Accra, June 29

Day Two

It was a good day for exploration, I suppose. I smell like ass, so the fewer people that Richmond can introduce me to, the better (for now). Richmond Aryeetey is the professor that I am working with this summer, a bright guy that I met last year when I helped to T.A. the Gates Institute summer course for mid-career professionals from developing countries.

He was a little surprised to see me at 9:40 this morning, but he was kind enough to make it work. When he discovered that I hadn’t eaten breakfast, he insisted on driving me around until he found an on-campus establishment that was able to serve me. I kept pleading with him not to worry about it, telling him that I’d be fine until lunch, but he wouldn’t listen. As it is, I paid about $2 to have instant coffee, two pieces of “butt” bread (from the end of the loaf), and this strange mayonnaise-infused pasta salad/cole slaw combo with red onions and red peppers. I mean, it’s not Big City Bread, but it’ll do. A daily breakfast of mayo may not go well with my African weight-loss plan, so I’ll have to see if this is indicative of a typical breakfast by trying out a few other places…

As Richmond left me at the restaurant to go to a meeting, he said, “Take a right out of the building, connect to a foot-path (sidewalk), and it’s a straight shot back to the school of public health.” Puh-lease. You’re kidding, right? And to make matters worse, no one I passed on the streets of campus even knew where the School of Public Health was. I walked for about an hour but I was finally able to retrace my steps and find the school. This brings me to the reason I smell like ass…

It’s muggy here. Not unbearably hot but very damp. I’m stabbing in the dark here, but I think it might be 80-ish degrees outside. It’s “cold season” according to the girl I met in the Population, Family, and Reproductive Health office. She told me she wished she had brought her gloves to the office today. I almost burst out laughing. I was wringing wet from my cross-campus hike at that point, with blue jeans stuck to my thighs and a cotton t-shirt clinging to my back. I’ll take cold season any day compared to the prospects of whatever “hot season” might be.

I came back to the hostel around 1pm for a little nap and a sorting-out of my life. I found a stove downstairs for common use, so I might buy a little set of utensils and a pot. We’ll see. I’m going to head over to the mall later today because it’s less than a half-mile walk. There’s a Shop Rite there, a South African chain that Richmond has compared to a WalMart. There’s also a Target-equivalent, he says. Based on what I can gather from conversations with him, I guess Accra is pretty much Baltimore? ☺

Later in the day:
Aside from my frozen office-mate this morning, I have had a few other chuckle moments worth sharing. For example, the reception area of the hostel has an office for employees only. I know this because the door says “Out of Bounds. Employees only.” Out of bounds? Hmmm….I did end up at the mall at around 3pm today. They have flat-screen TV’s in the mall airing commercials, and I had to stop and pause when I saw sanitary pads being advertised as “minty.” I’m so glad we use words like “fresh” to describe pads back at home. The mental image conjured by thinking of a minty pad is enough to make me gag. To top it off, I saw a girl wearing a t-shirt in the Shop Rite advertising for this exact same brand of sanitary pads. Who does that? My last inner-giggle came when I rounded a Shop-Rite corner to see Barbie doll accessories on sale in a children’s toy aisle. The picture on the packaging was clearly of a Caucasian Barbie, but the accessories were being billed as part of a line called “Benign Girl.” Ha. Hahahaha.. Good girl? Pretty girl? Sure. But benign girl?

I cooked pasta in the hostel tonight with my newly purchased pot and bowl. I also met an American guy named Andy (who is here with at least two other Americans). He cooked chicken legs while I stirred pasta over the tiny gas stove, and we were able to chat for a while. He’s just finished undergrad and is here volunteering with a microfinance project. He and his buds have been here for three weeks and he says good things about the hostel, so that’s refreshing. He also loaned me a fork, because I forgot to buy one on my grocery-run. That’ll be a follow-up purchase tomorrow I think…

I called the airport tonight around 8 to ask about my bags. Turns out the flight won’t be in until 9pm, and the bags won’t be sorted and confirmed present until at least 10:30pm. Looks like another night in my blue t-shirt and smelly jeans. I think these clothes will disintegrate on my body soon, so let’s hope the bags are retrievable in the morning.