Two Lists, Two Markets

So we made two lists; one for Don, the housing guy at University of Cape Coast, and one for us. Don’s list detailed the repairs needed on the house. Our list cataloged supplies we needed to make the house our home.

Don was in and out of the house for the next 2 days delegating countless maintenance men. Within 48 hours, the sink and toilet were fixed. Elle had a bed. They brought in a TV and stand. Curtains were put up in the bedrooms. An insecticide was sprayed around the house. The walls and floors were washed. The new ceiling fans we bought were installed in Elle’s and Cody’s room. A hole in the bathroom wall was covered and attempts were made to fix the bathroom door. One more concern on our list couldn’t be fixed, hot water. Don and his workers looked a little puzzled by our panic. The dialogue went something like this.

“No hot water?”

“Sure,” they pointed to the petite gas stove in the kitchen, “You put the water in a kettle on the heat.”

“But what about out of the faucet? We don’t have hot water out of the faucet?”

“You can heat it up on the stove.” I don’t think they quite understood why we had an issue with this.

“What about showers, baths? How can we take a shower?”

They pointed into the bathroom.

“We want to take a shower with hot water.”

“You can get a pitcher to pour the heated water over you in the bathtub.”

It was obvious that this problem didn’t register as any such thing to them. Scott tried another route.

“Do you have hot water?”

“Yes, we have kettles to put on the stove. You should buy a big kettle at the market.”

“What about when you shower? You take cold showers?”

“Sure.” The other workers matter-of-factly agreed.

“Do any of the houses on campus have hot water that comes from the faucet?”

“No.”

We made a hearty attempt in the market at finding a small hot water heater to mount above our tub. Don said that if we found one, they would put it up for us. But I’m pretty sure it was an optimistic gesture. Kind of like, hey, if I win 28 million in the lottery tonight, I’ll give you 100 grand. Same.

Dakota, along with some international students from Grand Valley, finally broke through our hot water paradigm. Three students from GVSU are attending U.C.C. this semester. We met with them back in Grand Rapids before the trip and had arranged to meet them for dinner upon arrival. On our way to meet them, Dakota reasoned with us, “Come on guys, I took a cold shower last night and it wasn’t that bad. You just get in and out fast. That’s just how they do it here. If they do it, we might as well do it. That’s the reason we’re here, right. To learn how other cultures live?”

(From left to right) Patrick, Regina, Elle, Jessica

The college students, Patrick, Jessica and Regina held the same open-minded reasoning. My age and inflexibility blazed apparent when contrasted with their ingenuity.

“I just put bottles of water in the sun all day. Then by evening they’re warm. I can use them to pour over myself when I need a shower.” Patrick shared.

Regina shrugged,” Yeah, you only need to shower like once a week.”

So we took “hot water” off of Don’s list and added “kettle” and “pitcher” onto our list.

Big John was the taxi driver who drove us to Kortakraba (I’m spelling it how I say it and I’m probably pronouncing it wrong), the biggest market in Cape Coast. Like Accra, it’s comprised of rows and rows of stands, booths and shelters with crooked shelves holding all types of items. There are some open stores where you actually walk in to shop, but they are few and far between. There’s no rhyme or reason to the items sold and the location you’d find them, so shopping is like one big, hot, sweaty, scavenger hunt. The roads are narrow, and a perpetual traffic jam forces cars and honking taxis to swerve in and out and around each other, pedestrians and head-vendors (meaning they’re balancing their goods on their heads, not selling heads). There’s a very tiny space between the shops and the road to walk, but it takes concentration to maneuver. Small concrete slabs straddle a deep cement gutter. The slabs aren’t always uniform and are sometimes wobbly or just plain gone, so walking through the market takes precision and athleticism, to say the least.

After showing Big John our list, he took us to Ghana’s answer to Target, Melcolm. It’s the biggest walk-in store. It actually has a floor and fluorescent lights, aisles and metal shelving. There’s a checkout girl sitting beside a table with a calculator and cash box and a security guard sitting atop a tall stool near the entrance. And by entrance, I don’t mean door. This is an open entrance, as if the front wall of the building has been removed. Big John accompanied us into Melcolm. Straight ahead were televisions on the wall and oscillating fans on the floor. Some stairs led to a lower level with table and chair sets. To the left were kitchen electronics, pans, storage containers and utensils. Elle and I headed right, where we passed little bikes and linens on our way to a wall of clocks. Scott strode to the fans, followed by Dakota and Big John. “I’m going to find a clock,” I told Scott over my shoulder.

“O.K., I’ll start looking for other things on the list.”

In front of the wall of clocks was a counter, behind which stood a young woman waiting on two middle-aged men in front of me. I stood beside them, holding Elle’s hand. She shuffled around between me and the two men. When the woman turned to me, I pointed to a round, white clock with cute colored flowers on the front. She shook her head, “That one’s finished.” I pointed to my second choice. She shook her head, “That one’s finished.”

Meanwhile, I heard Elle behind me asking, “Mama, will you scratch my back. Mama. Mama. Will you scratch my back?” I was intent on finding a clock that was available so I held a finger up behind my back. She continued her plea, as I pointed to another clock. This time the girl at the counter turned around searching among stacks of boxes, pulling one out and placing it on the glass counter. As she opened the box, I turned to check on a now quieted Elle. She had her back to me and the man who had been standing beside us, gently scratched her back. He looked up at me and smiled, then Elle turned back to me satisfied. “Thank you,” I stammered. I would learn soon that our boundaries with other people’s children are non-existent here, and his reaction to her request was quite natural.

When I turned, I saw Scott and Dakota approaching. Behind them, Big John carried sundry items from our list. Scott recited his finds and pointed to where he had seen pans. I walked that way, but Big John reached in front of me to take the clock out of my hand. It was an awkward moment, and I felt uncomfortable with this. I could picture what we looked like. The only white family in the store, empty-handed, followed by an African man hauling around all our purchases. It felt wrong to say the least, but I wasn’t sure how to deal with the issue at the moment, so I went to pick out some pans as quickly as possible. As I perused the pan sets, a young woman again stood beside me. I reached for a set but the lady shook her head, “It’s finished.” I reached for another. She shook her head, “It’s finished.” I finally found some pans, including a large kettle, that were available.

I spied some plastic pitchers on the top shelf and reached for one. The same woman shook her head, “Those are no good.” She pointed to cracks along the sides of it, took the pitcher and placed it back on the shelf. She grabbed a different pitcher from the lower rack and handed it to me, “This is a good one.” I knew Big John would take it from my hand to add to our other purchases. I felt anxious and sweaty. I didn’t like the situation and claustrophobia was setting in at the cramped check-out aisle.

“I’m taking Elle outside. I’ll wait for you out there.” Elle and I waited just outside the entrance. Four little girls stood in a line watching us. With their short black hair cropped to their heads, their big brown eyes stared silently as I found a bottle of water in my backpack and held it to Elle’s mouth.

