We arrived in Donkorkrom one month ago during the third and longest public school vacation(end of July through mid-Sept, and counting). At the time some senior students were attending extra classes to prepare for standardized tests. We sat in on a few to familiarize ourselves with local schools. Next to our house is an Electricty Company of Ghana office and next to it, a shop owned by a DASHS teacher. We've gone next door to the employees' canteen weekly to eat Ghanaian chop and to the shop to hang with teachers form DASHS and electricity company workers. We've made a habit of walking to town on the weekly market day to stock up on food where we usually meet up with the two nearby PCVs. We've ventured outside of town on a few occasions to visit one nearby PCV and to attend a meeting of PCVs in our same region of the country. We have regular visitors to our home, mostly students from the neighborhood. We're waiting for the beginning of school which is being delayed because some teachers are participating in a census. I am told that I will teach JHS Math to forms 1-3(6th-8th grade) and Hallie, high school Physics.
Now, story time:
Joe here: Early in the morning following swearing-in, we began our move to Donkorkrom waiting for a trotro(public van) to fill. Hungry and seated in a middle seat next to Hallie, I reached over her to buy us water and bofruit(deep-fried dough balls), as is common, from atop the head of a woman skillfully circling departing vehicles. We scarfed down our food as the tro departed then Hallie's head fell forward onto the seat in front of us for her inevitable in-transit nap. About an hour later, I jostled her awake with the urgent news that my breakfast choice necessitated a second passage through the trotro window. Speeding down the rare paved road in Ghana, I lost my meal to the surprise of those aboard the Metro Mass bus driving behind our trotro. The bus driver honked incessantly to alert our driver, who only got word of what happened a few minutes after the honking had stopped. He pulled over and got out to survey the mess on the side of his vehicle and my intentions for the rest of the trip. We continued down the road. Having eaten the same breakfast, Hallie concluded she was a ticking timebomb. Fortunately, her stomach was able to diffuse. I have been fortunate that my health in Ghana has not been any more complicated than this and I assure you that if it does get more complicated without getting more comical, I won't include the details here.
Hallie and Joe here: One of our PCV neighbors who has lived for a year in Memkyemfere, a nearby resettlement village, invited us for a day's visit. One pre-requisite for the half-hour car ride to her village was waiting two hours at the Donkorkrom station for enough people as is absolutely possible to squeeze into a more-than-worn station wagon. The driver started the car by putting two wires together and surprised us by making it to the village without the wheels popping off. We were instantly approached by a Ghanaian woman who was correct to guess that we were looking for our sister. She led us to the room in an NGO-built community center where Rachel stays. We greeted Rachel's housemates and checked out her accomadations before walking through the village. Rachel introduced us as the new PCV teachers in Donkorkrom to nearly everyone in sight: kids playing, women cooking, men assembling fishing nets, farmers walking between farm and home. Just a short car ride south of our home, Rachel converses in a different language than we do with Donkorkrom locals, Ewe. After lunch and a short rest, we walked through the bush to the nearby Fulani settlement. According to Rachel, the Fulanis are a nomadic tribe originating in Nigeria that established this particular settlement about two years prior. They have an appearance distinct from their neighbors in Memkyemfere. They have tall, thin frames and round eyes(Ghanaians have more almond shaped eyes and thicker frames) and they scar and tattoo their faces. Their jewelry, clothing, and hairstyles are really wild, too. The women style their hair into two tightly wound ropes that explode into tufts lying on either cheek. They dwell in one-room two-story-tall dome huts made from bush. Some Fulani people entertained our visit by coming out of their dwelling. They looked at us and touched our arms while talking to each other in a language we didn't understand. We tried to get any message across in all of Twi, Ewe, French, and English to little avail. They reminded me(Hallie) of Native Americans, only from 200 years ago. We took some pictures and felt like reporters from National Geographic. Some dwellings in the settlement were visibly vacated. Apparently, they are being coerced from the land due to complaints that they let their cattle roam freely to eat other people's plants. For the time being, we continue to see the Fulani in Donkorkrom where they come to sell cow's milk and deep-fried milk curds on market days.
On the way home from a meeting with the other PCVs in our same region of the country, Rachel and we made a brief pit stop in Akosombo to tour a major hydro-electric dam. Along the way we gained some insight into why Peace Corps has decided to place us PCVs in the Afram Plains. In the 1950s, foreign investors bade for a job, the construction of a dam at the southern mouth of Lake Volta, that would supply Ghana with the majority of its electricity. Perhaps the Italian investors that won the bidding meant well for the development of Ghana or perhaps they were seeking to return a big profit from a big project. Whatever the case, their and Volta Lake Authority's shortsightedness or carelessness became apparent when the completion of the dam drastically raised lake water levels well inland of shore. Farms and livestock were drowned in a region whose economy is primarily agriculture based. 80,000 Ghanaians were driven from homes that washed away between the old and new perimeters of the lake. Road flooding made access to communities such as Donkorkrom more difficult as is evidenced by the view from the ferry that crosses into the Afram Plains: branches of mature trees protruding just above the surface of the lake. Today, Ghanaians boast by a false sense of pride that Lake Volta is the largest man-made lake in the world. Ghanaians affected by the flooding moved into 52 resettlement communities and lobbied for relief. Judging from billboards erected around the lake that document monetary and infrastructure donations from the US government, the EU, and NGOs, their cries were heard from the western world. Notwithstanding, Peace Corps has donated six living, breathing contributions(thats us) to the area in the last four years.
Now, a picture show(Click to enlarge):
On the way to Donkorkrom, we crossed Lake Volta from the east. The boat ride is over an hour long. A man spent the whole ride bailing water coming through a crack in the boat.
We live in a walled compound with a dozen incessantly 'baa'-ing goats and sheep that will try to eat anything including laundry soap. Our only neighbor is the headmaster to the high school across the street.
The compound security guard and shepherd slaughter and prepare goats in our backyard.
Like I said, we have regular visitors from the neighborhood. Coloring books and computer games, could you think of a better way to spend an afternoon?
Hallie poses with an unwelcomed visitor, it's harmless.
Dried beans are cheap in market, but some are home to weevils(bugs). Take a closer look, the smaller sorted pile has been infested.
Some Africans praise Obama. The only other name I know of that personifies wine is "Jesus."
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