Wednesday.
Work from the house day!
I decided today that I would work from the house so that I could actually get some patterning done. It was nice to just roll out of bed, make a cup of coffee and get to work. No taxis.
We have taken over the living room down stairs for pattern making, and it has become quite a mess. So, before we started working we decided to take 15 minutes to clean and organize. I busted out the rubber gloves and everything! After all of the dust, scraps of fabric and mouse poop was cleaned we patterned our hearts out!
We spent the morning patterning but then we ran out of materials. Luckily we had a few other things to work on for the rest of the afternoon. I feel like there is a lot of pressure doing the patterns, because we make them on interfacing and we use pens. This means....when you draw a line it better be correct because you can't go back.
Yesterday I spent the better half of my day working with one of the batikers that was making a new sample for us. She has the BEST location ever! It is right on the ocean, so there is an amazing view and a great sea breeze. We did not have time to finish the sample, so I am excited to see the final outcome when I go into the office on Friday.
Tomorrow is a national holiday, so that means we have a day off!!!!
Not much of an update today...that's what happens when I don't leave the house.
Peace. Love. Fabric Scraps.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
May I have your attention please
I would like to inform you all that I have been offered and have accepted an extension on my time in Ghana.
I will now stay until sometime in December, so that I can see the main project I am working on through to the end.
That is all I will give you today.
Peace. Love. Visa extensions.
I will now stay until sometime in December, so that I can see the main project I am working on through to the end.
That is all I will give you today.
Peace. Love. Visa extensions.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Just another manic Monday
Week 7! Holy Smokes the time is flying!
Weekends throw me off here. I woke up this morning thinking that it was Sunday...then I realized that indeed it was Monday and I had to go to work.
I sat with a small child in the front seat of the taxi this morning. Is it strange that it is no longer disturbing to me? I just scoot their little booty over and plop dow next to them until we get to their school. The driver this morning asked if we go to Cape Coast everyday, because he often sees us standing on the street. Then he gave me his number in case we ever need a ride. Kind, however he picked his nose throughout the entire ride and we stalled twice. I think I will just "misplace" that number.
Because it was Monday the office was a mad house. We made round two of batik stencils and sent out a few patterns to have new samples made. It is exciting to see how quickly things are made, so it is going to be a good week getting all of the new samples in. My goal was to work in the office for the morning and then head back to the house to work on patterns, but after doing everything I really needed to get done I was only able to sneak out about 20 minutes early...no patterns were made.
On the way home Ras-T put "his girls" into a taxi and we were on our way. I bought a frozen yogurt on the way and for the life of me I could not open it up. I think I spent half the ride just chewing on the corner trying to rip the plastic.
The West Point group wanted to have dinner with us again so we went to Eli's. I am proud to say that I actually ate some chicken tonight. But it was actually a bit of a let down. But I have a rock cake in my bag to make up for it!
Peace. Love. Samples.
Weekends throw me off here. I woke up this morning thinking that it was Sunday...then I realized that indeed it was Monday and I had to go to work.
I sat with a small child in the front seat of the taxi this morning. Is it strange that it is no longer disturbing to me? I just scoot their little booty over and plop dow next to them until we get to their school. The driver this morning asked if we go to Cape Coast everyday, because he often sees us standing on the street. Then he gave me his number in case we ever need a ride. Kind, however he picked his nose throughout the entire ride and we stalled twice. I think I will just "misplace" that number.
Because it was Monday the office was a mad house. We made round two of batik stencils and sent out a few patterns to have new samples made. It is exciting to see how quickly things are made, so it is going to be a good week getting all of the new samples in. My goal was to work in the office for the morning and then head back to the house to work on patterns, but after doing everything I really needed to get done I was only able to sneak out about 20 minutes early...no patterns were made.
On the way home Ras-T put "his girls" into a taxi and we were on our way. I bought a frozen yogurt on the way and for the life of me I could not open it up. I think I spent half the ride just chewing on the corner trying to rip the plastic.
The West Point group wanted to have dinner with us again so we went to Eli's. I am proud to say that I actually ate some chicken tonight. But it was actually a bit of a let down. But I have a rock cake in my bag to make up for it!
Peace. Love. Samples.
Weekend Update
I was too lazy to type this all out on my phone.
Friday night we called our go-to-taxi drive Peter to take us to the Stumble Inn. He came to the house and 7 of us plus Pepo piled into his car and headed in the general direction of where we thought this hotel was. So we drove through Elmina and into the middle of nowhere, when we finally found a sign for the hotel. We continued to go further into the trees, when we finally saw lights. We pulled up to what looked like the county jail with a massive chain link fence with barbed wire on the top. The gate man let us in and we basically fell out of the car when we opened the door. Some workers from the hotel came to greet us, but froze in their steps as soon as they saw Pepo. One of the workers looked at us and said, "We would like to welcome you, but how your dog is, we are very afraid." So we put a leash on him, and then found out that we were at the wrong hotel.
So we all packed into the car again, and eventually found our way to the actual Stumble Inn. Check it out at stumbleinnghana.com . The group that lives near our volunteer house was part of building this Inn, and their volunteers living here for less than 8 weeks live at the Inn. So, the goal of our going to the Inn was to try to make friends with another NGO group in the area. Epic Fail. I think that our group is a little to hyper to make friends. We tried to be social, but they apparently were not in the mood to make new friends. So, we ended up hanging out with the two that live right next to our house.
When we got to the Inn, they had just put dinner out and it was the most delicious goat, chicken and rice ever! However, I was having second thoughts on the goat when I found out that it belonged to one of our neighbors. I guess they couldn't find a goat for dinner, so they just killed his. RUDE!!!
After dinner we went for an evening swim, because we all just get so excited whenever we are at the ocean...we couldn't wait until morning. After we went swimming we played cards and then sat around the campfire until it was time for us to go to sleep. We were in a dorm style room with 8 beds, but it was a pretty big room.
The next morning was really funny because we all woke up to one of the volunteers saying "ummmm guys, there is throw up on my shoes." Of course we all started cracking up, and everyone was looking at one another saying, not me, not me, not me. After deciding that we all would have heard a human throwing up, we put the blame on Pepo. Maria confirmed that he does often throw up silently, so we are sure it was him. Later in the morning we found out that he also pooped in one of the showers.....bad dog!
We really had no idea what to expect of the Stumble Inn, so we were thrilled to see that they served breakfast. Once again I ordered french toast, and coffee. Seriously, nothing beats sitting on the beach drinking coffee and eating french toast. It is the best way to start out a Saturday morning.
It was pretty cloudy when we got up, so we went for a walk along the beach after breakfast. The water washed up onto my feet and I looked down and suddenly there were tons and tons of red bumps all over my feet. It did not hurt or itch, so I just ignored it and kept walking. Eventually they faded, but there was still some irritation....and then later it turned into an itching nightmare. I seriously wanted to cut my feet off. On ONE foot I have 114 little red bumps. I do not know if they are bites or a rash or what, but it is so so so itchy.
After our walk, we just sat around reading because it was pretty dreary outside. Then we decided to have lunch. I think that is the bad part about having a tab....you just keep eating and eating and then at the end you are slapped with the payment. My tab was under the name Frick and Frack. So, we all had chicken salad sandwiches, and they were once again amazing! I think I just love the weekends because I always get to eat a lot.
After lunch we played cards. The main family running SABRE (the NGO) has 4 little kids that are always running around by our house. I always try to get them to laugh or smile, but I never have any luck. The family was at the beach and the little baby was crying, so the mother of little Casper asked if anyone wanted to hold him, and of course I just jumped at the opportunity. He was such a cute little baby, and he was so happy just playing with my water bottle and doing a little baby shimmy with me. Eventually I got the other three kids to like me too. :-)
We headed back to the house so that we could shower before going to watch the BIG GAME! I put on my oh so fashionable Ghana sweat band, and we went over to the Shell station to watch the game. At Shell they pull tons of tables into the parking lot and play it on a big screen. It was kind of like a drive in. Some of our "new friends" we there, and the little kids were also near our table. Everyone was going wild during the game, and it was so cool so see them when there was a goal, and then at the very end. They were dancing and cheering and loving life! I have a few photos of the reactions.
Sunday was sunny, and we were feeling lazy so we just went to the pool all day. People must think that we are insane, because I feel like we act like 5 year olds when we are all together. We all got into the baby pool, and ran around trying to make a huge whirl pool. Just picture 7 white people running around a tiny pool and floating around.
For dinner we went down to Elis, because a group of Global Mamas volunteers from West Point were in town and we all wanted to hang out. This particular group is working in a different area with the jewelry, but wanted to come to Cape Coast for a batik workshop and to meet the rest of us.
A few of us were still having extreme itching issues, when suddenly it dawned on me that oatmeal might help stop the itching. One of the other girls and I basically ran to shell to grab oatmeal, and made what we would now like to call "The oatmeal sock" We had instant relief. It was so nice not to itch like mad.
After our feet stopped bothering us, we went back to hang out with the other volunteers. They also probably thought that we were insane, itching like mad and then running off talking about putting oats on our feet. oy.
Ok, I think thats my weekend in review.
peace. love. oatmeal socks.
Friday night we called our go-to-taxi drive Peter to take us to the Stumble Inn. He came to the house and 7 of us plus Pepo piled into his car and headed in the general direction of where we thought this hotel was. So we drove through Elmina and into the middle of nowhere, when we finally found a sign for the hotel. We continued to go further into the trees, when we finally saw lights. We pulled up to what looked like the county jail with a massive chain link fence with barbed wire on the top. The gate man let us in and we basically fell out of the car when we opened the door. Some workers from the hotel came to greet us, but froze in their steps as soon as they saw Pepo. One of the workers looked at us and said, "We would like to welcome you, but how your dog is, we are very afraid." So we put a leash on him, and then found out that we were at the wrong hotel.
So we all packed into the car again, and eventually found our way to the actual Stumble Inn. Check it out at stumbleinnghana.com . The group that lives near our volunteer house was part of building this Inn, and their volunteers living here for less than 8 weeks live at the Inn. So, the goal of our going to the Inn was to try to make friends with another NGO group in the area. Epic Fail. I think that our group is a little to hyper to make friends. We tried to be social, but they apparently were not in the mood to make new friends. So, we ended up hanging out with the two that live right next to our house.
When we got to the Inn, they had just put dinner out and it was the most delicious goat, chicken and rice ever! However, I was having second thoughts on the goat when I found out that it belonged to one of our neighbors. I guess they couldn't find a goat for dinner, so they just killed his. RUDE!!!
After dinner we went for an evening swim, because we all just get so excited whenever we are at the ocean...we couldn't wait until morning. After we went swimming we played cards and then sat around the campfire until it was time for us to go to sleep. We were in a dorm style room with 8 beds, but it was a pretty big room.
The next morning was really funny because we all woke up to one of the volunteers saying "ummmm guys, there is throw up on my shoes." Of course we all started cracking up, and everyone was looking at one another saying, not me, not me, not me. After deciding that we all would have heard a human throwing up, we put the blame on Pepo. Maria confirmed that he does often throw up silently, so we are sure it was him. Later in the morning we found out that he also pooped in one of the showers.....bad dog!
We really had no idea what to expect of the Stumble Inn, so we were thrilled to see that they served breakfast. Once again I ordered french toast, and coffee. Seriously, nothing beats sitting on the beach drinking coffee and eating french toast. It is the best way to start out a Saturday morning.
It was pretty cloudy when we got up, so we went for a walk along the beach after breakfast. The water washed up onto my feet and I looked down and suddenly there were tons and tons of red bumps all over my feet. It did not hurt or itch, so I just ignored it and kept walking. Eventually they faded, but there was still some irritation....and then later it turned into an itching nightmare. I seriously wanted to cut my feet off. On ONE foot I have 114 little red bumps. I do not know if they are bites or a rash or what, but it is so so so itchy.
After our walk, we just sat around reading because it was pretty dreary outside. Then we decided to have lunch. I think that is the bad part about having a tab....you just keep eating and eating and then at the end you are slapped with the payment. My tab was under the name Frick and Frack. So, we all had chicken salad sandwiches, and they were once again amazing! I think I just love the weekends because I always get to eat a lot.
After lunch we played cards. The main family running SABRE (the NGO) has 4 little kids that are always running around by our house. I always try to get them to laugh or smile, but I never have any luck. The family was at the beach and the little baby was crying, so the mother of little Casper asked if anyone wanted to hold him, and of course I just jumped at the opportunity. He was such a cute little baby, and he was so happy just playing with my water bottle and doing a little baby shimmy with me. Eventually I got the other three kids to like me too. :-)
We headed back to the house so that we could shower before going to watch the BIG GAME! I put on my oh so fashionable Ghana sweat band, and we went over to the Shell station to watch the game. At Shell they pull tons of tables into the parking lot and play it on a big screen. It was kind of like a drive in. Some of our "new friends" we there, and the little kids were also near our table. Everyone was going wild during the game, and it was so cool so see them when there was a goal, and then at the very end. They were dancing and cheering and loving life! I have a few photos of the reactions.
Sunday was sunny, and we were feeling lazy so we just went to the pool all day. People must think that we are insane, because I feel like we act like 5 year olds when we are all together. We all got into the baby pool, and ran around trying to make a huge whirl pool. Just picture 7 white people running around a tiny pool and floating around.
For dinner we went down to Elis, because a group of Global Mamas volunteers from West Point were in town and we all wanted to hang out. This particular group is working in a different area with the jewelry, but wanted to come to Cape Coast for a batik workshop and to meet the rest of us.
A few of us were still having extreme itching issues, when suddenly it dawned on me that oatmeal might help stop the itching. One of the other girls and I basically ran to shell to grab oatmeal, and made what we would now like to call "The oatmeal sock" We had instant relief. It was so nice not to itch like mad.
After our feet stopped bothering us, we went back to hang out with the other volunteers. They also probably thought that we were insane, itching like mad and then running off talking about putting oats on our feet. oy.
Ok, I think thats my weekend in review.
peace. love. oatmeal socks.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Hug A Rasta Day
Friday.
I'm sorry, but there is such a thing as a stupid question.
