WAVE STORY

Time for a wave story. We have had 2 announcements in the last 30
minutes about safety precautions for rough seas. While in ASL club,
everyone in a chair fell and ended up on the floor. People were thrown
across rooms. Signs became poles that people were grabbing on to. I
almost started crying when I walked past the campus store...EVERYTHING
IS ON THE FLOOR, and I am supposed to work tonight....UGHHH this should
be fun! There is no way that we are going to be able to open. Anyways,
time for our pre-port meeting...SOUTH AFRICA TOMORROW!!!!!

Akwaaba!!

This final post on Ghana will be a snapshot of all the other things that I did! I am no longer an American, I am referred to around the world as “Obama People”.

The faith of the people in Ghana is so indescribably extraordinary!!!! God is here in every smile, every building, every wave, He is EVERYWHERE. 99% of the buildings are labeled with a Christian reference. For example, “God is Good Beauty Salon”, “Alpha and Omega Liquor Store”, “Jesus Lives Market”, “Repent for He is Near Clothing Store”. The list goes on! Another store that I was fortunate enough to visit is “Global Mamas”. Global Mamas is a non-profit organization that sells the crafts and works of local women. The money then goes directly to the women, and to resources that they benefit from. The store was at capacity during our week in Ghana! One of the ladies working there is a Peace Corps Volunteer from Baltimore and said that us coming to town has been a huge blessing on their store. She said that the most spent in 1 transaction was $400 by one of our faculty! I didn't quite spend that much, but I did get some very nice stuff from here. The lady said that with this great increase, they will be able to hire some new women! This made me so happy to hear, and I hope that this company continues to thrive to help the people of Ghana.

Another trip that I was on was the “Slave Dungeons and Castles”. This was a real eye-opener to the history of Africans. We toured the facilities where slaves were kept imprisoned and where they were held captive until they would be shipped out to the Americas and Europe. The conditions and ways of running the place were beyond inhumane. There is no excuse for humanity to have allowed this to happen. Before the end of the tour, we took a pledge to never allow this kind of behavior or actions ever happen again. In 2009, President Obama and the First Lady visited the Cape Coast Dungeon, they had a plaque dedicated and hanging at the entrance of the woman’s prison.

On the way back to the ship from the homestay in Tagorme, we stopped by a game reserve. After driving an hour in to the reserve, we came across a heard of antelope. Then we saw a bunch of baboons. We then got off the bus and hiked up a steep mountain to a bat cave. It was really cool, but again, animals are not really my interest. Especially after an exhausting time in the village. OH, I forgot to mention in my last post about how I could not wash my hands the whole stay so I couldn't even take out my contacts at night! Ok, back to the reserve. It was cool.

My next FDP (faculty directed practica) was “Woman's Childbirth and Maternity Practices”. For this trip, we toured the Tema Hospital maternity ward. It was very interesting to compare this with my experiences from when I volunteered at the Riverside Community Hospital. The conditions of the hospital were so drastically different than that of the US. I cannot say that they were horrible, but there were definitely extremes. There is no privacy in the hospital, husbands and family are not allowed in the delivery room because there is no space. This is because up to 5 women can be giving birth in the same room at a time. THERE IS NO AIR CONDITIONING in the whole hospital. All of the instructions and protocol are handwritten on the walls. The vaccinations are left out on the counters. Because there is no privacy code, we were able to read patient's charts. Some students even had the option to go into the operation room as a woman was in surgery. It was definitely interesting to learn about this culture and the way they run things. Ghana does have universal health care, which is something that the country should be very proud of. The midwife said that on an average day, they deliver 10-15 babies.

When Semester at Sea people were in a bus out in town, we were escorted by police. This was one of the hardest experiences for me. We were escorted so that we would get from place to place faster and avoid traffic...The police officer on a motorcycle led us weaving through traffic. The officer was so aggressive! If a car did not move over enough for us, then he would reach over and kick the car! People were moving, but no one looked happy, which is completely understandable. We were glared at, we were stared at, we were given dirty looks. It really bothered me because we are in no way better than the locals. We asked the tour guide why they do this and he said “we want you all to be comfortable here in Ghana so that you will have a good memory of us”.

Ghana was the busiest port that I have on this trip as far as plans. I love love love Ghana and really want to return one day! I apologize that these blogs took so long to be written. I had a hard time putting my experiences into words, and just needed some time to let it all sink in. My words on this page in no way give Ghana the proper justice. There is only one way for you to truly understand this place, GO THERE!!!

Next stop....SOUTH AFRICA!!! Waka Waka!

