A Ghana Update

You may be wondering why I haven't written about Ghana yet, well the answer to that is I got sick and didn't want to write about it :). I ate some Ghanaian foods like fufu and kelewele, which were both delicious at the time, but left me feeling uncomfortable the rest of the trip. Kelewele is deep fried sweet plantains then sprinkled with spices. Fufu is a ball of raw cassava dough, usually served in a soup. The light chicken soup with fufu that I ate was so spicy I could barely stand it and I relied on the fufu to calm the heat. My friends (Maria, Matt and Bill) and I ended up eating this with some locals we met on the first day.  We ate at restaurant that didn't have salt, pepper, and napkins on the tables, only a bottle of hand soap. In Ghana, before the food is brought out, the server brings out a bowl of water and hand towels for you to wash your hands. And contrary to popular belief, soup should be eaten with your hands and the cassava dough should be swallowed whole and not chewed. If we weren't with our new friends we would not have known what to do.  The Ghanaians are so friendly and loved having the opportunity to sit and talk to us.  After our meal with our new friends, we wandered down to the water, and as much as it is habit for me to say that beaches are beautiful, this beach wasn’t. The beach and sand dunes were littered with everything from plastic bags and bottles, to rotten food and diapers. It was also hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that I was in an English speaking country that was so under developed. The contrast between the modern world and undeveloped world was huge. There were endless plastic products imported into the country with no facilities for disposal and littered the grounds instead. 
Aside from the fact that I hadn’t been feeling too hot, my favorite activity in Ghana was at my drumming and dance workshop. I got to learn West African dance in WEST AFRICA! Matt, Maria and I went with the Semester at Sea group to Noyam Dance Academy. It was located in a tiny village outside of Accra. Our bus couldn’t fit down the small dirt road, so it dropped us off and we walked. The building looked unfinished because there were no windows or doors, but actually they were gone for a reason. When we got inside it was surprisingly cool and the wind blew in through the openings.  We learned a traditional social dance that is often performed at weddings and large gatherings, and as soon as we got through the whole thing, a storm came through and kicked up all the dirt and sand inside the building, which was another factor for my discomfort.  My time in Accra was enjoyable, but I felt like most of it was spent in a shuttle or bus waiting in traffic, everything moved in Africa time.