First week recap

Okay, so right now I am going to give a first week recap, but from now on I at least hope to update daily and pictures will be up on the web shortly. Just to give background, I am studying abroad through NC State's exchange program with the University of Ghana in Accra, Ghana (Accra is the capital city). There are five other students (4 of us from NC State and two from UNC) in my group.

The first week here in Ghana has been a great and eye-opening experience. But I still feel as though the adventure is yet to really begin. I arrived on last Sunday, the 12th at around 10:30pm (Africa time, Ghana is five hours ahead of the US). The flight just to get here was an experience all by itself as it was very long. I left from RDU in Raleigh and caught a plane in New York. From New York, I went to London and then finally down to Ghana. The flight to London was six hours and the flight to Accra from London was another seven hours. We arrived in Ghana Sunday night only to find the lights were out in our hostel (International Students Hostel II). So we had to move our bags up stairs and into temporary rooms all in the dark. The lights did however turn back on later on that night.

So far the week has been filled with orientations, tours, and registerations. We have registered as students here at the university and began registering for classes on thursday. Our coordinator, Dr. Charity Akotia and her assistant Gabriel (we call him Gaby) have been showing us around the campus and have taken us into the city to look around at the various markets and different places. The campus is absolutely gorgeous. There are huge trees and small trees everywhere, a lot of greenery (definitely a lot of green and no red bricks), gardens, sculptures, and the architecture of the buildings is fascinating (pictures will be up later to help with descriptions). The campus is really large and although all of it is in one area it is very spread out (my hostel is on the far west side of campus). As far as the city goes, it is both huge, congested, majestic, amazing, and sad at the same time. There is a tremendous disparity between the wealthy and the poor. The wealthy communities we have passed through so far has included nice cars (even nicer than what most people drive in the states) such as mercedes, honda, toyata, jaguar, and other foreign brands, beautiful two-story homes, and I have even seen one large mansion (I mean really really large). On the other hand, the poor live in shacks on dusty dirt roads and cracked streets. The conditions look horrible and one day I even saw a little boy washing outside. Clothes are outside drying on hanger lines, and most shacks have 5-7 people moving in and out of them. The streets of Accra are overcrowded with open markets and side vendors selling everything imaginable. It is really neat to walk the streets and be approached by every one trying to sell everything from food to cell phones, watches, shoes, belts, clothes, etc. They are all salesmen and entrepreneurs!

Of course the weather here is hot and humid. Actually, in the mornings (at least before 10) and at dusk and into the evening the weather is really nice with the temp being around 75 degrees. However, in the middle of the day it is so hot and humid - everyone is carrying around a towel at their side wiping sweat from their faces. Accra is located in the dryest region in Ghana, so naturally it doesn't rain here as much as other places in the country.

I have been exhausted at each day's end because of all of the walking around and the heat. Ghanaians work and live at a much slower pace than we do in America. As a result, it takes much longer just to do one thing here and sometimes it takes all day. For example, my cell phone doesn't work here so Gaby decided to take us out into the city to buy some. We left thursday at around noon and didn't get back until 8:30 that night (that is a story in and of itself that I will tell in another post).

So far, I just wanted to give a brief introduction to what has been going on here so far in the first week. In the next post(s), I will go into more detail about the city, people, what they are like, how the academic system is set up here at the university, classes I will be taken, places to go and see, and my take and perspective on the economic disparity of here in relation to back home in the states as well as the open market environment here. Thanks for reading and keeping up with me!