The four of us, and Big John walked through the market for another hour, peaking in each stand and shop to complete our scavenger hunt. Among other things, I bought two rugs and a blanket to cozy up our living room a bit. Before we could even find half of the items, Elle was crying, Cody was complaining, I was whining and an exasperated Scott announced, “I’m done.” We piled into Big John’s taxi as he loaded our things in the hatchback. I whispered to Scott, “I don’t like him following us and carrying our stuff like a servant.”

“Me neither,” he agreed, “I’ll talk to him about it.”

We decided we should complete our scavenger hunt on another day. Scott arranged for the GVSU students to come to the house, so we could go to the market sans children. We soon found out that leaving our children at home didn’t necessarily mean we wouldn’t have a group of children following us through the market.

This time Big John drove us to Abbra. It’s closer to the U.C.C. campus. It’s also smaller with dirt roads, fewer cars and fewer people. We still had to complete our supply list, plus now we had to purchase some food. For our first four days, the university had provided our meals at a small restaurant on Campus. That free meal ticket ran out so I would be expected to cook meals at home now. Big John dropped us off at an area of the market where vegetables, fruit and fish could be found.

We walked off the roadside and entered the maze of wooden stands. Women sat on stools in front of large trays spiraled with raw red snapper. There were also women with trays of dried brown fish stacked in a circle upon their heads. Wooden tables crowded the area, displaying colorful fresh tomatoes, cabbage, green peppers, onions, cucumbers, potatoes, huge, long yams, bananas, pineapples, bananas, along with plenty of unrecognizable berries, melons and gourd-like veggies. The walking area was narrow and we had to weave in carefully not to knock over stacks of fresh eggs or tables covered with assorted bottles (including coca cola and Heinz) filled with some kind of red sauce. I asked a young girl behind the stand what the sauce was used for. A language barrier prevented any explanation besides, “It’s used for stew.”

We used a textbook barter system to buy supplies, asking, “How much?” then offering less, expecting a counter-offer somewhere in between. But the food prices seemed more set. For instance, I had already figured out that I couldn’t expect eggs to be any less than 1 cedi for four, or a juice box for less than 50  pesewas. I suspected sometimes that a cedi or two was being added to our price because we were white, and so assumed rich. That didn’t bother me. I could see that relatively speaking, we are loaded, and one cedi means a lot more to them than to us. But when someone tried to add an exorbitant amount, just taking advantage of our ignorance, I walked away. They’d call us back, offering a reasonable price, but by then I was offended and risked finding the item elsewhere. One aspect of buying food here that really doesn’t make sense to me is buying large amounts of something doesn’t save you any money. I tried to buy a box of granola bars that I found in town. The woman gave me a questioning glance and stated, “18 cedis.”

My mouth dropped open and my eyes popped, “18 cedis?! That’s too much.”

She pointed to a rack with single granola bars perched in rows according to flavor, “They are 1 cedi 50 pesewas for one. This box is 12.”

I put the box back and grabbed two single bars instead. In the end, I’m glad I only bought 2 because they tasted like they’d been soaked in dish soap.

The same thing had happened in Accra when Scott tried to purchase a box of 100 band-aids and the woman asked for 50 cedis, explaining that each band-aid costs 50 pesewas. We hope Elle’s one box of Hello Kitty band-aids from home lasts 5 months, or we’ll be buying band-aids one by one.

After buying food, we decided to explore a side path that intersected with the main road. As soon as we passed the corner we could tell we’d entered a space rarely taken by Obrunis. The path wasn’t big enough for cars to pass through and behind each small stand stood a shack that looked like the vendors’ living spaces. Goats and chickens wandered through the path. Cement blocks and wood sheltered tiny dirt plots around the dwellings. There were open door frames and window frames, from which tiny brown faces poked out in excitement. We heard little voices announcing, “Obruni. Obruni. Obruni,” as we made our way down the path. In front of the dwellings, women and men lounged beside their stands. Soon, the peeking children ventured into the road behind us. At one point I turned around to find at least 15 little kids trailing us like the pied piper.

This is the 2nd picture. Look at the little boys running to join the photo!

Two little boys stood on the side of the road in front of us and pointed to the camera hanging around my neck. One called to me, “Obruni. Take our picture.” I happily pulled up my camera to frame the photo. Before the shutter snapped, little children began bolting toward the other two, gleefully posing for the camera. I took three pictures in succession and by the third, the picture of two boys became a group photo. We bought juice boxes and salt from one stand. The children gathered around to watch the purchase. Scott whispered, “Let’s buy them some candy.”

“No Way!” I had seen what happened when I pulled my camera up. If we bought this group of kids candy, I suspected every child in the small road would gather around us with hopeful eyes I couldn’t deny.

One girl really touched my heart. She was probably 9 years old. She balanced a white five gallon bucket full of water on her head, and sidled up to me. The other children backed up but continued to follow. “What is your name?” her small voice queried.

“My name is Molly.”

“Where are you from?” she asked on flawless English.

“I’m from America. Do you live here.”

“Yes.”

“What are you carrying?” I asked.

“Water for my home.” She told me.

“Do you have to carry it far?”

“No.” She pointed strait then to the left. “I went to America for Christmas. I went to Flor-ee-dah.”

“To Disneyland?” Her eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “Mickey Mouse. Do you know Mickey Mouse?”

A large grin displayed her comprehension. “Yes. Yes. I went to Disneyland.”

As we turned to leave her road, she waved and called, “Bye Bye. Bye Bye.” The group of following children  had started to sing a song in English. They followed us out of the street with a repeated chorus. Their high, sweet voices sing-songed,

“Hel-lo

How-are-you

I’m-fine.

Thank-you

And-You

Hel-lo

How-are-you

I’m-fine.

Thank-you

And-you”

We heard another song chanted by two middle-aged women sitting on a wall beside the corner. I recognized their repeated “Obruni” but I didn’t know any of the other Fanti lyrics. Based on their tone and the bystanders’ cackle of laughter following their rhyme, I’m guessing it wasn’t as sweet as the children’s. I didn’t mind, though. I sang all the way back to our bungalow, Hel-lo, How-are-you, I’m-fine,thank-you, and-you, wishing I could somehow take that little girl to Disneyland.

Wake Up Call

Preface: This was our first night as spoiled Americans in a Third World Country. We've learned alot since our first night and have since come to appreciate the above and beyond efforts that have been made for our comfort! I post this in the interest of capturing our real experiences and thoughts while adjusting to this new lifestyle. Thank you.

The housing guy said they weren’t expecting us until Saturday. We arrived in Cape Coast to move into our bungalow on Wednesday night, so the house wasn’t completely ready for us. We flipped open every window in the house to air it out and cool it down.

They had set up 6 chairs in the living room and two beds, but otherwise, we could tell immediately that the house hadn’t been inhabited in some time. The linoleum tiles were covered in a layer of dust and the blue and green walls were dirty and moldy. The toilet seat was broken and the bowl was black with mildew. I couldn’t get the thing to flush when I repeatedly pushed down the handle. There were ceiling fans, but Cody’s wouldn’t turn, and Elle’s made such a squawking, rattling racket, we shut it off. When I turned on the sink, it promptly disattached from the wall causing a heavy drip to splash my toes. Scott took a look at it, jiggled it around a bit, and the steady leak became a stream running directly from the tap through the drain and onto the floor. “Don’t turn on the sink anymore!” Scott announced.

