I'm in Ghana Now

Hey All,

Sorry for not doing this earlier. Our leaders have a bad habit of going over things that aren't critical for hour after hour and glossing over the most important things as quickly as possible. For example, we talked about health in Ghana for two hours. That talk consisted of a long drawn out story of a guy who died because he did not take his medicine. We listened to this story for so long that we had to skip two other topics that day. Four total topics were ignored because we did not have enough time. He could have just told us to take our malaria pills or die... but instead he decided to skip topics like: where we were going to live, what classes we were to take(or how to register for them), what internships we would be doing, how to get money/bank account, how to get a phone, or how to travel around the city. Also, we have been scheduled since arrival, so I had no time to search for an internet cafe and type this stuff up. For the future, I should be blogging a lot more frequently because we have a free computer lab for international students. And they have USB ports, so i'll come back and put pictures on the blog.

Here are the travel basics: the flight was good, British Airlines are really awesome, but London's airport is not good if you need some rest between flights. I didn't sleep at all on the first flight because British Air is just too good. the food was so tasty and the choices for movies so good, that I decided to stay up all night and sleep when I got to the airport. Wrong decision. There was no way to sleep in that place. For some reason they chose to make it impossible for anyone to stretch out. And it was so loud. There speakers everywhere. And every few minutes there was a new announcement. It had this annoying "Du, Duh, Di" prior to each announcement that both drove us(the three NU students) crazy and made us burst out laughing. It was also hilarious because it sounded like the announcers were competing to make announcements. The kept cutting each other off and talking over the previous announcement. Finally, those little airport carts kept driving by(the ones the drive those with disabilities around). Well, London's have obnoxious "BEEP, BEEP, BEEP" accompanied with a fun police style set of blinding, whirling, lights. The second flight was great. I was so exhausted that I slept instantly. Plus the plane was filled with students going to the same program that I am(CIEE in Legon's University of Ghana). We all slowly discovered this as the flight went on. I watched two movies after the nap(Michael Clayton and Stardust). I love Stardust. Great movie.

When we arrived CIEE picked us up from the airport and took us to a hotel. We lived there for two nights and did orientation all day. They told us about the culture and how to get around, taboos(those sorts of basics). We drove around campus a lot, but took the most confusing routes. So that, at the end of orientation, I had no idea where anything was. It is a lot better now that we are on the ground and out of the buses... but more on that when we get to class registration.

Yesterday we moved into our residences. I am living with a family - a big family. They have a small compound with three houses on it and the family is spread out among the houses. The houses are all treated as one home, so I can freely move between all of them without problems. There are a few of us in this neighborhood. Most foreign students ('obrunies' as they are called here) live on campus in the dorms. I am one of the lucky few to live with families. At least that my opinion. A lot of people enjoy living on their own. I like my way because I think I will be exposed to real life more. For example, last night my family and i talked about ghanain life and world stuff for hours.

Today we are on campus to register for classes. But, no one is registering. We have been wandering around checking out which classes are available. We are not able to register for anything, since the class schedule is not really complete. It is up to each department to organize their own registrations so there no way to know when class lists will be finalized. Many of the departments told us to come back tomorrow or next week to check if class lists have been posted. The only department that had finalized their classes was Sociology. Classes start on Monday, by the way. Hopefully I can find some schedules by then, because I am excited to start the learning.

Got to go. I love you all.