My lips are crunchy...

Dry season is here, Harmattan is coming!

Yours truly have been as busy as a bee since coming back to Kpassa from In-Service Training in Kumasi and Thanksgiving in Accra. Organizing an event is no easy task here but we managed to pull through with our HIV/AIDS Awareness program on Dec. 2nd in honor of World AIDS Day on the 1st. Below are pictures of the HIV/AIDS morning march we organized through Kpassa with the help of JHS students from 4 of the Leadership Clubs. We drove them for over an hour through the entire town singing their HIV/AIDS song and rewarded them with minerals (What soda is called here. It's not just soda versus pop anymore, kids) at the end. Don't they look spiffy in their school uniforms? They make my heart proud.











So that was the morning event. In the evening, we hosted a HIV/AIDS presentation with the help of some nurses, gave out some condoms, and showed short drama films concerning HIV/AIDS on a projector.






Did I mention how awesome a projector is? Takes me back to college. Since I have it rented out for a week, I have been hosting movie nights featuring Planet Earth episodes with some of the kids and boy, does it blow their cute minds. I am going to try and raise money to buy a projector for my NGO. If you are someone with a thousand dollars lying around ready for a good cause, let me know.

Anyway, it's getting too hot to blog anymore and my brain is fried from watching too much True Blood. I'm going to keep on living and not eat too much sand. Chin up, boys and girls.

I like to help baby goats find their mothers so they can stop screaming already.

The local NGO I’m working for, Footprints of Realisation (FOR Ghana), thinks writing grant proposals is as easy as eating fufu (with your right hand, shoveling it into your mouth). Just last week they decided to drop two last-minute projects on me out of the blue with no warning from the past 3 months that I have been here. As a result, they were informed with a firm no that we cannot get a grant approved in less than a month, thus leaving us with limited resources and scrambling around town asking for more. I feel this is something I am just going to have to get used to…

One of the projects is organizing a small program for World AIDS Day, which is Dec. 1st (but we are planning for Dec. 2nd. Africa runs on a slower schedule, even on official days apparently). Basically we are going to run the JHS Leadership Clubs around town making a ruckus, jabbing signs, and doing garbage clean-up. Following that will be a film showing about HIV/AIDs and a condom demonstration. Maybe get a nurse to speak a few. As I am now travelling again for In-Service Training (IST) next week and then to Accra for Thanksgiving celebrations at the Ambassador’s house (Hah! I get turkey too, America. In your face! Or rather, in my face.), I have so little time!

Anyway, I look forward to IST in Kumasi next week where we will given more information about how to attain much needed resources, i.e. how to do better at our jobs and not waste taxpayers’ money. The Environment sector will also be back together again as a group first time in 3 months and there will be a lot of catching up to do. I hope there will be flipcharts and juice boxes involved. Good times.

Kpassa is really littered. This is a bola. It is basically a public dumping ground, both fecally and materially. Every morning on my way into town or to the school, I see these toddlers poohing and peeing all over, leaving a steamy mess as the afternoon heat humidifies everything.


Two little neighbors of mine posing for the camera.


Duck soap advertising gone wrong.


Video clip of the Kpassa JHS 'B' Leadership Club performing a HIV/AIDS song:


This week has been ridiculously hectic with me biking throughout town visiting administrative offices and schools. I am finally putting my mountain bike to good use (instead of as a rack), though at this rate I’m going to shred my tires; it seems to be on automatic for finding the rockiest paths (which should really be a tourist attraction of Kpassa, I’d say). Teaching ICT went really well, considering there are 4 computers (one of them being mine) for a class of 50 . Better than the first time I taught ICT when I only had a keyboard.

Anyway, time to hand-wash my clothes in a bucket and then off to an afternoon nap.

Better Together – Jack Johnson

Kids and Cats

Coming into the Peace Corps and into this line of work, I know development is a slow and painful process, filled with failures and wasted resources. An immense amount of patience is required. No matter how much facilitators push, development is only achieved by the people of the country. If there is no peace, there is no development. If there is no enthusiasm, there is no development.

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For a little while in October, I picked up teaching (small small) the first-years at the Junior High School A nearby. These kids are really eager to learn (going to school is a privilege which not all can afford) but unfortunately, motivated teachers are hard to come by. Starting next week I’ll also pick up some ICT classes at the Secondary High School to help out my struggling colleagues who are on the board of the NGO I'm working for. As I am not officially a teacher nor is it my job to replace a teacher position, this teaching gig is only a side hobby to help me “integrate” into the community as the white lady that speaks funny English. There are multiple projects that are on the horizon but everything takes time, especially in Africa. Until then, here are some pictures of kids and cats.







