As of late

Two days after Perry and Karen departed for the U.S., my friend Lexi came to visit!

Lexi arrived at the airport Thursday around 9:30 pm, an hour earlier than expected! Luckily Katy and I had left for the airport early and were there when she got off the plane. We collected her bags and set off for campus. Lexi seemed hardly shaken by the new environment. I guess this shouldn’t have surprised me, she’s travelled extensively and spent all last summer in rural Bolivia working at a medical clinic.

Early Friday morning we grabbed a cab and headed to the Jamestown lighthouse. The lighthouse is in a shabby area of town, and to gain entry you have to walk around asking for the woman with the key. Once we found the key holder, we paid 5 cedi each and were led up an extremely steep and long winding staircase. The last leg of the climb was a wooden ladder that led up to a tiny door to the outlook of the lighthouse. I’m pretty sure the wood was at least fifty years old and I held my breath as I climbed. We climbed out the tiny door and onto the balcony at the top of the lighthouse. Immediately after stepping out, my fear of heights kicked in. I don’t know how to explain it, but as soon as I was looking down I felt dizzy and faint. I guess this is simply genetics kicking in, as my father also dislikes heights. The balcony provided an excellent view of the beach, ocean and the town of Jamestown. After leaving the lighthouse we walked along the beach. The beach was probably the dirtiest I’ve encountered so far. It was littered with feces as well as trash. What we thought would be a short stroll along the shore turned into a trek after we realized there were few places to exit the beach that weren’t covered in litter.

After exiting the dirt beach we hailed a cab to the Art Center. This particular visit we were accompanied by a Ghanaian named Slow who was dressed in the most ridiculous patchwork full body outfit I’ve ever seen. He was entertaining and introduced us to his cat whose name was “No food for lazy cat”. Lexi bought some souvenirs, the coolest of which was a six foot tall chief staff.

Later that Friday night we ate at Monsoon, the upscale restaurant Perry and Karen loved. The food was as delicious as always and the owner, Steve from New Zealand, treated us with complimentary post-dinner shooters. After dinner we headed to Epo, our favorite hangout in Osu.

Saturday morning a group of seven of us grabbed kebabs and took a series of tro-tros to Bojo beach. It took us about two hours to get there from campus. After arriving at the beach, we took a private pirogue across the sound to the main beach. I love the pirogues. Along the sound we saw people wind surfing and jet skiing. The beach was beautiful and by far the cleanest I’ve seen so far. We found a place in the sand to dump our things and immediately headed to water to play. The water was refreshing on the 90+ degree day and we all enjoyed the breeze propelled off the waves . We stayed on the beach sunbathing for a few hours and had food delivered to us beach side. After a spectacular sunset we pulled ourselves off the sand and began to head back. We eventually were picked up a tro-tro and stuffed into a seating area which was already over-crowded without our additional bodies. I literally felt like I was packed in a can of sardines and I found myself wondering anxiously what would happen if everyone needed to evacuate the tro-tro quickly. To make matters worse, the relatively short distance we needed to travel took over an hour in horribly congested traffic. When we finally reached the next tro-tro station we decided to splurge on taxis to bring us the rest of the way back to campus.

Later in the evening we headed to Champs for karaoke night. Catherine and I performed the duet “Dilemma” by Nelly, and later in the evening Michael and Lexi gripped the audience’s attention with their rendition of “Come on Eileen”. Needless to say, it was a successful night. I made friends with an Australian man who had lived in Ghana for the last six years. We bonded over our mutual yearning for fast food and he told me that Wendy’s is WAY better in America than in Australia. (Duh)

Sunday we decided to relax for the day and headed to the Living Room. There we rented a private room, complete with projector and couches and watched movies while lounging. The hotel the Living Room is attached to serves excellent Jamaican chicken which was delivered to us while the movies played.

Monday morning Lexi and I arranged for a taxi to drive us to Shai Hills Reserve, a wildlife park about an hour away. A bit of history: Shai Hills was originally a village inhabited by native people. The king and his wives lived in caves hidden in the hills for protection. During colonial rule, the British caught wind of the village and drove the native people out of the hills into the surrounding areas. Our taxi driver ended up becoming a safari vehicle, as a guide jumped in the taxi and instructed him to drive. Driving through the reserve was the closest thing to a traditional safari I’ve experienced so far. We were surrounded by miles of high grasses, dotted with giant trees and mountains in the background. Our first stop on the tour was a compound within the reserve. We walked through the compound and literally two feet away from the houses was a family of baboons. Apparently the baboons in the reserve live alongside the people and often feed on leftover food and garbage. There were five or six baboons total, including a giant male baboon (who would have probably been over five feet tall standing), a female baboon with a baby riding on her back, as well as a few young baboons. Post baboon sighting we drove through more gorgeous grasslands and to the ancient caves used to house the village royalty. I had no idea we’d be trekking through caves and stupidly wore my rainbows and a mini skirt. The next thing I knew we were crouched down climbing an incline of rocks. There was a strong, bad smell and we were soon informed that all of the rocks were covered in bat droppings (ew). We finally climbed to the royal chambers, which consisted of an open room, a small clave used to hide treasure and a lookout spot to watch for invaders. Post royal chambers the tour guide asked if we watched to visit the “bat cave”. We said yes and joked that our tour guide was batman. When we reached the bat cave, we could see and hear hundreds of bats flying all around the cave, so opted not to enter. I was already covered in bat droppings and was not trying to get bitten / pooped on. After leaving the caves we spotted baboons sitting on the branches of giant trees.

Unfortunately Lexi didn’t get to do much more exploring after Shai Hills, because her flight to home left at 11:55 pm Monday night :(.

The weekend post Lexi’s visit was Halloween! Catherine, Katy and I dressed up like trees. This entailed having a seamstress make strapless shorts jumpsuits in brown fabric. We then gathered leaves from plants around the hostel and stuffed them into the tops of our outfits. We looked pretty ridiculous, even more so because no one in Ghana celebrates Halloween. We went to a party on Friday night thrown by international students from California and I think all of the Ghanaians who saw us were thoroughly confused as to why all of the obrounis were dressed so strangely. I tried to explain Halloween to one student and midway through my explanation I realized Halloween must sound so strange to a non-American. “Yes, it’s a sort of holiday where children wear costumes and go to people’s houses and ask for candy”. Hmmm. American customs. On Saturday (actual Halloween) we went out to El Gaucho Steakhouse in Osu. Michael and Matt both ordered steak, which they said was delicious. Catherine and I, who both don’t eat red meat, shared chicken fajitas and pasta. The kitchen ran out of guacamole and so the waiter brought us a complimentary chocolate mousse which was fantastic. Speaking of freebies, they also gave us free bruschetta which was fabulous. After dinner in the spirit of Halloween we watched “The Shining”. I had forgotten how creepy that movie is. It reminded me of Alex and I teaching Thomas to say “redrum” was he was little.

Let’s see what else has happened this week…. I finally got an internship! I’m very excited, as I’ve gone to multiple organizations and spent countless hours searching for volunteer opportunities. I’ll be working at the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative starting Monday. I’m hoping to help organize a conference for teenage girls in the Eastern region about HIV/AIDS, sexual assault and domestic abuse. I’ll blog later when I know more!

This weekend Catherine, Katy, Michael and I are travelling to Kumasi. I’ll have more to report on Monday!