Weeks 4-7

News for weeks 4-7

Dear friends! here I come with updates about how my life goes here in faraway Africa..

WHERE & HOW DO I LIVE

- I live right next to the office of my work, the same premises
- My “home” is a small house with 5 rooms & 5 different entrances: bathroom with the toilet, 3 rooms for trainees and kitchen
- Thanks to living right next to the working place, I can afford to wake up “late” – this means around 7 – 7,30am, the other Ghanaians working in the company wake up very early, because their way to work lasts 1-2 hours in the traffic jams
- Currently only two rooms are taken, now we are 2 trainees in The Capital Group – me & Ana from Germany, Ioana from Romania left Ghana last week, since her traineeship was over
- In front of our home we have grass and few meters away there is a summer hut with table and chairs. There are palm trees all over and loads of green (now that we have rainy season)
- There are 2 cleaning ladies in the premises – they clean the place every morning (normally they come at around 5am and they are the ones who usually wake me up with their loud talking right under my window, yet they are very very nice and kind to us), they also wash the dishes and do our laundry – there`s no washing machine. Many Ghanaians believe that washing in hands is much better than washing machines
- There are 3 drivers – they work for the company and are at our disposal with 2 company cars during the working hours
- There`s no vacuum cleaner in our place, so I “clean” my carpet in the room with short birch
- Forget about hot shower in Ghana.. Since I came I take shower in the only water we have – a cold one. Yet we are happy that we have a cold water at least, because there are many stoppages of water here
- There are no glass windows in our place. Only mosquito nets, iron grates and wooden shutters from outside
- My room consists of small verandah with fridge and table and the second room: there is a carpet on the floor, wide bed (but short :( ), one armchair, table and TV with 2 channels
- In the kitchen there is a gas burner, so we can cook (if the gas bomb is not empty..), table, 3 chairs and quite ok kitchenware (they still use aluminum pots here)
- There are two gates in our premises, which are closed from inside. We have two security guards which is very normal here. If a car wants to get into the house, they honk from outside, security comes to open the gate for you and close it afterwards. The security guys stay out whole & every night, sleeping most of the time in front of the door

SPICES
- Ghanaians are crazy for pepper (they pronounce it “PEPA”). Pepper is simply a must! They add it to all the dishes, including sweet porridge. Ghanaians love spicy food – if they like it they call it “sweet” – for example: “Try it, it`s so sweet!”

KEBAB
- Ghanaians are meat lovers! Kebab is one of their favorites. They chop it in the spots – like we do with chips. Kebab means pieces of meat (normally goat meat) cut into pieces and put on the stick, sometimes with onions and fresh pepper and then of course loads of “spicy pepa” :)

MEAT
- most common are these: fishes, chicken, goat meat, beef and sausages. Animals` skins are considered as a delicacy and so skins are to be found in most of the sauces. Africans really like it!

DRUGS, ALCOHOL, CIGARETTES
- Ghanaians rarely smoke or drink, from drugs I heard a lot about African wheat, they say access is easy if somebody wants

ANIMALS
- Chickens - are everywhere! Literally, everywhere! You`ll find them running around on the streets, courtyards of the houses, even in some shops and around your feet
- goat flocks – everywhere!
- Mosquitoes – mosquito net above my bed becomes part of my everyday ritual before going to sleep and after waking up. Statistics say that every 500th mosquito carries malaria. On average I got 5 bites a day. Mostly mosquitoes are biting and the dawn and at the dusk. For Ghanaians to have malaria is something totally normal and if you can afford to buy drugs you can easily heal it. At least mostly it is so.
- Birds – are very big (like our eagle and bigger) and many kinds that I`ve never seen in my life. They`re a bit scary..
- Frogs – now during rainy season there are many frogs in our place. I call them megafrogs because almost every night there is a concert with frogs` singing. They are very noisy…
- Lizzards – there are many lizards, too. There is another animal similar to lizard, they call it wall jacker (or something like that), these small lizard-like animals climb the walls and ceilings
- my first monkey – I`ve seen my first real monkey (apart from the ones from ZOOs). The monkey sat on the shoulder of a guy walking the street. Just like that! :) I heard there are some places in Ghana with many wild monkeys directly in the villages. I hope I`ll see some! :)

WINDOWS
- Ghanaian windows are cut into horizontal glass panels and can be opened while pushing the lever down – they open up to horizontal position
- as a security on most of the houses you can find iron grates (similar to the ones I`ve seen in Tunisia)

PIDGIN ENGLISH (also called broken English)
- most popular among university students. Sounds really like “broken English” – when I hear it I still have an impression that I hear English, yet is like a slang, like if ppl are tired of talking, finishing sentences

CLOTHES
- men love loooooooong t-shirts, up to their knees, Africa lives for HIP HOP and this reflects also the way they dress
- fabrics – very popular here – you buy fabric & you go to “your” taylor who sews the African dresses for you
- traditionally the left hand is covered by the piece of cloth or often hold behind the back while greeting or while eating away from the table, since it`s considered as not clean

AIR CONDITION
- Awful! I`m really suffering! Ghanaians are able to put AC on 16 degrees and feel totally comfortable like this, while when there is 25 degrees outside they are freezing and suffering badly. Does it make sence???

TIME
- Ghana is GMT + 0. Greenwich meridian crosses the village called Tema – nearby to Accra

WEATHER – CLOUDY DAYS
- because it`s rainy season now, many days the sky is full of heavy clouds, these days without sun are sad and colder