It's been too long...

Well, since I haven't written in a long time I think it's time to catch you up on my time in Ghana. After leaving Kumasi, I went straight to the Volta region with Save the Nation Sight Clinic outreach staff. We had about a 4 hour drive to the town we were working in, Hohoe. The drive was beautiful and for the the most part a smooth ride( I am referring to the roads). We arrived in the afternoon. The place we stayed was called Pacific Guest House. We got our room assignments and checked out them rooms.  They were quite cute. We had what they called a chalet, so we had a sitting room area with a small box tv and a couple chairs, then a decent sized bathroom, and then our room with a king bed. I shared the room with Kamry, a pre-med student from Tennessee. We hit it off very well.  The other volunteers checked out their rooms then we decided we wanted to see the town we were staying in. So we all went for a walk. There were a lot of cute little shops that lined both sides of the lstreet. Food stands, fabric stores, Internet cafe, all the things we needed were on this main road.  Then after a long walked decided we'd seen enough for the day and headed back.  We were told to be ready for breakfast and outreach by 6 am so we were in bed early that night.  The week of outreach went very fast. The first morning we all met in the lobby of the hotel for a quick meeting before hitting the road. We got assigned our teams and then set off. I am assigned to be with James and Regina. James is 26 and a nurse who went to school at the University of Ghana, and Regina is a 23 year old student. Who knew at this moment in time how much I would come to love these two people. So day one of outreach went well. It was a slow day so I had a chance to talk to my team members a lot. After outreach we got back and ate some lunch/ dinner and then went for a three hour walk around town. I bought mama some fabric to make her a blouse and also some to get a bag made for myself. After we got back, we gathered the staff and all played some spoons( but with dice instead). Once they got the hang of this game, they all absolutely loved it. A couple of the guys held about 10 cards in hand while only supposed to have 4, but we let it slide since they were beginners.  When James would reach in for a dice, he often grabbed more than one on accident and we all really got a kick out of this. He's quite a character. Then after we had enough of cards we all hit our beds for some sleep.  Day two of outreach with James and Regina began with some bread and butter for breakfast. This was the first time since being in Ghana that I have had butter on anything! It was a surprise. We were a little delayed this morning because there was a rain storm that we wanted to wait out before leaving. So we all sat in our breakfast area and talked until it cleared up an hour later. We got dropped off at outreach and Chris joined us today. Chris is another volunteer who is a student at a school in Massachusetts. He is an English major. Today was slow because of the rain so we had a nice time chatting. I talked to Chris and James most of the time while working on visual acuity with Chris. We talked a lot about differences in education and jobs between our countries. After outreach we went back for some dinner. Tonight we had jolloff rice(red spicy rice) with some spaghetti noodles. Then I went back to my room and took a two hour nap. After waking up, I went for a walk into town with the other volunteers and while in town we met some other obronis! This means white people. There were three girls from California working with children in the same town we were in.  We met up with them for a drink at a little "spot" aka bar, and chatted for a while before heading back to our hotel.  A plus about today was the shower this morning cooling off the air! There was a nice temperature drop that felt so good.  Day three of outreach was in a church surrounded by schools. There were small school children running around all day, playing outside and peeking through the windows to see the white girl sitting inside. They kept creeping in closer and closer until James would joke around with them and tell them to leave me alone while working. Then when I had a little break I went out by them and played for a little while. I also took some pictures with them. They are all so adorable, shouting obroni and tugging on my hands and arms. They all want to be smiled at and asked their name so once I ask one their name I just prepare myself for them to all shout their names at me, competing with the others to shout louder so I hear them.  After this I had to use the restroom. There aren't usually any around except people's personal toilets, so I had to walk to a neighbors place and asked to use their toilet, and of course they said no problem. I've gotten pretty good at squatting, it feels normal now. So after I thanked him for allowing me to use his bathroom we began chatting. He asked me if I was hungry and I really was! I hadn't eaten since 6 am and it was now about 2 so he offered to go grab me something. I told him anything would do so he went and came back with a sack of crackers and Malta for myself, Regina and James. Malta is made by Guinness and it is a sweet malt beverage. I was not a fan of it but we thanked him for it because it was such a nice gesture. That is how a lot of people are here. They will just bring you small food items just because they want to show their appreciation. After our snack, a mother with an adorable 2 year old little girl came in and she walked right up to me to be held. She was absolutely precious and I held her while her mother was getting her eyes checked. Then we took a picture together(my current profile picture on Facebook) then she had to leave. But she totally made my day. Outreach was now over for the day so we packed up and headed back. We ate some dinner then called it a night. Thursday June 7: Our outreach today was at a tiny little church tucked back in some beautiful mountains.  