Squeezing in what i can

The walls of my house are now empty; less than 20 days left in it. I’ve been staying so busy that all I do there now is sleep. This week after giving a presentation for the new group 2 of them came to do a “Job Shadow” of me. The basketball, weaving, chess, darts, walking to Togo, palm wine, cloths shopping at market, and good eats might not have added up to a good job shadow but we definitely had a great time. It’s interesting how coming just 2 years later will completely change their PC experience.

I have a PO Box because when we got here internet was 45 minutes to open Yahoo. Now if I wasn’t leaving in less than 2 months I’d get a wireless modem. Roads are paved, power seems to stay on longer though water still goes out a lot. PC will also be doubling its number of volunteers within 2 years. Of the 70+ in the new group 28 are coming to my region, Volta. We have 6 in my group here. For a long time Julie was the only PCV within 3 hours of me. The increased net will allow for even more cultural exchange and that along all the other improvements and closer neighbors will make for happier volunteers. Happy volunteers do better work. I love how PC adjusts to progress rather than try to stay the same. Being a PCV is hard enough; they deserve every added comfort available. I’m excited to hear how these guys do.

1.5 strips left of my men’s cloth since I’ve been hosting and coaching a lot lately. We had a big meeting at the visitors’ centre with all the weavers and the paramount chief and talked about the future of it. The guys know I’m leaving and have been incredibly nice. They decided I get made a master weaver on August 30 at the opening ceremony of the Kente Festival! I have to have my cloth finished to become one so they’ve been helping any way they can. Bright takes my weight back and Lawrence will pick each string to make sure there are no knots in the warp whenever I’m gone. Both processes take me 30 minutes. I love these guys.

During basketball warm-ups Monday I was the proudest I’ve been here. We looked just plain sharp doing layups. Smooth, agile, and having fun. I should have taken before and after video. The guys still aren’t great but they’re getting good. I love that my starting 5 is Courage, Wisdom, Fiesta, James, and David with Wizzy as 6th man.

The new nets mom sent me even outlasted the rims as I had to take them down and weld them yet again. One completely snapped; they get used a lot. This time we added some extra support and so far so good. Wednesday was probably my last practice with all the guys there so to end it we did 2 on 2 with me and the 3 best. I showed my age in the end, spraining my ankle and having to stop. I’ve been limping to my loom and back since.

The huge guidebook to Ghana, Bradt, who is easily the most important aspect to any tourism sight, emailed me and said that Julie and I will be getting free copies of the newest edition for our help. That along with all the praise from the new group and my village has me pretty proud of what we’ve done here.

Marcus and I got September 16th as our official Close of Service date. We have to be out of our houses by August 12th for our replacements so we get just over a month of homelessness to finish up our service which should be kinda fun. That gives us like a month left living in our villages. That's like no time at all and it's really hitting me how close I am to leaving.

My replacement Chrissa coming is when it really hit me how much I've put into this project. Like people always say give it everything you got; well for 2 years we have and we've made lots of progress. It's weird to be showing someone else around and I'm very protective of it. Luckily, I really think Chrissa will do great things and will be a great change of pace for the guys. Working with a woman will be such a good thing for them. When she told some of my weavers she would be replacing me asked "Are you sure...?" She seems really excited about the project, ready to get to work, and has lots of good ideas.

Other great news is that there will be 2 PCVs in my village this next group. Brian is an environment volunteer but more importantly to me used to play basketball and can't wait to take over coaching. He'll also be able to maintain the court which was a huge worry to me. It looks like I'll be leaving things in good hands.