Dakota, who for some reason has upset the bathroom gods, locked himself in the bathroom AGAIN. But unlike in Norway, he couldn’t escape through the window this time, since four slats of louvered glass, a screen and chicken wire covered it. He pounded on the door and yelled, “SCOTT! SCOTT! SCOTT! I’M STUCK IN THE BATHROOM!”

“AGAIN? Hey Molly, Cody’s stuck in the bathroom again!” Scott chuckled, wagging his head back and forth as he pushed at the wooden door.

“You’re kidding me?” We gathered around the jammed door, Scott jimmying the door jamb with a screw driver he’d packed. When it stubbornly opened, the bottom of the door scraped along the warped floor, and Cody emerged.

“The toilet came off the wall.” Dakota announced, frustrated.

“What did you do Cody? Geez!” Scott’s own frustration starting to surface.

“Nothing, I swear! I just flushed the toilet!” We peered into the room and the toilet leaned precariously away from the wall. A slow dampness began to seep from the tank.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I honestly can’t remember who said this but I know it had to have been said.

I was seriously just glad to be somewhere where we could unpack. We’d been living out of suitcases and backpacks for the last 11 days, so I wanted to unpack and organize. Each room had a big wooden closet with two doors. One side housed shelving and the other a rod for hangers. They were dusty and dark and so deep, I couldn’t see all the way to the back. I didn’t mention it, but they were a little scary as a leaned in with a wet towel, wiping down the dirty wood. I basically had to crawl in the things to wash all the corners. Thankfully, I didn’t see any creepy crawlies (they may have seen me, though). After finishing my own closet, I went to wash Elle’s and called out to Dakota, “Cody, you should wipe off the shelves in your closet before you put your clothes in there.”

“I’m not putting my clothes in there. It’s kinda scary lookin’”

Needless to say, I could relate, so I washed it out for him. I emptied our luggage, one suitcase at a time and Cody stored the empties in the garage. The winter coats worn in Europe were loaded into one suitcase, as were any jeans, sweatshirts or sweaters, and they were placed in the garage as well. It was a safe bet we wouldn’t miss them.

Scott’s priority were the walls. “It’s just not healthy to have mold on the walls.” He used a bath towel and some dish soap he found left behind in the kitchen. He pulled up a living room chair, climbing up to scrub from ceiling to floor. Then climbed back down to lug the heavy wooden chair to his next target area.

Meanwhile, Dakota’s main concern was assembling and mounting his pull-up bar on the door frame of his bedroom. Miraculously, it held and he burned some steam with chin ups.

Elle hadn’t had her hair washed since we were in Germany so I called her into the bathroom, and turned on the faucet. I turned the knob toward the red side, and waited for the hot water to begin pouring out. And waited…and waited…and waited…and waited. There was water coming but it wasn’t hot. It wasn’t even luke warm. It was just plain cold. “Scott,” I yelled, “The water won’t heat up.”

“You probably have to wait a little while for it to warm up.” So I waited …and waited…and waited…I didn’t want to give up waiting. If I did, it meant I’d have to admit what I really didn’t want to admit. Scott wandered in the bathroom as I leaned over the faucet, hand beneath the stream of cold water. “Nobody’s lived here for a while. Maybe they forgot to turn on the water heater for us.” YES! That had to be it. “I’ll tell Don in the morning.”

“I sure hope you’re right!” At this point, the quaint hunting cabin ambience faded and I felt panicky. The panic heightened as I rinsed Elle with the cold water, and she started to scream, “AHHHHHH. STOP MAMA. THAT”S COLD. THAT HURTS!”

“It’s ok. It’s just one minute. Like a sprinkler, honey.”

“AHHHHHHHHHHH”

“Almost done, almost done. It’s ok. One more second.”

“AHHHHHHHHHHH”

“There, all done. Here, sweety. Wrap up in this towel and go jump in our bed.”

I stomped to Scott. No one was forcing me to subject my child to another cold shower. “If we don’t have hot water, we need to call the Embassy! Hot water is our right! Showering in cold water is like torture. If this place doesn’t have hot water, we’re moving to a place that does.”

“I agree.” Scott said.

As we laid down in bed that night, Scott simply asked, “What next?”

By the way, you should never ever ask “What next?”

The electricity went out. The ceiling fan stopped and the house went black.

I slept lightly, stiffening upon every unfamiliar noise, which was basically any noise. I heard rustling in the leaves beside the house throughout the night and stifled any mental images. It was still dark outside when a loud COCKA DOODLE DOO told me what wild animals were lurking around our bungalow! Roosters. Not two or three.  A whole flock of the cocky screechers. They squawked back and forth to each other, calling out their cocka doodle doos. One efficiently dropped the middle man, screaming COCKA DOO. Another was just plain lazy, COCKA. All of them were loud, especially on top of the silence of no electricity.

I swear, I didn’t ask “What next?”

But I must’ve thought it!

A low, eerie monotonous voice sounded through some sort of speaker system outside. It was a moaning, chant. Six syllables that I didn’t understand. Repeated over and over and over, a fraction louder with each repetition. I guessed it was around 4:30 a.m. at this point, and the groaning chant went on for at least 15 minutes. Scott was still sleeping. I may have drifted off for a moment, only to be jolted awake when the low chanting became an urgent sermon of some kind. This was loud preaching. Passionate and urgent, all in a language I didn’t understand. The man yelled into a super megaphone, and his oration echoed through the dark. I listened in shock, straining to hear any recognizable word. His message was loud and angry. The roosters screeched. His impassioned diatribe mixed with the screaming fowl blended into some horror movie soundtrack as I lay in the pitch black for nearly an hour freaked out!

Scott awoke then. “What is that?”

“I don’t know. It’s been going for at least an hour.” I filled him in on what I had already heard. “I only understand one word. He says ‘America’ sometimes.”

“Is it Christian or Muslim?” We lay quietly listening to the preacher’s heated address. “I think I heard ‘Allah’” Scott said, “It must be Muslim…or maybe a revolution has started.”

“Oh My God! Don’t say such a thing!”

As the amplified yelling continued, we heard muffled group responses. Scott looked at his watch. It was now close to 6 a.m. and a dim sunrise bled into the black sky. The service went on and on. The man got angrier and angrier.

Suddenly Scott blurted, “I’M GOING TO KILL BUCKRIDGE…I’M GOING TO KILL BUCKRIDGE!” Buckridge is a fellow professor who first recommended Ghana as a site for our international experience. “IF THIS HAPPENS EVERY MORNING, I’M GONNA KILL ‘EM!”

“How did nobody tell us about this? It’s not as if they didn’t hear it. How could you not hear it. It started before 5 in the morning. It’s a frickin’ megaphone. How did we not hear about this?”

We continued like this back and forth, trying to make sense of the situation we’d gotten ourselves into. Scott flipped from side to side, putting the pillow over his head. Grunting in frustration. A few times the voice stopped. We both perked up, shot each other a hopeful glance. Our eye contact remained unblinking, our breath caught, then the yelling would start again. Again and again and again.

