Posted tagged ‘Ghana’
January 4, 2013
The sun is shining, but it is just a ruse to draw me outside where I’ll freeze to death. The day looks a bit hazy as if I need to spin the lens to sharpen the image. The dump was on my agenda, but it will be far too cold as the wind there is like a blast of Arctic air. Gracie loves the dump, but she stays warm in the car wearing her Pendleton blanket coat. My back is a bit iffy today so hauling trash may not be the best idea.
The books have been flying off my iPad shelf. I have been in a reading frenzy. My favorite so far is Mr. Penumbrum’s 24-Hour Bookstore. I’m not quite sure how to describe it. There are books and there is technology, advanced technology of all sorts. One of the characters works for Google; another creates boob simulation software for which there is a huge market. The main character works in the bookstore, and it is he who prompts the action, as such. He finds coded books on the top most shelf, books he wasn’t supposed to read, and then the quest begins to solve the codes. Kat, great name for a character by the way, is the one who works for Google. It is she who buys a New York Times but can’t figure out to operate it. You have to love that line but you bemoan it at the same time. Real books take center stage so to speak in this novel which sort of made reading it on my iPad an oxymoron. I don’t know what prompted me to get this book, but I’m really happy I did.
When I was in Ghana last summer, I read eleven books in three weeks. In the mornings I’d sit on the porch with my coffee and I’d read. At night, I’d lie in bed and read myself to sleep. Even when the electricity went out, I had my iPad and all the light I needed. When I was a volunteer there, I read at every opportunity, much the same as I did last summer. Without the distraction of a TV, reading and listening to music are the best ways to spend time. That was about the only thing that didn’t change over the forty years in between visits.
Categories: Musings
Tags: book, dump, E-book, Ghana, Google, IPad, Mr. Penumbrum's bookstore, reading
Comments: 20 Comments
December 31, 2012
Today being the last day of the year and all I took a leisurely morning. First of all I woke up late, we’re talking 9:45 late, took my shower and then had an extra cup of coffee while reading the papers. I watched the birds from the window. It was like a convention of birds. One feeder had five goldfinches while other birds hovered just outside of it waiting for their seats at the counter. I felt bad for the doves as I had nothing for them. I have to go to Agway later to get Gracie food, sunflower seeds and thistle so I’ll also pick up a bag of assorted seeds to throw down for the doves. I’m so glad I filled the feeders the other day as the birds aren’t likely to find anything to eat with the snow.
Nope, I haven’t made a single resolution. Last year was a great year, and I didn’t make any resolutions then either. I’ll just let my life meander. That seems to work just fine.
I would like a trip this new year, but I have to go somewhere close and cheap. The last two Ghana trips depleted my savings, and I need some time to rebuild. Also, I’d like one more trip to Ghana, probably my last, in a couple of years, and that’s another reason for close and cheap. My friends Bill and Peg are going back to Ghana and Bolga in the fall. They mentioned that Duane, another volunteer with us from way back, would also like to go Ghana but he hasn’t yet planned the when. He was posted about 100 miles from us in Tamale, and I used to see him on my trips there, to the “big” city. He’ll have a bit of culture shock when he sees how big Tamale has gotten. It even has a store which sells real cheese.
I have no plans for tonight. My sister and I were laughing about that. In the old days, neither one of us would have been caught dead at home on New Year’s Eve. We’d be partying some place or many places, and we’d be wearing those silly hats and blowing horns. Tonight I’ll celebrate at home and be quite content. I’m thinking a bit of champagne and maybe even some shrimp. Just because I’m home doesn’t mean I can’t spoil myself!
Happy New Year, my friends. May this year be the best year!
Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: Africa, Agway, Bird, Bird feeder, Bird food, Bolga, Ghana, Sunflower seed, Tamale
Comments: 23 Comments
December 29, 2012
Today is raw which was always my mother’s description for damp and cold. The sky is that grey-white color which means rain or snow or, in our case, a bit of both. The snow will start off-Cape tonight while we’ll get rain then the tail end of the snow storm will hit us and bring maybe an inch or two or even up to four.
I’m not going anywhere today. The outside world doesn’t look all that inviting. I do have to fill a couple of feeders, and I’ll put the new one out and maybe fold and bring up the clothes in the dryer but that last one is a long shot.
