1 July 2010

This woman walked through the traffic which had slowed near the 37^th Hospital tro-tro station.  She had a shopping bag in her right hand and was holding her daughter with her left hand.  She had her baby on her back.  And she had a suitcase on her head.  She was obviously going somewhere on a trip.  Gives new meaning to Carry On Luggage, doesn’t it? 

I jokingly tell people that when you live in Africa you become part of the food chain.  I am now a believer.  I woke up last Thursday and noticed that my left cheek along my jaw line was sore.  I couldn’t see anything so I didn’t think much about it.  It felt tender when I shaved.  By mid day I noticed that I had welts along the jaw line toward my chin and a lot of itching.  I still couldn’t see much in the mirror.  I started putting hydrocortisone cream on the welts.  By Friday morning I had more swelling and the beginnings of an area of central necrosis (tissue death.)  It’s pretty obvious that something chewed on my cheek Wednesday night.  I have now developed a central area of hard swelling that is very painful.  I asked one of the African doctors I know what he thought about my “bite”.  He was not very impressed and shrugged his shoulders, as if to say “you’re worried about that little weeney bite???”  I’ve done my medical reading.  I’m sure I’ve got a Tumbu fly larva growing in my cheek.  We’ll know in 10 – 12 days when the larva matures and can be extracted from the wound.  If it’s not a Tumbu fly larva then it must have been some aggressive flesh eating spider.   This is what my "little weeney bite" looks like after a week.  It is very uncomfortable.  

Speaking of the food chain in Africa, being consumed by others is not limited to animals.  It also exists in the plant kingdom.  This next picture is a little hard to see but it is a kapok tree with a parasite tree wrapped around the outside.   We saw this near Wli falls.   Our guide indicated that the parasite tree is called a “blackberry tree” (that’s what it sounded like to me) and it grows on the outside of the kapok tree, wrapping around it and eventually cutting off the kapok’s nutrition, killing the tree.  The outside of the kapok tree remains intact and provides structural support to the parasite tree.   The parasite tree then grows supported by, but not competing with, the kapok tree. 

Last Thursday I spent a half day at Korle Bu in the ENT clinic.  It was a little slow because I think everyone, including myself, didn’t really know how it would work out.  I met many of the staff, most of the faculty and one of the residents – way too many names to remember.  The female nurses/staff are called either “sister” or “auntie.”  (Does one graduate from sister to auntie with age or experience?  I don’t know.)  I couldn’t catch what they called the nursing students who seemed to be everywhere. 

I have described the Korle Bu facility before.  The clinic is on the second floor of a building built by the British at the close of WWI.  It doesn’t appear to have been remodeled since its construction.  To get to the ENT clinic one walks up a front set of stairs and turns to either side to an outside waiting room, covered but open to the air on three sides.  There is a small enclosed financial office.  (Remember, you pay before being seen.)   There is a portable reception desk at the end of the waiting room near two doors that lead to hallways with five examination rooms per hallway.  The examination rooms are small and cramped with a patient, a doctor, a nurse and several nursing students.  The examination chairs are straight back sitting chairs.  The examination lamps are bare bulbs on goose necks.  The doctors use head mirrors with bands so worn that they are covered with duct tape.  The clinic had an operating microscope but I struggled to get it working.  It really needs a lot of lubricant.  The joints grind with movement.  I am not discouraged, though.  The staff make up for their facility/equipment limitations by the enthusiasm for their work and their willingness to learn.  This is a picture of Dr. Kitcher, the department chief, on my right, and Dr. Jangu, the faculty member that I am to train in otology this next year, on my left.  Dr. Jangu will be in charge of teaching otology when I leave in a year. 

It was raining lightly on Friday morning.  We thought we’d wait for it to stop before we left the apartment to walk to the car to go to work.  The rain picked up.  So we waited.  An hour later we were still waiting for the rain to stop.  I stood in our front doorway looking at our balcony.  I couldn’t step off onto the balcony because there was a pool of water on the balcony and I didn’t have galoshes.   It made me remember my predecessor’s (Dr. Mark Stubbs) recommendation that I bring shoes that can “get wet.”   I thought he meant shoes that could tolerate walking across pavement when it is raining, not wading through pools.   The rain eventually slowed enough that we could tip toe across the balcony to the steps and get on our way.

While I was standing in the doorway watching this downpour I took some pictures of my garden.  I need to first show a picture of my tomatoes with their new cages.

I made the cages two weeks ago of tree branches and string.  Pretty clever, huh?   The second picture is my tomatoes with their rain gear on. 

A couple of follow up comments on the World Cup.  If you didn’t know it already, Ghana beat the USA on Saturday.  Probably ho hum information for most Americans.  Not for the Ghanaians.  The victory is immense.  Everyone is talking about it.  It represents the little country beating the world power, despite the fact that in reality the USA is not a team to be feared in international soccer competition.  It’s not like Ghana beat Brazil.  One of the guards here at the apartment complex tried to extend his condolences to us for the USA’s loss but he couldn’t express it in English.  Each time he tried he would get part way into a sentence, stop, think about what he was trying to say, grin and then blurt out “Ghana won!”   