“OOOOOHHHHH MMMYYYYYY GGGGGOOOOODDDDD!” Scott groaned.

“I know,” I whined. “It’s been two hours, nonstop!”

Scott summoned his cool and vowed, “If I could, I would just walk through all the people strait up to that guy and say…and say…” he contemplated during a pregnant pause, “I’d say ‘Dude, What’s Your PROBLEM?!”

We both lost it. We laughed hysterically at the absurdity of it. We giggled and guffawed and snorted and cackled until tears streamed down our cheeks. We would regain our composure for a moment, catch our breath quietly. Then the man called out to his congregation again or a rooster screeched beneath our open window. Then we collapsed in hysterical, uncontrollable laughter again. We must’ve whole-heartedly rolled around laughing for 15 minutes strait, totally missing the finale of the sermon. I don’t think we’ve ever laughed so hard together before.

That was our wake up call. This experience will be different. Some days will be hard and scary and absurd. But we will get through it together. And we can whine and cry and get frustrated. Or we can laugh ridiculously together until tears roll down our faces.

Obruni

The electricity came on in the middle of the night. The lights, fan and air conditioner in our room all burst to life in a moment. By the time I got out of bed to turn off the lights, the surge led to another outage so I just crawled back in bed. We woke the next morning to a cool breeze from the fan and the grumbling air conditioner.

I gave Elle a shower, warning her to keep her mouth closed. Miriam made us breakfast and we packed up our bags one more time before the University of Cape Coast driver was to arrive and take us to our new home. We could finally unpack and settle in somewhere. We expected our ride after lunch so I asked Scott to walk around with Elle and me. Besides our ride to the American Embassy the day before, I hadn’t walked beyond the gated driveway of the U.C.C. guest house.

At the end of our dusty road was a busy street lined on either side with roadside stands. The stands butted up against each other and were made of a hodgepodge of building materials, from wood to metal to plastic, aged, roofed with tarps or umbrellas. The traffic buzzed by, leaving only a narrow path above the curb to walk, maneuvering around the tables of goods and the other people walking the street. There weren’t as many pedestrians as in the market we had driven through our first night in Accra so I didn’t feel overwhelmed “Do you wanna walk a little ways down the street then cross and come back?” I asked. “Sure,” Scott obliged. We, of course attracted attention, being the only white people in site. Most people said “Hello” or nodded or smiled at Elle. We really attracted attention when Scott hoisted Elle up onto his shoulders; the women especially. One woman might nod her head in our direction, drawing attention to Elle’s legs slung over her dad’s shoulders and her hands wrapped around his forehead. Then they would all laugh and discuss the oddity. Meanwhile, Scott and I nudged each other as we spotted bigger and taller and more awkward shaped objects balanced on the heads of passersby.

Elle spotted small brightly colored wrapping and yelled, “Candy. I want candy!” We approached the wooden hut, about the size of an outhouse. It was raised on some kind of stilts so its floor stood at our shoulder height. Inside were small shelves lining the walls, filled with various food items. In the small bit of area left, an old woman slumped, snoozing in a chair, and a younger woman stood beside her, a baby girl peeking around her legs, grandmother, mother, daughter. The mother spotted Elle and summoned her baby girl around her knees, pointing to Elle. The two girls looked at each other unabashedly. I wished I could study the woman as intensely as the girls observed each other. We looked at the children instead, grinning at their curiosity. The baby girl in the stand lifted her dress over her belly, showing Elle her little brown tummy. Her belly button poked out like the end of a balloon. We bought Elle two pieces of bubble gum and apple juice boxes then walked on. The mother urged her daughter to wave and I did the same. Neither of the girls waved, leaving just us mothers waving goodbye.

On our way back to the dirt road, we passed a bridge over a large cement gutter. Underneath a man squatted over the sludgy stream of water, pants around his knees. We looked away.

On the road leading to the guest house, there were some beautiful, large homes. One looked like a palace, with a brick and gold gate surrounding it. A uniformed guard stood out front, and when I poised my camera between the bars, he yelled, “Hey, that’s not allowed!” Across the street from the palace-like home was a gutted, old building, litter strewn around the dirt. Walking back to the guest house, new, clean homes alternated with dingy falling down shacks. Chickens strutted around in the bushes. We passed one old wooden gate and heard a tiny high voice, “Obruni,” the voice called. We turned to see a little African girl leaning out of her yard. She was probably 5 or 6 years old. In one hand she held a dingy white doll with snarled yellow hair. She waved to Elle with the other hand, grinning. I smiled back and waved. Then she was gone, probably running to tell her mom about the Obrunis she saw.

Scott bought some bananas from a corner stand and we savored their sweet, soft ripeness when we returned to the guesthouse. The drivers had arrived and we had to load the SUV with our luggage. When our bags wouldn’t all fit, the driver made a call and explained that another car was headed back to Cape Coast and he could take our bags to the university campus. Scott hurriedly scanned the luggage. The night before he had debated about where to store the piles of cash we’d exchanged. Should he store it all in one backpack which would never leave his side? Or would he separate it into several bags? He was extremely anxious about all that currency. If you’ve ever read The Pearl by John Steinbeck, you have an idea of Scott’s angst. “So we won’t ride with the bags?” Scott asked the driver. “No, we’ll send the bags on to campus with the other car and you and your family will ride with me,” he explained. Scott motioned with his hands, “Unpack the bags. I need to rearrange some things.” The drivers pulled out the bags and Scott scurried to get the money he had spread throughout the bags consolidated. He insisted that two of our suitcases stay with us and allowed the rest to ride in the other vehicle.

We pulled in the dirt driveway of our new home at dusk. They call it a bungalow. It’s on the campus of University of Cape Coast in an area called Lecturers’ Village. The house is a flat long house, situated in an L- shape. It’s a dark brown wooden structure trimmed in maize and dusty blue with swinging wooden doors that go FLAP FLAP FLAP when they shut. There’s a large living room, furnished with 6 rust-colored chairs (circa 1950) and two wooden end tables. The living room feeds into a dining room area, minus table or chairs. There are three bedrooms, two with beds made up with a fitted sheet and pillows. The third room, which will be Elle’s is empty. There is a wash room with only a toilet and a separate bathroom with a bath and sink. The walls are bright green throughout the house and bright blue in the bedrooms. The floors are all a pea-green tile linoleum (circa 1950). There are several uniform windows lining the walls, each screened and wired, with louvered windows that open and close with a lever. The back porch is my favorite part of the house. It runs nearly the whole length of the house and is shaded by a roof and surrounding trees. I think it’s a magic porch because no matter how still and humid and hot it gets outside, there’s somehow always a cool breeze tunneling across that porch. It’s also railed in with a FLAP FLAP FLAP gate on the end so Elle can play outside without me worrying about the unknown creatures in the brush.

The drivers hauled our luggage into the empty bedroom as we scattered, exploring our accommodations. “It looks like a cabin up north,” I call to anyone listening. When I was a little girl, my father and his parents had cabins next door to each other. I don’t even know what city they were in. All I remember is what it meant when we packed up to go “up north” in the summer. This place reminded me of my grandparents’ cabin up north. Dakota stomped from the front bedroom, which will be his. His gait, his clenched fists and his tightened jaw tell me he’s just plain angry. “Cody,” I optimistically urged, “Doesn’t it look like some hunting cabin up north?” “NO!” He snapped, “It looks like a penitentiary!”

