The Ramblings Of an African God...or so they say

For the past 5 weeks, i have been doing......lord....what have i not been doing!! My crew..aka the awesome people that are Natural Resource Management, and we traveled around in a big peace corps bus all around the country. our first stop....Brong Afafo region....Techiman. Techiman is home to the largest outside market in West Africa....Of course it was not going on while we were there, but that's OK. Here we stayed at one of the most wonderful places i have ever stayed....It is home to Monks and set in the most beautiful place. There were massive rocks to climb on and views to die for if you can reach the top. Here we learned about how to make soap, cultivate mushrooms and learn that monks really do like it quiet...and well we, might not have been the best guests in that way...Sorry monks! We than got into the bus again and made an 8 hour trip up to the upper east region, to a town called Bolgatanga. There we stayed at a spiritual retreat that was very nice, had some good times there....poker nights.....water sachet fights and quality time with the donkeys. Here we learned about bee keeping, NGOs, GoGs, Rabbit rearing (gulp....Scary rabbits), and some other things that i really cant remember at this time.... From here we went to Tamale, which is in the northern region. The was the nicest place that we stayed....it was almost cruel to house us here cause we are not going to be living that nice for a loooonnnnggggg time! Here we learned about Vetiver grass...which is this amazing grass that cures cancer ( not really, but man does this stuff help the world...almost as good as Morianga) you should look up both of these plants, cause they are amazing! We got to meet a lot of current volunteers which was nice! than we got back onto the bus for the last time and made our 10 hour journey back to home stay in Maase, Eastern region. So thats where i am right now, freaking out about an exam that i have this wend. to see how well i know my language.... Oye!!!!!!!! Also only 9 days till i swear in as an official peace corps  volunteer! gonna be good times!!!!!!!!!!

The life of a PCT...so far

Greetings! I have now left the coco college and have been traveling around Ghana for the past 2 weeks and have just started this adeventure, but first.....I have been to my site.....and i like it a lot!!!!!!! So to get to my site you have to cross Lake Volta on a ferry or a fast boat, and it takes around 30 mins to cross it, so its not to wide...thank goodness. So once you get to the other side, you have another 1.5 hours of traveling till you get to the next biggest town.....my Martet town...where i will buy just about anything that i might need.
Well, now we are in this large town (and when i say large think of those who know it....prob. around the size of Nashville, IN) from my this town, we take the only road that goes to my town for about another 30 mins. Its the picture that i posted before this one. Depending on the amount of rain we get, the road can either be relativily calm to a nightmare...so it all depends on monther nature...and how good the shocks are on your vehical (general....there are no shocks....so its more like a roller coaster ride). Than we get to my tiny town of mem chemfre! It is very small and quiet and amazing! there are no stores or anything; all the houses are off the main road in the trees a bit more. The landscape is...its hard to describe...there are mountains (or really like larger hills) on either side of me, so its always green here, but flat in my area, I will do try to post more pictures of it next time i got ( When i swear in as an Offical Peace Corps Volunteer).
I will be living ina  very secure compound with some teachers, so thats lovely.....I have one room and a kitchen. I also have a flush toliet all to myself and running water at certian times of the year!!!!! WHAT!!!!!! I was not expecting is at all!!! So that is very nice...Its a good combo of true PC living and some awesome amenaties!!
Ok, so here is the skinny on the next 3 weeks or so, the NRM crew is gonna be traveling all around Ghana, so i get to FINALLY see the north, which i am super excited about!!!! i will let know what what all is going on next time I get internet...so who knows when! But i hope everyone is having a Fantastic time where ever you are!!!!!!