Seriously.....think before you ask, and try to figure it out on your own.
It was pouring rain all morning, which was nice as I enjoyed my coffee on the balcony, but my feelings changed as soon as I had to walk outside and down the muddy street. Thank God for ziplock bags to keep all of my belonging nice and dry.
I was back working in the office today. Last night we received some feedback from the US on more prints and new styles, so I met with most of this designers this morning to give them the feedback. Once direction was given to each of them (and repeated over and over) I tried to focus on sending a file of samples for review. This took way longer than is should have due to the fact nobody can figure anything out on their own. Can you tell I am frustrated at the moment? You have a "to do" list.....DO IT!
I basically spent my entire day working on photos of samples and editing them to be sent off to the US to take a look at. Well....I guess I was also entertaining the designers with my realistic baby cry. Consider yourself a lucky one if you actually know what that sounds like! I am currently at the Beach Resort trying to get my email to send. My connection is slower than molasses, but I guess it gives me time to update here. After work I ran to the market to get a few things (coffee and cheese) and then I had one of our favorite drivers on the way home. He is a rasta man, and everyone just calls him Ras-T. I like when he drives us because he knows right where to drop us off without any direction. It makes for an easy ride.
Tonight we are going to attempt to make "new friends" and we are going to hang out with another NGO that lives in Elmina. They all live on a beach that people do not use as a toilet so we are going to hang out down there. It is pretty cold here today, so I think I will actually wear pants and long sleeves! I NEVER thought I would say that about Ghana!
Tomorrow....Ghana vs. USA
Who will win?
peace. love. rain.
I'm sorry, but there is such a thing as a stupid question.
Seriously.....think before you ask, and try to figure it out on your own.
It was pouring rain all morning, which was nice as I enjoyed my coffee on the balcony, but my feelings changed as soon as I had to walk outside and down the muddy street. Thank God for ziplock bags to keep all of my belonging nice and dry.
I was back working in the office today. Last night we received some feedback from the US on more prints and new styles, so I met with most of this designers this morning to give them the feedback. Once direction was given to each of them (and repeated over and over) I tried to focus on sending a file of samples for review. This took way longer than is should have due to the fact nobody can figure anything out on their own. Can you tell I am frustrated at the moment? You have a "to do" list.....DO IT!
I basically spent my entire day working on photos of samples and editing them to be sent off to the US to take a look at. Well....I guess I was also entertaining the designers with my realistic baby cry. Consider yourself a lucky one if you actually know what that sounds like! I am currently at the Beach Resort trying to get my email to send. My connection is slower than molasses, but I guess it gives me time to update here. After work I ran to the market to get a few things (coffee and cheese) and then I had one of our favorite drivers on the way home. He is a rasta man, and everyone just calls him Ras-T. I like when he drives us because he knows right where to drop us off without any direction. It makes for an easy ride.
Tonight we are going to attempt to make "new friends" and we are going to hang out with another NGO that lives in Elmina. They all live on a beach that people do not use as a toilet so we are going to hang out down there. It is pretty cold here today, so I think I will actually wear pants and long sleeves! I NEVER thought I would say that about Ghana!
Tomorrow....Ghana vs. USA
Who will win?
peace. love. rain.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Home Office
Thursday.
This morning I made the executive decision to work from the house. It was so nice not to ride in a taxi all day. Well, originally I planned to work from the house in the morning and then go into the office around lunch time. However, when we called in and found that there were no new samples I decided to just stay at the house.
So, while drinking my coffee on the "couch" I did some serious multi tasking! I took photos of a few products for the catalog, did some work on the computer, gave a quick photoshop lesson, patterned two new products, made a grilled cheese, sent a few emails via bb, had some amazing chocolate milk, drink more coffee, played with Pepo, and made a killer spreadsheet. Seriously, I should stay home more often.
After work I went over to the hotel to workout, but there was kind of a creepy man in there, so after running a mile I decided that was good enough and went back to the house. I need to just get up early in the morning and go, because there is never anyone around at that time.
We went to Eli's for dinner tonight and had amazing black eyed pea burgers. Pepo came to dinner and ended up getting stuck under the table and knocking everything over. Some of us laughed....others just looked annoyed. There is a lot of Pepo hate. I however love the little pup!
At dinner we talked about all the shows we would watch when we were younger....here are a few of the favorites.
Doug
Rugrats
Ahh real monsters
The magic school bus
Arthur
Recess
Richard Scary
Are you afraid of the dark
The elephant show
Lamb chop
And so many more.....
Name your favorite childhood show, and if you are a parent name your favorite from childhood and one you liked that your child watched.
Peace. Love. I ate 4 black eyed pea burger patties.
This morning I made the executive decision to work from the house. It was so nice not to ride in a taxi all day. Well, originally I planned to work from the house in the morning and then go into the office around lunch time. However, when we called in and found that there were no new samples I decided to just stay at the house.
So, while drinking my coffee on the "couch" I did some serious multi tasking! I took photos of a few products for the catalog, did some work on the computer, gave a quick photoshop lesson, patterned two new products, made a grilled cheese, sent a few emails via bb, had some amazing chocolate milk, drink more coffee, played with Pepo, and made a killer spreadsheet. Seriously, I should stay home more often.
After work I went over to the hotel to workout, but there was kind of a creepy man in there, so after running a mile I decided that was good enough and went back to the house. I need to just get up early in the morning and go, because there is never anyone around at that time.
We went to Eli's for dinner tonight and had amazing black eyed pea burgers. Pepo came to dinner and ended up getting stuck under the table and knocking everything over. Some of us laughed....others just looked annoyed. There is a lot of Pepo hate. I however love the little pup!
At dinner we talked about all the shows we would watch when we were younger....here are a few of the favorites.
Doug
Rugrats
Ahh real monsters
The magic school bus
Arthur
Recess
Richard Scary
Are you afraid of the dark
The elephant show
Lamb chop
And so many more.....
Name your favorite childhood show, and if you are a parent name your favorite from childhood and one you liked that your child watched.
Peace. Love. I ate 4 black eyed pea burger patties.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Fire Up Black Stars
Wednesday.
Well, I'm no auto expert by any means, but I do know that when driving a car that the steering wheel should not be upside down while driving. Then again...we did make it to work alive, so what do I know!
The mornings go by so fast around here! We got into the office and I sent all of the interns on site visits. Some had to leave from the house and some had to leave from the office. We had been at the office for a good amount of time when I received a BBM (text) from one of the girls telling me that she was lost. Well, it wasn't so much being lost as telling the driver the wrong road. Eventually she made it safely.
In between sending people off I worked on taking photos of all of the new samples that came in yesterday. I do not think that any of them turned out how we had planned, but they still for the most part look really great. Throughout the afternoon more samples came in but once again they were not as we had expected. However, they still look pretty good.
And now..I would just like to say this one time. Just because you went to some fancy art school does not mean that you are the best. This is a design TEAM...emphasis on the word TEAM. There always has to be one....
I came back to the house a little earlier than normal today, because we had some of the designers working from here. However, by the time I actually got home it was basically the end of the work day. So I just had a quick meeting (with the few that were actually still at the house) and then I went to workout.
For dinner I enjoyed some warm powdered milk and choco smiles...aka something similar to chocolate flavored cardboard. That's what I get for sending an intern to get my cereal. :-) Just kidding about the complaining..not kidding about sending an intern to do my shopping. There is only so much time in the day!
Ghana plays today, so I expect you all to cheer for them. Everyone in the office had Ghana color on...I was clueless that there was even a game, so I lost points in the team spirit category. But should I really be deducted points though if I don't have any Ghana colored items with me?
Not much excitement today...
Peace. Love. Choco Smiles.
Well, I'm no auto expert by any means, but I do know that when driving a car that the steering wheel should not be upside down while driving. Then again...we did make it to work alive, so what do I know!
The mornings go by so fast around here! We got into the office and I sent all of the interns on site visits. Some had to leave from the house and some had to leave from the office. We had been at the office for a good amount of time when I received a BBM (text) from one of the girls telling me that she was lost. Well, it wasn't so much being lost as telling the driver the wrong road. Eventually she made it safely.
In between sending people off I worked on taking photos of all of the new samples that came in yesterday. I do not think that any of them turned out how we had planned, but they still for the most part look really great. Throughout the afternoon more samples came in but once again they were not as we had expected. However, they still look pretty good.
And now..I would just like to say this one time. Just because you went to some fancy art school does not mean that you are the best. This is a design TEAM...emphasis on the word TEAM. There always has to be one....
I came back to the house a little earlier than normal today, because we had some of the designers working from here. However, by the time I actually got home it was basically the end of the work day. So I just had a quick meeting (with the few that were actually still at the house) and then I went to workout.
For dinner I enjoyed some warm powdered milk and choco smiles...aka something similar to chocolate flavored cardboard. That's what I get for sending an intern to get my cereal. :-) Just kidding about the complaining..not kidding about sending an intern to do my shopping. There is only so much time in the day!
Ghana plays today, so I expect you all to cheer for them. Everyone in the office had Ghana color on...I was clueless that there was even a game, so I lost points in the team spirit category. But should I really be deducted points though if I don't have any Ghana colored items with me?
Not much excitement today...
Peace. Love. Choco Smiles.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
This little piggy went to market
Tuesday.
On the way into work I saw the cutest little pig ever. He looked like half pig, half cow. About 30 minutes later I had to listen to that little piggy die. It is a sound that I never want to hear again.
After listening to the squeels of death I went on a site visit to work one on one with a batiker. Today I was working with Jennifer on sampling two new prints. Sorry, that is all the print info I can give....you know...top secret information. :-) She came to the office to pick me up because I had no clue as to where her house/studio was located. When we arrived she already had the base color done, so we were able to begin batiking right away. It is really interesting to see how different each of the womens styles are. Jennifer was just flinging hot wax all over the place. There was even a large splatter of wax on the ceiling, that I guess at one time exploded when she walked away. Yikes!
We spent the good part of the morning working on the samples, and then the greatest snack moment of my Ghana trip occurred. Jennfier made kettle corn. It seriously made my day. It was the perfect amount of sweet and salty.
After the samples were finished I went back to the madness of the office. There were still women coming in to pick up stamps, so space was tight. Also, while the stamp madness was happening we were trying to finish the second round of our trend presentation to send off to the US. Then at one point I gave up my computer so one of the women could check her emails....at which point I became completely useless. Then I basically had to serve as tech support to teach the women how to use the computers. You can ask my mom....I do not have an ounce of patience when it comes to teaching computers. Especially when it is not a mac. Luckily it was the end of the day, so we could just go home.
On the way to grab a taxi home we were walking when we all noticed the shirt of the man walking past. It said I (heart) Qdoba. I had to do a double take. I literally thought of asking if I could buy it from him.
When we were walking back to the house after being dropped off by the taxi we ran into a pack of Obrunis (white people) who work with an NGO based out of Elmina. They were having a snack/dinner at the street sausage spot, so we stopped to hang out with them. Most were from the UK and one was from Australia. I believe they do something with education, but I am still not 100 percent sure. We made plans to have our house hang out with their house this weekend.
Short post but I am so sleepy.
Oh, and I have been craving a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with puffy Cheetos and a glass of milk!
Peace. Love. Kettle Corn.
On the way into work I saw the cutest little pig ever. He looked like half pig, half cow. About 30 minutes later I had to listen to that little piggy die. It is a sound that I never want to hear again.
After listening to the squeels of death I went on a site visit to work one on one with a batiker. Today I was working with Jennifer on sampling two new prints. Sorry, that is all the print info I can give....you know...top secret information. :-) She came to the office to pick me up because I had no clue as to where her house/studio was located. When we arrived she already had the base color done, so we were able to begin batiking right away. It is really interesting to see how different each of the womens styles are. Jennifer was just flinging hot wax all over the place. There was even a large splatter of wax on the ceiling, that I guess at one time exploded when she walked away. Yikes!
We spent the good part of the morning working on the samples, and then the greatest snack moment of my Ghana trip occurred. Jennfier made kettle corn. It seriously made my day. It was the perfect amount of sweet and salty.
After the samples were finished I went back to the madness of the office. There were still women coming in to pick up stamps, so space was tight. Also, while the stamp madness was happening we were trying to finish the second round of our trend presentation to send off to the US. Then at one point I gave up my computer so one of the women could check her emails....at which point I became completely useless. Then I basically had to serve as tech support to teach the women how to use the computers. You can ask my mom....I do not have an ounce of patience when it comes to teaching computers. Especially when it is not a mac. Luckily it was the end of the day, so we could just go home.
On the way to grab a taxi home we were walking when we all noticed the shirt of the man walking past. It said I (heart) Qdoba. I had to do a double take. I literally thought of asking if I could buy it from him.
When we were walking back to the house after being dropped off by the taxi we ran into a pack of Obrunis (white people) who work with an NGO based out of Elmina. They were having a snack/dinner at the street sausage spot, so we stopped to hang out with them. Most were from the UK and one was from Australia. I believe they do something with education, but I am still not 100 percent sure. We made plans to have our house hang out with their house this weekend.
Short post but I am so sleepy.
Oh, and I have been craving a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with puffy Cheetos and a glass of milk!
Peace. Love. Kettle Corn.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Monday Monday Monday!
Week six.
Ohhh Monday.
I woke up this morning and cleaned my small corner of the house. Oh it feels good to be organized.
The rear view mirror in the taxi this morning was cracking me up. If you looked at the very top of the mirror your face would stretch like a fun house mirror. I noticed this when I looked up and had lips the size of Texas. So, forgetting that I was in a taxi with perfect strangers I started to make faces in the mirror...until I caught the drivers eye and snapped back to reality. In the end I scored a drop off right at the door.
Work went by so fast today! We had the first round of stencils made, so we wrote out some directions for the batikers. Trying to be helpful we tried to make color swatches to give a general color idea. The only problem was that we had a few crayons, so the end result was not as we had intended. Oops.