Tagorme Village, Ghana Africa

My biggest learning experience thus far on Semester at Sea was definitely “Tagorme Village Cultural Immersion Overnight”. This trip was my home stay in Ghana. The night before this trip was spent frantically packing everything that I may need for my overnight. How I forgot to pack toilet paper was the least of my problems. The bus drove about an hour off road to the village early in the morning. As we entered the village, there were people sitting there to let us in. As we continued to the center of the village where the community center was, children started appearing out of every building (hut), and started running to see who we were. When the children saw who we were, their faces lit up like I have never seen before! They started waving to us and couldn't wait to meet us. I have never been so eager to get off of a bus in my life! The children gathered around the bus and we were finally let off the bus. As each of us stepped down, 3-4 children per person grabbed our hands and walked us to the place that we were headed for a “naming ceremony”. We were instructed to follow the lead of our tour guide as we greet the chiefs and elders of the village. These were the most important people the community and were dressed in their traditional clothing and accessories. We went down the line shaking each hand, and one of the mothers of the village stood to give us each a hug and said “welcome home child”. We were seated in rows in the presence of the elders and chiefs, the mothers, and all of the children who were on a break from classes. To start the ceremony one of the mothers recited a prayer in ewe, the local language. The prayer involved screaming, crying, smiling, pouring liquids in the dirt, and welcoming the ancestors to join us to protect us all during our stay.

After several introductions to the village and distinguished people, we were then called up one by one be be given a local name, a handmade pot with our name written on it, and a bracelet that was made by the women of the village. My local name is “Adzu Fafali” which means “God is Peace” and I was born on a Monday. After we got through the entire group, we were then called up in pairs to meet our host mothers. I won't bore you with how we left the village to go to a resort for lunch, instead of dining with our famillies...sometimes I wonder SAS..Anyways, after lunch, we returned to spend the rest of the day with our families. During this time, Wonder, the “English speaker” of my family took me and my roommate around the village introducing us to people and telling us about the way of life in Tagorme. I met the whole family which consisted of a mother, 6 aunts, uncles, cousins, 5 babies, and the rest of the extended family. We walked down to the river bed and watched a man fish for Tilapia. The children get so excited when they catch a fish! Later, he took us to the village church where I met the pastor. The church is an Evangelical Presbyterian Church. Then, I was introduced to the chief of the area that I was staying in. I was told to bow down to him before I shake his hand, hmmmm....anyways, we kept walking around and met more people.

As the day continued, we were sitting around talking and watching the women of the family prepare the dinner. The local food that is commonly eaten for supper is “Fufu”. Fufu is some kind of nut that grows on a tree and then is ground into a mill. From here it is heated over a fire and stirred into a ball that is then dipped in to a fish sauce. I helped make this dinner! After the sun went down, it was time to meet with the entire community for dinner and dancing. Again, dinner was catered for the students so that the families would not have to provide for more mouths. After we ate dinner, there was a drum circle and we danced the night away with the children and other members of the community. The mother's of the families did not approve of our “attire” for dancing, so our mothers snuck up on us and wrapped a traditional African weaved skirt on each of the girls. After the dance party, we returned to our homes. While there, my roommate and I just sat and watched the family interaction. There was virtually no way to communicate with the family so we just observed and let it soke in. The family sat around outside and talked, the children were bathed and put to bed. Shortly after, we went to our room. We were in what our tour guide referred to as “decent rooms”. Our room consisted of a mattress and sheet, a fan, and a box. That's it..a little different from America huh? There was no running water in the area, there were no toilets. The water was fetched each morning by the family and stored in a container for use throughout the day.

The next morning, we woke up at 5:30am to watch the sunrise. When we went outside, everyone was already awake! Wonder was out fetching water, the women were cooking breakfast (which people were already lined up to buy), and the children were up helping with the whole process. The people of the village have a system that seems to work. Each family is responsible for different goods, and they sell their goods to each other to survive. The time quickly came to say goodbye to our families. We shared breakfast with them inside the church, exchanged contact information, I presented my homestay gift, and said our good-byes. Although we were there for only hours, it felt like these were people of my family. The entire community is like a big family and they welcomed us in with open arms. Doing this homestay was a humbling experience that I will forever remember. Thank you everyone for giving me this opportunity to see a different side of the world!!

GHANA PART 1

On Monday February 13^th, the MV Explorer arrived to Ghana. Ghana is located in West Africa and is a country of 25 million people. The country's capital is Accra. We ported in Tema which is an hour away from Accra. The night before arrival, I couldn't sleep at all! Since I can remember, it has always been a dream of mine to go to Africa. That is the one place that I would choose to go if I ever had the chance. Ghana is also one of the reasons that I chose to go on Semester at Sea in the first place. After my first African country....I LOVE AFRICA! Africa is one of those places that I believe every American should experience once in their life. This blog is hard for me to write simply because of the lack of words. Amazing, beautiful, sad, unacceptable, pure, dirty, refreshing, raw, none of these words explain what my eyes saw in a short 5 days.