Fear Itself

Scott and I got in our first fight of the trip that night. We had of course snapped at each other along the way in the last 10 days, but this was the first throw-off-the-gloves, hit-below-the belt-fight. It was about my very real fear. Elle’s favorite thing to do at the guest house was to squat in the gravel parking lot collecting rocks then carry them to the cement gutter and toss them in. It was a task she took seriously and she lost herself in the inspection of each dusty pebble. One of us always accompanied her outside, and she stayed close to the door where no car would hit her, so I didn’t mind her game. But when dinnertime approached, and dusk began to gather, outside was the last place I wanted my baby playing.

Dusk is when the mosquitoes come out, the tiny, buzzing syringes of fatal malaria hunting for some unknowing victim to suck. For over a year, Scott and I had heard the warning to stay indoors at dawn and dusk over and over while researching this trip. True, we had heard varying accounts on what to expect, sometimes contradictory reports on what we would encounter and the number of people we asked or books we read had different ideas about safety and danger. But every person, every article, every doctor, every book agreed on one thing. Stay indoors at dawn and dusk. I hadn’t discussed it with Scott. I assumed he’d heard the same repeated refrain as often as I had. But that evening, when the sandy sky began to darken I saw that the warnings must have escaped him. He was standing outside having a cigarette, talking to the guard. Elle was at his feet, digging through the gravel for her next delivery. Panic struck my guts. Horrified, I rushed outside and scooped her up, leaving a confused Scott behind. He could risk his own blood, but not my little girl’s.

The same horror overcame me when he told Cody it would be OK to brush his teeth with the tap water, “NO CODY! DO NOT PUT THAT WATER IN YOUR MOUTH!” I yelled. Scott scoffed, “It’s fine as long as you don’t swallow it. I brush my teeth with it.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Was he crazy? “Cody, Look at me.” I said steadily, holding his eyes with mine. “I don’t care what Scott does. You are to use the bottled water to brush your teeth. Period.” “Fine, OOOKAAAYY!” He walked out of the room exasperated by the melodrama. Elle followed him into the common living room.

“Scott.” I determinedly strode up to him as he sat fiddling with his new cell phone (We’d bought them on our way from the Embassy). “When I agreed to come here, to take my children to the other side of the globe, to a third world country, you promised you’d take care of me. Part of taking care of me is helping me feel safe here. I’m scared of malaria. I’m scared of parasites in the water. Don’t take Elle outside at prime mosquito time and don’t tell Cody it’s ok to use the water.” He rolled his eyes,” Molly, they’re fine. Don’t worry so much.” “I will worry. And I won’t apologize for worrying. And you promised to take care of me. That includes taking my worries seriously! So after only one day here, you already broke your promise!” I was angry and scared and panicked and my adrenaline was intensifying the terror. “Molly, you’re overreacting. I’ll be careful but I’m not gonna spend my time here hiding scared.” His voice was starting to rise, but worse than that was his stubborn tone. He didn’t understand my anxiety and wasn’t even going to try. At that moment, I felt I had made a huge mistake trusting this person. I felt that he was the most careless, self-centered, thoughtless little boy. I couldn’t imagine how he could take the safety of his family so lightly. “I don’t know what I was thinking coming here with you. I thought you were a man. I believed you could keep us safe. But you can’t keep us safe; you’re not even man enough to WANT to keep us safe!” That did it, and Scott didn’t control his voice this time, “YOU”VE BEEN NEGATIVE THIS WHOLE TRIP. IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT I DO. IT WON’T BE ENOUGH AND YOU’LL ALWAYS COMPLAIN! I glared, self-assured, sensing a check-mate, “That is so untrue that it’s laughable. You know I’ve been behind you 100% this whole trip. I’ve stayed open-minded and positive this whole trip and you know it. You’re just playing your same game, when you have no defense, you just lash out, but now you know you’re plain lying.” I entered that point when I didn’t care if the other guests heard me. I could not allow this man to endanger us with his lackadaisical behavior. “WE DON’T KNOW THIS PLACE. WE DON’T KNOW WHAT COULD HAPPEN HERE. BUT EVERYONE TOLD US TO BE INDOORS AT DUSK. EVERYONE TOLD US NOT TO DRINK THE WATER. I’M NOT ASKING YOU TO STAY INSIDE SCARED. I’M TELLING YOU THAT I WILL NOT PLAY RUSSIAN ROULLETTE WITH MY CHILDRENS’ SAFETY! I DON’T CARE IF YOU THINK IT’S IRRATIONAL. I DON’T CARE IF YOU THINK I’M BEING NEGATIVE. I’M PROTECTING MY KIDS AND I’LL FIGHT YOU EVERY SECOND YOU AREN’T HELPING ME!” He stomped out of the room. I sat on the bed, willing myself to breathe.

Within an hour, I believe that Scott understood my fear. It was just before dinner that I saw that raw panic again, in his eyes this time. We had asked Miriam for our dinner and she walked through the door labeled, “Out of Bounds” into what was most likely the kitchen area. The only one of us who had seen it was Elle. Miriam liked Elle and loved to pick her up, coaxing her to say hello. Elle began to trust her and earlier that afternoon had followed her through the doors. I peeked in, “Is that o.k., Miriam?” “Oh yes.” She assured. So I didn’t think twice about it this evening when Miriam hoisted Elle onto her hip and headed to the kitchen with her. Scott came into the dining area then and inquired, “Where’s Elle?” “She went to help Miriam in the kitchen. Elle really likes her.” Scott smiled, “We should get a picture of that.” I was writing at the table and didn’t want to get up at the moment. “The camera’s in my backpack. Go ahead.” Scott retrieved the camera and pushed through the kitchen door. Within moments he was back. His face was pale and his eyes were wide, “She’s not in there! Noone’s in there!” I looked up from the computer screen as he rushed out the front door calling, “Elle, Elle, Elle!” I stayed where I was. I’m not sure why but chasing after Scott didn’t feel like the thing to do. Instead I sat still, waiting. I tiny bubble of worry inflated up my throat very gradually, but before it could pop, Scott returned to the dining room. Color had returned to his face. He held Elle on one side and the camera on the other. Relieved, he reported incredulously, “She took her next door to her apartment to show her to her sisters.”