Before I knew it, it was time for lunch and I was so very excited for my 50 cent goat rice. I went out...turned onto the street...and stood in shock. She did not come to work today. so, I wandered the streets for a good half hour looking for something that would compare, and I ended up with a piece of bread and a bottle of coke. What a let down. However, it was not as much of a let down as Katies lunch, when she opened a packet of laughing cow cheese only to find something brown and crumbly, and my stomach just did a flip thinking about it again.....blah!
After lunch the day went by even faster than the morning. We called the batikers to come pick up their stencils and it was a steady stream of women coming in to get directions on their stamps and carve their foam blocks. The office is a small space to begin with, so when people start packing in, the volume gets 10 times louder and foam bits start flying, and you have to make sure they all give the coveted Shaprie markers back....you need to be on top of your game to survive that room. Its stressful. One of my major projects while I am here is to organize all of the stamps from the past and work on a tracking system for new stamps. Its much more complicated than it sounds...believe me! So, through the commotion I had to make sure I logged information on all the batikers as they were given work.
Because we are about to sample all new designs we thought it would be a good idea to have interns work with the women on perfecting the new colors and the layout. Throughout the next few weeks it is going to be fun working with all of the women in their studios.
At the very end of the day one of the workers went to pick up the mail...I'm not quite sure from where, but I was so excited to find a beautiful pink envelope for ME!!! My mom sent over a few more Clinique bags for the women, so I passed them out to the two who were picking up their stamps when I opened the envelope.
On my way to the taxi today I saw my good friend Sam. He was excited to tell me that I would be here for the festival in September...I don't know why he just thought of that today, but I guess its something to look forward to. I had to sit for a while today until the taxi filled up, and lucky for me I was wedged in with quite a talker. After taking an ear full for not speaking fluent Fante after living here for a month, I (or should I say Wendy) learned all about the photographer who has a shop in Elmina. I also had the pleasure of looking through a large stack of his recent work. I would like to describe it as glamor shots meets clip art. Very impressive graphics added to further enhance the already glorious photos......
After work I went over to the hotel to work out. Where I ran into my former husband and also picked up a new one while I was running. Oh the joys of the Elmina Beach Resort.
Peace. Love. Digital Prints.
Ohhh Monday.
I woke up this morning and cleaned my small corner of the house. Oh it feels good to be organized.
The rear view mirror in the taxi this morning was cracking me up. If you looked at the very top of the mirror your face would stretch like a fun house mirror. I noticed this when I looked up and had lips the size of Texas. So, forgetting that I was in a taxi with perfect strangers I started to make faces in the mirror...until I caught the drivers eye and snapped back to reality. In the end I scored a drop off right at the door.
Work went by so fast today! We had the first round of stencils made, so we wrote out some directions for the batikers. Trying to be helpful we tried to make color swatches to give a general color idea. The only problem was that we had a few crayons, so the end result was not as we had intended. Oops.
Before I knew it, it was time for lunch and I was so very excited for my 50 cent goat rice. I went out...turned onto the street...and stood in shock. She did not come to work today. so, I wandered the streets for a good half hour looking for something that would compare, and I ended up with a piece of bread and a bottle of coke. What a let down. However, it was not as much of a let down as Katies lunch, when she opened a packet of laughing cow cheese only to find something brown and crumbly, and my stomach just did a flip thinking about it again.....blah!
After lunch the day went by even faster than the morning. We called the batikers to come pick up their stencils and it was a steady stream of women coming in to get directions on their stamps and carve their foam blocks. The office is a small space to begin with, so when people start packing in, the volume gets 10 times louder and foam bits start flying, and you have to make sure they all give the coveted Shaprie markers back....you need to be on top of your game to survive that room. Its stressful. One of my major projects while I am here is to organize all of the stamps from the past and work on a tracking system for new stamps. Its much more complicated than it sounds...believe me! So, through the commotion I had to make sure I logged information on all the batikers as they were given work.
Because we are about to sample all new designs we thought it would be a good idea to have interns work with the women on perfecting the new colors and the layout. Throughout the next few weeks it is going to be fun working with all of the women in their studios.
At the very end of the day one of the workers went to pick up the mail...I'm not quite sure from where, but I was so excited to find a beautiful pink envelope for ME!!! My mom sent over a few more Clinique bags for the women, so I passed them out to the two who were picking up their stamps when I opened the envelope.
On my way to the taxi today I saw my good friend Sam. He was excited to tell me that I would be here for the festival in September...I don't know why he just thought of that today, but I guess its something to look forward to. I had to sit for a while today until the taxi filled up, and lucky for me I was wedged in with quite a talker. After taking an ear full for not speaking fluent Fante after living here for a month, I (or should I say Wendy) learned all about the photographer who has a shop in Elmina. I also had the pleasure of looking through a large stack of his recent work. I would like to describe it as glamor shots meets clip art. Very impressive graphics added to further enhance the already glorious photos......
After work I went over to the hotel to work out. Where I ran into my former husband and also picked up a new one while I was running. Oh the joys of the Elmina Beach Resort.
Peace. Love. Digital Prints.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
PHOTOS!
This is my house.
Going Up.
This is my bedroom
This is Busua.....the devil bird
This is my bathroom
This is me with a little monkey.....not the one who bit me.
My hut for the weekend.
Kids on the beach.
REAL COFFEE!
Campfire on the beach.
Driving my really cool sand car.
peace. love. photos
Saturday, June 19, 2010
I eat books
Ohhhh Saturday.
I "slept in" today...until 6:30. Even that early in the morning it was already so beautiful outside. I made myself a cup of tea and enjoyed a rock cake on the balcony. I finished my book. If you need a good beach read, I would suggest Something Borrowed.
Because it was such a beautiful day, we decided to spend a little time at the pool. Never really knowing what time it is around here, we headed over when it was really sunny. It was 8:30. we were the only fools there so early on a Saturday morning. We all claimed our beach chairs, and I started to read Murder on the Orient Express. I was hoping it would be a great murder mystery thriller, but after a few hours, I found it to be quite a disappointment. Sorry Agatha Christie, that is the only book I will read of yours.
Also, while at the pool I had an amazing salad. It was lettuce, cucumbers, green beats, potatoes, onions, carrots, green peppers, and peanuts, in some kind of garlic vinaigrette! Um. I was just excited to have raw veggies.
After I finished my book, and soaked up my fair share of sun, I headed back to the house. I had not brushed my hair in a while, because I just throw it into a bun everyday, so when I tried to brush it today I had a bit of trouble. There was a huge dred in the middle of my hair, and it did not want to come out. I had to sacrifice quite a few pieces in the end.
That's my day. Boring but relaxing.
Peace. Love. Books.
I "slept in" today...until 6:30. Even that early in the morning it was already so beautiful outside. I made myself a cup of tea and enjoyed a rock cake on the balcony. I finished my book. If you need a good beach read, I would suggest Something Borrowed.
Because it was such a beautiful day, we decided to spend a little time at the pool. Never really knowing what time it is around here, we headed over when it was really sunny. It was 8:30. we were the only fools there so early on a Saturday morning. We all claimed our beach chairs, and I started to read Murder on the Orient Express. I was hoping it would be a great murder mystery thriller, but after a few hours, I found it to be quite a disappointment. Sorry Agatha Christie, that is the only book I will read of yours.
Also, while at the pool I had an amazing salad. It was lettuce, cucumbers, green beats, potatoes, onions, carrots, green peppers, and peanuts, in some kind of garlic vinaigrette! Um. I was just excited to have raw veggies.
After I finished my book, and soaked up my fair share of sun, I headed back to the house. I had not brushed my hair in a while, because I just throw it into a bun everyday, so when I tried to brush it today I had a bit of trouble. There was a huge dred in the middle of my hair, and it did not want to come out. I had to sacrifice quite a few pieces in the end.
That's my day. Boring but relaxing.
Peace. Love. Books.
Friday, June 18, 2010
bag - o - wata
Friday Friday Friday!
I had the best dinner ever last night! First, the guac and plantain chips were amazing! Then for dinner we had black eyed pea burgers, and I put some of the extra guac on top! Yum. One time Karrah and I made turkey burgers with guac, spinach, and homemade pesto mayonnaise....(Karrah I know your mouth is watering right now), but anyway, they tasted just like that! This should just turn into a food blog, because I feel like it is all I talk about.
This morning I once again shared a seat with a small school boy. Due to the fact we had to stop at school I was one of the last ones in the office, but as I was walking up the street half the interns were leaving to go on a trip...so the office was quite empty when I walked in. The goal of today was to print and make all of the stencils for the first round of samples. And because we worked on this all day long....Mission accomplished! Thank you ellen Keane for cutting everything out! Number one worker of the day.
Between making batik stamp templates my day consisted of...drinking tea, going to the bank, eating my goat and rice combo, eating a sweet potato, listening to the world cup (not by choice) and drinking my first water bag. I always have my water bottle with me, so there has not ever been a need to buy water, but today someone got one for me, so I just had to drink it. It is a small square bag that is filled with pure water. If you ask me, it looks like a square breast implant...no joke. To drink it you bite the corner and drink away. It is slightly awkward, but also kind of fun.
We were a little late leaving the office due to some packing that needed to be finished for a shipment tomorrow morning. We were walking to where we always get a taxi, and you have to walk up a hill, cross a street and then walk back down a hill where all of the taxis are parked. So we were at the top of the hill, about to walk down when a driver asked "where are you going...Elmina?" We said yes, and he said "Yes, I will take you there" so I asked if it was a shared taxi, he said yes, then I set the price, he agreed, and as the other two girls were getting in I heard a lot of commotion. I looked down the hill and all of the drivers were yelling ELMINA! ELMINA! And waving their arms. I stood watching for a minute trying to figure out what was happening, when one of the drivers started to run up the hill. So I told the other two girls to get out of the car and we would get in a different taxi. They were confused as I grabbed them out, but the drivers seemed pretty serious that they didn't want us in that taxi. Now, maybe they just wanted the business, but I trust them because everyday we get a ride home from them, so the fact that all of the drivers were yelling at us made me think it was for a good reason. When I got to the bottom of the hill Sam was a little mad at me, asking why I would get in that taxi. I was confused, and just said sorry. Then he was fine.
By the time we got home it was dinner time, and we went down to Elis for veggie curry. It was so good!
This weekend my plan is just to hang out and maybe visit one of the castles.
Peace. Love. Curry.
I had the best dinner ever last night! First, the guac and plantain chips were amazing! Then for dinner we had black eyed pea burgers, and I put some of the extra guac on top! Yum. One time Karrah and I made turkey burgers with guac, spinach, and homemade pesto mayonnaise....(Karrah I know your mouth is watering right now), but anyway, they tasted just like that! This should just turn into a food blog, because I feel like it is all I talk about.
This morning I once again shared a seat with a small school boy. Due to the fact we had to stop at school I was one of the last ones in the office, but as I was walking up the street half the interns were leaving to go on a trip...so the office was quite empty when I walked in. The goal of today was to print and make all of the stencils for the first round of samples. And because we worked on this all day long....Mission accomplished! Thank you ellen Keane for cutting everything out! Number one worker of the day.
Between making batik stamp templates my day consisted of...drinking tea, going to the bank, eating my goat and rice combo, eating a sweet potato, listening to the world cup (not by choice) and drinking my first water bag. I always have my water bottle with me, so there has not ever been a need to buy water, but today someone got one for me, so I just had to drink it. It is a small square bag that is filled with pure water. If you ask me, it looks like a square breast implant...no joke. To drink it you bite the corner and drink away. It is slightly awkward, but also kind of fun.
We were a little late leaving the office due to some packing that needed to be finished for a shipment tomorrow morning. We were walking to where we always get a taxi, and you have to walk up a hill, cross a street and then walk back down a hill where all of the taxis are parked. So we were at the top of the hill, about to walk down when a driver asked "where are you going...Elmina?" We said yes, and he said "Yes, I will take you there" so I asked if it was a shared taxi, he said yes, then I set the price, he agreed, and as the other two girls were getting in I heard a lot of commotion. I looked down the hill and all of the drivers were yelling ELMINA! ELMINA! And waving their arms. I stood watching for a minute trying to figure out what was happening, when one of the drivers started to run up the hill. So I told the other two girls to get out of the car and we would get in a different taxi. They were confused as I grabbed them out, but the drivers seemed pretty serious that they didn't want us in that taxi. Now, maybe they just wanted the business, but I trust them because everyday we get a ride home from them, so the fact that all of the drivers were yelling at us made me think it was for a good reason. When I got to the bottom of the hill Sam was a little mad at me, asking why I would get in that taxi. I was confused, and just said sorry. Then he was fine.
By the time we got home it was dinner time, and we went down to Elis for veggie curry. It was so good!
This weekend my plan is just to hang out and maybe visit one of the castles.
Peace. Love. Curry.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
..
Thursday.
Ok, the title from yesterday was just part of a dream that someone had here. Quit racking your brains as to if it came from a movie or a show.
Last night a few of us decided to make a "family dinner" aka we all just wanted to eat each others food. We made a killer rice mixture! Rice, tomato paste, garlic, curry, cayenne pepper, and ground nut butter. SO GOOD! It was like Thai rice.
I rode to work this morning in a taxi that smelled like a tackle box. It was fairly unpleasant to say the least. At least my clothes were not on backwards today...
Today was a productive day (at least for me) at work. Last night we received feedback from the US on our trend presentation, so the first item on our to do list this morning was to review the comments. Overall we got a lot of good feedback, and we are going to test a lot of new stamps. We planned out a schedule for the rest of the time the interns will be here, and as of next week it is going to be crazy!! After we planned the schedule, I met with the design team to give them the feedback, and gave them a plan for the next few days. Then I went back to working on all my projects and let them work on more new designs.
For lunch I went and got my 50 cent rice bowl....yeah, I can eat the same thing every day and not be phased by it one bit. Oh, and today I learned that I am actually eating goat! Yep, goat stew...I guess she forgot to tell me that ingredient the other day.