I have decided that my last blog was inaccurate when I tried to describe the intense EXCITEMENT of soccer, I mean football.  I feel it would be more proper to describe the emotion of the game as intense ANTICIPATION.  There is a lot of heart racing waiting for the favorite team to score a goal.  It’s a lot like deep sea fishing – each time you cast out your line you know that you are going to catch a huge salmon. Your heart begins to race with anticipation. When you reel in your line with nothing on it you are only briefly disappointed.   You immediately cast out the line again knowing that you are definitely going to catch the big one this next time.  The World Cup matches are the same emotion.  Each time the team brings the ball into scoring position you know that they are going to score.  When they don’t you know that they will do it the next time they have possession.   I wonder how many soccer fans fish for salmon.  It would be an interesting study.  Not really.

I was disappointed last Friday night watching Brazil play Portugal.  In case you don’t know (and you would have to be an alien from another planet to not know) Brazil is considered the best soccer team in the world, or maybe the universe.  They are the New York Yankees of the soccer world.   In fact I understand that their motto is the same as the Yankees:  melhor o dinheiro pode comprar equipe (that’s Portuguese for “the best team money can buy.”)  When Brazil plays there is always a lot of hype.  Just like the Yankees.  The sports channel carrying the World Cup here in Ghana advertised this match between Brazil and Portugal as “the best of the first round, don’t miss it.”   Marsha and I didn’t miss it.    It sounded like it would be a good Friday night date.  We settled onto the couch at the beginning of the match and could immediately feel the intense ANTICIPATION of the game.  The ball went back and forth many, many times.  Each time Brazil had the ball we knew that they would score.  Ninety four minutes later, when the match ended 0 – 0, we decided perhaps we should have played Nertz for two hours instead.  Or gone salmon fishing.  What a disappointment.    I must admit, however, I really love the Brazil team.  Who wouldn’t love a team that has a goalkeeper named Julio Cesar, and stars that are so good they go by single names such as Lucio, Josue, Nilmar, Robinho and Kaka (he was red carded in the Portugal match – bad boy)?  And get this, they are coached by a man named Dunga.  Not Mr. Dunga, just Dunga.   (I am going to suppress any impulse to make a comment about the names Kaka and Dunga.  It would not be appropriate to laugh at the best soccer team in the universe.)   It would be hilarious if Brazil had a little guy with pointed ears named Yoda.  Think of the fear they could provoke in their opponents.   "Just use The Force, Luke, I mean Lucio." I think the Yankees need to follow the example of Brazil and let their Super Stars (the $$$$$ players) wear uniforms with single names on their backs such as AROD and DEREK.  

I fear that I am giving you the wrong impression that Marsha and I sit in front of the TV, or play Nertz, or go salmon fishing, all the time.  We don’t.  We actually watched only the first 20 minutes of the Brazil-Portugal match and then did other things, periodically checking the score, which obviously didn’t change.  We will be cheering for Ghana this coming Friday in their match against Uruguay.  I will be wearing this hat while cheering for the Black Stars.

I mentioned a month ago the availability of fruit – the mangos, the papayas, the pineapples, and the bananas.  We do enjoy easy access and affordability of such fruit.  We count it as a blessing each day.  Right after I made that blog entry Marsha and I were in Shoprite and I noticed they had fresh strawberries and raspberries.  The strawberries were Ghc 23 ($15.86) for a medium container and the raspberries were GHc 8 ($5.51) for a small container.  We both stared at the strawberries and raspberries.  Daily mangos, papayas, pineapples and bananas are wonderful but for us June and July are synonymous with strawberries and raspberries.  It’s not summer without strawberry short cake when the strawberries are freshly picked and cooled and the whipping cream is just the perfect texture and temperature, Marie Callender strawberry pies, and homemade vanilla ice cream with fresh raspberries.  Yum.  Just describing it makes me salivate.  We bought the raspberries.  Why not, it’s summer isn’t it?  We temporarily forgot that every fruit or vegetable you can’t peel or heat to boiling you have to bleach.  This is what raspberries look like after soaking in a Clorox solution.

Despite the raspberries being expensive (24 cents per berry) and Clorox turning them into mushballs we savored each one, eating them, slowly, one by one, letting the flavor magically transport us to a warm summer evening at home, out on the back patio, with a favorite summer dessert.   Enjoy your strawberries and raspberries.