While getting ready for bed, we had one more scare. This time neither Scott nor I were terrified. This time it was poor little Elle. As I mentioned, there was a common living room area located in the center of the home. When we were around the house, our bedroom door stayed open and Elle could wander into the living room with her books or to watch T.V. by herself. I was in the bedroom organizing for our final trip to Cape Coast where we could finally unpack and settle in. Scott was debating with himself about the wisest way to store the cash pile. Cody had gone to bed in a Benadryl stupor after breaking out in some kind of back rash that wrapped around his chest, and Elle wandered between the room and living room. Two young white girls from the Netherlands had just come in and we heard their banter as they settled in their room. “I’m sorry,” Scott murmured. “For what?” I always like to know if he’s apologizing for the right thing. “I’m sorry I said you were…” He was interrupted by total blackness. The electricity was out. The ceiling fan stopped, the air conditioner stopped, and every source of light was extinguished. Silence and pitch dark engulfed us in an instant. I froze, my stomach tightened, “Where’s Elle.” The one window in the room was covered with thick drapes and I couldn’t see in front of my face. No one made a sound, including Elle. “ELLE? Where are you?” Scott called. “I’m right here,” She bravely yelled. “Follow my voice, baby. Walk to my voice.” I couldn’t see whether he had her or not, but I heard a tiny whimper as she blindly inched toward her daddy. “Come on, Elle. I’m right here. Come toward my voice.” By this time Scott made it to our open door and sparked his lighter. The flame illuminated the area immediately surrounding him and Elle ran toward him. He swung her up to his chest and she immediately released her fear in a screeching cry. The lighter was off and it was black again. I stayed put on the bed, helplessly listening to Elle’s cries, “Why is the light off, Daddy?” “Why is it so dark?” “Turn the lights back on, daddy?” Soon after, the Dutch girls’ room lit up. One of the girls had a flashlight. I could now see enough to take Elle and walk to their door. “Do you mind if she stands in your room? She’s afraid of the dark.” “Of course,” one said.

The power was out for hours. We all ended up in the living room, huddled around the flashlight, sharing our reasons for voluntarily coming to this place. Charmagne and Marta would be students at University of Cape Coast for a semester. Elle fell asleep on the couch. The security guards brought in an emergency battery lamp that lasted all of 15 minutes, then Charmagne’s flashlight burned out. I used Scott’s lighter to find our extra batteries in my backpack and gave them to Charmagne. It got late enough that we gave up on power and went to bed. Without the air conditioner and fan, the air was still and hot. Scott, Elle and I squeezed into the full-sized bed. Our sticky limbs overlapped each other as we tried to sleep. I fell asleep thinking of Cody. So far, he hadn’t experienced a moment of terror as each of us had that day. But he had no idea the power was out; he’d slept through it. I just hoped he didn’t wake up in the middle of the night, enveloped in the silent blackness, disoriented and confused.

A Woman's Place

A driver from the American embassy was picking us up at 10 a.m.. Because Scott is a Fulbright scholar, a representative from the embassy, Sarpei, had some information for us. My hair was a greaseball from the dust and sweat of the night before, so I couldn’t put off showering, despite my fear of the tap water. The stand-up shower reminded me of a community wash room you might see at a campsite, with painted cinder blocks and a thin shower curtain. If we had been in America, this type of shower would definitely be home to Daddy Long Legs in the corners but upon my inspection, I saw no insects save a few tiny ants that didn’t worry me. The water pressure was equivalent to pouring a watering can over my head so it took pretty long to get the shampoo and conditioner out of my long hair. Thankfully, the water stayed warm until I finished and stepped out of the stall. I grabbed a towel I had balanced on the sink and whipped my hair upside down to rub it dry just as I saw that I had had an audience for my shower after all. A cockroach, just about an inch long must have crawled up the drain and was now silently standing on the shower floor. I was far enough away from the bug so I didn’t wake the house screeching as I would have if I had seen him while showering, and I chose to stay far away from him. I dried off, spying on him out of the corner of my eye, just to be sure he stayed still. Then I left the bathroom to get dressed.

We didn’t know if the orientation would last an hour or all day. My guess was that Scott would be busy in meetings and the kids and I would mostly be waiting around, so I packed my backpack with coloring books, crayons and a video game to entertain Elle, along with my Kindle, laptop and a book for me. We ate Miriam’s breakfast (a small white omelet, toast and cocoa), swallowed our malaria pills, sprayed down with sunscreen and mosquito repellant, and were ready for our first outting in Africa.

The sun wasn’t a scorching fireball beating down on us as I expected it to be. Instead it was a small circle of light beneath a yellow, dusty sky. In fact it was very hazy, smoglike. When we flew into Accra at dusk the night before, Scott and I both thought it was foggy, but whatever it was hadn’t lifted. “What do you think it is?” I asked. “I dunno? Maybe smog from Accra. It’s a big city.” “Do you think it cuts the heat down?” I would guess the temperature was only around 85. “I bet it does.” Scott agreed.

The streets we rode through were again lined with vendors on both sides, and men and women darted between the cars selling goods from head-balanced baskets. It was crowded, but nothing compared to the market through which we rode the night before. I told Scott, “Before we leave Africa I want to walk through the market from last night.” He answered, “We probably won’t get back there before tomorrow when we have to head to Cape Coast.” I clarified, “I’m not ready to go yet. I mean before we leave Africa in June, I’ll be ready to come back to Accra and go to that crazy-busy spot. I’m still too nervous now for that one. I’d like to walk around on the main road by the guest house before we leave, though.” “Yeah, me too. We’ll see how long we’re at the embassy. And we have to find out what time our ride is coming to take us to Cape Coast tomorrow. We should be able to take a walk before then.” And so I set a goal that day. I promised myself that before this trip was over, I would walk through that market that had freaked me out so much the night before. I took comfort in that fact that I still had 5 months to gather the nerve. Plenty of time.

We drove up to the embassy, a neatly landscaped haven from the dusty, brown surroundings. It had concrete sidewalks, benches, and symmetrical flower beds in black soil.  Sprinkler heads rhythmically spit streams of water onto the green grassed lawn. A black iron gate surrounded the perimeter and a large white sign ordered, No Photography.” I found out later that due to national security issues, photographing any government building in Ghana is forbidden. Two uniformed guards, toting machine guns ushered us into a carport beside a small security building, where we unrolled our windows. One guard perused our passports while another performed some type of bomb litmus test across the sides and under the SUV. After returning our passports, the guard ordered us inside the building, while the other guard continued the vehicle check under the hood. Our bags went through an x-ray and we had to empty out any electronics. My backpack went through six times before it was ok to pass. Of course by then it was empty besides 2 books, water and Elle’s crayons. They checked anything and everything electronic under their desks, passing us each a rounded wooden chip, hand-numbered with marker, and a visitor card to hang around our necks.

As expected, most of the time at the Embassy we spent sitting in Sarpei’s cubicle. Our security clearance didn’t allow us to move anywhere in the building without an escort, not even the bathroom. In fact, when Elle announced, “I have to go potty,” Scott asked Sarpei if he would take him to the restroom with Elle. Sarpei looked shocked, “You can’t take her to the men’s room! Mommy will take her.” So we all, Sarpei, Scott, Dakota, Elle and I filed through the halls and I took Elle in the ladies’ room while they stood outside the door. Scott told me later that while they waited, Sarpei explained, “Men do not take little girls in the men’s room. It’s not proper.” “What if a mom has to take a little boy into the women’s room?” Scott asked. “That’s fine. That’s her job.”

