Day 7
The days are seeming to roll into one. Set in routine, it's hard to differentiate one day from the next. I'm not sure if it's my upper lip that smells of piss or whether the children have managed to mark every knook and cranny with their muscky stench.
The kids are incredibly tiring and they all can be really naughty but they all have a sweet side to them which makes the naughty things they've done easily forgotten.
Class went really well today. It was surprising to see that Ghanian children are on par with Americans - They don't have a clue where they live either. Not one out of 44 children could point to where Ghana is on the map of Africa. They know now. We also taught them a little bit about England in our hood classroom. Adolph again wanted to go for a 'walk' but because of that glorious rota I was on dinner duty with Beth and we were making yam chips and they take forever - thank God.
We spent the evening like most others, watching films with the kids and then by ourselves after we put them to sleep, When I say put them to sleep I don't mean like how they do it at the vets with dogs. It's nice to have a little break from them because we aren't treated like climbing frames or asked the same question about food every 5 minutes.
URINATION UPDATE - In the night an outsider came in and flooded the mattress in the girls room. By outsider I mean one of the older boys and by girls room I mean it happened in the girls room. So that means the boys, me and Glennda have taken a 2-1 lead!
Day 8 coming soon...
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Wednesday, 21 September 2011
Volunteering in Ghana - Day 6
Day 6
The urination competition turned in our favour as in the night the girls lost a point due to a matt pee. Not as bad as a bed pee but after all the comments from them we rubbed it in their faces a bit...I'm not talking about the pee, that would be a bit disgusting wouldn't it. We gladly claimed the pee point so as it stands on the scoreboard it's Boys 1 - 1 Girls.
The kids today must think it's Oscar season, as they are really pulling the tears out the bag. We also seem to have claimed a new kid called Harrison. I don't know how he got here but he's smart.
Today was Bethan's birthday. In the morning we went into town in 2 groups, while the other group looked after the kids. Adolph popped by and asked if I wanted to go for a walk but I couldn't as I was looking after the kids...luckily. I managed to access the internet for the first time since being in Ghana and it was like using dial up in the 90's, it took about ten minutes to check one email and it was nothing to do with me being a slow reader. I felt like slapping the internet man for allowing me to pay for that.
School was incredibly tiring and it is difficult to keep the whole class engaged as they are at different levels of ability. The classroom is like a sweat shop, not that we make the kids sew footballs, just that I imagine a sweatshop would be as hot and sweaty as our classroom. We had a couple of kids in our class that really struggled on one we suspected had learning difficulties. Silv spent a lot of time with him today and seemed to make some good progress by the end of the lesson. After class Adolph appeared again but I was on bathing duty with Silv and again we had a lot of tears, but me and Silv managed to get the little trouble makers clean.
In the evening we celebrated Beth's birthday with a Ghanian drink called Cardinal, it's like a strawberry schnapps. We all crashed out early in front of the Lion king. Exhaustion really is setting in early everyday and I find myself using my housemate Reuben's catchphrase "What you trying it for?!" which really seems to puzzle the kids. They never seem to be satisfied even after massive bowls of food. The "I want some more" is becoming more than an Oliver Twist cliche. A vasectomy is seeming like a real safe bet right now.
The urination competition turned in our favour as in the night the girls lost a point due to a matt pee. Not as bad as a bed pee but after all the comments from them we rubbed it in their faces a bit...I'm not talking about the pee, that would be a bit disgusting wouldn't it. We gladly claimed the pee point so as it stands on the scoreboard it's Boys 1 - 1 Girls.
The kids today must think it's Oscar season, as they are really pulling the tears out the bag. We also seem to have claimed a new kid called Harrison. I don't know how he got here but he's smart.
Today was Bethan's birthday. In the morning we went into town in 2 groups, while the other group looked after the kids. Adolph popped by and asked if I wanted to go for a walk but I couldn't as I was looking after the kids...luckily. I managed to access the internet for the first time since being in Ghana and it was like using dial up in the 90's, it took about ten minutes to check one email and it was nothing to do with me being a slow reader. I felt like slapping the internet man for allowing me to pay for that.
School was incredibly tiring and it is difficult to keep the whole class engaged as they are at different levels of ability. The classroom is like a sweat shop, not that we make the kids sew footballs, just that I imagine a sweatshop would be as hot and sweaty as our classroom. We had a couple of kids in our class that really struggled on one we suspected had learning difficulties. Silv spent a lot of time with him today and seemed to make some good progress by the end of the lesson. After class Adolph appeared again but I was on bathing duty with Silv and again we had a lot of tears, but me and Silv managed to get the little trouble makers clean.
In the evening we celebrated Beth's birthday with a Ghanian drink called Cardinal, it's like a strawberry schnapps. We all crashed out early in front of the Lion king. Exhaustion really is setting in early everyday and I find myself using my housemate Reuben's catchphrase "What you trying it for?!" which really seems to puzzle the kids. They never seem to be satisfied even after massive bowls of food. The "I want some more" is becoming more than an Oliver Twist cliche. A vasectomy is seeming like a real safe bet right now.