I’ve got to close.   Anyone who has lived in Accra knows that you cannot consider yourself a veteran of the city until you have been to Makola Market.  We went to the market for the first time last week.  We took Florence (she cleans our apartment weekly; we have become good friends.)  It was raining.  The sights and the sounds and the smells are overwhelming.  The rain amplified the smells.  I would try to describe our experience but it is impossible to put it together in words.  We needed to purchase two items.  Florence guided us through the narrow streets, the cramped stalls, the mass of people, and took us to the first vendor who had exactly what we needed.  We stood in the rain and listened to Florence argue prices with the vendor.  After a minute of animated argument I produced the exact money to support Florence’s offer.  I showed it to the vendor.  He stopped arguing and took it immediately.  The second vendor didn’t have exactly what we needed and promised he would have the item in 48 hours.  Florence indicated to the vendor she would return in two days and pick up the item.  I paid for the item and we returned, once again through the narrow streets, the crowded stalls, and the mass of people to our car.  Inside the car I asked Florence if it was safe to have“prepurchased” the second item.  She didn’t pause with her response.  “Yes, he knows I can find him.”  When we got back to the apartment we took our shoes off to clean the red mud and our clothes off to wash them.  It had been a surreal experience.  Only a video recorder on my shoulder would have been able to capture this experience (and it would have missed the smells.)   I don’t know if I can ever put together words to describe it.  I think I’ll ask Florence if she would go back with me sometime and obtain permission to take pictures of the market.  Not when it's raining, though.

Last item:  we had another experience this week that makes us true Ghanaians.  Once again, anyone who has lived here will understand.  I’m going to call it Ghanaian Car Weaving, or Motor Macrame.  We’ve come across it before, but this was the first time we were in the center of it.  Here’s how it works.  (You’ll need to visualize this in your mind.  Think of an intersection with two streets perpendicular to each other.  The street you are on has a stop sign.  You are stopped.  The street perpendicular to you has crossing traffic without stop signs, and the traffic opposite you has a stop sign.   Can you see it in your mind?  Add to this mental image narrow two way streets, potholes, and  minimal shoulders.)  We were the first car at this intersection.  We stopped with two cars behind us.  One car was opposite us, similarly stopped.  Three crossing cars were coming toward the intersection from our left, and two cars were coming from our right.  I decided to wait for the cars to my left and right to pass.  The driver behind me decided not to wait.  He wanted to turn left so he pulled from behind me thinking he could beat the cross traffic. He started into the intersection.  At the exact same moment the car opposite me thought he could beat traffic and shoot across the intersection.  The initial move in Car Weaving requires that two cars come to a stop facing each other in the middle of an intersection.  This is what happened.  The car pulling out from behind me and the car opposite came face to face in the intersection and stopped.  They started honking their horns.  The second move in Car Weaving is to add the opposite sides.  You can easily imagine how this happens.  The first crossing car to my left pulled up to the stopped cars, and started honking his horn.  The first crossing car to my right did the same thing.  The crossing cars behind each of them tried to go around the stopped cars by moving into the opposite lane or onto the shoulder only to find their paths blocked.  They started honking their horns.  And then a third car behind me figured he didn’t want to miss the action so he pulled around me to the right and tried to skirt the intersection, only to find his path blocked.  At this moment there were 10 cars in one intersection, all stopped, and honking.   Honking must be the antidote for driver stupidity.   It took several minutes for the Car Weaving to untangle.  We were the first at the intersection and the last to eventually cross it.  But what the heck.  We had just experienced Ghanaian Car Weaving.  People riding the bumper cars at an amusement  park pay money for such an experience. 

Have a good 4th of July weekend.  Wave those flags.  

   

16 June 2010

 

Girls in Ghana learn at an early age how to carry loads on their heads.  

ONCE IN A LIFETIME started last Friday.  Marsha and I have read about it/heard about its coming every day since we arrived in Africa.  It’s on most of the billboards in Ghana.  It’s in all the media.  In case you don’t know what I’m talking about it’s the FIFA World Cup, the Super Bowl equivalent for soccer.  Oops, I mean football.  Only an American would call it soccer. 

Thirty two teams from all over the world are in South Africa for a month competing in the World Cup.  The teams are divided into eight groups of four and each team plays the other three teams one time with the best two teams per group advancing to the next level.  The matches are being played in ten stadiums throughout South Africa.  Three or four matches are played daily.  The first round of sixteen matches has been completed.  A total of sixty four matches will be played. 

I can’t help but share some observations about the first week of ONCE IN A LIFETIME.  I will probably be scorned for some of my comments, but, remember, these observations come from an Idaho farm boy who has never purposefully kicked a soccer ball.  I don’t think I’ve even sat through a complete soccer game before this week.   My observations are based upon watching parts of many of the first sixteen matches, all of the USA –England match (1 to 1 draw), all of the Ghana – Serbia match (1 to 0 win for Ghana) and all of the Brazil – North Korea match (2 to 0 win for Brazil.)    