I spent the rest of the afternoon working on some CAD and trying to figure out the worlds most intense spreadsheet. Then I hit a wall and did a little facebook stalking while jamming to some music. When it was time to leave I decided that I wanted a frozen yogurt, so I got my 50 cents ready and went on the hunt. As I was walking up the big hill I spotted not 1, but 3 FanIce bikes!!! THREE! As I approached them I made the mistake of making eye contact with all three of them and this is when the trouble began. Obviously there was only 1 of me, and I would only be buying 1 yogurt...the only question was from who!! So, they all started begging me to buy from them and people were all around and a big bus was pulling up so I just went with the one that was closest to me. Then, the bus was getting closer....when it realized that it was not going to fit. So, everyone just started yelling! Yelling at the bus, yelling at the vendors, yelling to get out of the way, and I was just standing in the middle yelling FOR THE LOVE OF FANICE!!!! Then the bus started to make its way through, so I grabbed my FanIce and peaced out!
Something kind of funny and kind of gross happened on the way home in the taxi...luckily it did not happen to me. There was a rather sweaty woman sitting in the front seat, and as we were driving her sweat was FLYING onto the boy sitting behind her. Ick!
Now we are off to a brainstorming dinner meeting at Elis. We talked her into making guac and plantain chips. YUM!
And once again, some Q and A:
1. I am only seeing world cup action via tv. But the fans here are so funny to watch. When Ghana scored they were screaming, thanking Jesus, yelling that they love their country and dancing in the streets! And we always get to jam to a good song....Wavin' Flag by K'naan. Download it and pretend you are here with me!
2. No worries, little miss oatmeal doesn't read my blog...and I guess oh well if she does.
Peace. Love. Guac and chips.
Ok, the title from yesterday was just part of a dream that someone had here. Quit racking your brains as to if it came from a movie or a show.
Last night a few of us decided to make a "family dinner" aka we all just wanted to eat each others food. We made a killer rice mixture! Rice, tomato paste, garlic, curry, cayenne pepper, and ground nut butter. SO GOOD! It was like Thai rice.
I rode to work this morning in a taxi that smelled like a tackle box. It was fairly unpleasant to say the least. At least my clothes were not on backwards today...
Today was a productive day (at least for me) at work. Last night we received feedback from the US on our trend presentation, so the first item on our to do list this morning was to review the comments. Overall we got a lot of good feedback, and we are going to test a lot of new stamps. We planned out a schedule for the rest of the time the interns will be here, and as of next week it is going to be crazy!! After we planned the schedule, I met with the design team to give them the feedback, and gave them a plan for the next few days. Then I went back to working on all my projects and let them work on more new designs.
For lunch I went and got my 50 cent rice bowl....yeah, I can eat the same thing every day and not be phased by it one bit. Oh, and today I learned that I am actually eating goat! Yep, goat stew...I guess she forgot to tell me that ingredient the other day.
I spent the rest of the afternoon working on some CAD and trying to figure out the worlds most intense spreadsheet. Then I hit a wall and did a little facebook stalking while jamming to some music. When it was time to leave I decided that I wanted a frozen yogurt, so I got my 50 cents ready and went on the hunt. As I was walking up the big hill I spotted not 1, but 3 FanIce bikes!!! THREE! As I approached them I made the mistake of making eye contact with all three of them and this is when the trouble began. Obviously there was only 1 of me, and I would only be buying 1 yogurt...the only question was from who!! So, they all started begging me to buy from them and people were all around and a big bus was pulling up so I just went with the one that was closest to me. Then, the bus was getting closer....when it realized that it was not going to fit. So, everyone just started yelling! Yelling at the bus, yelling at the vendors, yelling to get out of the way, and I was just standing in the middle yelling FOR THE LOVE OF FANICE!!!! Then the bus started to make its way through, so I grabbed my FanIce and peaced out!
Something kind of funny and kind of gross happened on the way home in the taxi...luckily it did not happen to me. There was a rather sweaty woman sitting in the front seat, and as we were driving her sweat was FLYING onto the boy sitting behind her. Ick!
Now we are off to a brainstorming dinner meeting at Elis. We talked her into making guac and plantain chips. YUM!
And once again, some Q and A:
1. I am only seeing world cup action via tv. But the fans here are so funny to watch. When Ghana scored they were screaming, thanking Jesus, yelling that they love their country and dancing in the streets! And we always get to jam to a good song....Wavin' Flag by K'naan. Download it and pretend you are here with me!
2. No worries, little miss oatmeal doesn't read my blog...and I guess oh well if she does.
Peace. Love. Guac and chips.
I threw your laptop down the laundry shoot...now your parents will never love you!
Wednesday.
Powdered Milk Love.
Do you ever watch The Real World....or I guess any reality tv show, and think, "those people are crazy!" Well, I am starting to realize why some of those people snap! Currently I live in an 8 bedroom, 4 bathroom house with 15 people, a dog, a parrot and multiple other "house guests" (a rat, some lizards, spiders etc.) Point being...the house is packed.
I think that the morning is the most challenging to deal with, because EVERYONE is trying to get read, and make breakfast, and use the bathroom, and get out the door by 7:30. When I first started here, I would escape to the balcony for a little peace and quite, however that has quickly become over crowded.....so now I just try to stay in my room for as long as possible.
I'm not anti-social.....I just need a little peace in the morning!
This morning I had the plan to get up at my usual time, but rather than staying in bed to read, I would get up and make my breakfast and then read after. So I go down to the kitchen and turn the hot pot on to boil water for my tea. Then I was going toast some bread in the frying pan. We have a gas stove, and I have only ever had an electric stove, so the task of lighting the stove makes me shudder every time I have to do it. First light of the match....it lit right away, but then the tip of the match went flying off (while on fire) and fell to the floor. Ugh! Second match...went out before it made it to the gas. Third match...(I am mad at this point) success!! Until I don't hold the gas on for long enough, and the stove goes off. Double UGH! Finally, someone just did it for me.
At this point, my water has finished boiling and is sitting in the kettle. I put my bread in the pan, and it is almost instantly toasted, so I am quite focused on not burning the other side. While I am watching my bread, someone asks if I was the one who boiled the water....I say yes I am going to make some tea as soon as this is finished. Apparently this translated into something along the lines of "yeah, I made it, but why don't you just go ahead and use it for yourself," because as I turn around to put my bread on the plate and pour my tea, I look over and see what should be my hot water going into someones bowl. Now....I understand this is just hot water, and it is not something to get upset about, but it was 6:00 in the morning, and I just wanted my breakfast! So, being the non confrontational person I am, I just stood holding my bread with a shocked look on my face as little miss hot oatmeal mixed her bowl, totally unaware. RUDE!
At this point, the kitchen is now full of everyone wanted the stove and hot water and everything under the sun, so we fill up the entire kettle and I wait for water....AGAIN!
Ok, I am done, it just really made me mad.
Now, onto work. The plan for work today was to hold a workshop for the quality control team about measuring standards. The four of us that were going to put it on met this morning to go over the plan, when we decided that we wanted to run through it completely before we held it. (If you are not interested in my school work just skip down to the next section) The plan was to pull a garment and have each of the workers measure 15 different spots. We would then compare the measurements to what the product specifications were. So, we decided that it would be a good idea to see what measurements we got when we did it ourselves. This is when things went crazy. We all found different measurements, none of which matched the specs of what should have been. Finding this out, we decided to cancel the workshop for today, because we knew everyone would end up being confused if we went on with it. Canceling it was not a big deal, because quality control is in this office and we were just going to interrupt their work to have the workshop. We spent the rest of the morning trying to figure out the exact spots being measured by quality control, because we knew it could not be the same ones that we were looking at. Its a mess.
We needed a break from the measuring, because it was getting to a point where we were so overwhelmed that it was no longer a productive meeting. Do you know how we decided to solve this issues? 50 peswa rice and pepper stew!
It solves all problems.
I spent the next part of the afternoon working on about 10 things at once. Then I had to take someone to the trotro station to catch a car to Accra.
I left the office early today so that I could go next door to our neighbors house to batik. Well, I didn't need to batik today, but I thought I should get to know her before I use her house. On the way back to Elmina it started pouring rain! Of course all of the windows were down and the rain came flying in! This was around the same point I noticed that the speedometer was not working.....I watched as the driver manually pulled his window up, and then he proceeded to pull over and pull up the passenger side window as well. Once all the windows were up, we were on our way again. Seeing as this is Ghana, and the weather is naturally steamy, out car fogged up pretty quick. Now, we did not know the speed limit, I was feeling nauseous from lack of air, and the driver was driving with one hand so that he could wipe the fog off the window with his other one. Lovely!
I'm eating powdered milk and cereal for dinner again!
Peace. Love. 50 cent.
Powdered Milk Love.
Do you ever watch The Real World....or I guess any reality tv show, and think, "those people are crazy!" Well, I am starting to realize why some of those people snap! Currently I live in an 8 bedroom, 4 bathroom house with 15 people, a dog, a parrot and multiple other "house guests" (a rat, some lizards, spiders etc.) Point being...the house is packed.
I think that the morning is the most challenging to deal with, because EVERYONE is trying to get read, and make breakfast, and use the bathroom, and get out the door by 7:30. When I first started here, I would escape to the balcony for a little peace and quite, however that has quickly become over crowded.....so now I just try to stay in my room for as long as possible.
I'm not anti-social.....I just need a little peace in the morning!
This morning I had the plan to get up at my usual time, but rather than staying in bed to read, I would get up and make my breakfast and then read after. So I go down to the kitchen and turn the hot pot on to boil water for my tea. Then I was going toast some bread in the frying pan. We have a gas stove, and I have only ever had an electric stove, so the task of lighting the stove makes me shudder every time I have to do it. First light of the match....it lit right away, but then the tip of the match went flying off (while on fire) and fell to the floor. Ugh! Second match...went out before it made it to the gas. Third match...(I am mad at this point) success!! Until I don't hold the gas on for long enough, and the stove goes off. Double UGH! Finally, someone just did it for me.
At this point, my water has finished boiling and is sitting in the kettle. I put my bread in the pan, and it is almost instantly toasted, so I am quite focused on not burning the other side. While I am watching my bread, someone asks if I was the one who boiled the water....I say yes I am going to make some tea as soon as this is finished. Apparently this translated into something along the lines of "yeah, I made it, but why don't you just go ahead and use it for yourself," because as I turn around to put my bread on the plate and pour my tea, I look over and see what should be my hot water going into someones bowl. Now....I understand this is just hot water, and it is not something to get upset about, but it was 6:00 in the morning, and I just wanted my breakfast! So, being the non confrontational person I am, I just stood holding my bread with a shocked look on my face as little miss hot oatmeal mixed her bowl, totally unaware. RUDE!
At this point, the kitchen is now full of everyone wanted the stove and hot water and everything under the sun, so we fill up the entire kettle and I wait for water....AGAIN!
Ok, I am done, it just really made me mad.
Now, onto work. The plan for work today was to hold a workshop for the quality control team about measuring standards. The four of us that were going to put it on met this morning to go over the plan, when we decided that we wanted to run through it completely before we held it. (If you are not interested in my school work just skip down to the next section) The plan was to pull a garment and have each of the workers measure 15 different spots. We would then compare the measurements to what the product specifications were. So, we decided that it would be a good idea to see what measurements we got when we did it ourselves. This is when things went crazy. We all found different measurements, none of which matched the specs of what should have been. Finding this out, we decided to cancel the workshop for today, because we knew everyone would end up being confused if we went on with it. Canceling it was not a big deal, because quality control is in this office and we were just going to interrupt their work to have the workshop. We spent the rest of the morning trying to figure out the exact spots being measured by quality control, because we knew it could not be the same ones that we were looking at. Its a mess.
We needed a break from the measuring, because it was getting to a point where we were so overwhelmed that it was no longer a productive meeting. Do you know how we decided to solve this issues? 50 peswa rice and pepper stew!
It solves all problems.
I spent the next part of the afternoon working on about 10 things at once. Then I had to take someone to the trotro station to catch a car to Accra.
I left the office early today so that I could go next door to our neighbors house to batik. Well, I didn't need to batik today, but I thought I should get to know her before I use her house. On the way back to Elmina it started pouring rain! Of course all of the windows were down and the rain came flying in! This was around the same point I noticed that the speedometer was not working.....I watched as the driver manually pulled his window up, and then he proceeded to pull over and pull up the passenger side window as well. Once all the windows were up, we were on our way again. Seeing as this is Ghana, and the weather is naturally steamy, out car fogged up pretty quick. Now, we did not know the speed limit, I was feeling nauseous from lack of air, and the driver was driving with one hand so that he could wipe the fog off the window with his other one. Lovely!
I'm eating powdered milk and cereal for dinner again!
Peace. Love. 50 cent.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Ice cold powder milk......
Tuesday.
I knew it would be an interesting day when I got into the taxi and noticed that my dress was on backwards.....oh brother.
Work went by so slow today. Seriously I think I was half asleep the first part of the day. I continued working on the stamp library and I prepared some stencils to test out new batik prints. Oh, I also scheduled some site visits for the other interns to go on in the afternoon.
Then I was so excited because my custom hoodie came in today! It is so cool, its orange and pink and white. Perfect for the beach.
Again, I lost track of time and took a late lunch. I went to the market because I was having a serious cereal craving. I had a rather small selection, so I went with Honey Flakes, because there was a very happy little bear on the front of the box. Then I broke down and purchased some powder milk....I will let you know my thoughts on that tomorrow.
On my way back to the office I scored a frozen yogurt! So good!
After lunch some of the designers were at a site visit, so I met with the remaining design team to plan the workshop we are giving tomorrow. There have been some issues with measuring, and we decided that the best way to solve the problem is to work hands on with the quality control team. It will be a short workshop, but I think it is better to have multiple short workshops than to overwhelm the workers with too much information.
Later in the afternoon I decided that I wanted a snack, and discovered what I will now eat for lunch everyday. For 50 peswas (less than 50 cents) I got a huge bowl of rice and some tomato pepper stew. Now, I will not lie to you...I thought about this food choice for a long time. First, I was concerned because it was legit street food. Then, I kept thinking of people saying how you should only eat street food that you see being cooked, and is served to you hot. This was sitting on the table, and God only knows when it was made. But, I was really hungry, so I went for it. Good thing I did, because it was so good and spicy! Yum!