Wednesday, 14 September 2011
Johnny G volunteering in Ghana - Day 5 (The return of Adolph)
Day 5 - The return of Adolph
This morning I sponged down an orphan or two, not really my cup of tea but it was an experience. I'm beginning to understand what it would be like to be a parent. I learned that the only peace you get is when your asleep and whatever you do don't feed them candy. They go crazy.
Today was going to be the first day of the summer school. As we walked through the village, lots of the local children from the village would run up to us to say they are coming to class later. It was nice to see how much they wanted to learn. In the morning we tutored our group with some exercises and discovered some of the kids couldn't read or write. Even Yao who seemed to be able to read me a book couldn't read words and I realised he had memorised the book, when I read it to him and then he read it back to me from memory.
We had a bunch of t-shirts made up for the summer school, with our names on the back and Raising Hope Foundation on the front which we pre-ordered before. What I hadn't looked at was the sizes and just went with a medium and Glenn did the same ordering the small. The measurements were in girls sizes. So, what we ended up with is the most super tight t-shirts in the world. The only thing I was grateful for is that I didn't have to look at it.
The summer school attracted about 150 children from the 3 local villages of Santrokofi. I was in class 3 with; sister Cat, sister Dani, sister Zoe and sister Silvs and it was an enjoyable experience. Sister Cat has a way of controlling the children which is amazing, they know not to get on the wrong side of her but they can still have fun. There were some really smart children in our group and others that struggled so it will be a challenge to keep them all entertained. Overall everyone did really well and it wasn't as daunting as I first thought it would be.
The co-ordinator/ chief of the village was called Adolph. Adolph is of no resemblance to the German Adolf. He made that clear and told us it's Adolph with a p. Anyway, he wanted to show me and Glenn around the village. When he spoke it was difficult to understand him and struggled to catch one or two words per sentence. Then had to a quick brain scan of those words till it made sense enough to reply to what at least I thought he was saying. His voice boomed and rattled around in the back of your head at the same time. He told us about when a German friend of his wife visited Ghana and he had prepared cat for dinner. She ran and left Ghana the next day. I think that's what he said. Anyway he laughed and me and Glenn not sure what to do also joined in the laughter. Then I wondered is he know going to make us eat a cat.
Often when he said something me and Glenn would just laugh and look at each other. With out any other communication between Glenn I knew he was feeling how I felt: Scared about where he was taking us and also because we didn't have a clue about what the hell he was talking about. He told us that we he can get us any woman in the village we wanted and kept offering to give us condoms. Again we cracked up laughing thinking it was a joke, but he was actually deadly serious and kept asking us several times.
Adolph introduced us to pretty much everyone in the village. They all seemed to want to meet us and were very nice. Baring in mind we did all this without managing to get home to change out of our super tight bright yellow t-shirts with Glennda and Johnny written on our backs. He gave us loads of different foods to sample and he also introduced us to a local liquor called abatassi. After you drink it you feel like there is a stream of fire from your mouth to your stomach, if only for a couple of moments. I swore I would never do another one again...we got another one for the road, which turned into two for the road. I was able to hear even less of what he said by this point. Me and Glennda, as per what was written on the back of his shirt really didn't want to offend his hospitality obliged.
We were paraded around some more and met some new people. We met one guy who was holding a machete, not uncommon in Ghana as a lot of Ghanian's farm to make a living. Adolph, again not to be confused with Adolf, told us that if we misbehaved that this man would cut our heads off and send them to the Queen, before he burst out laughing. Me and Glenn laughed along like idiots, as became the standard procedure.
He took us back to sister Kinza. He then asked me to show him out, which actually meant going to a bar with him for some more shots before eating some food which I'm pretty sure was cat...And yes it does taste a bit like chicken. A poor mans chicken. actually...probably a bit worse than Fried pigeon. On the way he started to hold my hand. Which I had a feeling was an African tradition, as I saw young boys holding hands while walking, but I couldn't help wonder where this next tour was going. I couldn't wait to be free of his sand papery grasp. I was hoping for some hand sweat so I could slip the hell out of there. I'm pretty sure he was just being friendly, although you can't be too careful in this day and age. By the 5th or 6th shot I really couldn't hear what he was saying until he shouted "Dance" at me. His intense eyes staring at me and I found myself doing some kind of African dance and some of the locals joined in but Adolph shouted "only Johnny can dance with me" and I was thinking to myself "I'm going to end up his bitch and there's nothing I can do". Tempted to run, but I continued to dance. He then said "I must take you back to sister Kinza" And I was free for that day. He said he would be round tomorrow for another "walk". Oh Jesus! I think he got the wrong impression from my tight t-shirt!