I’m trying to understand the appeal of this sport.  Everyone, I mean EVERYONE, in Africa is excitedly talking about the matches and watching them.  It is a contagious enthusiasm.  One cannot hear about the matches on a continuous basis without wanting to watch them.   But I don’t quite see the excitement of the sport.  It is definitely not Brahma bull riding.  The matches are 90 minutes divided into two halves of 45 minutes with a 15 minute intermission.  The clock does not stop during play.  Additional minutes are added to each half if the referee has had to stop play for things such as injuries.  The matches I have watched so far average about 94 minutes total time.  So let’s calculate the intense excitement.   The first round of sixteen games represents 1504 minutes of played time.  The total number of goals scored in these sixteen games is 25.  That calculates to a goal every 60.16 minutes.  Wow. That’s a lot of yawning time with big pauses between shouts of “SCORE.”    Most of the games end in  0 – 0, 1 – 0, 1 - 1  or 2 – 1.    The scores are similar to hockey matches, but the brawling during a hockey match makes the hockey game a lot more exciting. 

I also don’t understand the "tackling."  In one moment a player will trip another one and the commentator will describe it as a “beautiful tackle."   I call it a lucky trip.  But then the next moment a similar (as it appears to me) event will occur and the referee will whistle a foul, reward a “free kick” or give the tripper a penalty card.  I must be missing something here.   I can’t see much difference in the two types of tripping. 

Speaking of “free kicks” I am amused with the free kicks directly in front of the penalty box/goal.  These are not common, thank goodness.  The defending team forms a “human wall” with five or so players arm linked together trying to block the kicker’s shot on the goal.  It is a show of human bravery standing in front of someone who can kick a ball at you at bodily harm velocity.  Most of the time the kicker puts the ball over the heads of the human wall toward the goal.  But sometimes the kicker thinks he can thread it through the human wall.  When he tries to do so the human wall, by reflex, decides it is more important to protect personal items other than the goal behind them.  In unison their hands go down towards their groins.  During the South Africa – Uruguay match the broadcasting channel showed a free kick like this in slow motion  three times, probably not realizing that the majority of the viewing audience watched the hands of the human wall players not the course of the kicked ball.  Maybe soccer teams need to issue cups to those brave players who form the human walls.  Either that or the broadcasting stations need to avoid slow motion close ups of such kicks. 

I have come to like one thing about soccer, oops, football.  It is the use of yellow/red cards as penalties for fouls.  As all of you are aware when the referee blows his whistle against a player who the referee feels has committed a foul worthy of a penalty, such as aggressive tripping (Ghanaians probably call it “overtripping”) the referee runs toward the offending player with a yellow or red card in his hand pointing it towards the player.  It’s as if he is saying “shame on you.”  There is no doubt about who the bad boy is.  The referee runs right up to him.  I like it.  It is so much more effective than a foul in American football, where the offending player can quickly blend into the anonymity of the huddle hoping that the fans will not be able to see his number when the referee announces the offense over the speaker system.  I also like the concept of two cards and you’re out.  In the Algeria – Slovenia match one player from Algeria got his yellow card in four minutes of playing time and his red card ten minutes later.  Not only did he have to leave the match but he will not be able to play in the next matches.   He’s a real bad boy.  Maybe he needs to wear the Cone of Shame for a while.  (Watch the movie "Up" to see the effectiveness of the Cone of Shame)    

I doubt they will listen to me but I’ve got some World Cup suggestions.  I think that FIFA (it stands for the International Federation of Football Associations, in French)  needs to watch some American Football Super Bowls and do something about the advertising during World Cup non action time, primarily the 15 minute half time.  The advertising needs a lot of improvement.  Even though Budweiser is the official beer of the World Cup (what are they not the official beer of?) the quality of its World Cup advertising overall is very weak compared to its advertising on Super Bowl Sunday.  The World Cup Budweiser commercials are infrequent and unimaginative.  (Maybe they are saving their best for the last game, the CHAMPIONSHIP GAME.)  The most frequent advertisement shown this first week is for Coca Cola.  It plays during every break, sometimes twice during the same break.  I hope it is changed in the near future.  Sixty four games of showing it and I definitely will never buy a Coke again.  The most creative advertisement so far is one for Champion windshield wiper blades.  Think about how hard an advertisement agency had to work to make a World Cup viewing audience interested in windshield wiper blades. 

Last comment and then I’ll talk about things more important than soccer.   I didn’t anticipate this would happen, but when the American team was introduced on the field and the flag was raised and the Star Spangled Banner was played I spontaneously stood to my feet.  I got a real lump in my throat and tears came to my eyes.  I wasn’t anticipating that kind of a reaction.   It just happened.  I might be thousands of miles from the United States but the distance has not diminished my patriotism.  My red, white, and blue reservoir is overflowing.  When the USA team scored against England I jumped and cheered loudly, almost as much as I do for the BSU Broncos playing in the Fiesta Bowel.   Marsha danced and cheered as well.  Maybe soccer really is exciting!