When I sit down to write Coffee, I am often at a loss as to what to say. Day-to-day, or at least my day-to-day, is so consistent it lends itself to ennui, to boredom. Didn’t she just write about that I imagine you’re thinking as you read about Gracie and the weather. Other days my mind is filled with all sorts of neat stuff. Some of it is imaginative, and it grows out of daydreaming or a TV program or a book I’m reading, and I share even though you might think it borders on the crazy, the very weird. Memories often fill my mind triggered by something I saw or even smelled. You have all been to Ghana with me so many times I wonder if you groan and say, “Not Ghana again!” On my sloth days you already know that I’ll be doing nothing except reading and eating the proverbial bon bons.
What brought all this on? Well, one of the blogs I have been reading for years, Letters from a Hill Farm, is closing down. Nan has decided, “To live my life without writing about my life.” That got me thinking. I have been writing Coffee since 2004, the year I retired. I wrote every day for several years then I started taking Wednesdays off, a sort of mid-week breather. After my coffee and papers every morning, I sit in front of the computer hoping I have something to say, something you’ll enjoy or remember or something you can relate to. Where am I going with this? Not away as I really like writing and I love my Coffee family. I just want to be reassured that on days like today when I have nothing to say you’ll still listen.
Categories: Musings
Tags: bird feeders, boredom, Cape, damp, ennui, Ghana, New England, rain, Snow, Winter storm
Comments: 27 Comments
December 18, 2012
As I was walking downstairs this morning, I could smell the Christmas tree. I smiled. I love that smell and can’t think of no better way to greet the morning. Right away I went over and turned on the tree lights. They brightened the room and chased away the clouds and the rain.
Yesterday Gracie and I went about doing a couple of errands. She got her nails trimmed, and while I waited, I bought her a few surprises for Christmas. I also stopped at a favorite bakery to get cookies to bring to the library for this week’s Christmas open house. The bakery owner, whom I see all the time, was there and asked what I was looking for. I told him about the open house and the library. He said he loved libraries and then he gave me three packages of his cookies as a gift to the library. How kind that was! How generous! I am forever thankful for the goodness in people.
I got a call from my friend Bill who had somehow managed to track down Patrick, another volunteer with whom we had served in Bolga. I had looked for Patrick for a while but never found him. Bill found a story in an Iowan newspaper about Patrick and send an e-mail last September asking if the Patrick he’d found was our Patrick, but Bill didn’t get an answer until now when Patrick called him. Pat’s memory is a bit fuzzy. He barely remembered Ghana let alone any of us. He asked Bill if there wasn’t also a gal in Bolga. I can’t remember the last time I heard anyone say gal. Bill told him I was that gal. I had to chuckle as did Bill. I have Patrick’s phone number and am aimin’ to give that galoot a call. I’ll introduce myself as a gal he knew from way back when.
I have a story I like to tell this time of year about my first Christmas in Ghana, my very first ever away from home. I was homesick and sad. My mother tried to help so she sent me a small tree, ornaments from our family tree, brick crepe paper so I could make a fireplace and a small stocking to hang. I decorated my house but it didn’t help much. Besides, the weather was all wrong. It was the harmattan, the driest time of the year with a hot, dusty wind which blew each day and covered every surface in my house with sand. The heels of my feet cracked from the dryness, and I had to walk on tiptoes until the skin hardened. The only redeeming parts of the harmattan were the nights. They were cold, put a wool blanket on the bed cold. I’d leave all my windows open so I could snuggle under my blanket. It felt a bit like winter.
The nights in Bolga were quiet. They were bright with stars which seemed to blanket the sky. I was in bed trying to fall asleep on a night close to Christmas when I heard a small boy singing. His voice carried though the night air. It was the only sound I could hear. He sand We Three Kings, every verse. His voice was beautiful. I don’t know where he was. I guessed he lived in a compound near my house, but that didn’t really matter. He gave me one of the most beautiful gifts I have ever received. He gave Christmas.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Bill, Bolga, Christmas, Christmas tree, cold nights, Ghana, harmattan, holidays, homesickness, Peace Corps, sand
Comments: 40 Comments
December 9, 2012
During The 12 Disasters of Christmas, last night’s syfi channel movie, there wasn’t a single Fa La La La. Italy and Greece disappeared into the sea. The President was airborne because Washington had been fractured and was a gaping hole though at that point a droll observer might have opined Washington really hadn’t been affected at all. A crazy army general declared himself the leader of the new world and quoted biblical verses as proof but he was electrocuted by lightning bolts, proof he wasn’t. Our hero saved the world by inserting a rod, his birthright, into the head of a moai, one of six which had been buried in the US. The world was righted. I expect The 12 Disasters of Christmas will take its place among the giants of the season: Miracle on 34th Street, It’s a Wonderful Life, A Christmas Story and one of my personal favorites, Jack Frost, the killer snowman.