Back at the house we talked about how the day and lessons went. There's a really nice atmosphere when we can all just relax at the end of the day. Although I couldn't help to wonder what kind of hooker, drug and alcohol adventure that Adolph had in store for me next.
Day 6 coming soon.
This morning I sponged down an orphan or two, not really my cup of tea but it was an experience. I'm beginning to understand what it would be like to be a parent. I learned that the only peace you get is when your asleep and whatever you do don't feed them candy. They go crazy.
Today was going to be the first day of the summer school. As we walked through the village, lots of the local children from the village would run up to us to say they are coming to class later. It was nice to see how much they wanted to learn. In the morning we tutored our group with some exercises and discovered some of the kids couldn't read or write. Even Yao who seemed to be able to read me a book couldn't read words and I realised he had memorised the book, when I read it to him and then he read it back to me from memory.
We had a bunch of t-shirts made up for the summer school, with our names on the back and Raising Hope Foundation on the front which we pre-ordered before. What I hadn't looked at was the sizes and just went with a medium and Glenn did the same ordering the small. The measurements were in girls sizes. So, what we ended up with is the most super tight t-shirts in the world. The only thing I was grateful for is that I didn't have to look at it.
The summer school attracted about 150 children from the 3 local villages of Santrokofi. I was in class 3 with; sister Cat, sister Dani, sister Zoe and sister Silvs and it was an enjoyable experience. Sister Cat has a way of controlling the children which is amazing, they know not to get on the wrong side of her but they can still have fun. There were some really smart children in our group and others that struggled so it will be a challenge to keep them all entertained. Overall everyone did really well and it wasn't as daunting as I first thought it would be.
The co-ordinator/ chief of the village was called Adolph. Adolph is of no resemblance to the German Adolf. He made that clear and told us it's Adolph with a p. Anyway, he wanted to show me and Glenn around the village. When he spoke it was difficult to understand him and struggled to catch one or two words per sentence. Then had to a quick brain scan of those words till it made sense enough to reply to what at least I thought he was saying. His voice boomed and rattled around in the back of your head at the same time. He told us about when a German friend of his wife visited Ghana and he had prepared cat for dinner. She ran and left Ghana the next day. I think that's what he said. Anyway he laughed and me and Glenn not sure what to do also joined in the laughter. Then I wondered is he know going to make us eat a cat.
Often when he said something me and Glenn would just laugh and look at each other. With out any other communication between Glenn I knew he was feeling how I felt: Scared about where he was taking us and also because we didn't have a clue about what the hell he was talking about. He told us that we he can get us any woman in the village we wanted and kept offering to give us condoms. Again we cracked up laughing thinking it was a joke, but he was actually deadly serious and kept asking us several times.
Adolph introduced us to pretty much everyone in the village. They all seemed to want to meet us and were very nice. Baring in mind we did all this without managing to get home to change out of our super tight bright yellow t-shirts with Glennda and Johnny written on our backs. He gave us loads of different foods to sample and he also introduced us to a local liquor called abatassi. After you drink it you feel like there is a stream of fire from your mouth to your stomach, if only for a couple of moments. I swore I would never do another one again...we got another one for the road, which turned into two for the road. I was able to hear even less of what he said by this point. Me and Glennda, as per what was written on the back of his shirt really didn't want to offend his hospitality obliged.
We were paraded around some more and met some new people. We met one guy who was holding a machete, not uncommon in Ghana as a lot of Ghanian's farm to make a living. Adolph, again not to be confused with Adolf, told us that if we misbehaved that this man would cut our heads off and send them to the Queen, before he burst out laughing. Me and Glenn laughed along like idiots, as became the standard procedure.
He took us back to sister Kinza. He then asked me to show him out, which actually meant going to a bar with him for some more shots before eating some food which I'm pretty sure was cat...And yes it does taste a bit like chicken. A poor mans chicken. actually...probably a bit worse than Fried pigeon. On the way he started to hold my hand. Which I had a feeling was an African tradition, as I saw young boys holding hands while walking, but I couldn't help wonder where this next tour was going. I couldn't wait to be free of his sand papery grasp. I was hoping for some hand sweat so I could slip the hell out of there. I'm pretty sure he was just being friendly, although you can't be too careful in this day and age. By the 5th or 6th shot I really couldn't hear what he was saying until he shouted "Dance" at me. His intense eyes staring at me and I found myself doing some kind of African dance and some of the locals joined in but Adolph shouted "only Johnny can dance with me" and I was thinking to myself "I'm going to end up his bitch and there's nothing I can do". Tempted to run, but I continued to dance. He then said "I must take you back to sister Kinza" And I was free for that day. He said he would be round tomorrow for another "walk". Oh Jesus! I think he got the wrong impression from my tight t-shirt!
Back at the house we talked about how the day and lessons went. There's a really nice atmosphere when we can all just relax at the end of the day. Although I couldn't help to wonder what kind of hooker, drug and alcohol adventure that Adolph had in store for me next.