Later, Scott asked about homosexuality, a sensitive issue in Ghana. Sarpei’s attempt at diplomacy was apparent. He told us that traditional Ghanaians don’t acknowledge the existence of homosexuality. “It’s thought of as a mental illness here. Let me explain. Here, a young man can marry a woman, then he makes enough money so he can marry another woman, and he can marry as many women and have as many children as he can support. A man who gives this up to be with another man must be crazy. Some so-called enlightened people encourage acceptance of the idea but traditional Ghanaians do not.” I had an inkling on which side Sarpai fell, as well as some clue where women stood in the hierarchy here.

“Do you have any questions for Sarpei?” Scott asked me. I asked him about taking pictures and about the hazy sky. He advised me to always ask first when photographing people. He informed us the sky was hazy due to a dry season here called Harmaton (sp?). It lasts about two months. Because of the arid conditions at this time, sand from the Sahara is blown into the air here, so the sand and dust from the desert form the smoggy haze. He said the Harmaton came late this year, but it should pass by February.

At one point, Sarpei escorted Scott away to exchange his currency into Ghanaian cedis. The kids and I waited in the cubicle until they returned. Scott wore a childish smile. He carried a black plastic bag, and he bent over to transfer the cash to his backpack. Dakota’s eyes widened, along with his grin, as Scott opened the black bag, displaying piles of currency, bundled in color-coded denominations of 20, 10, 5, 2 and 1 cedi. At the moment, the exchange rate was about .65 dollars to one cedi. Scott’s backpack bulged with the loot. Carrying it around in the Embassy was one thing, but the thought of dragging it along with all of our other luggage until we finally reached our final destination in Cape Coast was unnerving, especially considering our track record the last few weeks. I privately vowed not to even touch the backpack. That way, there would be NO POSSIBLE WAY I could have anything to do with losing it.

Destination African Culture Shock

“Hooollllyyy Ssssshhhhiiiiiit!” That was me.

“We ain’t in Kansas anymore,” That was Scott. We all stared open-mouthed, through the SUV windows driving through Central Accra on our way to our temporary room at the University of Cape Coast Accra office and guest home.

“The trahffeec eez too bad so we mahs go a diffahrent way arund to th’universtee,” the driver told us. Of course he had an accent but I’m not so familiar with the cadence and pronunciation just yet so my phonetic representation of it is surely off.

We rode in a white American Embassy van. The driver and Sarpei, the cultural affairs guy from the embassy, sat in the front. Elle and I sat in the middle seat with Scott and Dakota leaning over our shoulders from the far back seat. Piled around us, our luggage (way too much luggage!) took up every spare inch of the van. We had landed in Accra at 6p.m.. We piled in a bus at the runway and rode to the one terminal. A painted mural, covered with flashing Christmas lights covered the door in. Inside red and green bows and colored, flashing lights escorted us down a corridor through red arches on a green carpet. The effort put forth to make the terminal look festive was apparent. We stood in two lines in which government employees checked our passports, visas and luggage. Thankfully, only one of our 14?, 15?, 16? (I’ve lost count) bags had to be checked and it was assumed the rest were equally unexciting family supplies, so we ended up outside the airport early. I think we were all in shock as we were funneled through the formalities. I honestly don’t recall how we ended up outside with two cartloads of luggage, surrounded by seven young opportunists eagar to help, and a sharp-dressed airport security guard who took a step to match each of mine remaining immediately by my side.

“Is there a place to smoke?” Scott asked the guard. The guard pointed. And that quickly, the kids and I stood alone, in an unfamiliar third world country, unsure where we were headed next. The guard asked me, “Whay are you goeen, mum?”

I tried to sound like I had one bit of a clue (which I didn’t), “I think we are going to the American Embassy? Someone is supposed to pick us up.”

“Who eez peekeen you up heah?”

“I’m not sure, my husband will know.” I hoped! Meanwhile Cody and I each held a cart of luggage, circled by young men awaiting the chance to help us unload. Elle wandered in and out of the circle watching a big screen monitor above us looping a bear cartoon, and the men, especially the guard, all kept eyes on her in case she wandered too far. Ironically, despite the uniformed guard, with his high shiny black boots, Elle felt like my safety insurance. Although I had no idea what to expect from our surroundings or these men crowding us, I did feel sure that no harm would come to us as long as we had this cute little girl with us.

Scott returned to the same questions I had been asked, answering, “A car from the U.S. Embassy is picking us up but we’re a little bit early so I should call them. Is there a phone I could use. Several of the young men dug in their pockets producing cell phones under Scott’s nose. He chose one and dialed Sarpei, who promised he was only a half mile away but in traffic. At this announcement the men encouraged us back inside the airport to wait. As a group they herded us, our luggage and our 3-year old back through the doors and instructed us to sit to wait. Scott pulled away and leaned into the guard, “Do ALL these guys expect money? How much money do they expect me to give them?” As we were being swept away, the only response I heard from the guard was, “Are you American?”

Before we could sit for 2 minutes, Sarpei strolled in wearing his normal huge smile and I immediately felt more at ease than the moment before. Scott had given the phone guy 10gh, or cedis (pronounced like CDs) and another 10gh to one of the cart pushers. We had just gotten money exchanged so we had no small bills. We weren’t about to give out big bills to all these guys. They would have to figure it out.

Sarpei took us to the van, where another group of young guys loaded our luggage in the van in a whirlwind, despite our insistence that we could do it ourselves. Sarpei pointed to the tallest of the guys and advised Scott to give him 10gh, then shooed the men away so we could get on the road.

This is where our shocked disbelief and swearing mentioned earlier started (ain’t is very offensive to me also). Night had fallen on the streets of Accra, but the activity around our van was definitely alive, and unbelievable. Sundry small stands, shacks, racks, shelves and piles, with tons of every item imaginable, from toilets to dresses to cell phones to fried fish to towels to handbags to tires to candy to fresh fruit. Everything. Everything you could possibly name. For miles and miles, on both sides of the road. We pressed our faces to the windows to see the men and women walking between the traffic-jammed cars. They peered in the window looking for any sign of interest in the items balanced on their heads. Yes, balanced on trays or baskets on their heads…again…everything!!! From bananas to popcorn to chips to oranges to juice to towels to cell phone chargers to sugar cane. Everything! I even saw a guy balancing at least ten hard-covered books stacked atop his head. They wove through the traffic strategically while we stared, stunned.

And the sheer number of people! I have never seen this many people gathered in one place except at a concert. Men and women covered every space around the stopped vehicles. Car horns moved people to the sides so the traffic could inch through the streets. Two things came to mind as I took in the sight. First I thought of ants. Please believe me when I say I didn’t mean it in any demeaning, racist way. But the amount of people piled in the street, maneuvering quickly around each other and the cars, reminded me of a hoard of ants crowding atop some sweet candy left in the dirt. So many beings crushed together in too small a space robbed each of their individual identity until in my mind, it was just a mass of humanity. There were too many, moving around so quickly that when I looked from one to the next then back, the last was replaced by another. I tried to snap some photos, but it was useless. Besides the darkness, I couldn’t pull the camera far enough back to capture the width of the street, and whenever I shot at a scene, some big truck would drive by or some head topped with a giant basket of goods would bounce into the camera’s viewfinder, blocking the shot. It was a bit claustrophobic crammed in the white SUV because I don’t know that there was actually room for us to get out of the vehicle even if we needed to; we were surrounded on all sides.