Once we docked in Tema port, it took about 2 hours to clear immigrations and customs. During this time, a ship full of eager people were about to be slapped in the face with our first real “culture shock”. Ghana's culture is not like any American or familiar way of life. When we were still on this ship, there were dancers and drummers waiting to greet us! There were also people with their booths set up ready to sell us their crafts. We got off the ship and got straight onto a shuttle that would take us to Accra. The bus ride into town was absolutely silent, and my eyes were working over time. It took us just under 2 hours to go 18 miles. TRAFFIC.

The drive there was spent seeing first hand the way of life in Ghana. I remember when I went on the ELCA Youth Gathering in 2009, my most shocking experience was seeing a village in Mexico from the train, with just a wall separating me, a privileged youth from this rough way of life. My Mexico experience of this poverty was then multiplied by about 10 and I was thrown in to it in Africa. Village after village, dirt road after dirt road, huts after huts, I was no longer in America, Brazil, Dominica, or the Bahamas. I was in a whole new world. No amount of lectures, readings, and stories could have prepared me for what I was seeing. I did not know how to process all of this, and I didn't know what to think of what I was seeing. The 2 hours finally passed and as I exited the shuttle bus, I had my first interaction with local people. This is where the culture shock kicked in. As soon as the bus doors opened, every person was swarmed by 10 men, grabbing us and yelling at us to look at their things to buy. They seemed genuine though. Genuine to be welcoming, or genuine just to get our money? That I cannot fully answer, but they nevertheless seemed “genuine”. We were greeted with hugs, hand shakes, and they wanted to know me on a personal level. They asked for my name, and that, they would never forget throughout the week..

The men made us name bracelets, handed us their goods, followed us for hours. Of course, they wanted money. It was impossible to get “rid” of them no matter how hard everyone tried. At this point in time, my experience changed drastically from the experience that other people had. This is when many people became irritated. They became mad. They wanted their “personal space”. For me, I had never felt more comfortable, which is ironic, because a Southern California girl thrown in to Africa does not fit the definition of comfortable. A man came up to me and was instantly “in love” he wanted to be with me and he wanted to get to know me. I told him that he just met me and that I don't even know him. He told me that he would stay with me during the day to make sure that no one rips me off. This however was not the whole reason why I felt more comfortable. The city was thriving with culture. I was in awe of the people's interactions with each other. I was surprised, but not, at the fast pace life, the masses of people flooding the streets, the noises of the city. If I closed my eyes, I for a minute felt like I was in Los Angeles. But the difference was the people. The difference was the smell. The difference was the heat. The difference was the sound. It was nothing like I had ever experienced, but I felt okay. I felt safe. The day went on and I continued to spend way too much money, but the conversations that I had with people made it worth it. I love Ghana. I love the people, I love the culture, I love the change. I understand how many people had “bad experiences” in Ghana, but that was just culture shock. People were uncomfortable, and instead of embracing it, many people ran to the ship as a safe-haven. I can not lie and say that I do not enjoy the comfort of having a “home” in every country. It is nice to at the end of a long hot day, come “home” to my own space, my own bed, my own shower..but then again did I not sign up for this trip to experience the “real” way of life around the world? I did, and that is why I did a home-stay in a village in the middle of Ghana Africa. TO BE CONTINUED.

CURRENT LOCATION

As of 1pm 2/18/12, I was located at the middle of the Earth!
Longitude/Latitude 000 degrees/00 degrees!
How awesome is that!! Now officially an "emerald shellback" for crossing
the equator at the Prime Maridean.

This is Elvis.

He wants to marry me.

Details to come.

Neptune Day!!

The day started off as a “reading day” and ended up with fish guts and shaved heads. 7 am rolled around and the whole ship was woken up to the crew dressed in togas marching up and down all the halls playing drums and banging on our doors. Then, the dean said over the speakers, “King Neptune has been informed that some people have crossed the equator without his permission.” We were all told to change in to our bathing suits and old clothes and report to the 7^th deck to undergo an initiation ceremony where we will be transformed from “pollywogs” to “shellbacks”. The head dean was painted green and with crowns and a toga. We then had fish guts poured on our heads, kissed a real dead fish, and were knighted into shellbacks. An optional part of the ceremony was shaving your head...don't worry...I didn't do it, but 7 girls (including my roommate) and lots of boys ended up going all out! It was a fun day, and a good way to break up the 9 day stretch that we are doing to cross the Atlantic Ocean. As of today, I have been at sea for 6 days, with 3 days to go. Next stop on our voyage of a lifetime...AFRICA!