Just a few pictures

The one and only road in and out of my town

The lake near my village

A village of Fulani (nomadic tribe)

a university for Coco...yes please

I have now been in Ghana for over a month.....holy hell....and i'm still loving it! We are leaving our homestay family's today and will be gone for the next 5 weeks. I am not sure when i will be able to get back onto the internet next, so i thought that i would write  real quick and tell you about what has been going on. I tired Fufu for the first time yesterday, it was not so bad......I did a major faux pas and chewed it, which you are not supposed to do, its more of a swallow fast type of paste...my bad!  I cant wait to see who is going to be swearing us in...it could be anyone... :) I feel that i must being this up, since being in PC i have become very close to all the people in my "class" in a very short time. First i feel that this is because we are thrown together in this Crazy situation and we have to hold onto each other and fall a long way down; second, to be doing something is ridiculous and out there, we all have to have at least something in common with each other and that can create bonds like nothing else and third, When you are in a land where there is NO one that you can relate to very easily, these people that i have only know for 1 month, are a life raft, are the light at the end of the tunnel, you could say and i love that we are together in this (whether we like it or not :)
P.S Happy b day Kim and Nicole!!

This is how we do it......

So I have now been in Ghana for....18 days.....wow......it seems longer and shorter all at once! So lets see, what have i been up to these past 2.5 weeks: I am now living with a Ghanaian "host" famliy, which means all of the NRM (natural resource management) kids are living in a village in the eastern region, with host familys. I have a new "mom, dad, 7month of brother and 2 year old sister" . It was been an.....interesting time....the food has taken some time to get used to. imagine if you can a large ball of bread dough, only with you roll it, it does not change shape, and has been fermenting for a while.....this is called Kenke.....a food that they have here....i can not say that i love it all so much!
But on the brighter side of life, the fruits are amazing! Two days ago, we learned where we are going to be living for the next two years.....called our Site announcement ceremony......I got WAY sick that day, and was feeling like death, so im sure most of the people there thought i hated that i was going to be living in the EASTERN region, up in the Afram Plains!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!! Im super excited! I will be taking over for a PCV (peace corps volunteer) that is there right now and will be COSing (close of service) this august.
I will be learning a language called Ewe, with only one other person, who is in the Volta region. I will be having 6 hours of language training DAILY and than 2 hours of tech training daily as well for the next 2.5 weeks! My head is going to explode with amazing knowledge! lol After that, we are (we, as in NRM and Watsan) going on field trip after field trip for about 5 weeks! i will visit my site and learn bee keeping and see crocs and go to a monastery! and lots of stuff, so look out for that, and i will put pics up soon, i just dont have  my camera charger at the moment...woops! lol, thanks mom for sending me a package!
Ok, well thats all that is going on in my life at the moment, PLEASE send me mail and packages!!!! I WOULD LOVE to hear from everyone!
 a special shout out to my Ginger Katie for thinking a head and sending me a kick ass postcard so i got something the moment i got there.... You ROCk!!!

GHANA.... WHAT?

So, im in Ghana.....Its pretty awesome......loving the people that i am with...so far...lol! I am on my vision quest at the moment in the volta region with laura. for those of you who are not in peace corps and have no idea what i am talking about, a vision quest is where i travel to some part of the country and spend 5 days with a current PCV..(laura is sed volunteer) she is a teacher for IT stuff....i know nothing to do with the envrionment, but its still pretty awesome! we went to another pcv site and planted some coco seedlings today.....pretty fun! but thats about it for now, we are going to go be leaving and eating some popcorn and watching a movie in her house..i will update soon with my views and thoughts of Ghana and such!              So yea....peace corps rocks....so far   :)

I'm Packed, I'm Ready, Lets Do This!

So this is it.........The US government was not lieing to me when they sent that invitation...it wasn't just a big hoax and anytime now someone will shout...You just got Punked.....I am actually going to be living in West Africa for the next 27 months. 

I just finished reading the first 50 years of the peace corps; it was very interesting and i learn quite a bit...I had no idea how many volunteers there once were and how they wanted to have that many again for the 50th ( 14,00 volunteers......we only have around 7,300 at the moment) so unless they can pull off placing 7 thousand more volunteers in 3 months, i dont see this happening...lol but back to me.....

The last week in the states for me was AMAZING! i got to see a lot more people than i thought that i would get to see.....thank Ashley Flinn and Kaylee jeorgens for spreading the word and getting married...lol Thanks too to Sean ( you know what you did) and Hillary Brown.....O why does south africa have to be so far away!!!! 

But i'm packed, im ready, Lets do this!