The rain has disappeared and left a cold sunny day, but the rain is due back later today and will stay around until Wednesday.
The dining room and kitchen are pretty well decorated for Christmas. I made several trips from the cellar yesterday hauling decorations upstairs so today I’ll give my back a break, but the living room looks awfully bare. Maybe I need to get and put up my tree. I always think that the best part of decorating.
The tree holds the most memories. Many ornaments have stories attached and some come from places far away in space and time. Ornaments from my childhood hang on the tree. They are glass ones which survived four kids, a dog and a few tree disasters. Some of the paint has worn off in places, but I don’t care. I don’t really notice. Ghana is well represented. Michelle’s old ornaments will be hung on my tree for the first time. They were a precious gift from her. New ornaments from Ghana will join them. Hand-made ornaments are some of my favorites because of the love infused in the making of them. Peter Pan and Captain Hook are on my tree as is Dorothy’s witch. I have a really ugly ornament, a woman dressed in go-go boots and a pink outfit. She sits right in front, right next to the angel with the stringy hair. My tree has beauty and it has whimsy.
I love sitting in the living room looking at the tree bright with lights. Gracie usually joins me on the couch and puts her head on my lap. The two of us just sit there quietly together.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Captain Hook, Christmas, Christmas tree, disasters, Ghana, Gracie, Holiday, ornaments, rain, sci fi movies
Comments: 16 Comments
November 20, 2012
It was not a hallucination. I swear when I first woke up this morning there was sun. I smiled, turned over, went back to sleep and missed it. By the time I woke up for good, it was gone; however, these familiar clouds have proverbial silver linings. On the weather last night we were fifteen degrees warmer than Boston and Southern New Hampshire. The weatherman said it was a combination of the warmer ocean and the cloud effect so I have stopped complaining about the lack of sunlight. I’ll just take more vitamin D than usual.
With Thanksgiving being an American holiday we still had to teach when I was in Ghana, but that didn’t stop us from honoring the day. We had a huge Thanksgiving dinner one year with several guests, one turkey, a few chickens, side dishes and pies. The owner of the turkey was a hard bargainer and Thomas, the cook, had to follow the man all the way to his village before he’d sell the turkey. When I was in Bolga last summer, I was amazed by the number of turkeys wandering around. In my two years living there I saw only that one which ended up being the showcase of our feast. The chickens you bought live, still do. You get to pick yours like we pick lobsters from the tank. The man hands you the chicken by its bound feet. I used to hang them from the arms of my moto (motorcycle) to get them home. Someone else always sent the chickens to their heavenly reward. I never could. The year of the giant feast we plucked the chickens. All of them, already having met their demise, were brought to us in a huge bucket. All of a sudden a few of them popped right out of the bucket onto the ground. No, they didn’t run around without their heads. They just popped. I knew scientifically why that had happened but it was still sort of amazing in its own weird way.
That was the year I made my very first pies ever, pawpaw pies. I made the dough, cut up the pawpaws and then added sugar and cinnamon. The cookbook Peace Corps had given us, Ghana Chop (chop being food), said that pawpaw pie would taste just like apple when you added the spices. I brought the two pies to the school’s beehive, clay oven. The cooks put them on the side of the oven away from the intense heat of the middle, but they still took only about 15 or 20 minutes to cook. They were delicious and they tasted exactly like apple pies.
That Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorites.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Chicken, cloud effect, couds, Ghana, Peace Corps, sun, Thanksgiving dinner, warm ocean
Comments: 7 Comments
November 13, 2012
The sky got black almost as quickly as in a science fiction movie just before the aliens arrive, but the rain came instead; it fell in torrents. Gracie stayed in the car while I was at my library board meeting, and I had left a window open for her. I don’t think she was thankful. The inside door and the seat were soaked, but Gracie, being both smart and practical, had moved over to the dry side. On the drive home, I splashed through flooded streets and had to be careful about hydroplaning. Right now the day has an eerie light, but it has stopped raining for the meantime. Gracie is resting from her ordeal.
Today is my errand day and I have only finished two of five, but the rain just started again, not so perfect for grocery shopping. How sad that makes me.
