First pictures!

Allright, as promised, here are some pictures! The transfer speed is rather slow, so we'll see how many I get uploaded before time runs out...
The first picture shows uncle George and auntie Joyce's house. To the right is the house that Mrs lived in between ages 2 months to 4 years. To the left is the new extension that uncle George is constantly working on, tiling the floor.










This picture shows uncle George himself. I have yet to catch Maa Abena and auntie Joyce on camera, but I'll do my best whenever I meet them.















This is the dog that guards the house. I have to admit that he seems a bit schizophrenic, being nice and quiet one minute, barking loudly at you the next. He almost scared Mrs to death on on occation. I feel a bit sad for him being tied up all day, but I'm not so sure I'd like to see him loose either... He's cute to look at from a distance!







Just to give an example of how much houses differ in standard, here is a picture of a block of flats. Quite run down, and according to uncle George they are to be torn down, but the tenants refuse to move and so far they are still standing. There are worse examples of housing, but certainly extremes when it comes to nice houses aswell!







When we went to the fishing harbour we saw these big fields of fish, spread out on the ground. Looked more overwhelming in real life than on camera...









This is me and the children at Vivibon School. They are very happy to pla with me, and I'm very happy t play with them. Some of them already are learning Swedish (Hej och hej då), and know my name and chant Mats instead of Obroni...









Here Amadou and Mariam are preparing for their next gig. No, sorry, it's me and Mrs preparing to go out and have a look at the solar eclipse.









This is what the full eclipse looked like. Gradually it got darker and suddenly the daylight disappeared and an eerie orange dusk or dawnish coloured light spread. The dogs of the house (We were at uncle Fred and auntie Helen's) got a bit uneasy and didn't know where to go. You could only look at the sun without the special glasses (and take photos) when the moon covered the sun completely like in the picture.






This is Derek, Moses and Dillon looking at the solar eclipse when it gradually goes back to being uncovered again. The eclipse was a special experince indeed, and the boys can save the spectacles for the next one in Ghana in roughly 50 years time...














That's it for now!

Life as an obroni

When you are a white in Ghana, you can nothing but expect some special treatment. The most obvious thing is the children who in a robotlike fashion turn their heads with their eyes wide open and chant "Obroni!". When Ghanians get older they, in most cases, manage to control themselves and not chant but to a certain extent the headturning is still there, even though they try to mask it as just passing by.

When you speak to a Ghanian person you can always expect them to smile at you. Sometimes it is because you say something funny or that they just happen to be happy, but I suspect that they actually think you look kind of funny in your mere apperance. It's not hostile in any way, but sometimes I get the feeling I could get away with saying anything, it's always slightly amusing and never troublesome.

You will also get used to a lot of honking. Taxi drivers seem to think that you always want a ride and honk to make sure you notice them.

I have even managed to spread some of my whiteness to Mrs. Just by walking next to me at the fishing harbour she automatically attracted women carrying baskets with huge fish that they wanted to sell to her, being white I obviously could pay. All the other women had to walk up to people before being offered fish, and often much smaller fish aswell...

Basically you feel very welcome but sometimes, it must be admitted, the honking gets on your nerves...

The first week, for real!

Me and Mrs arrived at Kotoka airport around 18.00 on Wednesday the 22nd. We nervously passed through passport controls, handed in forms with immigration information, got our Visas stamped etc. All of a sudden we were outside the airport, and saw a man waveing both his arms with a big smile on his face. This was uncle George who came to greet us together with his daughter Maa Abena. We were driven to their home in Tema. Tema is a city with roughly 700000 inhabitants, and it is divided into 20-something communities. Uncle George, auntie Joyce and Maa Abena lives in community 9. Dinner was served when we arrived and after eating lovely food we soon passed out in uncle George's big bed that he kindly lent us for our stay.

The next day Mrs went to get her hair done, and me and uncle George went to the exchange bureau and did some shopping. On friday we went on a short visit to Vivibon, the school where Mrs is doing research for her project, looking into the Ghanian schooling system. The school is located in Nungua, and we also met uncle Fred and auntie Helen and saw their house were we are staying while working at he school. In the evening, after returning to Tema, we went to Brian's Place, a bar and restaurant owned by Mrs' uncle Brian. We had appointed to meet him there, and he had the chef cook us a wonderful meal of yam and fish.