And yes, everyone. It is still hot in Ghana. Perpetual August hot. Enjoy your turkeys, snow, and hot chocolate.

(Not Your Average Girl From Your) Video - India.aire

“Traveling in Northern Volta require skills learnt from crossing rivers in Oregon Trail. Ford, flood, or keep going?”

I need a theme or something; these blog posts always turn out to be so random. But hey, it’s time for more show-and-tell! This was a kiddy pool compared to the rushing, knee-deep river that flooded over an international unpaved road, leaving trucks and passengers stranded. Good times were had by all as we crossed rock by rock.

I am always left in disbelief after a particularly harrowing journey; sometimes it feels as if these trucks could fly over ravines. And somehow, Ghanaians still manage to hang on to the vehicles.
Almost 2 months at site and I think I have been making good progress in establishing my identity in Kpassa and winning the friendship of the people through some good old Kaming charm. And man, am I charming my butt off. For example this past Sunday, I unintentionally got suckered into 5 hours of God time attending two church services (one in a church, one in a shanty out in the rice fields). Dance party! Some drumming.

The children living in my compound decided to play dress-up with Stephanie, my landlady’s one-year-old. I contributed the grey wig, a novelty birthday present which may prove to be useful in the near future. She’s got the cutest squint-face grin I have ever seen.
Shout-out to my mom for the unrequested gigantic bag of dumdum pops, which have kept me going since July with wonderful artificial fruit flavors. Obviously not as good as the real fruits but beggars can’t be choosers. I never knew how much one could grow to love and depend on dumdum pops.
Don’t you adore my fake-wood carpet?! I know I do.
Mellow Mood – Bob Marley and the Wailers

Dear President John Atta Mills...we need paved roads.

Welcome to Northern Volta. The rainy season waters the crops and keeps people cool and all, but it really leaves a messy road. As well as dirty, cranky travelers.



Day-old kids! Which Captain Pepperjack the puppy, tormented.


Finally got a chance to post pictures onto Facebook.

Brace yourself. Shit is about to get complicated.

Absolutely Cuckoo - The Magnetic Fields

This is like live-action Sims, Ghana Edition...

I feel incredibly lucky that I have it relatively easy as a PCV in Ghana, the black star of West Africa. After all I do have a cell phone, access to the internet, cold drinks, imported goodies, all in a hospitable, English-speaking country. Yet the disparity between the new and the old, the modern and the traditional, is very apparent throughout Ghana, as is the case of many developing countries. This certainly won’t be life on the beach (though there are some volunteers who are actually placed on the beach) as much work still needs to be done in an environment where progress comes slowly. Theodore Roosevelt said, “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.” Posh Corps or not, I intend to make the most of my experience.

Anyway, not really sure what else to say yet. I have been “busy” at site settling in, playing house, and imagining the day when my new home will feel like home. Dry, scorching hot, and unpaved, northern Volta lacks the lushness and general ease-of-access compared to mid- and lower-Volta. My first couple of weeks alone in Kpassa will open my eyes to the possibilities and limitations of living in northern Volta for the next two years. Welcome to the first three months of Peace Corps living. Welcome to life in slow motion.

I can't get good enough internet connection here to upload pictures on facebook, but here is the newest addition to the Cheung family.





Sideways - Citizen Cope

I am not a small girl.

Quick update:

I am finally at site! I have no kitchen and no furniture but I do have a whiny puppy! Most spontaneous purchase ever. Any name suggestions? How about Fleaface? Or Obama? I seem to have misplaced my USB drive but I have like 100 pictures I want to upload on facebook. More news to come, maybe in a couple of weeks?

XOXOXOXOXO, everyone. And happy birthdays to my dear friends :)

P.S. I have completely given up on keeping up with the news. Drop me a comment/email if anyone important dies or some disaster happens.

I Think UR a Contra - Vampire Weekend

My new fragance is DEET.

I like how my regular routine in the morning consists of applying a multitude of chemicals on my skin: 3 kinds of bug repellent, anti-scar cream, hydro-cortisone, sunblock.

So I have not gotten really motivated to take many pictures reflecting Ghanaian living. This is partly due to the fact that what was once shocking and new becomes so mundane even after only two months in country. Also, I figured that since I will be here for the next two years, there is really no rush to get creative with my camera.

Training is over in two weeks and the swearing-in ceremony is right around the corner! I will miss Addo Nkwanta very much.

