November 2, 2009

Starting out on my fourth week in Ghana. Wow, where has the time been going? I’m almost done my second box of malaria pills (about the only side effect I’m finding is wacky dreams each night), and approaching the 1/3 mark.

I’m starting to feel like Ghana is home. Everything that when I got here seemed so new, that I could do nothing but gawk at has started to seem somewhat commonplace. My bike to work is nothing exciting anymore, and when it’s been a few days since I’ve been to SWAD Eunice and Mohamed comment on how long it’s been since they’ve seen me. I found myself building a comfortable, little familiar bubble, so to mix it up a bit this week-end I walked the 2km into town to get a look at the market, and to try out a new restaurant. I’ve also been making an effort to try as much Ghanaian food as I can. In fact, ordering Red Red with Guinea Fowl was what cemented my friendship with Mohamed at SWAD. That night there was no guinea fowl, so I had it with chicken instead. (P.S. The Red Red was excellent—it’s a kind of bean stew in hot pepper and red palm oil, with fried plaintain on the side and some chicken). I, of course, had to make sure that I tried guinea fowl, so I tried again yesterday afternoon and to my delight guinea fowl was in!

I managed to get myself my first REAL sunburn since arriving in Ghana on my walk to town. It was about 30-45 minutes into town, a jaunt around, some lunch at The Crest on the shaded patio (the breeze was beyond AMAZING), and then return trip home. I was gone about 4 or 5 hours I would say, a solid Saturday afternoon. I’m surprised at how well I’ve adjusted to the heat. When I first got here it sucked the energy right out of me, and I was sleeping days away. Now I’m awake with the first mosque calls to prayer at 5:00am, and have to make an effort to sleep past 7:00. If only this could carry over to when I get home it would be perfect.

I’ve slowly been trying to learn a little Dagbani. Dagbani is the local language spoken around Tamale (whereas Twi and Ewe are spoken in other parts of the country). So far I’ve mastered: Good Morning: “Dassiba”, Good Afternoon: “Antirri”, Good Evening: Anin Wula. You answer all of them with “Naa”. It’s basic, but it’s a little bit. I would love to find a book to learn.

I had a spectacular experience Sunday night. I made fufu! Well, I helped make fufu. I’ve become really good friends with a student at T-Poly, Joyce. I’ve been spending some time at her home and with her family. Sunday evening she called to say she was coming to pick me up, and we went to one of her family member’s homes. With the extended family system here I’m not entirely sure who is an actual mother, an actual aunt, an actual sister in the biological sense… no matter. At the first house Joyce’s sister was braiding her other sister’s hair. They tried to convince me to get some braids, although I have to admit their technique (basically pointing out how terrible my hair looks here) was a little ego bruising. I passed this time, I’m not sure that the braids would look any better on me. We left and went to another family member’s house. They were getting ready to pound fufu! Fufu is the staple food of Ghana, made from startchy vegetables, I think in this case it might have been yams and something else. I missed the initial stages. Anyway, the vegetables are boiled and then they’re pounded using a GIANT mortar and pestle. One person stands and uses the pestle to pound the vegetables while a second person sits by the mortar and kneads the vegetables in under the pestle between pounds, every so often adding a little water. This is done over and over until the vegetables form a sort of dough. You eat it in a spicy pepper soup with meat (in this case some fish), using your right hand to pull off a piece, dunk it in the soup and then you put it in your mouth and just swallow, no chewing. While I have to admit it was not love at first swallow for fufu and I, I was just so excited to get to help pound the fufu. I tell you though that is a workout! I think my arms are going to be sore tomorrow. I was so worried about hitting Joyce’s mother’s fingers with the pestle I set a much slower pace on my turn to pound the fufu, this salaminga is not very good at making fufu.

Category: Ghana, Upon return // Add Comment »