Hot, Hot, Hot Tamale

Good Morning from Ghana!

Saturday morning S’Asia and I got up early, repacked our bags and met for a quick breakfast and coffee. I had 2 poached eggs, sliced tomato, cucumber and peas. I love that fresh sliced vegetables seem to always be available at breakfast! After breakfast we took our suitcases and headed to the lobby. We settled our bills and were immediately hustled into a shuttle, which is basically a small van. They took us 3-4 minutes and dropped us off at the national departures building.

Clearly S’Asia and I were in “anything could go wrong” travel mode because we arrived at a very small terminal at 9:30 for our 12:30 flight. There seemed to be 1 airline open, Africa World Airlines, and they were still only checking in people for the flight ahead of us. So we had to wait until 10:30, but then checked our bags and got our boarding passes quickly and easily. We had been worried about checking our bags because this was a much smaller “mosquito” plane and their policy online was to weigh your checked bag and your carry-on. I knew my checked bag was underweight, but my carry on was probably over their 5kg limit. The guy checking us in was very nice, checked our bags and didn’t say anything about the weight, so we headed to the gate to wait some more. The airport was small and all the flights seemed to board from gate three. While they still announced flights on a speaker, every time a flight boarded they also sent a representative to call out the flight to the small crowd. After our flight was called we made our way down a hall and a flight of steps to a bus. When we got on the bus two girls approached us to ask if we were with LRTT, and so we met another fellow from Philadelphia, and another from Australia! We all talked about where we were from, what we taught and how excited we were as the bus drove us down the tarmac to our small but very comfortable plane.

The flight from Accra to Tamale is only an hour, and really only 40 minutes in the air. In that time the flight attendant managed to pass out turkey or cheese sandwiches (I just took the cheese off of mine) and pineapple ginger juice (my new favorite juice.) I got a window seat! The views flying into Tamale where amazing. You can see all the buildings in the process of being built. Construction here seems to move at a slower pace. Some foundations are started, and have clearly been left for a while. Plants grow up around them, and goats and cows make their homes inside.

When we landed we walked into a tiny airport, and waited for our luggage to be rolled through an opening in the wall. Once it came through everyone waiting for their bag manually rolls them down to the end. We grabbed our bags and walked out to meet our team leads and a bunch of other fellows who came to meet us. Our driver, Auyuba drove us away from the airport, which also seems to be an Air Force Base, according to the signs. We made our way to Hotel Picorna. A group of fellows and I decided to walk through the local market. We saw tons of fruit, beans, bagged spices, vegetables, dried fish, and so much more. The noises, color and smells changed every time you looked somewhere new. Everyone was packed into a very small space, and the walking paths were very small. So many people yelled “hello” or “how are you?” as we walked by. One lady stopped us and had some of the fellows help her pound Fufu dough. We got a little lost in the market and Eliza (one of the fellows) had to get out her Google maps. We made it back to the hotel and spent some time getting to know other fellows until dinner. We had dinner together in the upstairs dining room. Our team leads shared some safety facts and we all did a lot more teacher talking. I can’t say this was a restful night. There were issues with a few people’s rooms at the hotel, but nothing catastrophic. We had a few hours of rest coming the next day on our ride to Zebilla anyway.

Write soon!

Love, Ms. O