August 11 2009

Things I learned today...
1. There is no hot water in our showers at the hostel.
2. I can melt (jk...?)
3. The Greater Accra region is positively ENOURMOUS
4. If you make friends with the woman selling goods at the local street market, you can buy things for cheaper prices.
5. Random pets milling about the campus is perfectly normal. Including the two untethered horses grazing right outside our hostel.
6. There is a beautiful Ghanaian instrument that is somewhat shaped like a guitar but with a round back and a wide wine glass-shaped body. (I must discover its name!!)
7. It is also seemingly normal to have a pet monkey on a leash tied to the tree in your front yard. (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Today we moved into our hostels. I am living in the International Student Hostel, which is on campus (although that's not saying much considering the campus's size). I have a good sized room on the 4th floor with a little porch facing the rest of campus. My hostel is directly across from the Night Market which sells anything from shoes to telephone minutes to shish kabobs. This is really just a few rows of family run stalls and children play at their mothers feet and stare with wide open eyes at us oboruni. In fact, after looking at all of us, one walked right up to one of the black girls in our group and held out his hand to be held by her. I think this is an incredibly interesting commentary on how the people around us as we grow up shape our expectations of others and our comfort level around those who are different from what we immediately know. Granted, this boy was about 2 and therefore little has been shaped about the man he will be - but interesting nonetheless.

In the hostel we're all in doubles. It turns out that I'm with another CIEE student. I was bummed about this at first because I wanted to have a Ghanaian or other African roommate. However, while Meaghan is from the United States, she is from an entirely different world than I know. Born and bred in St. Louis, she goes to school at Spellman College - an all women's college in Atlanta Georgia. This is an HBC school and I was horribly ashamed to admit that I had absolutely no idea what that was. HBC stands for Historically Black College. I knew there were all black fraternities and sororities and mostly black universities. I had no idea that there were such places that have a specific history of black students. She tells me there are about 2 white people at the school and I laugh and think: wow, she lives the exact opposite experience from me. I hate to say it, however true, Bucknell and Bronxville are HWS - Historically White Schools. I just made that up but honestly, Bronxville High had 2 black kids while I was there and Bucknell has about 15 black kids per class and they are rarely a part of the main social world - meaning they often choose to live in the African American Studies House and be friends with mostly other black kids. This is definitely not true for all Black students at Bucknell, but it does seem to be the case most of the time. I can't help but think that neither situation is the most healthy one but I'm really happy to be living with Meaghan because I've learned so much already.

We went and got our ID cards from the the Office of International Programmes and then walked back. From the OIP to ISH (my hostel, yes it is pronounced that way - so fun, right??) is about a 15-20 minute walk and man it is hot - this will be interesting. On our way however, we're walking by a few houses and suddenly we see something moving in front of a house slightly ahead of us. Thinking its a dog, I didn't think much of it until I saw other girls running over to it, pulling out their cameras. Whoever lived in that house, had tethered his monkey to a tree in his front yard. What?!?! Where am I?!! It's awesome!

We kind of chilled and settled in for the rest of the night because we have class registration tomorrow - exciting!!!!!!!

More updates to come!