Shake What Yah Mama Gave Yah

I made it through one week in Ghana!!

This weekend was pretty eventful. I definitely witnessed the funner side of Ghana. On Friday we went to the National Theater for a street dance performance. I saw the posters all over the city when we were doing the scavenger hunt the other day so I just wanted to go. Gabriel, our University Pal (U-Pal) took us by tro tro. There were like 11 of us from my building and he had to practically beg for a tro tro to stop for all of us to fit into one. But we made it there, late of course, which was perfectly fine because the show didn't start until 8:45pm when it was supposed to start at 7pm. Oh Ghana. Anyways it was amazing. It was called “Africa Streetdance 2009” which is essentially a continental wide streetdance competition which Ghana won last year. Yayy Ghana. However, this year it will be international so there will be competitors from Holland, the Philipines, the US, etc. The show we saw was the finals for Ghana so out of the final ten teams the judges had to decide which team was going to represent Ghana in the world stage-tough decision. There was flipping, stunts, dancing, etc. It was just like MTV's America's Best Dance Crew if you can imagine that. It was so live and the people in the theater were going crazy. Ghanians party hard lol. It took us about 45minutes just to catch a taxi back to campus. Good thing Gabriel's taxi-driver friend happened to ride by so we caught a taxi for 5 cedi instead of the 10cedi all the other cab drivers were trying to rip us off for.

On Saturday we had yet another orientation from like 9am to 3:40pm but this time it was given by the University. It was crazy long and ridiculously repitive so I left after snack time (piece of fried chicken, bread, and a can soda) which was like 11am. I went to use the internet for a while at a cheaper internet cafe which gives me twice the time for the same amount of money as ISH I. Thank you Carolyn for informing me that I was paying way too much! Then I took like a 3 hour nap until CIEE's welcome dinner at Chez Afrique Restaurant and Bar. Chez Afrique was another amazing experience. The food was good and we even had cake and ice cream. Since the drinking age is 18 here in Ghana the CIEE director ordered two rounds of beer for all of us. I don't drink beer-disgusting, so I just got Coke. After we finished eating thats when the live band set up and it was dancing time. They were playing some pretty good music and the lead singer was absolutely ridiculous, in a funny and fun way. He kept grabbing girls from our group and making them dance with him. Whenever he would grab a Black girl, including myself, he would encourage us to “shake, shake, shake, shake what our Mamas gave us.” At that, I was dying laughing. It was pretty fun and there was a wide variety of music from the American “Stand By Me” to the reggae “Murder She Wrote”, to a whole hosts of Ghanaian songs. The lead singer also kept singing “I love CIEE.” Which also had my dying laughing, he was so in his own world lol. It was a night filled with laughter, dancing, and good food. We left pretty early though because none of us wanted to pay for the taxi ride back to campus and instead decided to take the free CIEE bus. Listen, when in Ghana, you save money wherever you can lol.

On Sunday morning we went to Church-ah. Amen. We went to Gabriel's church which was on campus-about a 20 minute walk. Legon Interdenominational Church was packed. It had a balcony and all. It is definitely one of the nicest buildings on campus. People from all over Legon come to the Church as there were tons of kids. Before the sermon they called all the kids up for Sunday School and the congregation had to sing a song as they walked up. Something like “read your Bible, pray everyday, pray everyday, pray everyday, so you will grow.” It was sooo precious. The church was pretty high tech with a huge projector and power point style notes of the sermon. The church had traditional Praise and Worship with the song words up on the projector. Some songs even had words in Twi, it was pretty good and reminded me a lot like Church at Georgetown except there wasn't a Gospel Choir, more like a gospel choir ensemble. It was also communion Sunday. Amen. The sermon was about work and how it is not a laborious task but a divine command that we should enjoy and actually put our all into. This came at a time when I was debating which oprhanage I should go to and whether I should travel far. However from the sermon I learned that work is for a purpose and we should happyily go where God leads us. That is what I am going to do. Go where God wants me to, maintain a positive attitude, and fulfill my purpose. God always finds a way to speak to me. I was definitely blessed at Church. I will be going back. Oh yea, there is a wedding there next Saturday. I'm gonna try to go, it should be an experience!

After Church three of us took the tro tro to the Accra mall, which was essentially American style. It had a ShopRite, Nike Store, Puma Store, Panasonic, Sony, the Apple store, some clothing stores and a movie theater. There was also this store called Game which is supposed to have really cheap prices like Wal-Mart but its really like 10x smaller than a Wal-Mart and it has purple smiley faces instead of yellow ones lol. Things in the mall are pretty expensive and I did not buy not one thing. Most of the stuff is common in America but since this is a developing country these items are essentially luxury items so you can imagine why the prices would be so high. Inside Game for example they sold bed sheet sets separetly. Like 30 cedi for a sheet, 25 cedi for a fitted sheet, and 15 cedi for a pillowcase. Wowzers. Never in my life would I pay that much for some sheets lol. After the mall I napped for a good four hours and watched TV. There is a room with couches and a TV right next door to my room and I discovered the best channel ever. Channel 1-Viasat, has all the good shows Mon-Fri like the Cosby Show(my favorite show in the whole wide world), Friends, the Bernie Mac Show, Everybody Hates Chris, Oprah, CSI, and movies everynight at 10. Yesterday I watched CSI, some Nigerian movie and part of CatWoman.

Oh yea, the water was off in my dorm yesterday. Oh Ghana. I had to go to the next building to shower. Did I mention how the water to shower is always cold? But on days when the water isn't running at all I appreciate the cold showers so much more. Classes start today. I don't have class on Monday because I am keeping this day free to intern on. The time schedules for three out of four of the departments I'm taking classes in are still not up. Oh my, lol. Whatever. When in Ghana, do as the Ghanaians do. Basically, for today I'm chilling. Let's see how tomorrow goes. My chest is starting to feel a little better and I thank God I have not been sick. In Mali, at this time, I had fevers, was vommiting, and was a complete mess. God is good.

Love,

Tamika Nicole