And the Dirt Road Goes On

So after our exciting breakfast we started driving towards Tamale.  We stopped there and went to the cultural center and then continued on. I had never traveled the road from Tamale to Nkwanta (top of Volta Region).  The road is famous among PCV’s as being super shitty and bumpy and dusty and in the rainy season it is basically impassable.  We drive for 5 hours on what was in essence a dried out river bed…now a river of red dirt with large farm trucks hauling people, cows, and copious amounts of yams.  I can’t imagine doing it in public transportation.  It was super hot with the sun shining in so I had to rig up a two yard that bubbled out the window…we looked like a traveling gypsy van.  The road was beyond bumpy with “pot holes” that spanned the road and rocked the car back and forth constantly.  Small dust “tornados” would develop and go up maybe 200 or 300 feet in the air…they were actually kinda cool to look at.  The villages here were all made of circular mud huts with rounded out compound walls which reminded me of what I think the inside of beehive would look like.  We drove through many small villages with kids and adults yelling “obruni” and waving wildly at our car.  We finally arrive in Nkwanta and find a nice place to stay.  We are all dyed red from the dirt.  We go to order food.  All the things we ask for off the menu they are not having.  Mom and dad eat an omelet and I order a sort of chicken sandwich.  The next day we would finish our trip, landing in my village.  We start to talk about the trip as a whole.  Mom and dad are ready to go home.  Nothing is comfortable here; the beds, the cars, the food, the heat, the dirt, the intermittent electricity.  “We’re happy to have come and spend time with you, but I’m ready to get back. I just wish we could take you with us.”  Ain’t that sweet?  We talk for a little bit and then go back to the rooms and watch a soccer match and go to bed early so we can head to HoHoe early the next morning.

So we take our 3 hour drive to HoHoe, stop at the market to get food to take to my house, get fuel, and I take mom to the silversmith to do some first glances.  We then head to Likpe.  As we’re driving out to my village I think about the first time I traveled that road 18 months before.  I was coming to visit my village for the first time; I was loaded in a tro with Fo Nicho and Francis, both who I had just met, and was about to see my new home and community.  They were speaking some language, and it wasn’t Ewe, which I had been learning.  I was so nervous I almost felt sick.  I remember thinking how beautiful and green the land was with the mountain line looming in front of me; I remember going through Likpe Nkwanta and then Bakua, and then slowly climbing the hill and Francis saying, “This is Todome.”  We drive and I see the community meeting grounds with a cool gnarly, old tree leaning to the right, mud houses, some with concrete.  Old ladies selling at the side of the road and kids running down the street in their school uniforms.  We pass through the village and the tro stops to drop us in front of the school.  There is the sign for the guesthouse. “Up this hill is where you’ll live.  This is my house,” says Fo Nicho.  We climb out and he hollers and 4 or 5 kids come to haul all my luggage up the hill.  Francis and I start walking up the hill and I see the guesthouse…it’s not mud J  We get to the door and Francis starts to unlock it and I start getting real nervous…I have to live here for 2 years, dear Lord, please let it be ok.  And it was…and it is.  I completely lucked out.  I got a great house and phenomenal community that takes good care of me.  I’m so excited to show my parents this.  They have seen the bullshit of Ghana that still drives me crazy at some times, but now they are gonna get to see why I love Ghana…my village; people who I spend time with and eat with, the kids I play with, and the old ladies who love to greet me and give me bananas.  This community and these people have been my family for the last 18 months, and I love them.

There was a celebration in Bakua that many of my villagers were at, so there are not many people on the road in my village.  For the first time ever, I ride in a car up my road to the guesthouse.  We get out and start taking the luggage in.  We say goodbye to Ben and then settle in.  I had called Francis and had him sweep the house out before we came.  **Short story.  When I was living in KC my parents came to visit and dad was appalled at my dirty microwave, “Jeanna that’s disgusting. You’re gonna get ptomaine!”  So ever since then I never clean my microwave when I know my parents are coming to visit me, just to give dad something to gripe at me about.  Since I don’t have a microwave here, and I am indeed a lazy deep cleaner, I left my lil’ fridge dirty.  In all truth I haven’t cleaned it since I got here and it was gross, but when mom and dad said they were coming to visit I did deep clean my house, but left the fridge nasty just for sentimental reasons.  Francis cleaned my fridge while I was gone!  I guess he figured it was too disgusting for my parents and he cleaned out all nice and shiny!**

We walk back behind the house and greet Francis and then spend the afternoon relaxing in my house and trying to organize all our crap.  After a while there is a knock on the door, “Esther sent these to your parents.”  It was a big bunch of bananas and some ground nuts (peanuts).  This was the first of many gifts arriving at my door while mom and dad visited.  I believe we probably received around 70-80 bananas (no lie) while they were here.  Everyday we all had to eat at least 2 bananas…that was the rule we came up with. In the evening we walked down to Fo Nicho and Esther’s house to greet them.  We took Fo Nicho the digital camera he had given me money for…he was really happy.  Michaela (my favorite baby) was actually shy around mom and dad, Dixon and Rose were as goofy as always.  We sat and talked and then I showed mom her big, black cock that was running around the yard.  “Look mom, there’s your cock…light soup tomorrow J”  We had a good visit with them and then Fo Nicho walked with us into the village because I wanted to greet the chief.  We get into town and here comes Gifty (a woman my women’s group and one of my village favorites); she runs up and gives mom and dad each a big hug.  Then the old ladies saw them and came over greeting and bowing and shaking hands and saying stuff in Sekua.  They’re so funny.  Mom and dad were shaking hands and saying thank you’s and starting to get the feel of my village.  We went to NaNa to greet him and say we have arrived.  He said that tomorrow (Sunday) will be their welcoming ceremony where we would present them to the village.  Ok, so we walk back to the house and just chill.  The lights go out and we sit with a candle and talk.  Mom and dad both squeeze into my single bed and I flop on the couch.  Tomorrow’s the big day!