Day 6 coming soon.
Monday, 12 September 2011
Johnny G volunteering in Ghana - day 4
Day 4
I'm no longer constrained by the hands of time. After the routine struggle of getting the children to do anything, we took them to a monkey sanctuary. Which of course means a luxury cruise in a Tro Tro. Except this driver was like a normal tro tro driver, who had been on a red bull binge combined with having some sort of obsessive compulsive disorder, which seemed to mean if he didn't beep the horn every millisecond he would spontaneously combust into flames. I wish he had.
We took the kids to the monkey sanctuary and fed them bananas...fed the monkeys bananas, I mean. Everyone enjoyed it as the monkeys peeled bananas from our hands. The guide was pretty darn good and making monkey noises with his mouth. I have no idea what he was saying though.
That afternoon to evening the puppies left destruction in their path, eating everything in sight. Then the crying fits started. It was hard not to feel sorry for them, but then I remembered they ate all the food, Including my food. And people who know me know how I love my food. They really took the biscuit...or my biscuit as it turned out.
Glenn and I (look at that English) were on urination duty that night which means having all of the pee pants in our room and our job is to wake them in the night to make sure they don't live up to their name. Glenn fell asleep on the sofa at about 11. I gently woke him up saying "urination time" Which is what we say to the little ones. Glenn must have been in a very deep sleep because he had no idea where he was as I led him out onto the porch. He looked at me with the same glint in his eye as the kids like "why you making me do this". It took him a good minute to realise what was happening. He was so confused. Poor Glenn.
By the morning we had failed our first urination duty. Courage wet the bed, not just any bed, but our bed. Glenn and I ended up sleeping in the lounge. Beth keeps going on about this little mishap especially because we didn't change him into clean clothes. But as I told Beth, defending our lack of actions, he might be confused into believing that if he pees himself then that means he gets a new wardrobe. So I still think it was right to let him wallow in self pitty...or pissy. Sorry Beth.
I'm no longer constrained by the hands of time. After the routine struggle of getting the children to do anything, we took them to a monkey sanctuary. Which of course means a luxury cruise in a Tro Tro. Except this driver was like a normal tro tro driver, who had been on a red bull binge combined with having some sort of obsessive compulsive disorder, which seemed to mean if he didn't beep the horn every millisecond he would spontaneously combust into flames. I wish he had.
We took the kids to the monkey sanctuary and fed them bananas...fed the monkeys bananas, I mean. Everyone enjoyed it as the monkeys peeled bananas from our hands. The guide was pretty darn good and making monkey noises with his mouth. I have no idea what he was saying though.
That afternoon to evening the puppies left destruction in their path, eating everything in sight. Then the crying fits started. It was hard not to feel sorry for them, but then I remembered they ate all the food, Including my food. And people who know me know how I love my food. They really took the biscuit...or my biscuit as it turned out.
Glenn and I (look at that English) were on urination duty that night which means having all of the pee pants in our room and our job is to wake them in the night to make sure they don't live up to their name. Glenn fell asleep on the sofa at about 11. I gently woke him up saying "urination time" Which is what we say to the little ones. Glenn must have been in a very deep sleep because he had no idea where he was as I led him out onto the porch. He looked at me with the same glint in his eye as the kids like "why you making me do this". It took him a good minute to realise what was happening. He was so confused. Poor Glenn.
By the morning we had failed our first urination duty. Courage wet the bed, not just any bed, but our bed. Glenn and I ended up sleeping in the lounge. Beth keeps going on about this little mishap especially because we didn't change him into clean clothes. But as I told Beth, defending our lack of actions, he might be confused into believing that if he pees himself then that means he gets a new wardrobe. So I still think it was right to let him wallow in self pitty...or pissy. Sorry Beth.
Saturday, 10 September 2011
Volunteering in Ghana - Day three and Johnny's observations
Day 3
It was an eventful evening to say the least. Me, Glenn and Kwame were locked out of the room by two of the orphans, Dolce and Cornelius. They straight up outsmarted us, playing a joke but falling asleep. The worst thing about it was that I made a joke about it happening and didn't have the sense to get the keys out of the room. Kwame and Kinza went around the outside of the house to flash a torch into the room. The windows are like mesh with slats of glass. As we were knocking the door like police at a crack den bust, we heard Kwame shouting from outside into the lounge. I walked in there to see him shining a light in there. I told him he had the wrong room and the boys were in the room next door. He went next door...but to the wrong next door, the next door being the girls room. Eventually ending up at the right room and waking them up. It took about 20 minutes before we could get into our room to sleep.
We spent all day playing, reading to, and looking after the kids. I found out that a group of orphans is like a swarm of locusts - nothing is left after they pass through. Instead of stomachs they have bottomless pits. They can eat and eat and then out come the puppy dog eyes like they haven't been eating. Do not be fooled by those adverts you see on tv!
