Junie's Online Thoughts
Saturday, January 31, 2004
Its been a long time. First and foremost, thanks to Trish for coming to visit us. Thanks for your generous treating and bringing presents and taking stuff home with you. We hope you had a good time, as we enjoyed seeing you and sharing Ghana.
The last bit of Trish's visit sent us back up to the Volta region. We stopped at a really cool bead making village to watch them pound glass and pour it into clay molds, put it in an oven, and then use tools to make the middle hole and to make them round. After the beads cool, they dump them in a shallow dirt hole and use mud and water to rub them together to make them smooth and shiny. We went a little nuts in the bead store, and bought quite a few necklaces and bracelets.
Then we drove up to Tafi Atome to the sacred monkey sanctuary. The road to Hohoe was terrible--full of potholes or bumpy gravel roads. Signage was equally terrible, so we ended up on this dirt/stone side road for twenty minutes, not really knowing if we were in the right place. Thankfully we were, so we dumped our things in the guesthouse and followed our guide to see some monkeys.
Down the main street in the village (of about 1,000 people), we stopped along some trees. The guide made a high pitched kissing noise and suddenly monkeys were nearby. He fed them bananas and we watched them swinging from branches. Years ago, the chief decided that the monkeys were children of the stool, and were therefore sacred. No one can hunt or kill the monkeys now in this area, and every year they host a festival to honor the monkeys. So without predators, the monkeys live happy, jumping monkey lives. And its so cool to watch. We had a drink at a spot (without electricity, so warm pop) and then were called to dinner. Like most villages I've been to, people are poor and live simply. They also eat simply. We had plain rice, with a sauce made from hard boiled eggs, tomato paste, palm oil and chiles. I had been feeling a bit off all week, and then got heart burn, and then got sick from dinner. That night, I had severe stomach pains. The pit toilets (although lighted) were a good three minute walk from our rooms, so every so often I would try to go. But it hurt so bad....worse than my normal acid reflux attacks. Finally, after moaning and tossing and turning, I spent the wee hours of the morning puking my guts out over and over again. I got a few hours of sleep, but opted out of the 6:30 am monkey walk through the woods. The guide dropped off breakfast for me (plain oats and sweet bread covered in margerine), but my stomach wasnt ready for food.
Jeremy and his mom came back to the guesthouse and while we were packing up, monkeys surrounded our rooms. We watched them playing in the trees for a long while, taking way too many photos with the digital camera.
We decided to take another way home, which turned out to be a mistake. A woman walking toward the city where we were going, offered to show us the way on the "rough road." Jesus. That road was undriveable. It is a sheer miracle from god that we didnt bottom out, or get four flat tires, or overheat the car. Jeremy was the best driver I've ever seen, and steered us around gaping holes, trecherous terrain and landed us in a village with dirt roads. The bad, dusty, bumpy roads lasted over two and a half hours, and by the end we were all about to cry. I dont know how Jeremy did it, but he landed us on smooth pavement in Ho, and smooth sailing all the way back to Accra.
Then we ran some last minute shopping errands for Trish, packing and taking photos. We ate dinner, then dropped her off at the airport.
Yesterday I spent part of the day with Heidi, who was returning to Denmark. Unfortunately, one of her colleagues got really sick, so stayed home while we all went out for dinner. (Jeremy, myself, Heidi, another Danish gal, Mark, Tycho and Lucienne.) We packed them up to go the airport, but the Danish gal, I think her name was Sine, was still throwing up and having diarrhea and feeling like hell. The line at the airport was ungodly long, so she laid down on the ground while we stood by the bags. Check-in was supposed to be from 6 to 8:30 pm, and I cant imagine a worse scenario. They all had overweight baggage, expired VISAS, it was 9:15 pm (the plane left at 10:30) and one gal was feeling like death warmed over. Finally we reached the door, and I only got a rushed goodbye with Heidi as she pushed both carts through. We herded the other two gals to the front, but Sine could barely make it through without having to crouch down on the floor. We were a little bit freaked out, thinking that if she had a fever, she should be in the hospital for fear of malaria. THey would treat it better here than in Denmark, I think, because they're more used to it here, and I couldnt imagine a full day's flight when I felt like that.
