary School! This was a great opportunity to work with two of the officers from GES - Stephen and Daniel - who did really well running the majority of activities on the day! 

Stephen and Daniel running the show at Pelungu Primary!

I ended the day feeling extremely proud of the work they did and totally pumped for the rest of our training! Thursday will consist of the second day, but luckily between now and then we have tomorrow off, as it is African Union Day so weather permitting there may be some pot painting at Sirigu as entertainment for the day...!