While waiting for patients to come I sat and read some of my book in the sun. I finally got a little color. Then went back inside and did visual acuity for the patients. While doing this, a huge bug crawled past me. It was a centipede the size of an eye glass case. So gross, but I then attempted to pick it up with a stick and then they told me to quit because it was poisonous. Yuck! After seeing more patients a nice lady brought us a plate with mangos and a knife to eat. Oh, and i can't forget to share that I ate red-red for dinner. It is a combination of beans with gerrie(Parmesan cheese like stuff but tastes different) with a bread roll. It was quite yummy but Regina got me too much so I couldn't finish it.  Then James wanted to make a video with my phone so he did and it is quite funny. I will be making a video when I get home of all my clips and it will definitely be a part. So after this day of work, we went back and I took a nap and slept straight through dinner. Oops. I must have been tired because I never skip meals here! Then when I woke up from my nap I walked to town with Kamry and we went to the Internet cafe for about 30 minutes. After that we went back to the hotel and played more cards with the staff. We've got them really loving card games! Then Carly and I taught James some magic card tricks and he just loved them. Carly and I were laughing so hard I was crying all night. Such a good time. Oh yeah, better introduce Carly! She is a student from canada! She came with another volunteer, Zoe who is also from Canada.  June 8: I woke up this morning for another bread and butter breakfast with tea. I swear I will not eat bread ever again once returning home. It's all I have been eating I feel like. Well other than rice and noodles and some fruit here and there. Anyways, we then left for another outreach. This one we set up under a tree next to a small church. James did his consulting inside though. When I was done with doing e visual acuity of patients James asked me to come join him inside to keep him company and to show me some things with patients. We then went outside by Regina and I was going to give James his bracelet Kamry and I made him out of fabric then she snatched it. Her and James played games all day trying to get the bracelet from each other. Apparently Regina wanted one also! We had also given one to Mohammed. they both loved them and told us they would wear them forever. I also have a matching one to theirs. Then we left to go pick up the other teams and it began raining. At the last stop we got out and ate in the church. A woman who lived nearby had brought (ground up corn and fermented) and some baked fish. The kenkey has a very bitter taste and I do not like it at all and the fish is not what you expect either. It a full fish, head and tail attached and they eat it all but the bones. They also brought us some spicy stew with vegetable. And since I didn't like any of this I skipped lunch for the day and had to wait on dinner. I ate a snack of peanut butter when we got back to hold me over.  I think it's time for me to explain some other staff and their personalities.  James: super funny, very chatty and outgoing, he's got that big smile with dimples where his whole face just lights up when he laughs Regina: more shy, super sweet and loves to give James a hard time  Emmanuel: another super outgoing guy, really smiley and sweet. Him and James joke around a lot with each other. Gloria: very giggly lady who is very talkative with me Then there is Yayra, Martha, Nawal, Mohammed, and Eric who are all shy but still very nice people.  Auntie Theresa: awesome lady who cooks all our meals Karim and frank: our awesome drivers! They are both very sweet guys. Alright: so on the way home after eating the meal given to us, Emmanuel, the one always teasing, says that James is single and ready to mingle and that he wants to marry a white woman. So the entire staff starts laughing and thinks it is just hilarious. Basically they all know that James has this little crush on me like a middle school kid. It's quite cute. So we all laugh and laugh til we can't laugh anymore. Then we get home, chill until dinner then get a good night sleep. Before going any further I want to list some things that stand out to me as interesting:  1) it is normal to see men carrying shotguns over their shoulder just walking alongside the road in villages 2) it is normal to see school children in uniforms throwing around machetes cutting grass 3) it is normal for a woman to whip her boob anywhere to feed her baby. And I mean anywhere! While getting her eyes checked my the doctor, boob just hanging free. On a tro tro ride crammed with 15 people, while selling fruit at the market. Anywhere. And no one looks weird at it.  4) it is normal to see charter busses pulled off to the side of the road and the entire bus full of people peeing next to it in the ditch. Women squatting next to the men as they just stand there.  Saturday outreach was a quick one because the staff wanted to get back and watch the Ghana soccer game. So we did our jobs and left around 2 for the hotel. I laid in bed and read my book before falling asleep and sleeping the entire evening and night away. I must have been exhausted after a long week of work. Kamry and I both slept through dinner and woke up around 11 just to find everyone already asleep. So we went back to bed and rested up for our mountain climb and waterfall trip tomorrow. So Sunday was our first day off since being in Hohoe and the staff suggested we climb the tallest mountain in Ghana then go swim at the Wli waterfalls. So that's just what we did. We headed to the mountain first. The staff kept telling us how tough it was and  they were right. It was super hard. So steep we had to use our hands at times to make it up the slope. I don't think my body type is mad for climbing mountains either. It was soo hard going up and the way down was simple for me while the other struggled on the way down. Guess my long legs helped with the steep steps. So after we were all exhausted we drove the waterfall which was close by. W got there, paid, and walked about 20 minutes back to where it was in the mountains. Absolutely beautiful. Being that I have never seen one in real life, I was blown away. Almost literally too. The water crashing down made it super windy once you got close. We were allowed to swim in it so after our hot mountain climb it felt great to jump in and cool off. I took my sweaty clothes off and swam in my swim suit and man did the water feel nice and refreshing. You could only get so close to the waterfall itself because the water would splash into you