I have never been a hat person. My mother sometimes forced one on me at Easter, a hat in a pastel, usually pink or blue, with small flowers. I always felt a bit self-conscious. I’d put up my hood on the coldest days when I walked to school, but I seldom wore a real hat. On rainy days my hair got wet. I remember my mother trying to make me wear one of those silly transparent hats which tie under the chin and fold up to fit into a small pouch. I always thought of them as old lady hats kept by them in oversize purses in case of rain emergencies. I have earmuffs, and I don’t mind wearing them. I have a couple of baseball hats which I actually wear at baseball games to keep the sun at bay. When I lived in Ghana, I had a straw hat I wore for a bit, but I felt like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm so I stopped wearing it. My neighbor across the street always wears a similar hat when she works in the garden. She looks a bit like Ma Kettle working the farm.
I have a hat collection. That always makes me chuckle a bit at the irony.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Clothing, earmuffs, Easter, Ghana, Gracie, hats, rain, Straw hat
Comments: 21 Comments
November 9, 2012
The weatherman said sun today, and he was mostly right. The sun has appeared every now and then with a cloudy blue sky as its backdrop. The wind and rain stayed around most of yesterday into last night, but I still went and filled the deck bird feeders out of a sense of guilt. I got wet. Warm weather is coming this weekend.
When I was a little kid, I never thought much about the week or even the day ahead. The only time I counted days was before Christmas. Life was in the present. Seldom did we ever make plans for the weekend or even the next day. It wasn’t until I was older, in high school, that the weekends took on importance. We made plans. Sometimes we went bowling or to a movie or even just hung around together. If the school had a Friday dance, we went. It was always, as most of them were, in the gym. Life was seldom complicated.
It seems all my life weekends have been the best part of the week. I got to sleep late, no alarm jarred me out of bed. Sometimes I had plans, especially when I was younger and still working. Friday nights we’d hit happy hour. Those were the days of free food with your drinks. Saturday I did my chores and went shopping, sometimes just for groceries or other times because I wanted to shop at fun stores and antique shops. It was my day, and I could do whatever I wanted. Sunday was change bed, do laundry, go to the dump, correct papers and prepare classes day. It was a warm-up for Monday.
When I was in Ghana, every day was a neat day, even the weekdays. I was always up early, never even needed an alarm. My world was always interesting. I’d sit on my porch before teaching and watch women carrying baskets on their heads as they walked to market and see small children going to school and stopping to say hello as they walked by my house. I’d watch lizards darting around and see chickens and goats wandering the school compound. Teaching too was a bit of an adventure. It was figuring out the best approach so my students could understand the intricacies of English grammar. Though I didn’t teach weekends, I lived on school grounds so I was always involved with school and my students often visited. I never minded the blurring of weekends and weekdays.
Since I’ve retired, I tell people every day is a Saturday. I can do whatever I want. Today I’m going to see a movie. Today I’m also going to the dump as I didn’t brave the elements yesterday. Weekends have lost their importance. Now Saturdays and Sundays are just days in the week like any other days. I’m happy.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Friday, Ghana, retired, Saturday, Workweek and weekend
Comments: 12 Comments
October 15, 2012
The day is perfectly beautiful; it’s so warm and sunny I have “unbattened” down the hatches and opened windows. I feel as if sitting inside is wasting the day so I keep going out to the deck and just standing there to enjoy the warmth before the rain starts or it gets cold though I don’t know if either is predicted. Weather just changes so quickly this time of year. It rained last night. I never heard it. The only way I knew we had rain was the wet street.
Yesterday it rained during the ceremony. Fewer people were there than expected, but the hardy ones came anyway armed with umbrellas and wearing rain gear. I was a fashion statement, a fashion statement for Ghana anyway. A reporter from the Cape Times took my picture and interviewed me. She asked what were some of the difficulties of living in Ghana. I came up with a lack of cole slaw. She also asked about Peace Corps, and I said it was the most remarkable experience, an unequaled experience. She wanted to know about what I was wearing. I swear it was the matching hat which caught her eye!
I’m going out and about today. I have an appointment at noon then I can roam. I have no set destination, but I’ll stop if something catches my eye. Back roads are favorites of mine. I like to go places I’ve never been. You can never get lost on the Cape. When you hit the ocean, just go in the opposite direction. Almost any road will lead to a main road as there are so few of those. Figuring out where you are is usually easy.
On The Amazing Race last night they were in Bangil, Indonesian, and it was beautiful, strikingly beautiful. I immediately put it on my wish list of place to visit. I haven’t ever been to Asian so I’m figuring it might be, in a year or two, my next destination. That will give me time to plan the trip and save enough money.
I love my life, but for this, I wish I were wealthy. I could just pack a bag, book a trip and leave.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Fashion, fugu, Ghana, Peace Corps, The Amazing Race, warm weather
Comments: 16 Comments
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