“I am not the same having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world.”
The morning is cloudy. A cooling breeze comes and goes, but the heat continues, and the day will get as high as 87˚. A couple of plants need to be potted, but that’s it for my to-do list. The heat makes me loll.
When I was in the sixth grade, one of my classmates had a grandmother who lived in England. He went to visit her every few years. I oozed jealousy. Never did I imagine I could see the world, but I wished I would. My family, including all the aunts and uncles, didn’t travel overseas for pleasure. My father saw Europe during the war. His ship was in Rotterdam, and he remembered seeing the Manneken Pis in Brussels, Belgium. I told people I suffered from Barrett’s Disease, named after that classmate. I didn’t explain it and nobody asked thinking perhaps it was serious or even life threatening. Had anyone asked I would have told them it was my vow to out-travel my classmate, and I hold vows as promises.
The first country I visited was Canada. It didn’t seem all that foreign, but it was still first on my list of countries I’d visited and was the only country on that list for years, through high school and college. Ghana was second on the list. Never did I think I’d ever visit let alone live in Africa, but after a while, it seemed a cheat because I felt so comfortable in Ghana it stopped feeling like a foreign country. I traveled the countries bordering Ghana, and my list got longer. I always thought it the most amazing list, and I was just getting started.
When I chose Peace Corps, I never thought it would be the best decision I’d ever make. It was both exciting and scary. What I knew about Africa came from books and movies, but none of it really prepared me. Ghana was exotic, even magical. Those pictures from my geography books came alive. Women carried huge loads on their heads. On markets days, sellers and shoppers vied for space. I always thought the markets had a bit of carnival about them. The sides of the roads were filled with women sitting in the shade selling their goods, selling fruit and cooking food for sale. I didn’t know what I was eating, but I was adventurous enough to try. I tasted plantain, Guinea fowl, yam chips, mangoes and pawpaw (papaya) for the first time. I loved them all and more.
I haven’t added to my list of countries in a long time. My last three trips were back to Ghana. Before that I visited Morocco. When I added it to my list, I didn’t realize Morocco would anchor that last spot for such a long while.
I still suffer from Barrett’s disease so I’m itching to travel, the only way to mitigate my symptoms.
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July 24, 2022 at 5:36 pm
Hi Kat,
How many digits did the high temperature reach today at DFW airport? If you guess two digits you would be wrong. 🙂
I was lucky in that I achieved my childhood dream of becoming a professional pilot. Unfortunately, I never became an international pilot except for flying to Canada, Mexico, and the Bahamas. However, my current position has allowed me to travel around the world but from a passenger seat and not from the flight deck. Regardless, I enjoyed every International trip because I stayed in each location for at least a week and I got to know work with our foreign colleagues and did a little sightseeing.
I wouldn’t have done well in the Peace Corps because even in my youth I considered roughing it, Motel 6. 🙂 I was lucky to not get drafted into the military, (I drew a good number in the first draft lottery), for the same and even more serious reasons. Somehow, imagining myself on a 10 mile forced march carrying a full back pack and rifle was a nightmare I am glad I never had to live.
Similar to the other members of the Coffee family, I enjoy your photos and stories of your time roughing it in Ghana while in the Peace Corps. I’m convinced that you and your fellow Peace Corps members is why Ghana hasn’t succumbed to violet civil wars as have other African countries after achieving their independence.
July 24, 2022 at 7:39 pm
HI Bob,
I think I would have guessed three digits given the weather you’ve had. It was hot here, relatively speaking.
I also fulfilled my childhood dream even more than I imagined I would. I have visited 32 countries. After Ghana, my best trip was from Caracas to Rio, a trip that took 7 1/2 weeks, the whole summer. I think I probably surpassed Marty Barrett’s list, but the travel itch never goes away.
Ghana was the very first Peace Corps country, and the only break from having volunteers since 1961 was the recent evacuation due to Covid two years ago, but I am thrilled as volunteers have returned to Ghana, a small group but a good start.
Volunteers see their countries as home during those two years. We lived the same as Ghanaian teachers did on the same salary. I think that makes a bit difference. We weren’t colonialists. We were just Peace Corps volunteers doing the best we could.
July 24, 2022 at 8:06 pm
An idea like the Peace Corps could never emerge from the current iteration of the Republican Party. I’m sure that Abraham Lincoln must be turing over in his tomb at the antics of such politicians such as, Senator Ted Cruz, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, and especially Donald J. Trump. You’re lucky, you don’t have children of your own to worry about who will grow up in a world where a majority of the Supreme Court Justices are right wing ideologues who are turning back the clock of freedom one decade per ruling.
July 24, 2022 at 8:24 pm
Lincoln was the first Republican president who only won because the Democrats were split between two candidates. I agree that he would be turning over in his grave. I don’t even think that you can call what we have now the Republican Party. Look at your governor and at De Santis. I don’t even know what to call them. Your list is frightening.
I have 6 grands ranging in age from 8 months to 16 years. Their parents are the hated liberals who turned Colorado blue. Like you, I worry about the world they are growing up in.