and would sting your skin almost like sleet in the winter time. The boys had such a fun time here and their young, playful personalities really showed through while swimming. They would have little races in the shallow part and kept wanting to pick us girls up. They were quite hilarious to watch and swim with here. After we had enough we got out, took some photos then headed back to the van. There were some souvenir shops to look at but I didn't want anything but food. We hadn't eaten since 6 am and the mountain climb killed us all making us hungry. So we got back, ate some dinner, then headed to Obama gardens with the staff. All of them came except a few. We all had a drink or two and had a blast dancing to some African music. They taught us the azonto and told us we were doing great even though I already know how I look when I dance! but they were great teachers and encouragers. We then showed them the American way of dancing, also known as grinding. They thought it was hilarious and already knew of it because they have seen it on tv. Eric and James were entertaining dancers. They make it look so easy and sooo good too. I was blown away at their moves. After having an absolute blast here we headed home for some sleep.  It was Monday again so time for more outreaches. We kept the same teams as last week which I was excited about since I have so much fun with James and Regina.  Today started out just like every other outreach then changed very quickly. I was sitting outside with Regina when huge groups of men started marching through the street. They were all carrying machetes and guns and shouting the whole time they walked. Before they got close to our church, people were scrambling to close the windows and doors of the church. At this very moment I didn't know what was going on and my heart sank quickly. I asked James and Regina what was going on and all they said was people weren't happy because someone died. It didn't make much sense to me until after the outreach and someone else explained. So we stayed a while longer at the church before heading back to the hotel. It was a scary drive back. We had to weave in and out of burning piles of peoples belongings in the middle of the street. People were shouting at us to not go further but we had to get back to our hotel where we were for sure safe. So we finally made it back and we all sat in the lobby area and shared our experiences we just had with one another. Carly and Zoe got the worst of it. After hearing enough of what was happening we all went to our room to chill for a while.  We then were told to pack up because we had to leave in the morning. The town was on lockdown from 6 pm to 6 am so we had to wait til morning. We were all so sad about having to leave early from this clinic because they were all our favorite. So tuesday morning rolls around and we are packed up ready to leave until they tell us that the bus going to Accra is full of patients and there is only room for 2 volunteers to go. Carly and Zoe had to go because they changed their flight to leave a week early. So they said their goodbyes and rode back to Accra. This made Kamry and I super happy because we were the two who really did not want to leave!! So we were excited for more time with the staff. So we go on outreach that day and enjoyed our time with the staff. Then in the evening we got a call from Jerome saying we had to leave and go stay in a hotel in the next town over because they wanted us out of Hohoe. We said super quick goodbyes and Kamry and I cried all the way to the next hotel. We couldn't believe that was our goodbye to them. No hugs, just a small wave and we were off. I think that's what made us so sad, the fact that it was so rushed and we didn't get the chance for a proper goodbye. So Kamry put on her sunglasses to hide her eyes and we both just sobbed the entire 25 minute drive. We got to the hotel and visited with the other volunteers for a bit before Frank told us we could go back in the morning to see everyone one last time, and of course Kamry and I start crying again. We were happy to at least get a nice goodbye from everyone. So we go to sleep so the morning comes faster. We wake up early and hit the road for Hohoe then Accra.  We get back to our guest house and sit down for a small breakfast before taking the crew to their outreach spots. I sit down and as soon as James and Emmanuel walk in I tear up again. I knew this was my last time with them. James comes over and sits down by me and gives me a great big hug and asks me why I'm sad. Then Emmanuel walks in a gives Kamry and I a sweet kiss on the forehead. These guys are just so loving towards us it's ridiculous. Then we all pile in the van for our last ride with them and drop them off at their churches, crying a little as we drop each team off. And lastly we drop of James and Regina.  They both squeeze me in a huge hug, tell me they will miss me, then we were off. That was it. These people came into my life so quickly, I grew to love them, and now they are gone and more than likely I'll never see them again. It was hard. Super hard. I never imagined I'd feel so attached to these people. The drive back to Accra was not fun. I didn't feel like chatting so I listened to my music the whole way. When we arrived we stopped at the clinic to see Dr. Baah and then we went and checked into our new hotel. We chilled for a bit before going to a coffee shop for lunch. It was yummy, I had a chicken and egg sandwich with fries. We then went back to the hotel for a bit before eating at Peter pan for dinner, a fast food like place. Then had ice cream. The good food made me not so sad from leaving, but I still was. Then we went back to the hotel for the night because we had to watch surgery in the morning. June 14: We wake up and head to the clinic and get there about 9. We thought we'd be watching surgery all day but turns out we didn't start til 3:30 so we sat in the clinic for several hours. Good thing it has wi-fi so we could get on the Internet. So we then watched a couple hours of surgery, took some photos and then went back to the hotel before dinner with Dr. Baah and family. He picked us up at seven then took us to an amazing Chinese restaurant. It was delicious. We enjoyed our time with him and got to chat a bit. Then went back and went to sleep.   I will write more soon!!!