I also found that Kwame is an awesome artist and he has been sketching in my diary for me. I will try and scan some of his works for you to see. But you can check out some of his paintings here.
The only time we left the village today was to go to the market in a borrowed car from Emile, the builder. The local kids will often come up to you and demand money. A small kid no bigger than my knees said " You give me 1,000" which in the old money is about 10 peswas which is about 2p. Still, I didn't like his attitude. So I replied "No, you give me, 1,000" and so it went on in a loop until finally he left. On the way to the market we hit a pothole pretty hard and one of the hubcaps went flying, We don't know if Emile ever knew about it. He probably does now.
Johnny's Observations
1) The water is undrinkable and the sewerage is poor, but every man an their dog seems to have a mobile phone with internet access.
2) When riding in a Tro Tro - if your head is not hurting from the drivers inability to not beep the horn every 5 seconds, it will be hurting from the amount of times you smack it against the side of the van.
3) They bloody love a plastic bag. Everything comes in one. It wouldn't surprise me if the hospitals put the newborn babies in them (with air holes of course) so the parents can carry them home.
Thursday, 8 September 2011
Volunteering in Ghana - Day 2
Day 2
After the first night in Africa it didn't feel much different to England. At breakfast, which consisted of a slice of sweet bread and a cup of black coffee (the milk was yellow and if you go by the motto of don't eat yellow snow, it's best to leave that yellow milk in the jug). Glenn, Silv, Hellie and I spoke about the first night in Africa and how it wasn't so bad although their fan didn't work and their bed was half the size of ours. Silv asked us if she had kept me and Glenn up with her cough. We joked "sorry we couldn't hear anything, the fan keeping us cool was too loud" which to be honest is a line we repeated more than once. But we thought it was hilarious even if no one else did.
Out the window we could see Ghanian life. Beeping horns, red soil, markets selling bread, and impressive amounts of things being balanced on ladies heads.
There is no hot water so showering seemed like a chore. There is no pressure either. I felt bad for complaining about not having a power shower at uni.
When we walked outside, it was like stepping inside a photograph out of a National Geographic magazine. Everyone we walked past would stare, wave, or try to sell us something. Beth and Danielle walked us to the Living Faith Orphanage which is run by Auntie Agnes aided by the help of a few others and charities such as Raising Hope Foundation, who I was with. There's also a school there so the kids can get an education. We also met the other volunteers; Helen, Claire, Zoe and Cat.
Here we met the twelve children that would be coming with us to Santrokofi to live and attend summer school with us. Their names where: Theresa, Courage, Cornelius, Kwame, Mila, Prosper, Nunana, Sharita, Yao, Dolce, Believe, Angela. So all eleven children plus twelve volunteers plus big Kwame and sister patience had to fit in one tro tro along with everyones luggage. After a game of human and luggage tetris we were all in and ready to go. It was a tight squeeze to say the least. How I longed for the spacious TAP Portugal economy seats, that I complained about on the first day. The journey took most of the day, full of; being wedged in sideways, a stray bag hitting me in the back of the head every bump in the road we hit, and one Nunana bouncing around on my knee, all that adds up to one numb bum, and we finally reached our destination of Santrokofi a town made up of three villages.
We were given two buildings in two different compounds for the orphans and volunteers to stay in. One of them was lovely inside and the other looked like something out of saw and I would rather cut off my foot then stay in there. Luckily for the first week, me, Kwame and Glenn would be sleeping in the nice house. Where there is a massive fan to keep the room cold, so there is no need to put the mosquito nets up, mainly because it would get hacked up by the fan, but also because there isn't many mosquitos in the house. It's actually about 10 times nicer than my house at uni so living in an African village is a step up for me.
Day 3 coming soon...
After the first night in Africa it didn't feel much different to England. At breakfast, which consisted of a slice of sweet bread and a cup of black coffee (the milk was yellow and if you go by the motto of don't eat yellow snow, it's best to leave that yellow milk in the jug). Glenn, Silv, Hellie and I spoke about the first night in Africa and how it wasn't so bad although their fan didn't work and their bed was half the size of ours. Silv asked us if she had kept me and Glenn up with her cough. We joked "sorry we couldn't hear anything, the fan keeping us cool was too loud" which to be honest is a line we repeated more than once. But we thought it was hilarious even if no one else did.
Out the window we could see Ghanian life. Beeping horns, red soil, markets selling bread, and impressive amounts of things being balanced on ladies heads.
There is no hot water so showering seemed like a chore. There is no pressure either. I felt bad for complaining about not having a power shower at uni.
When we walked outside, it was like stepping inside a photograph out of a National Geographic magazine. Everyone we walked past would stare, wave, or try to sell us something. Beth and Danielle walked us to the Living Faith Orphanage which is run by Auntie Agnes aided by the help of a few others and charities such as Raising Hope Foundation, who I was with. There's also a school there so the kids can get an education. We also met the other volunteers; Helen, Claire, Zoe and Cat.