4.5 strips left of my men's cloth!
This might look incredibly slow, and for a master weaver it is but for a kid from Michigan it's pretty good. Each zig zag section takes me like 25 minutes now; when I started it took almost an hour so I may be slow but I'm improving.
These sections only take me a few minutes now

Blackstars Out

Friday night the Blackstars played against Uruguay in the World Cup Quarter Finals. If they won they would have been the most successful African team ever. They should have but ended up losing in a shootout after missing a penalty kick in overtime. A group of us headed down to Accra for the match. It was INSANE. BBC said it was like a carnival atmosphere. Big screens all over, everyone sporting Blackstars apparel and businesses closed down or made it possible to watch the match. It was easily the best vibe I’ve ever felt for a sporting event. I’ve never wanted a team to win as badly as I wanted them to. After the loss, everyone was just quiet and semi depressed. The next day Accra was still pretty empty. Some of us are still recovering from the lose.
Other than that lots of weaving and guests. I’m down to 6 strips left of my men’s cloth but only have a little over a month left in my house so it’ll be tight. My replacement, Chrissa, comes for site visit on Wednesday so that’s exciting. Marcus and I are getting our plans for our trip home together which is exciting. It’s bittersweet though because right now we have a lot of fun. We’re comfortable here, have great friends, and lots of freedom. This weekend a group of us went to a great beach appropriately called “the Hideout.” It took almost a day to get there but so beautiful and worth it.
Video after we qualified for the next round..after a loss.
Trevius Jones, the TCU o-lineman and me
Weaving, it's what I do
The Hideout
Awesome bridge you have to cross
USA vs Ghana party in the weaving centre
My new turbo fan and my old one in the background (without the duct tape and 2 spoons it had that used to hold it up)

Loss PARTY!

After Ghana LOST to Germany 1-0 Wednesday the entire country went into a crazy party. The streets of Ho were absolutely nuts. Thanks to an Australian upset, Ghana made it to the knockout rounds of World Cup to play against no other than the USA. Lots of my excitement was lost on the fact that everyone was so happy after a loss. One of our players was running around the field with a Ghanaian flag and the Germans, who won the game and group, just walked off the field. I’m still not used to that aspect of the World Cup.
The buildup to yesterday’s game against the US was huge. Everyone was telling me how much they were going to “score us.” They kept saying how they beat us in 2006 and they’ll do it again. I pointed out that the 2 finalists from 2006 had already been eliminated but that didn’t change the amount of taunting. Actually even now I’m still not sure who I was really cheering for. I mean Ghana got me hooked on football and I’ve seen the Blackstars play 30 times more than the US but still US is home. It was definitely a fun night with the weavers watching on a tiny tv. Now I know I’ll be pulling 100% for the Blackstars again on Friday. Last night after the game, however, I played it safe and came straight home as the street in my village was packed. It’s a great atmosphere but dangerous. Up in a northern region there were a few fatalities; I love football but not that much!

GO BLACKSTARS GO!

Summer Days

The weather has been wonderfully cool or at least for Ghana. This morning I thought it was cool and it was 83. I’m not sure if it’s the wetter and cooler weather or what but lots of my stuff is breaking. My pipes have a leak so I have to turn off the water when I’m not using it. Right now, however, that doesn’t matter since there is no water. My fan finally gave up after a 4 month battle but that’s fine since it’s been so nice out. My surge protector started making noises and stopped working but that’s alright since I don’t need it if I don’t have a fan. It all works out.
The newly arrived 70+ PCTs just got their site assignments. My replacement is named Chrissa. I haven’t met her yet but I hear she’s from Nebraska so she must be cool. I think having a girl will really be a good change of pace for Kpetoe after almost 5 years of guy PCVs. Hopefully she can pick up where I leave it and take it even further. It’s weird to think that someone else will basically take over the last 2 years of my life. We’ll overlap some so I can teach her the bit I’ve learned but then I’ll hopefully leave Ghana in September.
Thanks to having an Ipod again I’ve been putting more hours in my loom lately than ever, setting a PR for weaving twice within the last week. 21 squares on Thursday and then 24 yesterday; my previous record was 13. I have over 10 double strips out of the 19 I need for my men’s cloth. I wasn’t even able to get out to the basketball court for 2 weeks due to traveling, weaving, World Cup, and training for a regatta in October.
When I did finally get out there it really was astonishing. I was expecting it to be empty and I’d have to go round up the kids. I ride up to the court to find a full game going on with plenty of kids waiting for next! They stopped the game to welcome me and ask where I’ve been and then Wisdom drained 2 middle range jumpers when they started back up. Wisdom is the hardest worker of the lot, not the best athlete by a long shot but he practices his shooting all the time. He’s easily got the best jumper inside the arc and it’s something else to see his confidence rise. Seeing that the court is still being heavily used even if I’m not pushing it was really gratifying.
World Cup matches haven’t really went my teams’ ways so far but tomorrow that could all change. Go Blackstars and USA! Julie comes back from America tomorrow too so I get my closest neighbor back! It’ll be great to have someone consistent to talk to again.

