Day 4 - Etesen? Aya!

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Hi family!

I miss you guys! It's so great here in Ghana and I'm learning so much, bit it gets kinda hard at night when I realize I'm in a different country, far from what I'm used to. So I really appreciate the emails that you write back! I love hearing from you guys.

Last night we had a CRAZY rainstorm. It was nuts. All of the windows are open all day long in the house because it is so warm outside anyway. So I woke up to wind blowing around everywhere and loud rain and lightning. There was a loud banging noise, over and over again. In my frenzied, exhausted state of mind I thought that people were coming into the outside gate and were trying to break into our house!! I imagined that I would get up and find 7 or 8 strange men in the house. But I was so tired and terrified that I never got out of bed.

The next morning we woke up and Karen told us it was just the doors on the inside of the house banging around. Haha, and all of us had been terrified the night before and had all been thinking the same thing - that people had broken into our house. Oh geez! It sure made for an exciting night (but not very much sleep).

Abomosu Marketplace on a rainy day

Traditional dress of Ghana. Most of the women wore dresses similar to this.

Today was our first day in the clinic! I loved it. I was helping with the intake of the patients. I helped with the vitals and the history. I was working with a woman named Loretta. She is 19 years old (20 years old next week). She is working so she can save up money to go to school to become a professional nurse. So it was fun to connect in that way - both of us trying to be nurses.

Loretta - Isn't she stunning?!! One of my best friends in Ghana.

She was so nice and patient with me. She took the vitals and asked about the history, and I wrote those things down. All of the history was given in Twi, so I had no idea what the patients were saying. Loretta would then translate for me, and I would write down things like, "Fever, abdominal pain, vomiting, " etc. A lot of they symptoms looked like Malaria symptoms. The students in other areas of the clinic said that a lot of the patients were diagnosed with Malaria. At least the medications are cheap, so some of the people can afford them. BTW, did you know that half, HALF of the kids don't live past 1 year old because of malaria? That made me so sad when I heard that.

Writing down the medical history in the patient's chart. Look at how cute that tiny girl is that the mom is holding?!! Ghanaian babies are beautiful.

But Loretta was so nice and SO patient! She would say something to me in her Ghanain accented English and I had a hard time understanding, and then she had a hard time understanding me and my questions. She would just laugh and laugh and say, "I don't get you!" But we eventually figured it out. She was even nice and taught me some words in Twi. Like good morning, good afternoon, good evening, I'm fine, etc. I would repeat what she said and she would laugh so hard at me! And I would try out my new Twi knowledge on some of the patients and they would just laugh me and say, "Oh, Abruni (white person)" in this condescending way. I wasn't offended at all, I just thought it was so funny that they thought I was funny, trying to fit in by speaking their language.

A sample of some Twi:

• Good morning = maakye - pronounced "ma-chi"
• Good afternoon = maaha
• Good evening = maadwo - pronounced "ma-ju"
• How are you? = Etesen?
• I am fine = Mehoye - pronounced "me-ho-ye"
• Thank you = Medase
  

Me, Loretta, Chantal, and ?? (can't remember her name)

Loretta told me she's teaching her LDS friend how to speak Twi. She isn't LDS, but she has a friend who is. She said her friend was American. When I asked her if her friend was a missionary she said he was! So she's seeing the missionaries! WOOT WOOT! That's awesome.

Loretta was asking me when I was coming back tomorrow. She said, "I like you. I want you to come back." I told her I really liked her too and that she is so nice. I'm glad I get to see her tomorrow, because she is so welcoming and patient with me, even though she thinks my Twi attempts are hillarious.

After the clinic we rested at home for a bit. The hottest part of the day is between 12-3 and we try to be indoors during some of that time - it is SO hot. So we chilled for about an hour and then some of us went oustide to play soccer with the kids.

Soccer was a blast. At first we could only find two older boys to play (Mark and Isaac). They were probably 15 or so. Man, they probably thought that we stunk. But we had fun. I guess the word got out that the Abruni were playing soccer, because suddenly all of these kids were showing up to play. It was so fun! Their ages ranged from 5 to about 13. They all went to the Zion school (which was built by LDS members in the US). They were a little shy of us at first, but by the end they were full-fledged playing against us.

The soccer field on the far right. You can kind of see the posts just sticking out of the ground as goals.

All of those kids LOVED soccer, or football as they called it.

One little boy named George was a GOOD goalie! He loved it. He would always want one of us white girls to shoot against him so he could show us how good he was. And these little kids are all good for how young they are. Man.

The soccer field was just two wooden posts stuck into the ground on each end as goals and it was just dirt and long grass. Man, they needed to mow it with their machetes, it was long! They really do mow with machetes, it's crazy.

The funniest part about today was during soccer. We were playing soccer and one of the kids pointed to my friend, Elaine, and said, "Abruni, come here." He waved her over to the sidelines, almost like a coach would wave over a player who is playing terribly. "Abruni, why do you not let me score? Why do you always kick it away?!!" Elaine said, "Uh... because I'm not on your team!" The little boy just shook his head at her and said, "Psh", almost like "man, you don't understand how to play this right at all." It was HILLARIOUS. We were still laughing about that when we got home.

On our way home the kids followed us the whole way home (of course). And we loved it. They started holding our hands as we walked back and acted like they were being so brave to hold our hands! Haha!


We went inside and they stayed oustide of the wall of our house, calling out "Abruni!" whenever they saw us through our windows for almost 2 HOURS afterwards. It was crazy. We were all wondering if their parents were worried about them. Karen then explained to us that the fathers work out in the fields and the mothers work in the market, so their kids are kind of like "latch key kids" in the US. She said she's worried about the kind of effect it will have on their community with their kids growing up with no parents at home. It's sad that they don't have any other option. Either don't eat but stay at home with the kids or go out and work so you can eat.

Tomorrow we are meeting with the mayor and a couple of other "big wigs" who are going to talk about our service project with the clinic and how we're going to do it. Karen rolls her eyes that it has to be a big ordeal with all of these officials. She said it "always has to be a big deal with these things." We also get to go to institute tomorrow night! That should be awesome! I'm way excited about that.

I love you guys! I have some assignments I've had to type up - some "deep thinking" journals that I want to send to you when I have time. I'm learning a lot here when I sit down and think about it, it's such a blessing.

Hope you have a great day today!

Love,

Jess