 Let me move on to other things.  This is a picture of orphanage children on an outing. (I will get back to the kids in a minute.)  Marsha and I and President and Sister Froerer drove to the Volta region last week and spent two days seeing sights.  The Volta region is in the eastern part of Ghana, about four hours distance by car.  It is named for the Volta River.  In the early sixties the United States government built a hydroelectric dam on the Volta River, creating the world’s largest man made reservoir.   I have been told that the hydroelectric dam produces all of the electricity for Ghana and for some of the surrounding countries.  (I have not researched this fact to confirm it.  Sounds pretty good, though.)   The reservoir extends over half the north/south length of the country.  Look at it on a map of Ghana to appreciate its size.  

On Wednesday we drove to the town of Ho, the largest community in the Volta region, and then out toward the Ghana/Togo border to the village of Kpetoe Agotime.     The villages in this vicinity were settled centuries ago by the Ewe people, a minority tribe in Ghana.  Kpotoe is described as a weaving village.  Many of the families in this village continue the tradition of hand weaving.  This is a picture of a young boy, probably 14 – 16 years old, hand weaving on a loom.  

 

One of the men in the group explained to us that the Ewes were the first weavers in West Africa and the Ashantis (the dominant tribe) captured some of the Ewe weavers and made the captured weavers teach the techniques to the Ashantis.  The current Kente cloth that is synonymous with Ghana is attributed to the Ashantis.   But the Ewes claim that it originated with them.


On Thursday we drove to Hohoe.  (The ‘h’s” are silent.  It is pronounced  Oh, Oh-ee.)  The Wli waterfalls are east of Hohoe.  The falls are described as the number one tourist attraction in the Volta Region.  One would anticipate that it would be easy to find the most popular tourist attraction in this region, but in reality, it was difficult.  The 25 km road from the Bank of Ghana in Hohoe (the guide book says “turn right at the Bank of Ghana”)  to the waterfalls ranged from the standard Ghanaian asphalt/pot hole surface, to red clay with DEEP mudholes (it had rained during the night.)  The roadsign advertisements for the falls did not provide help other than point the general direction.  We eventually arrived at the village of Wli Agorviefe and found the “entrance” to the waterfalls.  It sure didn’t look like the number one tourist attraction in the Volta Region.  There were a number of vendors selling items.  There was a circle of men around a table, under a tree, playing a card game.  There was a small building with a portico behind.  No one was in the building.  A man from the card players eventually walked toward us and invited us to the portico where he welcomed us to the waterfalls.  We signed the entry book and paid the entrance fee of Ghc 8 per person.  He then called Samuel (pronounced Sam-well) from the card players and introduced him as our guide.  (see picture.)

Samuel walked with us to the lower waterfall, about 45 minutes through the jungle on a three to four foot wide path.  We crossed a small river about nine times on bridges varying from sturdy and well built to rickety and insecure.  The waterfall is very beautiful.  (see picture.)  The guide indicated that the waterfall is 60 meters in height.  There is an upper waterfall but we could not go that day because of the previous night’s rain which made the trail dangerous.  

On our way down from the waterfall we encountered an orphanage from Hohoe.  There were about 50 children and 10 adults.  They were on an outing to the falls.  Some of the children carried inner tubes for the falls.  Some carried food.  Some carried water.  And some carried cooking/cleaning items.  They were excited.  

In a previous blog I mentioned the orphanages of Ghana.  I don’t understand them very well.  Where are the orphanages?  Who runs them?  Are they private or are they supported by the government?  How many are there in Ghana?  What circumstances bring a child into an orphanage?   What is the prospect of a child leaving an orphanage prior to adulthood?  I don’t know the answers to these questions.  I hear rumors of abuse and corruption in the orphanages.  But then I hear the same rumors for everything else in Ghana.  I cannot speak accurately of this situation. 

We tend to feel pity for these children of the orphanages.  We see them and only think of what is missing, and will be missing, in their lives.  We unconsciously believe that because they have so little they must be miserable.  But this is a misconception.  These children are happy.  They enjoy life.  All of them laughed and giggled as they passed us.  They greeted us with big smiles reflecting their enthusiasm.  I noticed one little boy wearing a pair of snow boots.  The boots were way too big for him, undoubtedly part of a Goodwill/Deseret Industries shipment of discarded clothing sent to Africa, but he didn’t seem to mind.  He didn’t even know that snow boots are not the recommended footwear for an outing to a waterfall. He was on an adventure and oblivious to the inappropriate footwear.   

Marsha took a picture of these girls.  For hours afterward, even days, Marsha could not get this image from her mind.  She talked about these girls frequently.  She wanted to know more about them.  What were their ages?  Were two of them sisters?  She wanted to help them.  She even talked about possibly adopting all four of the girls.   Reason (Marsha, how old would we be when they are in high school?) has finally overcome emotion (but DelRay, they need us) and Marsha now just looks at the photograph hoping that we will not some day sadly look back at this missed opportunity to make a difference in a child’s life. 