World Cup!

World Cup has totally changed the daily life here. School was canceled to watch the opening match and any time an African team plays. Every house that has a tv has it turned to the match with the constant vuvuzeela (horn) noise becoming part of your day. Normally there are a lot of Ghanaian flags on houses and cars but this week it has been insane. Some cabs can barely see due to 7 flags on their cars. We set up a tv in the weaving centre so we can still get some work done.
I was actually in Togo and Benin for some of the matches but they were still extremely interested since all of Africa is cheering for any African team. So far Ghana is the only one to win but Ivory Coast plays this afternoon. Ghana’s win was huge and puts them in great position to advance.
Togo and Benin are both Francophone countries so communication was hard but the food was absolutely amazing. Peace Corps Volunteers there should weight more than here in Ghana but Ghana is a little better off financially. Crossing African borders is a painful yet humorous process. They wouldn’t believe that Sinae was American because she’s of Korean decent and they all wanted bribes. Luckily we knew the prices and are well traveled. I also forgot my Yellow Fever card after making sure to tell everyone else to bring theirs. I sure as heck wasn't getting a shot in the hut they were giving them so I just acted like I didn't speak english or french and repeated. "Yellow card?" "Yellow card" and walked on by despite them yelling after me.
Stilt village in Benin. So big..

Mountains & Goodbyes

Michael, and if you look hard his girlfriend struggling in the background; great pic!



My great Dutch friends left on Saturday. Since February we’ve been having good times. While I will be visiting them in Holland on the way home (3.5 months!) it was still sad to see them leave. The day that they were to leave they decided to climb the mountain that dominates the horizon around Ho. I had never done it so Marcus, who was visiting, and I went with them. A light rain made it a rather dangerous climb and we even had to climb a HUGE tree upside down because it had fallen and blocked the only way but it was so worth it.

That’s close friends Julie, Andrea, and Kristine all leaving within a month. Luckily I’m going to Togo and Benin with Cynthia, Sinae, Rachel and Lindsey tomorrow for a week so I won’t get too down. The weather has been amazing lately too so I hope it holds for our trip. Rainy season is marvelous; like, I don’t sweat 24/7. It looks like that was my last dry season and I can’t say that I’ll miss it.

Summer’s always fly by, even here, so I’m trying to get as much work done ahead of time as I can. I made our new brochure and sent it in for revisions this week. Compared to my 1st brochure this one looks great (not saying much). You can really see the progress I’ve made in Photoshop; not exactly a skill I thought I’d develop in PC. May also set an all time record for sales and guests with GH 1,202 ($850) and 75 respectively! Lots of those guests came from the basketball tournament but they still count, just not sustainable. We’ve also been setting up arrangements to deal with the overlap of the new volunteer and myself. My top weavers have been so busy with orders that I have Guinness stocked up in the fridge (the commission the guys give me for each cloth I sell) so we’re all pretty happy here. I even got an Ipod from the Hubbells which will make my weaving, running, and traveling 100xs better! Thanks guys! World Cup on Friday too, GO BLACKSTARS GO! USA!!


(At a BBQ at the Canadian Embassy)
Cute girl as leaving: So maybe I’ll see you in Grand Rapids sometime.
Me: Yes please.

The PCVs I was with got a good laugh outta that but I need to get back into the social life…
Kente made for an Apple Laptop. We had an appleoff between Bright Joshua and me to see who got to do it. My apple took second to Joshua's shown above.

Old Brochure


New Brochure