Here we met the twelve children that would be coming with us to Santrokofi to live and attend summer school with us. Their names where: Theresa, Courage, Cornelius, Kwame, Mila, Prosper, Nunana, Sharita, Yao, Dolce, Believe, Angela. So all eleven children plus twelve volunteers plus big Kwame and sister patience had to fit in one tro tro along with everyones luggage. After a game of human and luggage tetris we were all in and ready to go. It was a tight squeeze to say the least. How I longed for the spacious TAP Portugal economy seats, that I complained about on the first day. The journey took most of the day, full of; being wedged in sideways, a stray bag hitting me in the back of the head every bump in the road we hit, and one Nunana bouncing around on my knee, all that adds up to one numb bum, and we finally reached our destination of Santrokofi a town made up of three villages.
We were given two buildings in two different compounds for the orphans and volunteers to stay in. One of them was lovely inside and the other looked like something out of saw and I would rather cut off my foot then stay in there. Luckily for the first week, me, Kwame and Glenn would be sleeping in the nice house. Where there is a massive fan to keep the room cold, so there is no need to put the mosquito nets up, mainly because it would get hacked up by the fan, but also because there isn't many mosquitos in the house. It's actually about 10 times nicer than my house at uni so living in an African village is a step up for me.
Day 3 coming soon...
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
Volunteering in Ghana - Day 1
Intro
How I came to be involved with volunteering was through my friend Beth who helps run the Raising Hope Foundation charity with Kinza and a few other wonderful people. They run summer camps, help out at orphanages, as well as sponsoring Ghanians through education and currently they are building an orphanage along with its own farm land.
Day 1
Having spent most of the night trying to cram all of my things into my rucksack, waking up was a struggle. The snooze button once again became my best friend. On the way to the airport with my mum and the reality of where I was going and what I was going still had not sunk in, and I don't think it truly did till we touched down on that red African soil.
At Heathrow I met Glenn, who I hadn't seen since my failed attempt at eating the biggest burger I've ever seen in 40 minutes. I also was reunited with Hellie, who I hadn't seen since our last la crew reunion and met Silv for the first time. Likewise they felt the same as me. There was an air of uncertainty in the atmosphere.
On the plane to lisbon we sat on the backrow. The legroom wasn't enough, but when is it? And the meal...don't get me started, although I ate it anyway. When we arrived at Lisbon we had 40 minutes to get to our connecting flight. We walked for what seemed forever, showed our passports, had our bags scanned again, had visions of an oasis before we eventually reached the gate for Accra. The gate turned out to be the same one we landed at. So really they made us walk in a massive circle, when really we could have stayed on the same plane. I'm looking at you TAP Portugal.
On the second flight to Accra, I was sat next to two Ghanian's: Friday and Desmond. Both were very nice and now lived in the UK and were visiting. They asked me if someone was meeting me at the airport to which I said "Yes". They said "That's good, that's good". It turns out that armed robbery is quite common at night so you have to be careful where you tread.
We arrived at the airport 2 hours late. I'm looking at you TAP Portugal! Beth, Danielle, Kinza and Dani were there waiting for us. Kinza picked us up some water. We were expecting bottles but we were introduced to Ghanian filtered water which comes in plastic pouches. They make good water balloons. Ghana did not present the scorching sun I was expecting but instead we were welcomed with that all too familiar rain.
We also had our first experience of transport in Ghana. For us we had hired a "Tro Tro" which is pretty much a narrow people carrier filled with too many rows of seats. We also me Kwame, who helps out at the orphanage and he helped us to load our bags into the Tro.
We speeded out of the city, barely able to take in any of the landscape through the condensation on the windows. The driving is fast, all over the road, dangerous, and as far as I could tell there doesn't seem to be a highway code. How my boxers remained clean, I have no idea.
as we got further out of the city we passed huts, which looked like they had been made out of old shipping containers. A familiar logo kept popping up and that logo was Vodafone, which surprised me seeing how much they charge for roaming in Ghana. But seriously, almost every other wooden, or container hut was red and rocked the vodafone symbol. This seemed to be the case in every village we passed through.
Along the roads armed police stop cars at checkpoints to see where they are going. It was interesting to be in a tro tro full of white people and to be considered suspicious. A shining light pierced my eyes as the policeman scoped out our faces and asked the driver questions. I was too busy looking at his gun to hear what was said. I heard rumours that in Africa it's not uncommon to bribe police for them to turn a blind eye. In this case no bribe change hands and we were allowed on our way. It became a routine as we were stopped, blinded by light and then allowed to continue on the road. When I say road, I really mean dirt track covered in potholes.
We arrived in Sogakope at around 2 am at a youth hostel. I was surprised to see a massive flatscreen on the wall and a double bed with a fan about it keeping us cool through the night. Which was nice.