At the end of the day I had a meeting with Maria to talk about the progress of the projects. During our very formal meeting...the office was a mad house. There were people coming in and out, and phones ringing, and people calling people telling them if they call back again we will track them and have them arrested...it was quite the afternoon.
It is now time to try the powdered milk...update tomorrow
Peace. Love. Tuesday.
I knew it would be an interesting day when I got into the taxi and noticed that my dress was on backwards.....oh brother.
Work went by so slow today. Seriously I think I was half asleep the first part of the day. I continued working on the stamp library and I prepared some stencils to test out new batik prints. Oh, I also scheduled some site visits for the other interns to go on in the afternoon.
Then I was so excited because my custom hoodie came in today! It is so cool, its orange and pink and white. Perfect for the beach.
Again, I lost track of time and took a late lunch. I went to the market because I was having a serious cereal craving. I had a rather small selection, so I went with Honey Flakes, because there was a very happy little bear on the front of the box. Then I broke down and purchased some powder milk....I will let you know my thoughts on that tomorrow.
On my way back to the office I scored a frozen yogurt! So good!
After lunch some of the designers were at a site visit, so I met with the remaining design team to plan the workshop we are giving tomorrow. There have been some issues with measuring, and we decided that the best way to solve the problem is to work hands on with the quality control team. It will be a short workshop, but I think it is better to have multiple short workshops than to overwhelm the workers with too much information.
Later in the afternoon I decided that I wanted a snack, and discovered what I will now eat for lunch everyday. For 50 peswas (less than 50 cents) I got a huge bowl of rice and some tomato pepper stew. Now, I will not lie to you...I thought about this food choice for a long time. First, I was concerned because it was legit street food. Then, I kept thinking of people saying how you should only eat street food that you see being cooked, and is served to you hot. This was sitting on the table, and God only knows when it was made. But, I was really hungry, so I went for it. Good thing I did, because it was so good and spicy! Yum!
At the end of the day I had a meeting with Maria to talk about the progress of the projects. During our very formal meeting...the office was a mad house. There were people coming in and out, and phones ringing, and people calling people telling them if they call back again we will track them and have them arrested...it was quite the afternoon.
It is now time to try the powdered milk...update tomorrow
Peace. Love. Tuesday.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Monday.....back to oatmeal
Week Five.
Time is flying by!
I was soooo tired this morning. My alarm went off, and all I wanted to do was sleep. However, once I wake up, I do not usually fall back asleep, so I just stayed in my bed for an hour and started my new book. Then I forced myself to get up and get on with my day.
The house is jam packed in the morning, with everyone trying to get ready and get breakfast and ahhh every single room and chair is full. I use to have the balcony to myself, but they caught onto that, and now it is the first spot to fill up.
On the way to work I had a little friend in the front seat with me. This little one was about 5 years old, and was so darn cute in his green school uniform with his backpack and lunch bag. I really need to find a school where I can hang out with the little ones for awhile.
This morning I was in a little bit of a mood (surprise, surprise) so I set my work station up in the main office, rather than in the design room. I just needed my peace. I spent the entire day working on the stamp library. Currently, there is no organized way of knowing what stamps have been used, and what colors they were sampled in, so my OCD has taken over, and is now getting everything in order.
I took a late lunch, because I was so wrapped up in my project that I did not know lunch time had passed. I went down to the market and ended up finding a really cool fabric store! I think they will be getting a nice chunk of money from me, because I was in love with all of the wild prints. I think you have to at least buy 1 yard, but it was a really good price, and it felt like a nice quality! The store was mostly raw material, but there were a few pre made garments. I ended up getting a dress for 75% off of the original price, so I could not pass it up. It has a very African feel to it, but I think I can pull it off once I get back to the states.
Today I was walking down the street next to a goat, when suddenly he stopped, sneezed and then poop shot out of his butt. Then he sneezed again and more poop. It was so funny to me at the time, so of course I laughed at it.
When we got back to the house there were two new volunteers. One is a designer, and one is working in Accra, but wanted to see Cape Coast.
Good news, Pepo is fine. He just has a little bacteria infection.
And now...the ever so popular Q & A section.
1. Yes, I am sure that I am OK from the monkey bite.
2. At this point I have read:
- The year of living like Jesus
- Made from Scratch
- The Irresistible Revolution
- A Case for Christ
.......and I am currently reading Something Borrowed.
peace. love. I could really go for some popcorn right now.
Time is flying by!
I was soooo tired this morning. My alarm went off, and all I wanted to do was sleep. However, once I wake up, I do not usually fall back asleep, so I just stayed in my bed for an hour and started my new book. Then I forced myself to get up and get on with my day.
The house is jam packed in the morning, with everyone trying to get ready and get breakfast and ahhh every single room and chair is full. I use to have the balcony to myself, but they caught onto that, and now it is the first spot to fill up.
On the way to work I had a little friend in the front seat with me. This little one was about 5 years old, and was so darn cute in his green school uniform with his backpack and lunch bag. I really need to find a school where I can hang out with the little ones for awhile.
This morning I was in a little bit of a mood (surprise, surprise) so I set my work station up in the main office, rather than in the design room. I just needed my peace. I spent the entire day working on the stamp library. Currently, there is no organized way of knowing what stamps have been used, and what colors they were sampled in, so my OCD has taken over, and is now getting everything in order.
I took a late lunch, because I was so wrapped up in my project that I did not know lunch time had passed. I went down to the market and ended up finding a really cool fabric store! I think they will be getting a nice chunk of money from me, because I was in love with all of the wild prints. I think you have to at least buy 1 yard, but it was a really good price, and it felt like a nice quality! The store was mostly raw material, but there were a few pre made garments. I ended up getting a dress for 75% off of the original price, so I could not pass it up. It has a very African feel to it, but I think I can pull it off once I get back to the states.
Today I was walking down the street next to a goat, when suddenly he stopped, sneezed and then poop shot out of his butt. Then he sneezed again and more poop. It was so funny to me at the time, so of course I laughed at it.
When we got back to the house there were two new volunteers. One is a designer, and one is working in Accra, but wanted to see Cape Coast.
Good news, Pepo is fine. He just has a little bacteria infection.
And now...the ever so popular Q & A section.
1. Yes, I am sure that I am OK from the monkey bite.
2. At this point I have read:
- The year of living like Jesus
- Made from Scratch
- The Irresistible Revolution
- A Case for Christ
.......and I am currently reading Something Borrowed.
peace. love. I could really go for some popcorn right now.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
No more monkey business
Well my faithful readers....I am back from my weekend at busua beach. I think I should live there.
The trotro ride was an adventure as always. I need to just accept that when a driver tells us that he knows where we are going that it is a lie. We drove for quite awhile and took a few wrong turns in the jungle before we finally found the Alaska hotel. For less than 15 US dollars each we were able to stay two nights in really sweet huts.
When we got to the beach it was already dark outside, despite our early start and we were all starving! After we put out stuff in our rooms we went out to the sitting area to order some food. The woman who runs the hotel is wild. She reminds me of the voodoo woman from pirates of the Caribbean. Wild clothes, shells in her hair....she is funny. However, she was also very nice and gave us discounts on all of our food for being students and volunteers. So, once again I had French Toast. This time it was French toast how I imagine it to be. Cinnamon, sugar and an added twist of lemon and syrup that tasted like honey! Yummm.
After dinner we had a huge fire on the beach. The built what looked like a fire tower, and it burned down. Then we just sat on the beach and watched the stars for awhile. We as a group have come to call moments like that an "oh africa moment" where you stop and think...ohhh I'm in Africa right now.
Then I had to pee before bed, so I walked over to the communal toilet and tried to pee while 5 lizards watched me on the walls. To add to the animal interaction for the evening Pepo slept on top of my head all night. What a spoiled dog.
Saturday.
Shockingly I was able to sleep in a little, most likely because there was not a rooster screaming out my window. We all met back at the beach for breakfast. I had REAL coffee....it was perfect. So we all sat on the beach and enjoyed our hot coffee with milk and sugar. Then I decided that I was hungry, so I went up to the bar to order.
Now, don't freak out at what I am about to say.....there are monkeys here, and on my way back to the table I think I got a little too close for the monkeys comfort and he jumped onto my leg and bit me. I SAID DON'T FREAK OUT! I got all of my shots before I came here, and I washed it and sanitized it right after it happened. Its fine.....red cross just might never take my blood again. Really, its fine.
After the attack (yes using the word attack is a little drams I know) I enjoyed my wonderful breakfast, of fried eggs, toast, and potatoes. Soo good.
After breakfast we just sat around, because it started to rain. But then we decided that we could still swim in the rain, so the kind lady from before gave us some body boards to use on the waves. Obviously next to the surfers we looked really cool.....but it was so fun, and the waves were so good for using the body boards. I think I will become a professional body boarder. I really think it could work out.....
For dinner we went down to the Black Star Surf Shop/internet cafe/restaurant. We picked this particular spot to eat because there was a wide selection of food, now I am aware that that exact reason can be used to not pick a spot to eat, but today it all sounded so good! I ordered a burrito, and it was the perfect food to settle all American cravings. Seriously, watch out Qdoba, Ghana knows how to make a burrito. Right after dinner it was time for the US vs. England game, so the surf shop pulled a tv out from nowhere and we all gathered around to watch the game...on the beach. There were the Global Mamas interns,two people from Spain, some peace corps guys,surfers from all over,a french man, some Canadians, a family from London, a man from Israel, and tons of excited kids from the village.
The majority was cheering on England, however the match was called at US 1 England 1, so I guess everyone was happy.
When the match ended they started a huge fire on the beach and turned some music on. All of the kids were dancing around, and were seriously such good dancers. We all hung out on the beach until the fire burned out. All the kids were hanging around until everyone was gone. We all kept thinking....do their parents wonder where they are. Isn't it a little odd that 5 year olds are hanging at the beach at 11 at night.
Sunday.
I was the first one up today, but I enjoyed my alone time on the beach with my coffee and book. When a few more people got up we ordered breakfast. I thought I was getting an egg sandwich, however that somehow translated to a grilled cheese. It was soooooo good though. There was onion and avocado on it.....mmmmm. Towards the end of breakfast one of our little kid friends came to hang out with us, and score some chocolate chip pancakes.
We met this particular kid through one of the guys from England. He met this little boy on the beach and found out that he was deaf. They were pretty much inseparable the rest of the weekend. He was so cute, and he loved playing with peop and just hanging out with all of us. We all wanted him to come back with us.
After breakfast we came back to our part of the beach, but it was really cold and windy, so I grabbed a hammock and did a little reading. For lunch we decided to go back to the surf shop, because the food was just that good! When we walked up almost everyone from the night before were there as well. The British family was leaving for the next stop on their adventure, and all the little kids were so sad to see the younger guy leave.
After lunch the Ghana game was on, and I started to watch it, but honestly I had no idea what was happening, so I went in the waves. When we finished body boarding it was time to go, so we all got back into the trotro and headed home. :-(
Pepo and Maria did not come back with us because Pepo is still ill and he needs a blood test. Poor little pup.
One final story from the weekend. I would like to talk about the characters that were staying at the Alaska. Other than the pirates of the Caribbean voodoo woman, there was an French surfer who was the poster child for what too many drugs can do for you. He was best friends with some of the monkeys.... Then there was a German couple who lived in a semi truck, and looked freakishly alike. Late at night there were some guys that looked like they were old school punks from London, and then the most mysterious of all.....the old men with the young African women. We could not figure out their story. We decided that it was most likely creepy, so we did not try too hard to figure it out. It was quite a colorful bunch.
This weekend will be in my top five favorite Ghana moments.
Peace. Love. Monkey bites.
The trotro ride was an adventure as always. I need to just accept that when a driver tells us that he knows where we are going that it is a lie. We drove for quite awhile and took a few wrong turns in the jungle before we finally found the Alaska hotel. For less than 15 US dollars each we were able to stay two nights in really sweet huts.
When we got to the beach it was already dark outside, despite our early start and we were all starving! After we put out stuff in our rooms we went out to the sitting area to order some food. The woman who runs the hotel is wild. She reminds me of the voodoo woman from pirates of the Caribbean. Wild clothes, shells in her hair....she is funny. However, she was also very nice and gave us discounts on all of our food for being students and volunteers. So, once again I had French Toast. This time it was French toast how I imagine it to be. Cinnamon, sugar and an added twist of lemon and syrup that tasted like honey! Yummm.
After dinner we had a huge fire on the beach. The built what looked like a fire tower, and it burned down. Then we just sat on the beach and watched the stars for awhile. We as a group have come to call moments like that an "oh africa moment" where you stop and think...ohhh I'm in Africa right now.
Then I had to pee before bed, so I walked over to the communal toilet and tried to pee while 5 lizards watched me on the walls. To add to the animal interaction for the evening Pepo slept on top of my head all night. What a spoiled dog.
Saturday.
Shockingly I was able to sleep in a little, most likely because there was not a rooster screaming out my window. We all met back at the beach for breakfast. I had REAL coffee....it was perfect. So we all sat on the beach and enjoyed our hot coffee with milk and sugar. Then I decided that I was hungry, so I went up to the bar to order.
Now, don't freak out at what I am about to say.....there are monkeys here, and on my way back to the table I think I got a little too close for the monkeys comfort and he jumped onto my leg and bit me. I SAID DON'T FREAK OUT! I got all of my shots before I came here, and I washed it and sanitized it right after it happened. Its fine.....red cross just might never take my blood again. Really, its fine.
After the attack (yes using the word attack is a little drams I know) I enjoyed my wonderful breakfast, of fried eggs, toast, and potatoes. Soo good.
After breakfast we just sat around, because it started to rain. But then we decided that we could still swim in the rain, so the kind lady from before gave us some body boards to use on the waves. Obviously next to the surfers we looked really cool.....but it was so fun, and the waves were so good for using the body boards. I think I will become a professional body boarder. I really think it could work out.....
