Done with training in under a week! Everyone passed their language test on their first try and 40 of our original 42 will swear in Friday, that’s unheard of. This group has a lot of character and a bunch of great people.
On Wednesday the Small Enterprise Development (SED) trainees put on our cross sector. Cross sector is when one group teaches the other 2 things that they specialize in. Environment and Water/Sanitation put on great cross sectors but traditionally SED’s put people to sleep. While it wasn’t thrilling by any account, Marcus, Allen and I presented a pretty solid idiots guide to bookkeeping that people at least said they really liked. There were 3 other stations that went very well too I hear. Marcus is our finance major, I’m our accountant, and Allan is just a bad ass.
Allan and his wife Marian both did PC way back in the day in separate countries. Years later they met while volunteering overseas in another country. Now they have a son who just finished PC in Eastern Europe and they’re giving another 2 years. They’re definitely role models for all of us and just great to have around.
Yesterday was the big final trainee vs. trainer football match. It rained the hardest I’ve ever seen in Africa just before we played, that made it so much fun. Of our top 3 players (and only soccer players), Steve was the only one who played. Omar had to go back to the States and Cameron has a growth of some sort that they had to remove from his back, so he referred. We pieced together a team but didn’t expect to do that well. The whole team played absolutely amazing. Everyone overachieved. We were never down by more than 2 and with 10 minutes left we were tied up at 3. We gave it all we had but we ended up losing 5-3 in a really fun game. I pulled off a hat trick with my first goal off a slide kick at the goal post as the ball was going out and the next 2 off pure luck. I want to set up a PC Togo vs. PC Ghana football match. We’d have a stacked team.
One of the amazing things that remains constant between the US and Ghana is the importance of sports. Almost all Ghanaians will tell you who scored each goal for Ghana when they beat the US in the 2006 World Cup. I love how much they love sports. I don’t get why people in the US basically stop playing sports after high school just because they’re not amazing at it. Sports are fun and a great way to get that competitiveness out of the system. I’m planning on joining the Kpetoe’s city team if I can make it.
There is energy like crazy for the elections tomorrow. Being here during this has been one of the most interesting things I’ve ever been part of. If one party doesn’t get 51% then it goes to a runoff and with 3 major parties and 5 minor ones odds that’s what will happen. That could happen anytime within 2 weeks. Mom wants me to get people to vote for the CPP because their mascot is a chicken, sorry mom.