Click Day 2
How I came to be involved with volunteering was through my friend Beth who helps run the Raising Hope Foundation charity with Kinza and a few other wonderful people. They run summer camps, help out at orphanages, as well as sponsoring Ghanians through education and currently they are building an orphanage along with its own farm land.
Day 1
Having spent most of the night trying to cram all of my things into my rucksack, waking up was a struggle. The snooze button once again became my best friend. On the way to the airport with my mum and the reality of where I was going and what I was going still had not sunk in, and I don't think it truly did till we touched down on that red African soil.
At Heathrow I met Glenn, who I hadn't seen since my failed attempt at eating the biggest burger I've ever seen in 40 minutes. I also was reunited with Hellie, who I hadn't seen since our last la crew reunion and met Silv for the first time. Likewise they felt the same as me. There was an air of uncertainty in the atmosphere.
On the plane to lisbon we sat on the backrow. The legroom wasn't enough, but when is it? And the meal...don't get me started, although I ate it anyway. When we arrived at Lisbon we had 40 minutes to get to our connecting flight. We walked for what seemed forever, showed our passports, had our bags scanned again, had visions of an oasis before we eventually reached the gate for Accra. The gate turned out to be the same one we landed at. So really they made us walk in a massive circle, when really we could have stayed on the same plane. I'm looking at you TAP Portugal.
On the second flight to Accra, I was sat next to two Ghanian's: Friday and Desmond. Both were very nice and now lived in the UK and were visiting. They asked me if someone was meeting me at the airport to which I said "Yes". They said "That's good, that's good". It turns out that armed robbery is quite common at night so you have to be careful where you tread.
We arrived at the airport 2 hours late. I'm looking at you TAP Portugal! Beth, Danielle, Kinza and Dani were there waiting for us. Kinza picked us up some water. We were expecting bottles but we were introduced to Ghanian filtered water which comes in plastic pouches. They make good water balloons. Ghana did not present the scorching sun I was expecting but instead we were welcomed with that all too familiar rain.
We also had our first experience of transport in Ghana. For us we had hired a "Tro Tro" which is pretty much a narrow people carrier filled with too many rows of seats. We also me Kwame, who helps out at the orphanage and he helped us to load our bags into the Tro.
We speeded out of the city, barely able to take in any of the landscape through the condensation on the windows. The driving is fast, all over the road, dangerous, and as far as I could tell there doesn't seem to be a highway code. How my boxers remained clean, I have no idea.
as we got further out of the city we passed huts, which looked like they had been made out of old shipping containers. A familiar logo kept popping up and that logo was Vodafone, which surprised me seeing how much they charge for roaming in Ghana. But seriously, almost every other wooden, or container hut was red and rocked the vodafone symbol. This seemed to be the case in every village we passed through.
Along the roads armed police stop cars at checkpoints to see where they are going. It was interesting to be in a tro tro full of white people and to be considered suspicious. A shining light pierced my eyes as the policeman scoped out our faces and asked the driver questions. I was too busy looking at his gun to hear what was said. I heard rumours that in Africa it's not uncommon to bribe police for them to turn a blind eye. In this case no bribe change hands and we were allowed on our way. It became a routine as we were stopped, blinded by light and then allowed to continue on the road. When I say road, I really mean dirt track covered in potholes.
We arrived in Sogakope at around 2 am at a youth hostel. I was surprised to see a massive flatscreen on the wall and a double bed with a fan about it keeping us cool through the night. Which was nice.
Click Day 2
Tuesday, 6 September 2011
An apology and the rest of Dublin
As seems to be the protocol of my blog, I need to start with an apology for the lack of blogging again. I'm beginning to feel like a divorced parent who gets the kids on an occasional weekend always promising to take them to a football game the next time and I just keep letting them down and then they grow up to have issues. So not wanting you guys to grow up to have issues (if you already have issues I'm in no way responsible), we will go to the football game and it will be on the regular. By football game...I of course mean, I will write my blog more often and give you that brain candy you severely deserve.
Okay, so it has been an incredible summer for me and has flown by at 100mph. I've met so many great people, made some wonderful friends, had some amazing experiences, and laughs have been coming by the thousands. Can't ask for more. I will firstly finish the tale of Dublin as I left it on a cliffhanger leaving you all warmed up.
So Day Two. The Guinness brewery and Sam's birthday. Probably one of the coolest places in the world, where everyone pretends to be interested in all the information about the history of Guinness as they're secretly searching for the place to cash in the drink token. I was no exception. Although near the entrance there is a massive pit full of barley. Whenever someone in the group thinks up an idea that would be funny but no one with at least a couple of brain cells would even think about doing, all eyes end on me. In this case they thought it would be funny for someone to jump into the pit of barley. But I didn't really want to be that guy today, there was too many people around and if I got kicked out before I managed to cash in my token, I would have been pissed.