We are definitely in the “rainy season.”  The temperature has become very comfortable, to us.   Two nights ago I noticed one of the guards wearing a coat and scarf over his head.  It is obviously not comfortable for him.  I’ve also noticed some of the deciduous trees are  dropping leaves.  One might be tricked into thinking that winter is coming.  

 Here is a progress picture of the Ghana Tomato Project.  The tomatoes are five weeks old.  I added peas  to my garden last week.  They were out of the ground in four days.  I’m going to call them my Chorus of P’s.  It’s probably crazy to consider growing peas in Africa but, after all, the "cold" season is the time to grow "cold" vegetables.  We’ll see what happens. I’m not having to water my garden because it rains at least once every 24 hours.  It is so wet that I’m trying to figure out how to protect the tomatoes from the daily downpour.  The soil around the plants has not dried out for two weeks. 

I will be going to Korle Bu this week.  I’m finally licensed in Ghana.  The ENT department has scheduled a half day of clinic for patients with ear disease.  It will be my first opportunity to teach in the department.  I’m excited. 

 


 

3 June 2010

It seems to be a truism in life that once you notice something you think is unique you then notice it everywhere. Two weeks ago I wrote a little note about “overspeeding.” I thought it was unique to sign posts on the Accra – Cape Coast highway. It is not unique to that highway. I now see signs about “overspeeding” all the time. Here is a photograph of the back of a truck that had better not be “overspeeding.” It makes you think that this might be a conscientious driver who is concerned about safety. Ha! Fooled you. I doubt it would do any good to try and report him or her to the number on the warning sign. Nothing happens when you call 1801.

 Here’s another photo. I’ve described the abundance of fruit here in Ghana: pineapples, bananas, papayas and mangos. All are grown locally, are plentiful at the fruit stands, and are inexpensive. We eat fruit at least two times a day. It is probably the best part of living here in West Africa. I’m familiar with the plants that produce pineapple and bananas. Travels to Hawaii and the Caribbean have taught me to recognize these plants. But I have not known what to look for with papayas and mangos. About two months ago on a trip to Kumasi our driver pointed out to us the trees that produce papayas. They look like a coconut palm tree, with a smaller diameter trunk, and palm fronds that are very short. From a distance you would look at the tree and think it is a palm that is dying. The fruit grows from the center of the trunk/fronds. Even though they grow year round the best season for papayas, I’ve been told by the fruit stand managers, is August through January. I had not seen a mango tree until last Saturday. We encountered one at a bead business about an hour outside of Accra. The tree is a branching shade like tree, with large leaves and lots of hanging down fruit. This is a picture of Marsha and a mango tree. Welcome to the Garden of Eden. Walk out and pick your dinner.

 Another photo: this is my tomato garden at three weeks. The tomato on the left is Justice, and the one on the right is Mercy. I’m going to see which yields more tomatoes.


OK. So what has happened since I wrote last? We had another cockroach encounter. We had been out until about 8 p.m. and returned to our apartment complex in the dark. Being outside in the dark makes Marsha nervous because she is always worried about the critters that emerge when the sun goes down. She knows that having to walk the 40 feet from the car to our stairwell and  up two flights of stairs gives us significant exposure to such critters. As we exited the parking lot she pulled very close to me for protection. We approached the stairwell. In the dim light we noticed something shoot across the walkway too fast for identification. I suspect it was one of the stray cats that live around the apartments. Marsha thought it was something much more dangerous. She pulled closer to me. As we turned the corner into the stairwell we both jumped. There was a large frog about half the size of a dinner plate. We couldn’t see it very well because of the dim light. We stepped around it. On the first landing there was another frog. We jumped again. We hurried up the last flight of stairs watching for more frogs. We made it to the door of the apartment and stepped inside, thinking we were past the critter encounters. We turned on the light to the living room and a cockroach was right in front of us. Marsha yelled and I smacked it. We’re getting pretty good at cockroach yelling and smacking. I took a photograph of this one before I disposed of him/her. 

We talked to the complex manager the next day and he gave us some brown jell stuff to put down around the perimeters of the rooms and the thresholds of the front/balcony doors.  It is supposed to keep the cockroaches out. I tried to read the label of what we put down but it was in a foreign language that I didn’t recognize. There were a lot of danger emblems on the tube, enough to impress me with the toxicity of the jell. If we come back to the states and our hair has fallen out and we are drooling it’s probably because we’ve been sleeping cockroach free but breathing something that is banned in all English speaking countries.