Here today...

GHANA TOMORROW!!!!

I can't sleep. I will be pulling into Africa in nsdmgjnskjfgn...7
hours!!!!!! AHHHH!!!

If the world were shrunk to a village of 100 persons, there would be...

• 57 Asians, 21 Europeans, 14 from the Western Hemisphere (both North and South), & 8 Africans
• 52 would be female, 48 would be male
• 70 would be non-white, 30 would be white
• 70 would be non-Christian, 30 would be Christian
• 89 would be heterosexual, 11 would be homosexual
• 6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be from the USA
• 80 would live in substandard housing
• 70 would be unable to read
• 50 would suffer from malnutrition
• one would be near death
• one would have a college education
• one would own a computer
  

Brazil!

Bem- Vindo Brasil! Our arrival to South America began with a quick stop in Macapa to pick up 3 US Embassy representatives. They joined us the rest of the way to Manaus informing us of cultural and other educational things that we needed to know before our arrival. Manaus is a city in the Amazon that is deeply rooted in culture throughout the river and the surrounding area. Upon stepping foot into the sauna, I mean city, I boarded a tour boat that would take us through the Amazon. The vast brown sea was quite the view as it was surrounded by wilderness and jungle. We even saw a “schoolboat”, same concept as a school bus, but it picked the children up from their floating homes and took them to school on the other side of the river. The most amazing view that I had seen thus far was the merging of the two biggest rivers in the world. Where the Rio Negro and the Amazon meet, it looks like oil and water because of the distinctive color differences in water. When we got to the jungle part of the Amazon, we transferred to smaller canoes and went on a short hike through the man made path that led to huge water lilies and the “mother tree”. Born and raised in Southern California the “nature” and BUGS were a bit much for me, so luckily only a few hours later I was on an airplane on my way to Rio de Janeiro.

    Before Rio, I had my ideas of what to expect. After being there, I now realized that when people said “Rio is a big city”, I pictured and American city. This was not at all what I found. Rio seemed like the most extravagant and populated American city..on STEROIDS. But just with any other big city, it was thriving with culture and life. If you have seen the movie “Rio”, then you know exactly what the city is like! The movie does a phenomenal job portraying Copacabana and the beauty of the city. Our hotel was located 2 blocks from the beach, and walking distance to much shopping and dining. One thing that I learned real quick in Brazil is that pedestrians in NO WAY have the right away..there were a few close calls. Being a sociology fanatic, I was quick to realize the vast stratification that is in this city in particular. Rio de Janeiro is the most diverse place that I ever ever seen. There are Germans, French, Italians, Spanish, and the list goes on. Rio also has a large black community. Down on the beach and surrounding areas, were where the “white” people live. A majority of the workers at all the restaurants, hotels, stores, and such were black. All the people shopping relaxing on the beach were white. All the homeless people on the streets were black. All the police officers were white.

    On the last day of Rio my group went to visit the Favelas. These are the slums of Rio. I have never seen such intense poverty in my life. Words cannot express the living conditions that these people survive with. It wasn't until the 1980's that they actually got running water and electricity. All of the people living in the Favelas were black. The children ran around and played with no shoes on. In the community, they had their own stores, restaurants, schools, daycare centers, and everything they needed to avoid going into the city. The Favelas are a national museum, and we were told, “the buildings, the grafitti, the people are all on display”....WHAT! ? For me personally, I had a real hard time swallowing this concept. These people are people just like you and me. How is it ok for me to stick my camera in their house to get a good picture of the “display”? About half way through the tour, I was able to understand a little bit more about the beauty and the art of the neighborhood, and that, I took pictures of.

    From the favelas to the luxurious city life, Rio is beauty. Although I had a ton of AMAZING experiences in Rio such as the jeep tour through Rio, the DELICIOUS cuisine, the breathtaking waterfalls in the jungle, the spending way too much money on Havaianas, the samba classes, seeing one of the seven wonders of the world; the Christ the Redeemer Statue, and seeing the preparations for Carnival, there is one thing that I will always remember. The Favelas. I pray that one day I will be able to return, this time as someone in a position to bring change. I felt God's presence at the statue looking over the tropical beaches, and I felt His presence through the people living in this poor neighborhood.

Quote of the day

"Global Studies will be broadcasted into your cabins so that you can go
to class and puke simultaneously"
-Academic Dean

Atlantic Ocean. Rough seas. "wave days" (class cancelled). Puke
everywhere. I didn't get sick at all today, THANK YOU LORD!