At the end of the tour we learned how to pour the perfect pint of Guinness and received a certificate praising us for these skills. I think you know this qualification appears on my CV right next to the 50 metre swimming badge. At the top of the brewery there is a bar with glass windows that overlooks the city of Dublin. It's quite a sight to behold. We spoke to the bar staff and told them it was Sam's birthday and then the bar manager made an announcement on the microphone about it. Everyone in the bar stopped to watch as she began singing happy birthday and most people joined in. After that, a few more people came up to her and telling her it was their birthday's. If you know Luke then you know he has a pair of lungs on him and his voice can reach pretty amazing levels, enough for everyone to stop to look at him as he sings. People then kept coming over and giving us their unwanted Guinness tokens - luke got most of them. An American woman called patty came over to us thinking that we were a choir. She wanted her daughter to meet "the choir boys". It turned out that her daughter, Shannon had just got divorced and along with her sister Maggie and her new husband Harry they were in Dublin celebrating the divorce. We were invited to the table and there we drank with them the rest of the day. Mainly we got free drinks but sometimes we had to go to the cash bar to buy drinks at a low rate of 4 euro 40. On the way to the bar me and miles saw a man being filmed as he poured a pint and spoke to the camera. It was the guy that is in all of the videos as you walk around the brewery - I can't remember his name. Anyway he gave us the beers he had poured and we ended up being on camera tasting them. Whether the footage was used I have no idea.
The average time spent in the bar in the Guinness brewery bar is around 40 minutes. We were there for about 6 hours and it was dark by the time we left. On the way to the exit there was of course the pit of barley. We were all by this stage pretty much two Guinesses (not sure what the plural of Guinness is?) from hitting the floor, so we ran and jumped into the barley mound and did what I like to think was the worlds first mass Barley angel attempt - A joint American and UK attempt. I know there is a photo of it somewhere or at least some cctv footage kicking about, so if yes, please send it to me so I can post it on here.
We got back to the trusty old travel lodge in the eastern block, that we were calling home for the few days. For some reason, not naming names, but he knows who he is, we'll call him, I don't know, Mr. "I'm going to have a shower but before that I'm going to drink Gin butt naked for three hours", for now. And that's exactly what he did. Not content with burning mine and Luke's retinas, as we tried to get ready for a night out, he thought it would be hilarious to teabag a Gin and tonic that was closest to him, only it turned out to be his gin and tonic. The look on his face was amazing! If you don't know what teabagging is, in this case or any case, in fact - ignorance is bliss. Don't google it. Surely it must end hear you must be thinking but no. I went to see what the guys where doing next door when I found a massive polish guy hanging around our door outside. He must have heard the music and excitement from outside our door. As soon as the door opened he was in, seeing Mr. "I'm going to have a shower but before that I'm going to drink Gin butt naked for three hours" he seemed to think that was the dress code. So he whipped his trousers down and shouted "It's party time!" He was quickly thrown out! And if I could hit my head on something to erase this memory, I would do.
While we waited for one of the overpriced taxi's we had a guinness in the hotel bar. There was a couple sat their who are always there every night drinking. When the man told us that they had lived there for 4 months, without missing a beat Dan said "So, you're a bit like Alan Partridge then?" The taxi arrived just in time and we were off.
Dan had hooked us up with a"VIP" table in the most exclusive club in Dublin. I can't remember the name it was something like crystal or something. Any way we never made it to our table the whole night and we figured out we then walked into the club next door which was outside and spent the whole night there. I don't remember any other details. This is mainly because...it was a long time ago.
In our room only me and Luke made it back. There was a double and single so there was one spare. "One of us should probably sleep in the spare bed"
"yeah"
then we both got into the same bed. It was a bit like the relationship in friends where Joey and Ross always have naps together.
The next day we went to Jameson's factory where there is no way of getting more than one free drink so it's not getting as good as a write up as the Guinness factory. It was ok. But the smell of whiskey really was not what we wanted after the night we had. As it was our last day in Dublin and exhaustion was setting in, we took this day a little easier than the others and it had probably to do with us spending most our money already. We went to Gourmet burger to get some food and I ended up paying 40 pound for one burger. The reason? Because I had to go over my overdraft and got a 30 pound charge for the pleasure. When asked how did it feel to spend so much on a burger I said "I'll let future Johnny g worry about that!" And that's my new motto. We had a few hours to kill and about 10 euros each so what better way to spend them than in a fabulous club in Dublin. I think entrance was 10 euros so how we got drinks I have no idea, I think a few of the lovely locals bought us enough drinks to get by.
On the plane back Pagey asked me "so how does future Johnny g feel about past Johnny G" I replied "I'm not sure about future Johnny g, but present Johnny G thinks Dublin Johnny G is a right dick"
And that was Dublin, the place where dreams are made of. I have not had a guinness that tastes as good since and I would swim there to get another one of those bad boys! It was a pleasure.
I will be on top of the blog for the next month at least as I will be writing up the diary I kept when I volunteered in Ghana, maybe every day or at least every second day. So keep checking for that.
Thanks for reading. Sorry for the lateness again.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)