Sal in Ghana!: HALF WAY...crikey!

Unbelievably I have now been in Ghana for three months. This comes as a little bit of a shock to me, as despite feeling like I’ve been here forever I can’t quite believe it’s May! In my head May means exams and summer being just around the corner, but how can summer be just around the corner when I left in February?! On hearing that it had snowed in the UK the other day I was not surprised – it confirmed what I have always believed; it is still February in England!

It is officially the rainy season in Ghana now, although this affects Accra less than anywhere else. This is good; I am not a fan of the rain, even if it does mean slightly cooler weather. When it rains we have to rush around shutting all our windows and if it rains at night this means getting up and running around the house. Twice now I have been woken by Maria in my room doing just that! With the windows shut the room feeling even hotter than normal without a little breeze and after the recent flooding near-flooding-event (only stopped by use of many, many old towels!) I live in fear that this will happen whilst we are sleeping blissfully aware!! I’d rather just take the sun, everyday thank you, than deal with that drama on a regular basis…! Today it rained from around 10.30am and I thought I was going to be trapped at the school it was raining so hard! The kids go happily crazy and because the nursery teacher was away one classroom had all the youngest in at one point which was... a madhouse of screaming, crying, jumping off tables and attacking the poor, defenseless obruni (me)! Eventually, I braved the weather and took a tro tro home...!!

The school with all the rain, and little Betty looking on!

Me standing in our yard about to go to House 3 wearing MY JUMPER FOR THE FIRST TIME!!! Exciting stuff...!

Not much has changed here since my last blog post actually – I am still working at both the school and house 3. The school is still practicing for their graduation on some days which is actually getting rather cute. There are a select number of children who have made up the “choir” and they sing a few happy songs such as a bad-English version of “My Grandfather’s Clock” (I failed to correct Auntie Diana) and a nice song called “See the Wooden Soldiers”. A group of children, mostly the outsiders, have also the task of reciting poems or prayers and there is a nice little dance type thing to the “the farmers wants a wife” song. The Ghanaian version goes farmer, wife, child, dog, cat, mouse and cheese and at the end the cheese stands alone followed by “and the cheese… IS THE WINNER!!” repeated three times with the children jumping up at the last part throwing their arms in the air. They love it! There is also a dance that fifteen of the kids do to two church songs. This is pretty damn adorable and even I know the actions now! I am looking forward to being able to see the event itself in July and will definitely be filming the whole thing!

(above photo: Abraham, Dennis (outsider) and Isaak. Below: the farmer and the wife and dancing)

Below: sitting on Abraham with the other Abraham on my lap!

Anna occasionally comes to the school with me and more often than not we find ourselves at Irene’s afterwards for a coke and a sausage roll or meat pie! This is a newly discovered treat as Irene makes the pies and cooks them right then and there, and she really does make verrrry good pastry. For all you who know me very well you know how I enjoy pasty! Meat pies in particular are a bit of a thing here actually. For you avid blog readers, of sure there are many (!), you may remember the picture of the fan ice man who sells meat pies and small cakes – however these are nothing on Irene’s as for a start they often have very little meat in them and then it’s just lots of dry pastry. Anna had one a few weeks ago that only contained a small solitary piece of onion… Irene’s, as well as being around 5 times as expensive, are farrrrr superior and always stuffed full of corned beef (tastes better than it sounds) and her sausage rolls are also better anything I have found on the street!

Whilst I’m on the subject of food I also enjoy these small fried doughnut type balls called something that sounds like “bo-fru” although we are not quite sure! There are some very nice ones sold near the Home in the mornings for 20 pesos for one (10p!) and are kind of a cross between hot doughnuts and muffins. Yum yum! I also now visit the lovely fruit lady near work every day or sometimes twice a day for at least two pawpaw for 50 pesos or possibly a mango… a lady on the walk to work also sells pawpaw ready cut up so it has been known for me to buy from her too… and occasionally eat Anna’s if she can’t manage it…

So ANYWAY, love to everyone in England!

Love, Sal xxxxxxxxxx

Below: the madness of House 3 and Augustina wearing a headscarf!