My Door

So my door (if you refer back to my last post) literally just rotted off of my mud walls. It was a bummer when I tried closing my door one day and the frame fell away.

So I called the carpenter to ask him to come fix it. His grand plan? Switch the left frame with right frame. Okay... one rotten side for another.... Sigh.

A few more days pass and another carpenter comes who actually does fix it. Of course this doesn't go as planned either. Just as he finished the frame it started to rain and work was called off. So I had a big hole in my wall without a door. Then the light rain that was falling turned into a downpour. So as I'm struggling to save my room from destruction my house father totally comes through for me and covers my room with a local mat. I chilled with the local mat for a door for 2 more days and then my door was finally put in.

The cultural minuses: making up crazy ways to fix a door, not coming to fix the door when you say you will, stopping work because it's raining leaving me door-less
The cultural pluses: Not letting me pay for the labor because I'm their guest in the village (even after 7+ months)

And I have to say that to me, it was an okay trade-off. I'm a sucker for hospitality, kindness, and hilarity. And looking back this was kind of funny.

My old frame

Mat for a door

(my greatest regret actually getting the door fixed though is losing the "love the one who love you" quote above my door)

My new door (I never took a finished picture, but rest assured I have a working door now)

Cham Cham. Yeah, I ate it. This has nothing to do with my door. Think of it as a bonus.

 

Sorry for the delay in blog posts friends and family (Mom). I was feeling under the weather a bit but I'm all good now!

Let me make good on my last blog post- climbing trip.
During the All Vol conference my friend and I bought a rock climbing trip offered from another volunteer. This trip we cashed in on at the end of May. I took a bus down to Kumasi and met up with Ran there. After a bunch of small trotro's and taxi's we reached our fellow PCV's Nathan's site. It took me about 12 hours to reach his house (imagine I-70 with potholes so large that your entire tire could fall into it).

We were met with an awesome offer of homemade pizza. Delicious. We may or may not have dropped one on the floor, picked it up, dusted it off, and put it back into the toaster oven for a few extra minutes and ate it.

The next morning I awoke to rain and I had my hopes dashed to go climbing. However the rain was light and let up so we were still able to climb. We reached the rock around 10 or so and after an hour approach were able to touch the rock face. It took about 7 hours to get up and descend. Nathan led the route while Ran, Andy (mutual PCV along for the trip), and I climbed up after him. Rich would come up the rear and clean the route (collecting the equipment left in the rock).

The descent was scary. Rappels have always scared me. Everything was done with awesome grace though and out 250 feet repel went off without and troubles.

Hilarious times were had and it was definitely one of the best trips in Ghana I've had.

Since that trip I've also gone to a meeting about kayayo's. A kayayo is a name given to a person who has left their village to go be a type of porter or seller in a larger city. This is becoming a bigger and bigger problem because more young women (as most kayayo's are women) are leaving their villages and flocking to cities where they have no shelter and expose themselves to all kinds of risks (sexual assault, robbery, malaria, etc. etc.).

Personally in my own village I've had 6 girls leave (all whom I knew) and only 1 has returned. It's sad the pressure the family's are under. A mother (who is not allowed to own land and therefore does not farm) with a family of 5-10 children has almost no source of income but is expected to provide the soups that accompany all meals. The money needed to buy the vegetables and spices is also needed to pay for school fees for their children and other odds and ends. You can see how a mother may be pressured to send a child into a city they know nothing about to try to make some extra money and perhaps have 1 less mouth to feed.

Add onto my list of things to do: Hold kayayo workshop in village.

Village life is going well though. My villagers have all started to construct their rabbit hutches. I hope by August to have purchased the rabbits and have the project completly underway.

Thank you all for your letters and until next time!

Yours truly

Nathan, Ran, and Andy

The view from the top!

Next post, the story of what happened with my door.