Transportation in Ghana, and some random thoughts

I dont know if I have done a thorough job of explaining the transportation in Ghana. The most common form of transportation is the trotro, which is a small van with a sliding door. There are usually three rows of seats behind the front seat. The back row is solid seats but in the other two rows the aisle seat flips up so that you can walk there, in Ghana they call it a jump seat, probably because whenever you go over a bump it tilts a bit and you jump. Trotros have a driver and a mate that operate the car. Cars in Ghana are called lorrys. The lorry station is filled with trotros, and all the mates are working hard to collect people to fill their tro. They ask every person who passes by where they are going, or they will simply shout over and over again where they are going. They can sometimes be pretty aggressive about it, because the faster they fill up the tro, the sooner they can leave. People can pay extra if they have something to load into the back of the tro. Things to be loaded range anywhere from huge bags of cassava, suitcases, goats, bicycles, plantains...anything. Sometimes in the lorry station you can pay and get a ticket to wherever you are going, but most of the time you just sit in the car until it fills. Once they have two people in the front (not including the driver) and four people in every row (not including the mate) they will leave, although sometimes they dont make it that full. Sometimes they make it so full that the mate is pretty much squat/standing until someone gets out of the tro. The mate will collect money from everyone depending on where they are going, and some tros charge more than others so sometimes its hard to tell when you are being cheated. The way I have found to keep from getting cheated is ask the mate how much it costs where other Ghanaians can hear his answer. Ghanaians do not like to see foreigners cheated. Then whenever you want to get off  you tell the mate and he tells the driver to stop. If you arent at the lorry station you can flag down any tro with an open seat that is going in the direction you want to go. For me personally, I am lucky because my house is located right next to a road where plenty of tros pass every day. Some days, like sunday, the tros are less frequent but they still come.

The tros are supposed to pass inspection, and there are police checkpoints to check that the tros are up to date. However instead of checking the vehicles, the police will let you pass through if you give them a cedi or two bribe. So I have been here for five months and not once have I seen a car not pass “inspection”, but I have seen countless drivers as their mate for a cedi as we approach the checkpoint, and sneakily stick it into their registration card so that when the police open the card the money slips into their pocket. So tros do not make me feel safe ever. One time we hit the car in front of us and my knee slammed into the jumpseat in front of me so bad that I was bleeding. Now I have a scar.

If you want to pay more you can hire a taxi. They will drive past you on the road depending on where you are, or if you have the phone number of a taxi driver you can call them.

Also people have motos, bicycles, and they walk places. Then there is the metromass bus that is a huge bus that I havent used yet so I cant say much about it.

Concerning me:

I got a cat. Its name is Kitty because I couldnt think of anything that fit. Ive never had a cat of my own before so it was a little annoying at first because I think I was trying to train it like a dog. It was meowing all the time and I wasnt sure what to do so I gave it whatever I thought of to make it shut up but I think I might have spoiled it. Now it thinks if it meows enough I will give it fish and milk. But today it peed in my room so I will no longer let it come in there because cat pee is just about the worst smell ever. And I am speaking as someone whose toilet is a hole in the ground. Fortunately I used the Ghanaian method of cleaning up poop and pee. I have seen this method used for cleaning up baby poop, baby pee, chicken feces on the veranda, and throw up.  So here is what they do; they take a scoopful of dirt, put it over the mess, and then sweep it up. It works swimmingly. It is just like how you clean up spilled mercury in chemistry lab, by pouring kitty litter over the mercury and then sweeping it up. Other than making me angry today my cat usually makes me happy because sometimes it likes to cuddle and I like to hear it purr.

As for the rainy season update; the rains still havent come full force but some small rains have come. I am interested to see how things change with people's daily routines when the rains come full force. I think many of them are waiting for the rains to soften the ground so they can start planting. Right now the ground is hard. My father of course has already transplanted many of his chilli peppers and has been watering them. He is a very hard worker and is always busy. I have helped him some in the process by working on the nursery, doing some weeding. Then a couple times I helped fetch water to water the seedlings. That was quite the chore. We fetched the water from the river which is semi close, but the river has dried up because it is dry season. The remaining water was seriously disgusting death water. One time I fetched water until I couldnt lift the bucket down from my head without spilling it everywhere. My arms were exhausted and I couldnt feel my hands. How else am I supposed to get strong though? Then we water each seedling, I think they are spaced about a foot apart. We use a tin can and a bucket. It is a lot of bending over work which hurts my back but I always stay until my father tells me to go.

I have been riding my bike everywhere and my legs are getting stronger which is awesome. People like to see me riding my bike I think. The only bad part is that the seat is a little too high for me so when I stop to talk to people there is just no graceful way to do it. I either lean a lot, on tippy toes, or just get off the bike altogether. Ghanaians are often too short for their bikes and their method is to stand over the bike in front of the seat but I havent quite mastered that one yet.

Sometimes I forget where I am and everything I left behind. My concerns are so simple these days. Spending time with people. Going to market. Washing my clothes. Watching the sky for rain.

Sometimes I get cravings but it seems like having those things again is so far away that I almost dont crave anything anymore. I would kill for a nice cold IPA...I would kill a bug. Im not ready for killing chickens yet. My counterpart killed one yesterday and I watched the entire process and butchering and was slightly disgusted to see that we put almost everything into the soup. I wasnt as grossed out as I feel like a previous Nancy would have been, but im still not jumping to do cut a chicken up on my own. When we make light soup with chicken....MMMM it is so good. I eat all. I even drink the soup. It isnt often we eat chicken.

Sometimes I hear what sounds like fireworks and it is people burning their land. I think the fireworks sound comes from bamboo. Honestly you can see fires everywhere around here. It is just easier than using a cutlass to weed all of your land. Ive done so many papers in school on slash and burn agriculture but then when you are actually here how can you make people change? They already know its not the best. Its not good for the land but also sometimes the fires get out of control and spread to other people's farms where they havent finished harvesting their corn yet. People know its not good but they still do it.