Ponderings of Young Minds

June 20, 2011

So my Vision Questors left yesterday. We had a good time; we went to the caves, took them to market, worked at women’s day, visited the school, ate fufu, made banku and groundnut soup, drank palm wine, went dancing in Mate…it was a great time. They both really liked my village and Mawuli, Fo Nicho, and Esther; they were also really impressed with my fancy housing. We were gifted copious amounts of food while they were here: 5 vo fruits, 4 avocados, 8 ears of corn, cocoa pods, and we also had some mangos. It was very nice! Talking with them, I’m amazed at all the stuff I’ve learned this year without realizing it; I actual function quite well in Ghana.

So today I went to Wli to drop off purses and headbands to Sister Kafui. On the way back a guy gave me a ride to the Bakua junction where I’d pick my next tro to Todome. Some of my village kids go to a prep school in Bakua, and they were sitting and waiting for the tro, too. So 2 of the girls, Angela and Susan, probably around 7 or 8 years old, start talking to me about all kinds of stuff. They wanted to know if I had ever been in a plane. I said of course, I did not swim all the way from America to Ghana. “Oh, your arms would have been very tired!” Yes…and I was just joking… “I have heard that you can eat, shit and even bath on a plane. Sister Boala, is that true?” So I explained about the little packaged food and that you could go to the bathroom, but I had never seen a shower in a plane. “Once you squat down, where does the shit go?” “Well, it goes down into a container in the bottom of the plane, then when you get back to the ground they empty the container.” Ok. “Can you see lots of animals from the plane?” “Yes, when you take off, but when you are high high, you cannot see anything. You are taller than the clouds! When you come back down, then you can see the animals again.” “Can you take a rope and come down when you want to drop, or do you have to wait for the plane to stop at the ground?” “Oh you must wait till the plane comes to the ground. Everyone alights at one place.” “Oh Sister Boala, when you go on the plane back to America, please take us. We want to go on a plane!” “Ok, it will be a long time before I leave Todome, though.”

As we talk, 2 tros pass by too full, so finally we start the 45-minute walk back to our village and the topics cover:
1. My hair: is it mine or is it weave? Do I put cream on it? It is very long.
2. Do my people eat fufu? Banku? Or do we only take rice and eat it with a fork and knife? I explained some of our food and told them about a sandwich and that we eat it with our hands. They thought it was so strange when they saw 2 yevu eating fufu with a spoon…LUDICROUS!!
3. Have I ever ate a pig? Yes, and I miss it!!! Then they told me I should never eat ostrich meat in Ghana (and they did not know the word for ostrich so they explained it had two legs, was very tall, black, with 2 large (arms out to the side)…I assume it is ostrich…I have seen them raised in Ghana). I should not eat it because they had been told in school that white people love to eat ostrich and will pay a lot of money for it, so some people dig up dead bodies and paint the skin and do something else and then sell it to us. “So Sister Boala do not ever take it, it will make you sick!” I promised I wouldn’t and was very touched by their concern.
4. Angela told me she has never eaten fried rice, even though you can get it in HoHoe. When she goes to HoHoe with her mom she never takes her to get chop, so could I make fried rice one night and have her over…she has heard it’s very good. And she will bring me avocados, pineapples, mangos and other fruit she finds in the bush for exchange. Ok, sounds good to me.

We keep walking and talking about all kinds of stuff and I only understand about ¾’s of it. A tro picks us up about 35 minutes in and takes us to the village. I tell the kids goodbye and head to Esther’s shop to hang out. I play with the babies, get peed on, and greet as people go by. Today was a good day.

j