Faces, pronunciation, energy and the gardens of Aburi

Goat
Women lugging sticks up a hill, I offered to help, they refused...naturally
BIG tree
BIG spider
BIG wormy guy
The kids

Almost two weeks of Ghanaian culture and a couple things continue to fascinate me the more I try to get to know these people. First, I have noticed that in about one in three people have a peculiar scar(s) right below the cheekbone sometimes multiple and on both sides of the face. It is not the scar of a cut, but more like a separated indent of about three cm long and one cm tall. Once I know what this is about and once I get a close up of it, I’ll share the knowledge. Also, I’ve found myself beginning to pronounce words like the people here, due to the fact that almost every time I ask a question or begin a conversation, I get the pardon me and puzzled look right back. This means pronouncing all ‘o’s like home…So when we talk about the hostel instead of ‘hastel’ like I would normally say it, it has become ‘hoestal.’ Clear? What’s really working better is picking up on the local language, as some of the workers around the hostel have been teaching me. One dude passed me on a bike yesterday and asked me how I was doing in the local Twi, and it took me a couple of seconds to get the gears going, but I eventually responded in kind, and he threw me a thumb’s up and ‘that's very gooood.’ People like it here when I know something about their country whether it be words, history, politics, or economics and they try the best to welcome me even more. In fact, on my way back from today’s adventure, I had a conversation with a chemistry student and he was psyched that I was over here studying finance and the trouble it has encountered. After being preoccupied with how I excited I was that I was finding good and useful information, I’ve realized how inefficient credit programs here can be. This guy was talking about how hard banks are on people and complaints are coming from the bottom of the social ladder all the way up. Loan rates are usurious in most cases, and collateral is egregious…Facts I was hoping to find to the contrary. Credit institutions are trying to become more financially and operationally stable and the way they do that is raising interest rates and collateral, while narrowing the depth of outreach to the poor. The institutions loaning to the extreme poor are staying afloat only by donor groups, and insufficient capital is being provided by the government, notorious for its corrupt allocation of resources. Right, so I asked him what kind of career he was planning to pursue and he brought up the impending energy crisis that is beginning to worry many Ghanaians. They’ve been supplied with power from a single dam that was built during the tenure of the nation’s first president 50 years ago. I originally thought that the three days power on, one day power off thing was limited to my hostel, but turns out I was way off and in fact is applied to the entire country. They’ve divided the sectors so that everybody doesn't lose power at the same time, but the other day when Accra didn't have it, generators filled the streets and made for an extra smelly, loud and contaminated day. This guy was telling me how this dam is starting to wear down and the government had originally envisioned it lasting 40 years and they are now beginning to scramble. Solutions I ask? This student is hoping to work in/develop/increase solar energy…Booya. The sun, yep, they have that. Loads of it. It of course isn’t that easy, or at least until foreign enterprises start investing in this country.
Today though, I took my first solo trip out into the nature of Ghana to a place called Aburi north of the city. Our tro-tro wound up the side of the mountain to a small town wherein lies the 65 hectare gardens of Aburi. In said gardens I saw the largest tree, worm and spider I have ever seen in my life. There was a myriad of footpaths and I descended one down and out as far away from the people I could get and popped out meeting a group of six children hanging out under their “roof” (composed of some bamboo and big leaves). They gave me some directions, but I didn't want to leave without getting a picture of the oldest boy and his Bulls shirt. Theirs tons of Bulls shirts and jerseys over here, but this one, noting that the Bulls were established in 1964, was my favorite. Right after I whipped out the camera, the other kids ran over to join, all except the crying one in the background. Lots of children, no shoes, tattered clothes, no real home…That’s the story all too often here, and you can see the boy has a machete in his hand that he uses to help his father cut down the brush. I trounced a while and headed back during the torrential 15 minute rain shower that came. I walked back through town where there was a funeral (during which all the women wear black dresses and the men huge thick black robes) and took the tro-tro back home after an exhausting day.