The second thought I had was of the Champs-Elysee in Paris. I’m not kidding here. This was basically the Marche Noel, which ran the length of the Champs-Elysee, but in Africa. In Paris, one by one, shops housed in small white structures butted up to each other while people wandered by stopping to buy assorted items from different vendors. Same idea, right? The only difference, really, was here, the stands weren’t uniform and there were way more shoppers. Plus they probably weren’t shopping for Christmas crafts or tourist trinkets. Those might be the ONLY things NOT available to purchase here.

Soon, the shops became further apart and the traffic spread enough to gain some speed until we turned left down a dirt road with walls and gates on either side. I assumed this was residential and behind the different fences were homes but I could see too far in the dark. I turned to Scott in the seat behind me, “This reminds me of that movie in Africa with the hotel.” “Hotel Rawanda?” Scott asked. “Yeah, you know the part when the main guy goes to search for his family in the houses? The road he ran down looked just like this.” “Oh yeah,” Scott agreed. Our driver maneuvered slowly over huge divots in the road as we bounced around inside until we came to a partially opened gate and the SUV stopped. He honked and a guard wearing pressed brownish-green pants and a tan shirt swung the door open.

I felt relieved to say the least, and, as the men hauled in suitcase after suitcase into the ranch house, I pulled Elle from the car. It is a ridiculous understatement for me to say I was freaked out at this point. I had no idea what to expect from our surroundings and it was dark. I didn’t know what could be crawling in the gravel beneath our feet, hanging from the tree branches above our heads or slithering in the wet, cement gutter circling the perimeter of the house. All I knew was I needed to get inside with my baby, sit down and breathe. Scott stunned me when he asked, “How do we get a taxi to go get something to eat?” He obviously wasn’t feeling the same anxiety and fear and need to escape behind closed doors that I was. The guard put up a finger and walked behind an adjacent door labeled office. He yelled something inside in his own language and waited for a woman’s affirmative response then made his way back to us. “The cewk weell make you food. Go een un she weell see you in theah.” I probably audibly heaved a sigh of relief as we walked in the house. The only thing I wanted less than getting in a taxi and heading back into the Accra crowds, was being left here alone while Scott went (because he would have if there weren’t food available here…nothing comes before Scott’s appetite).

Miriam, a young girl, probably not quite out of her teens, shuffled into the dining room. She spoke sufficient English to let us know she would make us food then turned back into the kitchen. I took Elle to our room, shut the door and sat on the bed. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. The 12 * 20 room had one full-size bed, covered in a fitted sheet, with a light, tan blanket folded at the bottom and two cased pillows at the top. It had a wooden desk, a vanity, a small armoire-like closet, and white walls yellowed with age. The narrow walkway between the furniture and bed was now filled with luggage so I had to tip-toe, bend and suck-in to reach the bathroom. I was sweaty and felt gritty. I needed to wash my hands. I walked up to the sink and reached for one of the two spigots then stopped short, frozen. I envisioned microscopic snakes and ameobas swimming through the stream of water, silently waiting to burrow into my pores (did I mention I was freaked out?). There was a round, pink soap balanced on the edge of the sink but, paranoid, I shimmied back through the suitcases to find a bar of our own. I grabbed a bottle of hand sanitizer as well. I forced myself to drive the imagined monster-germs out of my mind and timidly pushed my hands under the water. I scrubbed with soap, rinsed, turned off the wicked water then hurriedly squeezed anti-bacterial gel into my palm, frantically rubbing it in. I looked down to Elle’s grubby little fingers but couldn’t put her tiny, innocent, perfect, trusting, healthy hands under the water so I just kneaded the antibacterial gel into her palms and fingers. The dust became muddy and dripped between her fingers. I have never been a germ freak, and have laughed at those moms who constantly worry about sterilizing their kids. Now I was one, and for the moment, I was not apologizing for it!!

Our first dinner in Africa was jollof rice with vegetable sauce and fried fish. Jollof rice is white rice that’s cooked with a delicious tomato-based red sauce with a little kick to it. Miriam served each of us a huge mound of it filling most of the plate. We are a sauce-loving family so we experimented with adding the vegetable sauce (it may even be the same sauce with which the jollof rice is cooked but small vegetable chunks were added). “Man, that sauce is good. Molly, you should learn to make that.” Scott exclaimed. Cody agreed, “Hey dude, don’t take it all; I want some more.” I have never been a big fish eater but it smelled so good I began picking the flesh from the tiny bones and was pleasantly surprised. I wouldn’t choose it first but I could enjoy it if served it again. “I don’t like all the bones,” Cody complained. “It’s good and all but there are so many bones.” He stabbed his fork into the fried fish, demonstrating the hardness. “Look at this. This whole piece is all bone.” I leaned forward, squinting to see the piece he poked repeatedly and realized the problem. “Cody, that’s the head. Look, there’s the eye hole.” He flung the head onto my plate, “UUUuuueeeeckk, I don’t want that on my plate. I think I ate part of it’s head!”

Because we only had one bed for the four of us, Dakota got his own room again. He moved his backpack and computer bag over. I followed him over to his room. “Hey, this is begger than our roo…” “NO it’s not,” Cody cut me off defensively. “It’s just turned sideways so it looks bigger.” I swear it really was bigger but that really wasn’t the point. “Cody, even if they are the same size, there’s one of you in here and three of us in the other room, so you have more space.” “No I don’t,” he argued. I’m not sure why he wanted to fight about this; I just wanted to store some of the luggage in his room so we had a walking path to the bathroom. “Cody, my god. What is the big deal. I just want to put half the luggage.” “Fine,” he sulked out going to pull bags across the hall. Sometimes, every little move was an irksome debate with him.

A driver from the American Embassy would pick us up at 10 a.m.. “What time do you want to set the alarm for?” Scott asked, rustling through a suitcase to pull out a small gray alarm clock. He fitted a plug adapter on the cord. “Maybe 7 a.m.?” I answered. “That early?” “Well, yeah. We have no idea where anything is in the luggage so that will take extra time, and I will need a shower but I don’t know how long that will take. Then we’ll have to wait for Miriam to make breakfast. Who knows? That may take an hour? I don’t even know what they make for breakfast here. I don’t want to be in a rush because that will make me forget something stupid.”Plus we have to find the malaria medicine and everyone needs to put on mosquito repellant and sunscreen. 7 is the latest we should get started.” “OK I’ll set the alarm for 7 then.” He reached down to plug in the clock and a small poof sounded but the digital numbers didn’t light. “Uhoh. I think I blew up the clock!” Scott threw the alarm clock and we asked Dakota to set the alarm on his Ipod touch instead.

After basically pulling everything out to find something cool to sleep in (we were still dressed in what we left wintry Germany wearing), we fell into bed exhausted. The room had an air conditioner and a powerful ceiling fan that spun no slower (or quieter) than helicopter blades. Cody was sleeping across the hall with his door locked and Elle squirmed between Scott and me. I’m sure my anxiety should have kept me up all night but the exhaustion of the trip here knocked me out.