We are enjoying the rainy season. There is no pattern nor predictability to the weather now. Sometimes it rains during the day. Sometimes it rains at night. Some days will be cloudy and look like an impending storm. Right now, for instance. As I write this I can look out my office window and see very ominous dark clouds to the northeast. I’ve been watching them for an hour anticipating rain but nothing has happened. The clouds might stay all day or might go away in an instant. It doesn’t rain every day. Some days it will be completely clear with beautiful blue skies. Most of the time the clouds move in from the higher elevation to the north. Just when I think this is a predictable weather pattern the clouds and rain will move in off the ocean. Thunder and lightning are often part of the rain, especially at night, keeping us awake with the light and noise.  But some times the rain just quietly slips up on us and catches us unaware.

This is a picture looking outside my office window during a rain that lasted for over an hour. The best part of the rainy season is that the temperature is about 3 - 5 degrees Celsius cooler now. It is very tolerable. The humidity still makes one sweat, but the cooler temperature keeps one from melting.

I must be getting desperate for ideas when the best I can do is cockroaches and the weather. What else can I report?


Last Saturday I drove to C&J Hospital at 6:30 in the morning. It was the first time I had driven the streets of Accra at that hour on a Saturday. A lot of things were different. There was less vehicle traffic. Most of the trucks/vans were carrying items or produce, I presume, to the markets. Every empty lot had a soccer game. There were lots of young men playing, and lots of spectators. There were more pedestrians than I would have anticipated for that hour. I have no idea where they were going. Maybe to the markets. Many were dressed up, but not in the black/red clothing that means they are going to a funeral. Maybe they were going to church. I was very impressed with the number of women cleaning the areas around the fronts of their houses and businesses. They were bent over with little hand brooms sweeping the dirt, the pavement, or the concrete. I noticed a man and his daughter on one of the sidewalks. The little girl was about two years old and dressed in a yellow Easter like dress. The man was carrying her in his arms. Both were laughing. He might have been tickling her. Why would I consider this unusual? Two reasons. First, women carry the children here, not men. I posted a picture on a previous blog of a woman carrying a child on her back. It is not unusual to see women carrying children 3 – 4 years old on their backs. To see a man carrying a child was unique. Second: the amount of laughing was also unique. Ghanaians, especially the children, are very happy, but I have not seen this much parent/child interaction before. This father and his daughter were enjoying each other, laughing and giggling. It was a very tender and singular show of affection.

I’ll close with a bat story. When we were learning our way around Accra we often made a point of knowing our location in reference to the “bat trees.” These are about a dozen LARGE trees on the median and along the sides of Independence Ave at its intersection with the Burma Camp/Achimoto highway. There is a hospital at this intersection. The trunks of these trees are about 6 – 8 feet in diameter and the height of each tree is about 40 – 50 feet. Each tree has large branches that spread out and arch over the base of the tree and extend over the north and south lanes of the road.


For the first four months we were here we would pass the bat trees on our way to the office in the morning and note the commotion of the bats returning from the night and getting into their upside down sleeping positions. The bats would fly toward and around the branches looking for an open resting place. Multiple bats would group together creating large, black, teardrop appearing masses all over each of the trees. Marsha always accuses me of exaggerating, but I’m not exaggerating in this case when I say that there must have been at least 50,000 bats on the trees.

This is a picture of the bat trees.  Look closely to see the "blobs of bats."  On our way home in the afternoon the bats would be pretty quiet without much, if any, movement. If one hadn’t noticed the commotion in the morning one would probably drive by the trees and think nothing of the hanging down blobs of sleeping bats. With the sunset, however, the bats would start leaving the trees and move out for a night of eating (hopefully malaria infested mosquitoes.) These bats would fly to the north right above our apartment. We could stand on the front porch and watch thousands of them go overhead. The process would continue until it was too dark to see. I don’t think my estimate of 50,000 bats was an exaggeration. This mass movement of bats in the evening would be bigger than one could see extending in every direction in the diminishing light. And then the bats would return in the morning.

I’m sure that many of you have read the Bat Books: Bats in the Barn, Bats at the Beach. One indeed wonders what bats do all night long. Eating insects for twelve hours has to be pretty boring.  Maybe they spend the night at the hospital: Bats in the Morgue.

The reason I describe this bat phenomenon is because the bats are gone. They left last week. Not just a few of them. All of them. And they did it overnight. I wonder where they migrated to. We can’t call the trees at that intersection the “bat trees” anymore.

Here is a picture given me by John Welling. He took this during the time he and his wife, Cozette, were here. I look at this picture frequently. It is captivating. I hope you agree.

Week #18

This is a photo of eggs coming to market.  Can you imagine the mess if this vehicle were to be in an accident?