Thank you Jon for the Oreos!

We partook in the killing and butchering of a chicken.

Some boring goats.

Addo Nkwanta!

Went to the Koforidua beads market, supposedly the largest of its kind in West Africa.

The Vodafone internet cafe. It is pretty sweet.

Me & Amma!


I love good feels.

Teenage Dream - Katy Perry

63 cedis for 2.3 kg of mozzarella...

Ghana is everything that I imagined and everything that I did not. Being one of the most stable countries and an international hotspot of West Africa, Ghana is a crazy blend of a modern nation still in dire need of development. For example, I can easily get most of the conveniences of a developed country (electricity, flip flops, soda, toiletries) but not all the comforts that I grew up with (paved roads, dairy products, general cleanliness).

Sometimes, the disparity and absurdity of it all slaps me across the face and leaves me spinning in awe. I would take a mental step back, survey my surroundings, and truly wonder where I am. Yesterday I was eating pizza and ice cream at a rest stop outside Kumasi, Ghana’s second largest city. The night before, I was in a monastery on the top of a rocky valley watching a movie as bats flew above my head in the darkness. Today I will be visiting the Kumasi Zoo. Tomorrow I will be back with my host family in Addo Nkwanta, surrounded by malnourished children, goats, and dirt potholes.

I know after training is over, things will fall into a routine as I prepare to settle down for the next two years of my life in Kpassa. From then on, the experiences I will have will be on my own (no more Peace Corgies in summer camp) and I will find myself scrambling for a way to express them to the rest of the world. Yet mere blogging words can never equate the immensity of it all nor can pictures encapsulate the depth of human emotions. I guess ya’ll just got to come and visit :).

Today we went to the Kumasi Zoo, the only zoo in Ghana:



Incidentally, we found this headline later on the same day:

"Where ever you go, there you are."

Well, we are deep into week 7 of training and so far, so good. My Twi language is coming along relatively well and the environment sector has the best training sessions out of all the other sectors. In about three weeks we will be sworn in as official Peace Corps volunteers and I turn 23. I am both elated to finally start my two years of service but saddened to say good bye to all the new friends that I have made. Though I knew nothing of them before training, there is something special about the human bond that forms through spending continuous hours after hours together, experiencing the same stress and revelations. Northern Volta has some of the worst roads in the country so I do not expect to see any other volunteers very frequently. But in the end, it is comforting to know that there are others going through exactly the same experiences and we still have each other to lean on.

Yesterday was one of the most beautiful nights I have experienced. For the past week and a half we were staying at a Catholic monastery surrounded by glorious rocks that rise above the tree line. Last night, we dragged a mattress up those rocks and watched a movie under the moon. Afterwards we pretty much laid up there listening to Oasis and watching the most wondrous clouds I have ever seen, softly kissed by the moon. I realize that joining the Peace Corps is probably one of the best decisions I haveever made.

For lack of better sentence structure, here is a string of word/phrases that reflects my Peace Corps training thus far:

Flip charts. Crackers. Juice boxes. Bug bites. Peace Corgy. Is this Asian proof? Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. You make my top five. Adon de day… Dallin, monastery voice. Goddamn it, Joe! Forever young, I want to be forever young. What’s love got to do with it? Thoughts pad. Honeymoon photoshoots. Typical ____ behavior. Douchebaggery. The Prophet. Hot. Less hot. Wrap it up, boys.








She is Love - Oasis

Ghana has more potholes than roads

After traveling 12 hours yesterday, I am utilizing internet access to its fullness at the Tamale sub-office.

Glimpse of unpaved roads in Ghana during rainy season. That tree is planted as a warning sign.

Got to scope out the digs during site visit. This subpar picture is taken from my bathroom. I will have two rooms where that clothes line is strung in a compound on the outskirts of town. Yes, that is a satellite dish.

I was taken around town to be introduced to the schools and people I will be working with. These kids are part of a leadership club. They recited me a poem and sung me a welcome song.

Environment group picture taken at the Ambassador's reception couple of weeks ago. Credit to Francesa!

For those interested in mailing me letters/packages (which is all of you right?), it takes at least a month for things to arrive. Concerning price, what I would recommend is picking the lesser of the two options of a flat rate or by weight. I am not missing anything in particular but sauce packets, spices, and sweets (that are individually wrapped!) are highly appreciated :):). Also maybe some pens. And bubbles. Kids love bubbles. Address is on the left side bar!



XOXO

June on the West Coast - Bright Eyes