For dinner we went down to the Black Star Surf Shop/internet cafe/restaurant. We picked this particular spot to eat because there was a wide selection of food, now I am aware that that exact reason can be used to not pick a spot to eat, but today it all sounded so good! I ordered a burrito, and it was the perfect food to settle all American cravings. Seriously, watch out Qdoba, Ghana knows how to make a burrito. Right after dinner it was time for the US vs. England game, so the surf shop pulled a tv out from nowhere and we all gathered around to watch the game...on the beach. There were the Global Mamas interns,two people from Spain, some peace corps guys,surfers from all over,a french man, some Canadians, a family from London, a man from Israel, and tons of excited kids from the village.
The majority was cheering on England, however the match was called at US 1 England 1, so I guess everyone was happy.
When the match ended they started a huge fire on the beach and turned some music on. All of the kids were dancing around, and were seriously such good dancers. We all hung out on the beach until the fire burned out. All the kids were hanging around until everyone was gone. We all kept thinking....do their parents wonder where they are. Isn't it a little odd that 5 year olds are hanging at the beach at 11 at night.
Sunday.
I was the first one up today, but I enjoyed my alone time on the beach with my coffee and book. When a few more people got up we ordered breakfast. I thought I was getting an egg sandwich, however that somehow translated to a grilled cheese. It was soooooo good though. There was onion and avocado on it.....mmmmm. Towards the end of breakfast one of our little kid friends came to hang out with us, and score some chocolate chip pancakes.
We met this particular kid through one of the guys from England. He met this little boy on the beach and found out that he was deaf. They were pretty much inseparable the rest of the weekend. He was so cute, and he loved playing with peop and just hanging out with all of us. We all wanted him to come back with us.
After breakfast we came back to our part of the beach, but it was really cold and windy, so I grabbed a hammock and did a little reading. For lunch we decided to go back to the surf shop, because the food was just that good! When we walked up almost everyone from the night before were there as well. The British family was leaving for the next stop on their adventure, and all the little kids were so sad to see the younger guy leave.
After lunch the Ghana game was on, and I started to watch it, but honestly I had no idea what was happening, so I went in the waves. When we finished body boarding it was time to go, so we all got back into the trotro and headed home. :-(
Pepo and Maria did not come back with us because Pepo is still ill and he needs a blood test. Poor little pup.
One final story from the weekend. I would like to talk about the characters that were staying at the Alaska. Other than the pirates of the Caribbean voodoo woman, there was an French surfer who was the poster child for what too many drugs can do for you. He was best friends with some of the monkeys.... Then there was a German couple who lived in a semi truck, and looked freakishly alike. Late at night there were some guys that looked like they were old school punks from London, and then the most mysterious of all.....the old men with the young African women. We could not figure out their story. We decided that it was most likely creepy, so we did not try too hard to figure it out. It was quite a colorful bunch.
This weekend will be in my top five favorite Ghana moments.
Peace. Love. Monkey bites.
Friday, June 11, 2010
FRIDAY!
Another week down!
I bring you this post from the back seat of a trotro. Window seat to be exact. 10 Obruniss and 1 dog.
Work pretty much sucked today. It was stressful, and frustrating. I feel that I have a different work ethic than most of the others, and I am not use to having to told someone's hand to get a project done. Oh the joy of being in a leadership position.
After an annoying morning, we took a half day in honor of Pepo, and now we are off for a weekend at the beach.
I won't be blogging until Sunday night.
Peace. Love. Pepo.
I bring you this post from the back seat of a trotro. Window seat to be exact. 10 Obruniss and 1 dog.
Work pretty much sucked today. It was stressful, and frustrating. I feel that I have a different work ethic than most of the others, and I am not use to having to told someone's hand to get a project done. Oh the joy of being in a leadership position.
After an annoying morning, we took a half day in honor of Pepo, and now we are off for a weekend at the beach.
I won't be blogging until Sunday night.
Peace. Love. Pepo.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Take a Bite
Thursday.
I have been eaten alive. Bug bite madness.
What's the deal....I post a question and only one person responds! My readers have disappointed me.
The ground around our house was a little water logged today, so we had to walk a different way to get a taxi. I should have known it was going to be an interesting ride when the driver could hardly answer if he would take us a Cape Coast for 80 peswas. But 7 of us piled into the car (yes a car, not a tro) and we were on our way. Sometimes I close my eyes because the wind is blowing my hair all over the place (or maybe out of fear for my life) and the driver must have known that was why my eyes were shut, so he put the back windows up. However, the one window was off of its track and made a horrible sound. Then he had the radio on. Normally, this would be an added bonus on a taxi ride, however, today I wanted to cut my ears off! Think of when a cd skips, and add some choppy talking on top of that, and then play it threw blown out speakers. That was the noise I heard for 20 long minutes this morning. Plus, the drivers phone was ringing an obnoxious sound. Can you tell that I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?? The driver also took a "short cut" this morning, but he went the wrong way, so it actually wasn't short at all. Gaaah!
When we got to work we all had different projects to work on, and as part of my job, I jump around between a little of everything. Today I worked with one of the girls on the layout of the 2011 catalog. We had a lot of good ideas, and everything was flowing...and then there was an issue with a batch of dresses. This dress has been haunting me from the moment I touched ground in Ghana. The we fixed the main issue with how the dress was fitting, but now there were issues with how the dress was being sewn. An entire batch came in, and none of them passed the quality control inspection. Lots of stressing out later, I had to make a trip to go visit the dressmaker, to show her the issues. It was an uncomfortable experience, because why should she listen to me, she can sew 10 times faster than I can, while using a hand crank sewing machine. (Its a beauty). So, I explained to her the issues, and told her that she needed to be sewing with a much smaller and sharper needle. She told me that they didn't make them, and I had to tell her that they did make them. Then we had to talk about her sewing lines, and how they needed to be straight and smooth. The final issue was that she was not using a seam ripper to remove a mistake. Her solution was to just RIP it out, pulling each sid of the fabric. This explained so much.
We told her that she could not remove stitches that way, and that she needed to take her time. She told me that she was very sad, but I told her we just wanted her to fix it before it was too late, and her dresses were rejected. Then we took one of her workers to the market to buy seam rippers. We were walking along, and then suddenly I was back in the market, surrounded by the smell of hot (uncooked) meat! Gaaaaaaaah! I picked up the speed during that section. I was glad we went into the market though because I found some fabric vendors tucked in the way back. Now I just need to figure out how to get back to that section without passing the dead animals.
Speaking of animals, poor Pepo is sick. He has been so sad lately, and today he stayed under the bed all day. Maria is trying to give him some meds right now. Poor puppy.
Back to work! After the site visit I went all the way back to work only to find that everyone was on lunch. However, I lucked out because one of the women who makes hoodies was there, so I placed an order for a wild orange one. I should have it next week! I had to run a few errands on my lunch, so I had to walk back to the market to find some food. At one of the stores a women asked what was around my ankle, and I said a bracelet, and she could not understand why I would want to tie scrap fabric around my leg. Then, after looking at it some more, she said are you working for Global Mamas? I was like yes, how did you know? She said she could tell by the print of the fabric. The rest of the afternoon I went back to work on the catalog.
When I got back to the house I went over to the resort to workout because I was in serious need of some alone, and de-stress time. After I worked out, I decided that I would put the extra effort in and take a shower. I have not washed my hair in 5 days......let me tell you..I feel CLEAN! :-)
Tomorrow I think we are going to take a half day and take a trip to the beach for the weekend. Pepo will be turning 1, so to celebrate we are all going away to Busua Beach. Google it. Then pray for Pepo to feel better, and sunshine this weekend.
Peace. Love. My hair smells like coconut.
I have been eaten alive. Bug bite madness.
What's the deal....I post a question and only one person responds! My readers have disappointed me.
The ground around our house was a little water logged today, so we had to walk a different way to get a taxi. I should have known it was going to be an interesting ride when the driver could hardly answer if he would take us a Cape Coast for 80 peswas. But 7 of us piled into the car (yes a car, not a tro) and we were on our way. Sometimes I close my eyes because the wind is blowing my hair all over the place (or maybe out of fear for my life) and the driver must have known that was why my eyes were shut, so he put the back windows up. However, the one window was off of its track and made a horrible sound. Then he had the radio on. Normally, this would be an added bonus on a taxi ride, however, today I wanted to cut my ears off! Think of when a cd skips, and add some choppy talking on top of that, and then play it threw blown out speakers. That was the noise I heard for 20 long minutes this morning. Plus, the drivers phone was ringing an obnoxious sound. Can you tell that I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?? The driver also took a "short cut" this morning, but he went the wrong way, so it actually wasn't short at all. Gaaah!
When we got to work we all had different projects to work on, and as part of my job, I jump around between a little of everything. Today I worked with one of the girls on the layout of the 2011 catalog. We had a lot of good ideas, and everything was flowing...and then there was an issue with a batch of dresses. This dress has been haunting me from the moment I touched ground in Ghana. The we fixed the main issue with how the dress was fitting, but now there were issues with how the dress was being sewn. An entire batch came in, and none of them passed the quality control inspection. Lots of stressing out later, I had to make a trip to go visit the dressmaker, to show her the issues. It was an uncomfortable experience, because why should she listen to me, she can sew 10 times faster than I can, while using a hand crank sewing machine. (Its a beauty). So, I explained to her the issues, and told her that she needed to be sewing with a much smaller and sharper needle. She told me that they didn't make them, and I had to tell her that they did make them. Then we had to talk about her sewing lines, and how they needed to be straight and smooth. The final issue was that she was not using a seam ripper to remove a mistake. Her solution was to just RIP it out, pulling each sid of the fabric. This explained so much.
We told her that she could not remove stitches that way, and that she needed to take her time. She told me that she was very sad, but I told her we just wanted her to fix it before it was too late, and her dresses were rejected. Then we took one of her workers to the market to buy seam rippers. We were walking along, and then suddenly I was back in the market, surrounded by the smell of hot (uncooked) meat! Gaaaaaaaah! I picked up the speed during that section. I was glad we went into the market though because I found some fabric vendors tucked in the way back. Now I just need to figure out how to get back to that section without passing the dead animals.
Speaking of animals, poor Pepo is sick. He has been so sad lately, and today he stayed under the bed all day. Maria is trying to give him some meds right now. Poor puppy.
Back to work! After the site visit I went all the way back to work only to find that everyone was on lunch. However, I lucked out because one of the women who makes hoodies was there, so I placed an order for a wild orange one. I should have it next week! I had to run a few errands on my lunch, so I had to walk back to the market to find some food. At one of the stores a women asked what was around my ankle, and I said a bracelet, and she could not understand why I would want to tie scrap fabric around my leg. Then, after looking at it some more, she said are you working for Global Mamas? I was like yes, how did you know? She said she could tell by the print of the fabric. The rest of the afternoon I went back to work on the catalog.
When I got back to the house I went over to the resort to workout because I was in serious need of some alone, and de-stress time. After I worked out, I decided that I would put the extra effort in and take a shower. I have not washed my hair in 5 days......let me tell you..I feel CLEAN! :-)
Tomorrow I think we are going to take a half day and take a trip to the beach for the weekend. Pepo will be turning 1, so to celebrate we are all going away to Busua Beach. Google it. Then pray for Pepo to feel better, and sunshine this weekend.
Peace. Love. My hair smells like coconut.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Technology Fail
Wednesday.
It rained a lot last night. A lot.
Well, the morning started off with smoke filling the kitchen. Minor stove fire. I guess nobody was listening at fire safety Sunday. Maria was making Pepo some rice for breakfast, and I think she forgot what she was doing, because she walked away and next thing we knew, it was on fire. So one of the girls did something to stop it, and Maria came in the kitchen and said "oooooooh I am soooo bad at cooking in the morning" (say that with a Spanish accent). I don't know if Peop ended up eating breakfast today.
This morning I went into work a little late today, because I had to go to the hotel to send our trend presentation. They have a faster connection, so I figures it would cause less stress if I went over there. Lucky for me, the internet was fast and the file sent in record time.....I need to be in and out over there so that my husband can't hunt me down.
As I was getting ready to leave, it started raining really really hard, and Maria (the office manager) was at the hotel as well, so we decided to wait a few minutes until it stopped. Then we called a taxi, and had door to door drop service. We treat rain days like snow days, you just don't want to leave house.
When we got to the office we went to a workshop that was being put on for the women about financial independence. Even though it was half in Fante, I feel like I learned a lot. At these workshops there is always some kind of ice breaker (very Laura Jay) and today the question was..."If you had all the money in the world, what would you do?" Some women said they would open an orphanage, some would open more businesses, some would travel, some would pay their workers more. I decided that (one of) mine would be to find the worlds BEST cup of coffee! Now it is your turn to tell me what you would do. (Laura you better do this).
The meeting went on for what seemed like days, but when they brought in a cooler of FanIce, I knew that I would survive until the end. After the meeting, the design team got together with some of the fair trade workers and talked about going on site visits, to see the women working. We were able to schedule a few during the meeting today, but with the way things work around here, we will still need to call the day we plan to go just to be sure.
When we went back to the design room.....aka the storage room, I had an email from the US office about the presentation, and they were so impressed with it. That means we are off to a good start! I think that we have a really good design team, and for the most part we all have very similar ideas. I think there will be some good products coming out!
There was such a cute little kid at work today. He was just sitting on the bench, behaving so well. We played for a few minutes, but I still do not know who he belongs to. Hopefully he will be back again. I think I need to find some little kids to hang out with.
The rest of the afternoon flew past, and then it was time to go. The weather had been pretty bad all day, and when we were walking to get a taxi home, it looked really creepy outside. The sky was so dark, and the ocean was a really strange combination of blues, and the goats were running around like nuts. Strange feeling, but we made it home without anything odd happening.
Once I got home I was completely exhausted. This gloomy weather is so annoying.
My roommate is feeling much better, but she is not fully recovered from the mystery illness yet. And now another girl is sick. I'm telling you...these interns are dropping like flies.
Oh, random fact. Today I found out that Ellen has TWO kids! That's all I know, but I will find out more. I think I should meet them.
Peace. Love. Answer my Question.
It rained a lot last night. A lot.