It was Marsha’s turn to scream this week.  She went into the bathroom on Sunday night, turned the light on, and started screaming.  I jumped up just as she yelled “it’s not a snake!”  I think that was a suggestion as to what kind of weapon to bring.  I grabbed the toilet plunger.  As I got to the door she was pointing at the corner behind the toilet.  It was a cockroach, the second one we’ve had since arriving in Ghana.   He was backed into the corner.  The cockroach was probably as scared as was Marsha.  As I mentioned in one of my first blogs these cockroaches are something to be reckoned with.  They are big enough to put saddles on.  I bravely stepped forward, with my toilet plunger in hand, and tried smacking him with the plunger part.  I couldn’t get him because he was in the corner.  So I turned the plunger to the handle and tried poking him with the end.  He dodged the end and charged us.  As I tried to turn the plunger again Marsha deftly stepped on him with her flipflop.  I was so proud of her!  It’s amazing how the cockroaches crunch.  We disposed him/her down the toilet and inspected the periphery of the bathroom looking for his/her home.  We discovered a loosened tile near the base of the bathtub and promptly sprayed bugkiller behind the tile.  Take that, you home invader!  Marsha has shared the cockroach experience with others this week.  It’s interesting how the bug grows in size with each telling.  We’re lucky to have survived. 

I had a second encounter with bugs this week.  Not an actual encounter, though, just an observation.  I was running the stairs for exercise and noted a dragonfly moving very slowly along the periphery of the ground floor.  I stopped to observe.  It turned out that the dragonfly was not moving on his own.  He was dead.  He was being carried across the floor by an innumerable company of ants, small enough to barely see one individual ant, but when together they appeared to be a black spot underneath the dragonfly.  I watched the progress while I continued running the stairs.  During the course of twenty minutes the ants moved the dragonfly about10 feet across the tile floor over to the wall of the building.  They moved the dragonfly into an opening at the base of the wall and had to bend his wings to get him under the edge.  To bend each wing a number of the ants would crawl up onto the upper edge of the wing and with enough ants on the edge the wing would then slowly bend down while the remainder of the ants moved the body into the opening.  The entire procession eventually disappeared into the opening.  For all their work I hope the dragonfly was a culinary reward.  

 

This is a picture of another critter, a gecko inside the laundry room at the MTC.   Geckos are good intruders.  We don’t scream when we see geckos.  They eat bugs.  Too bad they aren’t big enough to eat cockroaches.  The next picture is one of an outside gecko, about 10 inches long.  

The rainy season started on Monday.  The morning was sunshine and heat, the usual Accra weather.  At about 11 a.m. the clouds rolled in, the wind picked up, and the rain started.  It poured.  It poured for two hours.  All of the gutters filled to overflowing.  (I don’t think I’ve described the gutters before.   They are concrete.  They are deep:  18 – 24 inches, deep enough that if a car drops a wheel into the gutter the car is on its underbelly.  We’ve seen cars in this predicament several times.)  By two in the afternoon it had stopped and cleared.  But the moisture in the air was like a sauna.  One could see the humidity as well as feel it.  It did the same thing on Tuesday morning and on Thursday.  It has rained at night the remainder of the week.  It hasn’t rained yet today.  One week of rain and everything in Ghana that was brown is now green.  And the temperature is a little less hot.

I indicated in last week’s blog that I thought I would have to thin my tomatoes this week.  I didn’t have to thin them.  The rain did it for me.  Instead I had to salvage the few that weren’t beat into the ground by the rain.   I staked them.  This is a picture of my poor tomatoes during the rain.  

  
 

Last item:  Marsha and I had our first experience with a chief.  Despite Ghana being a democracy there is still a strong tribal tradition in this country.  Many day to day activities are regulated by tribal law instead of government law.  Every Ghanaian can tell you what tribe he or she is from.  They can tell you what language is spoken by their tribe.  They can tell you their tribe’s history.  They know who their chief is.  Many of the tribes continue to have tribal markings:  cuts on the face placed in infancy that “mark” which tribe the child is born into.  Permission for certain activities such as marriage still have to be approved by the chief.  Etc, etc.

The tribal chief came to church today.  He arrived with four other men, all wearing tribal dress with the flowing cloth draped over one shoulder and around the waist, the second shoulder bare.  One of the escorting men carried a large umbrella shading the chief from the sun.  The chief had a gold ring on each hand about the size of a teacup.  I wish I could have been closer to see the design.  Each ring appeared to be the image of an animal.  But I could not get close enough to see the rings clearly.  And the chief’s sandals were straight out of a Nieman Marcus catalogue.   They were a dark brown with inlaid gold in the straps and a central raised ornament on each sandal that appeared to be made of gold.   They definitely were not the sandals worn by the Ghanaians on the street.  When the chief left the building his escorts surrounded him, and provided him umbrella protection from the sun.  The umbrella was also a Nieman Marcus accessory.  You can’t buy one like the chief’s on any street or market here.   

Have a good week.   This is a picture of five missionaries that arrived yesterday afternoon.   They came by the apartment on their way to the MTC.  They had missed the Saturday morning session at the MTC where I start their hepatitis B immunizations.  I gave them their first shots in our apartment.