On Another Note

There is something that makes noise at night that I swear sound like Dr. Zoidberg....

Late Night Rambling

There are times that I think I may be falling in love with Africa.

The days when the sun is setting over the palm trees and tropical landscape with it is orange and yellow hues highlighting delicate features of young women as the wind blows aggressively through the window of a line taxi barreling down dirt roads.

Or the nights when the power is out and I am left in my room to the sound of music and the light of my candles the only brightness, the shadows like statues on my yellow tinted walls.

Or the times when sleep escapes me and I lay down on the ground in the middle of the compound and just look at the sky, the stars, the bats that fly by, and just feel the cool breeze that isn't in my room on the same nights as power outages.

It is in these moments. The calm. The times where you can just take in the fact you are away from everything that you know as home in a distant land, where people have let you in, and in some ways you find a footing on your own. In these moments, it feels calm, accepting, and it feels like maybe you are finding something again that you thought you lost.

Updates on Programs

Hello!

I wanted to update everyone on my job and the programs I run. I work in Antoa at the Antoa SHS and JHS schools running two. The one at the SHS is a girl's leadership program that meets once a week on Monday and then the tutoring peer to peer program that meets on Tuesdays and Thursday.

Girl's Leadership Program (GLP):

The program has been good. We have had 3 sessions all focusing on self esteem and goal setting. The girls are great, but they have been having some serious issues with showing up on time. Which has been frustrating because we start at 3:30, and the longer it takes them to get to the classroom, the longer I stay and prolong my eating dinner...food problems.

But it is all around good. I work with a local Ghana woman named Grace and Ann (Expo staff) running the program and all the girls seem like they are enjoying it. We voted on a club name and we are now called, "Girl's Generation: Leadership is Power." Our second session was a little crazy because about 10 minutes on a huge rain storm came through and I had to push the girl's close together and scream so they could hear me over the rain crashing through the open window. Eventually it passed, but it was crazy for a few.

All in all though, the girl's are a great group and I want to do good by them. I am trying to connect with Mount Holyoke people in the Ghana area and see maybe if they would talk to my girl's. Or even trying to connect them with St. Joseph's Academy so they can see a different side of the world and life.

Tutoring

I feel like I have good days and bad days with tutoring. For the most part, the students do well in their small groups with the tutors. It is the large time that they are with me that I find annoying. I pass out snack to the students while they do a writing prompt. Sometimes it is great, other times it is annoying because students take the snack and then leave. I have talked to them multiple times, and then yesterday I was getting so annoyed because almost a whole group wanted to walk out and I stopped handing out snack and just bitched to them that when they do that, they are stealing from me and are essentially a thief. Of course I said that I know that they are good students and are not thieves, but they needed to act that way and not goof off and think they can just leave. It makes me distrustful and it angers me because the majority of the group does well. But is is enough students in the program that it can cause an issue with things.

There are a few things that I am looking to tweek to help with some of the issues that I have been experiencing. I am going to try and incentive good behavior all the time by having "Ms. Taylor" time. As well, I am going to have midterm awards for attendance and such. Hopefully that will place things in a more positive direction. .

The tutors are great though. There are 1 or 2 students that I am going to have to talk to about making sure that they just don't do lecture style teaching, but all around they are good kids.

But yea, that is my program in a nutshell. I will post some picture next time I remember to upload them :/

Paz,

Chustz

I AM BACK AND THINGS ARE GOOD

Hello All!.

So I realize my last post was very down and sad. It was a bit of a rough a few weeks. I was alone in Antoa a lot, but things have gotten better.

Riley, another Expo person, has moved into the room that Ryan left (he went back to the US). She stays more often in Antoa, so I am not alone as much.

It was also frustrating because our office days changed from Saturday afternoon to Friday morning. Realistically, this schedule makes more sense for reporting. However, it costs more money for me to leave Antoa on Friday, come back, and then leave again if I want to go out and such on Saturday. Sure it opens up my days, but now I spend 14 cedis on travel rather than the 7 I did before. It adds up over time.

Also internet has been a bitch. My modem decided to freak out on me and that prevents me from accessing it in Antoa. But also the office keeps running out and I am now only supposed to use it for work related things. Which makes communicating with my family difficult because my phone still isn't unlocked, even after multiple calls with AT&T....

And the power. Although is is s shitty schedule with 24 hours off and then 12 on, at least sometimes we get an extra 12 hours of power. So that hasn't been horrible...

I realize I am ranting. It was just my last post came when a lot of things were going on and it just made me feel all sorts of sad. But things are good now. I will post more in a separate post so this isn't all in one space, but yea!

Paz,

Chustz

And So It Goes

Dear Readers, 

I apologize that it has been a while since I have last posted. Things have been a little difficult with internet and electricity here...

Things in Ghana have been fine, but I've been a little emotional the past few days.  I think because I've been seeing all the images of Mardi Gras and such and I miss being with friends and family. Ghana is great and all and things haven't been bad, but I guess I am just lonely. I spend a lot of time alone in Antoa because my roommate go out to party in Accra a lot and some stay with their boyfriends in the city. So it is just me and my Ghana roommates. They are fine, and I have made some friends in Antoa and I visit them, but until I fully lean the language it is hard to communicate on a deeper level. 

But that is just recently. For the most part things have been well over here. My tutoring program runs on Tuesday and Thursday with 40 kids and 5 tutors and I have a women's leadership group that is for high school students that meets on Monday with about 25 girls. Both programs have had their ups and downs, but overall it has been good. 

The kids have been a bit sneaky in the tutoring program though. Some of them wait till I give them snack and sneak out when they walk to their tutor rooms. I've caught 2, but I think some others did it as well, so now I am on the look out...Sneaky kids....

Ghana has been typical Ghana and Africa recently. The government has put the country on a new electricity schedule that sucks. We have 24 hours off and 12 hours on. Sometimes we get power a little longer if they deem they have enough, but all in all it is annoying. Plus adding credit to my internet modem has been frustrating so that is why I haven't been able to skype. I can't figure out how to bundle my data when I get credit so I have to go to the office, but I don't have keys yet so I have to figure out when people will be there. It is all a little ball of frustration and annoyance but hopefully it will be better soon in regards to power and internet. 

I will probably go to Togo, a neighboring country in a 2 weeks with everyone. It is the 60 day mark of us being in Ghana soon, and every 60 days we have to leave the country because of our visa. It is weird, but it will have us visiting parts of Africa. I am going to email Momo and see if he plans to visit Africa or his family in Cote de Ivor anytime soon so maybe we could meet up. 

I met a British guy named Toby who is a volunteer in a small beach town in Ghana who wants to come to Nola one day. He was cool. We may go visit him in his village to hang out on the beach before he leaves for the UK. I now have an open invitation to go to Liverpool which is cool. So many British people in Ghana, it is crazy. But then again, it was a British colony so it makes sense. 

But Ghana has not been bad. I am adjusting to the city more and feel more comfortable taking the line taxi and trotros by myself. The language is still hit or miss, but I am teaching myself as I go. I think I am just in a little slump right now and it will be good later. But I miss everyone and love you all. I hope everyone who is reading is well, and hopefully I get this damn internet and electricity in a better state....

Paz, 

Chustzie