Too tall Obruni!!

It's only been a few days since my last post but there's already more to add. While I like being tall, it would be nice to be a few inches shorter for the next 27 months. Tro-tro's are not equipped for people of my size. Tro's are the main source of transportation so depending on the day, I might spend 2-5 hours or more in a tro. 4 people usually squeeze into a 3 person seat and when confined in such a way, my knees are crammed into the hard seat in front of me. On market days (this varies depending on your town) a tro might carry 15 people with enough groceries to feed their respective family for the next week. Yesterday, my legs were pulled to my chest so as not to crush the groceries beneath my seat. Luckily, I don't have to focus on the discomfort in my legs for long because each bump in the road gives me a nice bump to either the side or top of my head (depends on the seat). Honestly, I'm not too uncomfortable but it does bug me that I have to duck in order to see the beatiful scenery out the window.

On another note, Obruni is the non-pejorative (I think) way to saw "white man," in Twi. Everywhere I go, men, women and children alike will wave and say Obruni. A basic conversation will go as follows.

Ghanaian: Hello Obruni
Me: Hello, how are you?
Ghanaian: I am fine. Thank you. You are welcome.
Me: Thank you

No joke. I'll have this exact conversation at least ten times a day. I've notices that more tenured volunteers hyper-annunciate their english words. I've started to do the same. I never noticed how much we jumble our words together when speaking.

16 minutes left to summarize the past 4 days. Our training group woke up at 5am on Saturday so we could all be ready to leave at 6am for our respective "Vision Quest," sites. My site was only about 2 hours away so the 8 trainees in my tro spent most of the day sitting in Koforidua (Eastern Region) walking through the market, trying new street foods and getting to know our Vision Quest leaders. Walking through the market was a TRIP!!! It is very mazelike with narrow pathways and dead end paths leading in every direction. I walked through while looking for bits of cloth and I was walking amongst dozens of children (all yelling "Obruni" or "big man"). Some tables held fruits and veggies while others held HUGE snails. These thinks are nasty!! The shell is the size of my fist and the snails are crawling around the tables while waiting to be bought. Very different from Safeway I must say.



That night, 6 of us took an hour long tro ride to a PCV's house in Abompe for the night. A woman was celebrating her birthday while a number of volunteers were enjoying their "one year in Ghana," celebration. It was a nice opportunity to get stories from volunteers while providing new music and american stories in return. This house was 4 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms and had an unbelievable view. We've been assured that it's the nicest house in Peace Corps Ghana.


The next day, we went back to Koforidua, wandered for a bit before going another hour to Elizabeth's site in Nkurankan. We mostly sat around and chatted for the day. This was our first opportunity to relax since leaving the states and we all took full advantage. Aside from a brief market trip, we all laid around for the day.

Yesterday, I finally made it to my Vision Quest leader's site. She lives with a family right in the bush. There is no electricity or running water and we enjoyed our second day of buck bathing. Literally fill a bucket with water, dump a cup of water over your head, lather up, rinse and you're done. It feels AMAZING after walking around in the heat. Stephanie (my VQ host) lives with a family. Got to see the family make soap, make glass beads, cook fufu and more. I got to help cut grass for the grasscutters and helped take care of the 14 month old twins (they crawled around at will so I'd pick one up if he was crying). I loved this site and would love to go back.



I'm running out of time. We're back in Koforidua, we leave today for Kumasi and from there we go to Techiman for the remainder of our 10 week training.

Love you all,

Ira

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