hello again at last

some babies in the Ga district. the children here are all incredibly adorable. in fact, last week in Cape Coast I made eye contact with a girl, maybe 8 years old, and the next thing i knew she had her hand in mine. she was pretty quiet; we talked a bit but mostly she just patted my hand and rubbed my arm, and walked me 10 minutes to the bus, where i had to say goodbye. i wont lie, it was hard, but the experience made my day. the feel of a child's hand in yours, especially across so many cultural boundaries, is a very special thing.

me, happy to be at the beach, on the other side of the atlantic!

most of the shoreline is rocks, and in places no land at all. ghanaians dont "go to the beach" like westerners do, so for us to beach here, we have to drive somewhere made specifically for that purpose, which we got to do last weekend (that's coming later)

2 weekends ago we journeyed out to a friendly, westerner-oriented part of accra called "osu" and ate at this restaurant called frankie's. i ordered this salad, which was ridiculously overpriced but i've been in serious salad withdrawals. even still, i'll probably not pay for another one while i'm here. more to look forward to in december! ill admit ive already been making a list of things i did not think i would miss that i do, and things i want to do and eat!

when we were trying to leave osu, all the trotros were full or not going our way. we had almost resorted to taking taxis when this empty trotro drove up, headed to legon (where the university is), so we all piled in, filling up the whole bus! they made good money off our load of obrunis (which is what many of the locals call white people. we hear this term A LOT).

i splurged on some granola from the shoprite (western-style grocery store) in the accra mall.

palm trees from the botanical gardens.

...

I'm resolved to make the best of my time here, but that doesn't mean I have to relish all my classes! I truly value my experiences outside the classroom- that's where the true learning is. and I already knew that--somehow I thought things would be different here, I don't know why. this weekend is packed with a funeral, a trip to maxmart, church, and ever-looming papers and readings. some people also have gone to the movies tonight (yes, the movies! but i hear they're frightfully expensive) but I've elected to stay here and write to you... thank goodness we have only 1 day of class next week before leaving for the homowo festival in akropong. this break couldn't come soon enough for me! this group of people here is quality, and I also look forward to the life story night we're planning for next week. after having a lovely dinner with kids from trent university on monday, 5 of our group were horribly sick for about 2 days. being here, everyone is likely to get food poisoning or a stomach bug from something or another...we were told it's practically nevitable, but certainly not welcome, so please keep us in your prayers.