Well, the morning started off with smoke filling the kitchen. Minor stove fire. I guess nobody was listening at fire safety Sunday. Maria was making Pepo some rice for breakfast, and I think she forgot what she was doing, because she walked away and next thing we knew, it was on fire. So one of the girls did something to stop it, and Maria came in the kitchen and said "oooooooh I am soooo bad at cooking in the morning" (say that with a Spanish accent). I don't know if Peop ended up eating breakfast today.
This morning I went into work a little late today, because I had to go to the hotel to send our trend presentation. They have a faster connection, so I figures it would cause less stress if I went over there. Lucky for me, the internet was fast and the file sent in record time.....I need to be in and out over there so that my husband can't hunt me down.
As I was getting ready to leave, it started raining really really hard, and Maria (the office manager) was at the hotel as well, so we decided to wait a few minutes until it stopped. Then we called a taxi, and had door to door drop service. We treat rain days like snow days, you just don't want to leave house.
When we got to the office we went to a workshop that was being put on for the women about financial independence. Even though it was half in Fante, I feel like I learned a lot. At these workshops there is always some kind of ice breaker (very Laura Jay) and today the question was..."If you had all the money in the world, what would you do?" Some women said they would open an orphanage, some would open more businesses, some would travel, some would pay their workers more. I decided that (one of) mine would be to find the worlds BEST cup of coffee! Now it is your turn to tell me what you would do. (Laura you better do this).
The meeting went on for what seemed like days, but when they brought in a cooler of FanIce, I knew that I would survive until the end. After the meeting, the design team got together with some of the fair trade workers and talked about going on site visits, to see the women working. We were able to schedule a few during the meeting today, but with the way things work around here, we will still need to call the day we plan to go just to be sure.
When we went back to the design room.....aka the storage room, I had an email from the US office about the presentation, and they were so impressed with it. That means we are off to a good start! I think that we have a really good design team, and for the most part we all have very similar ideas. I think there will be some good products coming out!
There was such a cute little kid at work today. He was just sitting on the bench, behaving so well. We played for a few minutes, but I still do not know who he belongs to. Hopefully he will be back again. I think I need to find some little kids to hang out with.
The rest of the afternoon flew past, and then it was time to go. The weather had been pretty bad all day, and when we were walking to get a taxi home, it looked really creepy outside. The sky was so dark, and the ocean was a really strange combination of blues, and the goats were running around like nuts. Strange feeling, but we made it home without anything odd happening.
Once I got home I was completely exhausted. This gloomy weather is so annoying.
My roommate is feeling much better, but she is not fully recovered from the mystery illness yet. And now another girl is sick. I'm telling you...these interns are dropping like flies.
Oh, random fact. Today I found out that Ellen has TWO kids! That's all I know, but I will find out more. I think I should meet them.
Peace. Love. Answer my Question.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
CRIKEY!!
Tuesday.
I bought a bag of orange juice this morning. I was so excited because it looked so refreshing, but then it tasted like Sunny Delight. Gah! I will not be buying that again.
There is always a struggle to get a taxi on Tuesday mornings, because it is a "no fishing" day. I guess no fishing also means no taxis. When it was just three of us, it was still ok because we could always catch one random cab on its way to Cape Coast. However, this morning when 12 of us needed a ride, we had a bit of trouble. I think it took at least 10 minutes to even flag one down, and then I had to talk him into taking us to Cape Coast for the correct amount. Our full car make it to the coast in good time...over a half hour later the other interns finally made it.
The first part of the morning I spent with the new interns, trying to get them up to speed on what the design team was working on. Then they had to go on their tour of the town, while we worked on finishing our presentation. In the afternoon we did the final presentation, and it went over really well. Our next step is to send it to the US and get feedback. I finished catching up the new interns, we walked about some new (and really good) product ideas, and then we went home!
Our taxi ride home was not anything exciting. When we got back I was feeling kind of blah, so I went over to the gym to work out. After my workout I was walking through the hotel and I said hello to one of the workers. He then proposed to me, but I said that I was married. Luck for me I had just moved the ring that I wear on my middle finger to my ring finger because my hands were swollen from working out. Then he noticed the ring and said, ohhhh you have husband. I said yes, and he said what kind of ring is that! (It is just a silver band) and I said a wedding band!! Then he said, oh but I want to marry a white girl like you. I said back to him, well its not going to be me!! Then he insulted my ring again. Then he asked if I would help to find him a wife, so I said that I would get back to him when I found one, and walked away as fast as possible. The, I went and got one of my all time favorite street sausages! I think I am addicted to them.
I feel like this post is too short, and I need to go on an adventure or something.......
Lame day.
Peace. Love. No fishing.
I bought a bag of orange juice this morning. I was so excited because it looked so refreshing, but then it tasted like Sunny Delight. Gah! I will not be buying that again.
There is always a struggle to get a taxi on Tuesday mornings, because it is a "no fishing" day. I guess no fishing also means no taxis. When it was just three of us, it was still ok because we could always catch one random cab on its way to Cape Coast. However, this morning when 12 of us needed a ride, we had a bit of trouble. I think it took at least 10 minutes to even flag one down, and then I had to talk him into taking us to Cape Coast for the correct amount. Our full car make it to the coast in good time...over a half hour later the other interns finally made it.
The first part of the morning I spent with the new interns, trying to get them up to speed on what the design team was working on. Then they had to go on their tour of the town, while we worked on finishing our presentation. In the afternoon we did the final presentation, and it went over really well. Our next step is to send it to the US and get feedback. I finished catching up the new interns, we walked about some new (and really good) product ideas, and then we went home!
Our taxi ride home was not anything exciting. When we got back I was feeling kind of blah, so I went over to the gym to work out. After my workout I was walking through the hotel and I said hello to one of the workers. He then proposed to me, but I said that I was married. Luck for me I had just moved the ring that I wear on my middle finger to my ring finger because my hands were swollen from working out. Then he noticed the ring and said, ohhhh you have husband. I said yes, and he said what kind of ring is that! (It is just a silver band) and I said a wedding band!! Then he said, oh but I want to marry a white girl like you. I said back to him, well its not going to be me!! Then he insulted my ring again. Then he asked if I would help to find him a wife, so I said that I would get back to him when I found one, and walked away as fast as possible. The, I went and got one of my all time favorite street sausages! I think I am addicted to them.
I feel like this post is too short, and I need to go on an adventure or something.......
Lame day.
Peace. Love. No fishing.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Weekend Update
Here are a few photos from the beach. Yes, I know, I still owe you all house photos and I swear they will come :-)
This is one of the rooms you can rent at the beach. I just LOVE the color of the building.
Here I am with my coconut.
This one pretty much sums up the day.
peace. love. sand in your toes.
I'm having fish tonight!!
Monday.
Week Four. Can you believe that this is already my fourth week here? Time is flying by!
Please excuse my multiple SUNday entries, my blackberry is wack and decided to post it four different times. fail.
I woke up in a bed of sand this morning......I guess I did not shower as well as I had thought. I think sand is just falling out of my pores now. Other than the sand in my bed issues, it was a typical morning, read, oatmeal, taxi. There was nothing exciting about the taxi this morning, because we had to take a bag of supplies to work, so we hired a "drop car".
Katie, my roommate was sick all night long, so this morning she had to go to the hospital. After many hours and many different tests, they found that she does not have malaria, but she has something....hopefully it will get better soon.
We drank a lot of starbucks via this morning, so we got a ton of work done this morning. We (the designers) have our big trend presentation tomorrow afternoon, so the afternoon was spent putting everything together.....and singing random songs.
At one point two huge bags of scrap fabric came falling down from a huge stack, and almost flipped the table. We were definitely awake after that!
On the way home I broke part of the taxi. I had Katies backpack with me today, and when I got into the taxi, it was still half on my back. Then I looked to my side to pull the bag onto my lap, when I realized that I was wrapped up in some kind of rubber. It ended up that I got the bag stuck on the rubber that seals the door and pulled it right off. So I turned to the girl next to me and just started cracking up. Then the drivers started laughing, and 5 of them came over to try to stick it back on. They laughed at me for a long time, until finally it was stuck back on the door.
Walking back to the house I noticed that there were some rock cakes and fish pies at Elis. I did not sign up for dinner, so I stopped and got some for dinner and breakfast.
I spent most of my evening working on our presentation, and getting to know the new designers that came to the house today.
Short post.
Peace. Love. Fish pies.
Week Four. Can you believe that this is already my fourth week here? Time is flying by!
Please excuse my multiple SUNday entries, my blackberry is wack and decided to post it four different times. fail.
I woke up in a bed of sand this morning......I guess I did not shower as well as I had thought. I think sand is just falling out of my pores now. Other than the sand in my bed issues, it was a typical morning, read, oatmeal, taxi. There was nothing exciting about the taxi this morning, because we had to take a bag of supplies to work, so we hired a "drop car".
Katie, my roommate was sick all night long, so this morning she had to go to the hospital. After many hours and many different tests, they found that she does not have malaria, but she has something....hopefully it will get better soon.
We drank a lot of starbucks via this morning, so we got a ton of work done this morning. We (the designers) have our big trend presentation tomorrow afternoon, so the afternoon was spent putting everything together.....and singing random songs.
At one point two huge bags of scrap fabric came falling down from a huge stack, and almost flipped the table. We were definitely awake after that!
On the way home I broke part of the taxi. I had Katies backpack with me today, and when I got into the taxi, it was still half on my back. Then I looked to my side to pull the bag onto my lap, when I realized that I was wrapped up in some kind of rubber. It ended up that I got the bag stuck on the rubber that seals the door and pulled it right off. So I turned to the girl next to me and just started cracking up. Then the drivers started laughing, and 5 of them came over to try to stick it back on. They laughed at me for a long time, until finally it was stuck back on the door.
Walking back to the house I noticed that there were some rock cakes and fish pies at Elis. I did not sign up for dinner, so I stopped and got some for dinner and breakfast.
I spent most of my evening working on our presentation, and getting to know the new designers that came to the house today.
Short post.
Peace. Love. Fish pies.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
SUN-day
Finally! A day with no rain.
I think my roommate has malaria. We always joke that she has it, but now its not funny because she is really sick. If she does not feel better in the morning we will have to go to the doctors office. I'm pretty sure if we go there she will be sent home with malaria meds even if it is not what she has.
When I woke up this morning I was super excited because it was already hot outside and the sky was blue. I knew that we would finally make it to the beach. We called Peter, our beach taxi driver, and at 9:00 the first group of us set off for the beach...you were all still in bed sleeping!
I made my oatmeal, and a cup of coffee for a Sunday morning treat. Again, I have an oatmeal comment...are you shocked that I am STILL talking about this? Ok, the new girl brought some Jiff to share, so as a treat I used some of that in my oatmeal this morning. It was not as good as when I use the natural ground nut butter...so you have been warned. And while I am talking about food, the rock cakes I eat do not have anything in them, I'm guessing to keep the cost down, but I'm sure they would be great with something extra!
It was such a perfect day to go to the beach. It was hot and sunny, and there was a perfect ocean breeze to cool us down. We grabbed some beach chairs and set up our spots, then of course we went right in to "swim". The waves were a little bigger than the last time, and I think that at some point during the day, each of us had a wave kick our butt and give us a face full of sand....yet we continued to go back for more. In between waves I started a new book and enjoyed some sun. And yes mom, I had my sun lotion on....I think I used an entire can of SPF 50!
A few of us decided to get lunch at the beach, and I had french toast. After all, it was my sunday brunch :-). It was nothing like french toast in the states...say from, ohhhh I don't know....Steves, but it was delicious in its own unique way. It was more savory than sweet, as it was served with tomatoes and onions on top. It definitely hit the spot...but I could have used some extra crispy bacon on the side.
After lunch, we repeated the events from the morning, and I bought my first coconut. I was not all that impressed. Truthfully, I was wishing it would taste like a pina colda..obviously it did not. I guess I will try one again someday, because I feel like it is something I might like. I just need to be in the right mind set...or something.
Today I also found my first snake. He was bright green and slithering along the trees. While we were eating our brunch I looked over at the entire staff running over to a tree, each holding a stick in their hands. Then, I wish that I would have taken a video of what came next. All of the people started to smack the branches of one of the coconut trees, and as soon as they would smack it, they would jump back right away before taking another swing at it. This continues for about 5 minutes, so I assumed that the snake was in the tree. Sure enough, he fell out, most of the people scattered, and one beat the poor snake to death. For all that effort, I hope he was poisonous. Bye bye snake.
Later in the day we went for a walk further down the beach, and we watched some huge waves. Well, I don't actually know anything about waves, but these were too big to swim in. We were walking up on the shore, a good distance from the water, and there was two different times that the waves broke so far up on the shore, that people were knocked over and pulled across the beach. I'm telling you, these waves were serious. I do not understand how those little fishing boats make it past them.
I ran into the man who sold me the drum, he said if I bring it down we can jam some more. Then we did a fist bump, and he said "one love" It was a very black eyed peas Pepsi commercial moment.
When I came back from the beach, I decided it would be a good time to shower, seeing that there was sand packed into every part of my body. I really should have taken a photo of the shower when I got out. Let me just say, that before today I did not realize that the tile in our shower had a brick pattern to it. However, due to the amount of dirt that came off my body, I could see the pattern crystal clear. Ew
Tomorrow its back to work, and we are getting 4 new design interns....it will be interesting.
Ok, I had a lot to say for a day that was so lazy
Peace. Love. Snakes in a tree.
I think my roommate has malaria. We always joke that she has it, but now its not funny because she is really sick. If she does not feel better in the morning we will have to go to the doctors office. I'm pretty sure if we go there she will be sent home with malaria meds even if it is not what she has.
When I woke up this morning I was super excited because it was already hot outside and the sky was blue. I knew that we would finally make it to the beach. We called Peter, our beach taxi driver, and at 9:00 the first group of us set off for the beach...you were all still in bed sleeping!
I made my oatmeal, and a cup of coffee for a Sunday morning treat. Again, I have an oatmeal comment...are you shocked that I am STILL talking about this? Ok, the new girl brought some Jiff to share, so as a treat I used some of that in my oatmeal this morning. It was not as good as when I use the natural ground nut butter...so you have been warned. And while I am talking about food, the rock cakes I eat do not have anything in them, I'm guessing to keep the cost down, but I'm sure they would be great with something extra!