On the saturday we went to the fishing market were we took a stroll, looking at fish for sale, fishermen untangling their nets (Nej, inga barnslavar i sikte, mamma. Det måste vara en företeelse från landsbygden.), and fields of small fish spread out on the ground to dry in the sunshine. We had a soothing drink straight out of decapitated coconuts before returning to community 9. In the evening uncle Joe came to pick us up to go see his house. House is maybe not the right word, it is at least on the verge of deserving to be called a mansion. It's huge! During our tour through the house I got lost twice, even though uncle Joe was guiding the way. In a similar fashion as our other hosts, uncle Joe fed us properly. We had chinese food and a very nice time!

On sunday we packed our bags and left for our first stay in Nungua with Fred and Helen. We also met their sons, Derek and Leroy, Unidentical twins, and the younger Moses. Unfortunately Leroy was ill, but Derek took us to school the following day. We met the director and the headmaster of the school, and was informed that the school was, and still is, undergoing end of term exams. So both during Monday and Tuesday we sat in as "envigliators", a terrifying term that means that we were handing out exams and making sure no cheating was going on. In the evening we met uncle Alex and auntie Emelia and their son Justin, relatives to a friend of Mrs' dad.

Today, Wednesday the 29th, the school had an extra holiday. Why? Becaus of the total solar eclipse that occured today. This morning we were outside the house in Nungua with special eclipse shades on our noses, looking at the moon slowly covering the sun until it hid it completely for about 4 minutes. Beautiful!
Mrs' has had her last Hep B injection today, an excursion that included waiting in the waiting room for 3 hours, becuse the nurse forgot to tell the doctor about our visit. In the end the doctor wasn't even needed and the whole thing could have been done in 5 minutes from entering the clinic. Annoying, but at least we got it done. We then headed for Legon and met Mrs' cousin Nana Efujaa at the university campus.

Phew! That's the first week! Looking back on what I've written it looks kind of compact and not very intresesting to read... Hmm... Might leave out more stuff in the future, and write more detailed on certain events. I've found a decent Internet cafe with broadband now, some pictures are on their way.... As soon as I remember to bring the cord for the camera with me...

First few weeks... or is it days?

The atmosphere here is very relaxing! The heat makes any kind of walking fast or running impossible. Everybody takes their time to get from point A to point B, and when they arrive at point B there is no rush in getting off towards point C. Generally point B is the shade under a dense tree, where spending the rest of the day is not unusual... This is of course under the condition that you are not working, but even when you're at work you tend to let things take their time.
Me and Mrs have also realized that Ghana is a sort of time warping zone. Yesterday, for example, we took a taxi to the fishing harbour where we walked around for quite some time, looking at boats, nets, people and plenty of fish. We were offered all kinds and sizes of fish, but ended up with nothing more than a coconut each that we drank us unthirsty from. Anyway, after this little daytrip of ours we came home thinking we've spent a nice day out, only to find that only a couple of hours had passed! The same phenomenon has made us feel as if we already have spent a few weeks here, although it's only been two days.
Anyway, I'll write detailed reports of the last few weeks, sorry, days soon! Just wanted to give you a general feeling first.

We're there!

Yesterday evening at 18.25 we set our feet on ghanian soil. We had excellent service on the Lufthansa flights but nothing can compare to having a bed, and being served dinner by uncle George and auntie Joyce. I would have posted some pictures, but I must wait for the Internet cafe to upgrade to broadband first (Next week according to a sign that looks as if it was posted a month ago...). Anyway, the sun is peeking through clouds down at us cruising the streets in taxis, with long trails of children shouting OBRONI! (White man!) We have to skip and jump our way between the geckos, chicken and goats that populate the streets, and Mrs has gotten herself some new fresh cornrows (Typ inbakade flätor på svenska) at the local hairdressers. Write more soon!

Closing in

The date of departure is coming closer. Today we have invested in a first aid kit, plenty of insect repellent and other things from the pharmacy. The guide book we have strongly recommend wearing a shirt with a buttoned pocket when visiting markets. In the pocket you can keep the cash you plan to spend without risk of anyone snatching it without you noticing. With this in mind I bought a nice airy shirt, with buttoned pockets. The shirt cost about £3.50 which is somwhere around 1/15th of what we spent in the pharmacy...

Write more soon... Time to run home to pack! Leaving in less than one and a half days!!!!!!

Tickets!!!!

Yay!
Finally the tickets are booked! The point of no return! We're going out on March 22nd and return on the 31st of May. Unless we extend the trip that is... We sacked Ghana International Airways after finding a cheaper offer flying with Lufthansa via Frankfurt and Lagos. A bit of a detour doubling the travel time to a total of 12 hours, but still better than AlItalia that would have taken almost 24 h...

Can't wait to get out of the rain!