Today Im not quite sure what to do with myself. I cleaned our room and the house, and then had an unfortunate run in with some ants. I was making oatmeal, and noticed a few on the counter. Then more down the front of the cupboard drawers. I sprayed them with Raid, and watched hundreds and hundreds more pouring out from the bottom drawer in the kitchen. Inside the drawer, the Raid fumes had mostly killed them, but there were literally tens of thousands of ants in there. I dont understand. The drawer was empty. Are they eating the wood? I felt really bad slaughtering that many of them, but damn. Its so freaky when you are staring at a river of insects near you and your food and your feet and not want to get rid of them. Since I've been back, theyve been a new kind of ant...medium sized and black, and mostly only in the kitchen. Weird. I've stayed out of the porch, where the majority of the ants live. As long as they stay in there, I wont kill them. But Ive left remnants of previous slaughters around the kitchen as a warning for them to KEEP OUT. When will they learn?
Anyway, I think tomorrow we are having a BBQ, and maybe today I"ll just try to exercise and write. Hope everyone is well. More later.
Monday, January 26, 2004
Saturday night, we were laying in bed and trying to fall asleep. A dog outside began howling, sort of a typical lonely howl of a dog at the moon. Then it continued. And became a heart-breaking moan of anguish. What the hell was going on with this dog? If you could picture the sound of a human hysterically sobbing and shrieking, but coming from a dog, thats what it sounded like. Jeremy finally got dressed and went outside to check on the dog in our compound. It wasnt him...he was sound asleep. Turns out it was the dog in the next compound over, and when Jeremy talked to him, the dog started barking. But as soon as Jeremy returned into the bedroom, the dog began its wailing again. I dont know if thats what caused it or not, but I had wretched dreams the whole night long.
Sunday was Jeremy's birthday, so we started the day with a big breakfast that I made for him and Trish (veggies and eggs, olive ciabatta toast), and then he and Trish went to the cultural center for some initial gifts and looking around. While they were gone, I frosted Jeremy's layer cake (chocolate with red frosting in the middle and blue frosting on top with sprinkles and M & Ms) and started lunch (a big green salad with veggies, peanut stirfry with rice and fresh lemonade). We ate, then drove to Teshie and Nungua to see coffins and art. We chatted with the guys there for a while and took a bunch of photos. They had some new coffins that they didnt have last time (now the inventory included a book, chickens, fish, truck, a vice grip, a machine gun, a shoe, a cobra (for a fetish priest), an eagle, a turkey, a chili pepper and an okra. Last time they had had a cellphone and a giant Star beer bottle. If necessary, multiple guys can work on a casket and it takes one week. If just one guys builds the coffin, it takes a month. Most decorative coffins cost between 7 and 8.5 million cedis ($800-900), although most Ghanaians opt for the straight-ahead, rectangularish, typical casket due to time and cost. They average about four decorative coffins a month and have shipped them all over the world.
The art at the Artist's Alliance was equally good---so many beautiful sculptures and paintings. We didnt buy much--Trish got some posters and I got a book on fertility dolls.
We drove home, cleaned up and went to the fancy Labadi Beach Hotel for dinner. One of Trish's friends had generally given her a bunch of money to take us out for Jeremy's birthday, so we really enjoyed ourselves. Jeremy had a mushroom risotto with pumpkin, I had penne pasta with garlic, mushrooms, tomatoes and peppers, and Trish had grilled prawns with spinach fettucini. We shared a bottle of wine, and two desserts (chocolate sponge cake in cream liquer and vanilla, strawberry and lemon ice cream in these edible sugar cups). It was the kind of place that makes me want to whisper--where the waiters frequently return to fill up your glasses, and brush crumbs off the table, and remove your three sets of silverware. Strange, but wonderful and decadent.
Today we're sticking around Accra for errands and shopping. Tomorrow we're heading out to the Volta region to a bead making village and to the Monkey Sanctuary. We should be back in Accra by Wednesday afternoon for last minute errands and packing up on Thursday.