It was such a perfect day to go to the beach. It was hot and sunny, and there was a perfect ocean breeze to cool us down. We grabbed some beach chairs and set up our spots, then of course we went right in to "swim". The waves were a little bigger than the last time, and I think that at some point during the day, each of us had a wave kick our butt and give us a face full of sand....yet we continued to go back for more. In between waves I started a new book and enjoyed some sun. And yes mom, I had my sun lotion on....I think I used an entire can of SPF 50!
A few of us decided to get lunch at the beach, and I had french toast. After all, it was my sunday brunch :-). It was nothing like french toast in the states...say from, ohhhh I don't know....Steves, but it was delicious in its own unique way. It was more savory than sweet, as it was served with tomatoes and onions on top. It definitely hit the spot...but I could have used some extra crispy bacon on the side.
After lunch, we repeated the events from the morning, and I bought my first coconut. I was not all that impressed. Truthfully, I was wishing it would taste like a pina colda..obviously it did not. I guess I will try one again someday, because I feel like it is something I might like. I just need to be in the right mind set...or something.
Today I also found my first snake. He was bright green and slithering along the trees. While we were eating our brunch I looked over at the entire staff running over to a tree, each holding a stick in their hands. Then, I wish that I would have taken a video of what came next. All of the people started to smack the branches of one of the coconut trees, and as soon as they would smack it, they would jump back right away before taking another swing at it. This continues for about 5 minutes, so I assumed that the snake was in the tree. Sure enough, he fell out, most of the people scattered, and one beat the poor snake to death. For all that effort, I hope he was poisonous. Bye bye snake.
Later in the day we went for a walk further down the beach, and we watched some huge waves. Well, I don't actually know anything about waves, but these were too big to swim in. We were walking up on the shore, a good distance from the water, and there was two different times that the waves broke so far up on the shore, that people were knocked over and pulled across the beach. I'm telling you, these waves were serious. I do not understand how those little fishing boats make it past them.
I ran into the man who sold me the drum, he said if I bring it down we can jam some more. Then we did a fist bump, and he said "one love" It was a very black eyed peas Pepsi commercial moment.
When I came back from the beach, I decided it would be a good time to shower, seeing that there was sand packed into every part of my body. I really should have taken a photo of the shower when I got out. Let me just say, that before today I did not realize that the tile in our shower had a brick pattern to it. However, due to the amount of dirt that came off my body, I could see the pattern crystal clear. Ew
Tomorrow its back to work, and we are getting 4 new design interns....it will be interesting.
Ok, I had a lot to say for a day that was so lazy
Peace. Love. Snakes in a tree.
SUN-day
Finally! A day with no rain.
I think my roommate has malaria. We always joke that she has it, but now its not funny because she is really sick. If she does not feel better in the morning we will have to go to the doctors office. I'm pretty sure if we go there she will be sent home with malaria meds even if it is not what she has.
When I woke up this morning I was super excited because it was already hot outside and the sky was blue. I knew that we would finally make it to the beach. We called Peter, our beach taxi driver, and at 9:00 the first group of us set off for the beach...you were all still in bed sleeping!
I made my oatmeal, and a cup of coffee for a Sunday morning treat. Again, I have an oatmeal comment...are you shocked that I am STILL talking about this? Ok, the new girl brought some Jiff to share, so as a treat I used some of that in my oatmeal this morning. It was not as good as when I use the natural ground nut butter...so you have been warned. And while I am talking about food, the rock cakes I eat do not have anything in them, I'm guessing to keep the cost down, but I'm sure they would be great with something extra!
It was such a perfect day to go to the beach. It was hot and sunny, and there was a perfect ocean breeze to cool us down. We grabbed some beach chairs and set up our spots, then of course we went right in to "swim". The waves were a little bigger than the last time, and I think that at some point during the day, each of us had a wave kick our butt and give us a face full of sand....yet we continued to go back for more. In between waves I started a new book and enjoyed some sun. And yes mom, I had my sun lotion on....I think I used an entire can of SPF 50!
A few of us decided to get lunch at the beach, and I had french toast. After all, it was my sunday brunch :-). It was nothing like french toast in the states...say from, ohhhh I don't know....Steves, but it was delicious in its own unique way. It was more savory than sweet, as it was served with tomatoes and onions on top. It definitely hit the spot...but I could have used some extra crispy bacon on the side.
After lunch, we repeated the events from the morning, and I bought my first coconut. I was not all that impressed. Truthfully, I was wishing it would taste like a pina colda..obviously it did not. I guess I will try one again someday, because I feel like it is something I might like. I just need to be in the right mind set...or something.
Today I also found my first snake. He was bright green and slithering along the trees. While we were eating our brunch I looked over at the entire staff running over to a tree, each holding a stick in their hands. Then, I wish that I would have taken a video of what came next. All of the people started to smack the branches of one of the coconut trees, and as soon as they would smack it, they would jump back right away before taking another swing at it. This continues for about 5 minutes, so I assumed that the snake was in the tree. Sure enough, he fell out, most of the people scattered, and one beat the poor snake to death. For all that effort, I hope he was poisonous. Bye bye snake.
Later in the day we went for a walk further down the beach, and we watched some huge waves. Well, I don't actually know anything about waves, but these were too big to swim in. We were walking up on the shore, a good distance from the water, and there was two different times that the waves broke so far up on the shore, that people were knocked over and pulled across the beach. I'm telling you, these waves were serious. I do not understand how those little fishing boats make it past them.
I ran into the man who sold me the drum, he said if I bring it down we can jam some more. Then we did a fist bump, and he said "one love" It was a very black eyed peas Pepsi commercial moment.
When I came back from the beach, I decided it would be a good time to shower, seeing that there was sand packed into every part of my body. I really should have taken a photo of the shower when I got out. Let me just say, that before today I did not realize that the tile in our shower had a brick pattern to it. However, due to the amount of dirt that came off my body, I could see the pattern crystal clear. Ew
Tomorrow its back to work, and we are getting 4 new design interns....it will be interesting.
Ok, I had a lot to say for a day that was so lazy
Peace. Love. Snakes in a tree.
I think my roommate has malaria. We always joke that she has it, but now its not funny because she is really sick. If she does not feel better in the morning we will have to go to the doctors office. I'm pretty sure if we go there she will be sent home with malaria meds even if it is not what she has.
When I woke up this morning I was super excited because it was already hot outside and the sky was blue. I knew that we would finally make it to the beach. We called Peter, our beach taxi driver, and at 9:00 the first group of us set off for the beach...you were all still in bed sleeping!
I made my oatmeal, and a cup of coffee for a Sunday morning treat. Again, I have an oatmeal comment...are you shocked that I am STILL talking about this? Ok, the new girl brought some Jiff to share, so as a treat I used some of that in my oatmeal this morning. It was not as good as when I use the natural ground nut butter...so you have been warned. And while I am talking about food, the rock cakes I eat do not have anything in them, I'm guessing to keep the cost down, but I'm sure they would be great with something extra!
It was such a perfect day to go to the beach. It was hot and sunny, and there was a perfect ocean breeze to cool us down. We grabbed some beach chairs and set up our spots, then of course we went right in to "swim". The waves were a little bigger than the last time, and I think that at some point during the day, each of us had a wave kick our butt and give us a face full of sand....yet we continued to go back for more. In between waves I started a new book and enjoyed some sun. And yes mom, I had my sun lotion on....I think I used an entire can of SPF 50!
A few of us decided to get lunch at the beach, and I had french toast. After all, it was my sunday brunch :-). It was nothing like french toast in the states...say from, ohhhh I don't know....Steves, but it was delicious in its own unique way. It was more savory than sweet, as it was served with tomatoes and onions on top. It definitely hit the spot...but I could have used some extra crispy bacon on the side.
After lunch, we repeated the events from the morning, and I bought my first coconut. I was not all that impressed. Truthfully, I was wishing it would taste like a pina colda..obviously it did not. I guess I will try one again someday, because I feel like it is something I might like. I just need to be in the right mind set...or something.
Today I also found my first snake. He was bright green and slithering along the trees. While we were eating our brunch I looked over at the entire staff running over to a tree, each holding a stick in their hands. Then, I wish that I would have taken a video of what came next. All of the people started to smack the branches of one of the coconut trees, and as soon as they would smack it, they would jump back right away before taking another swing at it. This continues for about 5 minutes, so I assumed that the snake was in the tree. Sure enough, he fell out, most of the people scattered, and one beat the poor snake to death. For all that effort, I hope he was poisonous. Bye bye snake.
Later in the day we went for a walk further down the beach, and we watched some huge waves. Well, I don't actually know anything about waves, but these were too big to swim in. We were walking up on the shore, a good distance from the water, and there was two different times that the waves broke so far up on the shore, that people were knocked over and pulled across the beach. I'm telling you, these waves were serious. I do not understand how those little fishing boats make it past them.
I ran into the man who sold me the drum, he said if I bring it down we can jam some more. Then we did a fist bump, and he said "one love" It was a very black eyed peas Pepsi commercial moment.
When I came back from the beach, I decided it would be a good time to shower, seeing that there was sand packed into every part of my body. I really should have taken a photo of the shower when I got out. Let me just say, that before today I did not realize that the tile in our shower had a brick pattern to it. However, due to the amount of dirt that came off my body, I could see the pattern crystal clear. Ew
Tomorrow its back to work, and we are getting 4 new design interns....it will be interesting.
Ok, I had a lot to say for a day that was so lazy
Peace. Love. Snakes in a tree.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
rain rain go away....
Saturday.
I guess I should clear up a comment from the last post. I'm not actually depressed, I was just being dramatic because I really wanted to go to the beach. No need for any actual concern.
Oatmeal update! Add a little cinnamon to it....oh what an early morning treat.
I had a bit of trouble sleeping last night because I was soooo cold. Cold to the point that my bones were hurting and I was curled up into fetal position with my single sheet wrapped around my entire body. Now, I guess that I could have gotten out of my bed to shut all of the windows and turn off the fan, but that requires untucking my bug net and crawling over and around my bed, and at 3 in the morning it's just not worth it.
Sadly, when I woke up it was very cloudy and there were still a few drizzles falling from the sky, so we took a group vote and decided to skip the beach. Rather than spending the morning lounging in a hammock, I went back under my bug net and finished reading one of my books. Peop decided that he would be lazy as well, and somehow weaseled his way under my net and onto my bed. He really does not realize what a big dog he is. So he flopped onto my twin size bed and spread out literally on top of my body. I'm sure it was quite a site. Eventually he heard something outside and I had the bed back to myself to keep reading.
I made some mac and cheese for lunch, using laughing cow cheese wedges...I was shocked to find them here! I had attempted making this before, but I didn't have the correct noodle to cheese ratio going on. This time I had success.
After lunch I walked over to the resort and worked out. I have rediscovered my love of jumping rope. There are also hula-hoops, but I don't have much luck with those. After working out there was a little bit of sun, so I walked down to the pool. However, due to the massive amount of rain, or my bad luck, it was closed for chemical treatment. I had a book with me, so I just grabbed a chair overlooking the ocean and did a little more reading.
After sitting out, reading, watching the waves roll in....(Rough life, I know) I walked over to shell and got a frozen yogurt. It was rock solid when I bought it, and by the time I got home it was half melted. Gah. I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing another book that I was reading.
We walked down to Elis for dinner, and I lucked out because there was a rock cake for me!! We had a very healthy dinner of potatoes. :-).....hey, its just what we were craving.
Now, about your taxi suggestions. We do have a few that we call if we are going somewhere like the beach, but its just too hard to arrange something like that in the mornings. Plus, if I had a reliable driver everyday, what would I blog about?
Thank you for always leaving me comments! I love getting them.
This is such an uneventful post...
Beach tomorrow? Keep your fingers crossed!
Peace. Love. Books.
I guess I should clear up a comment from the last post. I'm not actually depressed, I was just being dramatic because I really wanted to go to the beach. No need for any actual concern.
Oatmeal update! Add a little cinnamon to it....oh what an early morning treat.
I had a bit of trouble sleeping last night because I was soooo cold. Cold to the point that my bones were hurting and I was curled up into fetal position with my single sheet wrapped around my entire body. Now, I guess that I could have gotten out of my bed to shut all of the windows and turn off the fan, but that requires untucking my bug net and crawling over and around my bed, and at 3 in the morning it's just not worth it.
Sadly, when I woke up it was very cloudy and there were still a few drizzles falling from the sky, so we took a group vote and decided to skip the beach. Rather than spending the morning lounging in a hammock, I went back under my bug net and finished reading one of my books. Peop decided that he would be lazy as well, and somehow weaseled his way under my net and onto my bed. He really does not realize what a big dog he is. So he flopped onto my twin size bed and spread out literally on top of my body. I'm sure it was quite a site. Eventually he heard something outside and I had the bed back to myself to keep reading.
I made some mac and cheese for lunch, using laughing cow cheese wedges...I was shocked to find them here! I had attempted making this before, but I didn't have the correct noodle to cheese ratio going on. This time I had success.
After lunch I walked over to the resort and worked out. I have rediscovered my love of jumping rope. There are also hula-hoops, but I don't have much luck with those. After working out there was a little bit of sun, so I walked down to the pool. However, due to the massive amount of rain, or my bad luck, it was closed for chemical treatment. I had a book with me, so I just grabbed a chair overlooking the ocean and did a little more reading.
After sitting out, reading, watching the waves roll in....(Rough life, I know) I walked over to shell and got a frozen yogurt. It was rock solid when I bought it, and by the time I got home it was half melted. Gah. I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing another book that I was reading.
We walked down to Elis for dinner, and I lucked out because there was a rock cake for me!! We had a very healthy dinner of potatoes. :-).....hey, its just what we were craving.
Now, about your taxi suggestions. We do have a few that we call if we are going somewhere like the beach, but its just too hard to arrange something like that in the mornings. Plus, if I had a reliable driver everyday, what would I blog about?
Thank you for always leaving me comments! I love getting them.
This is such an uneventful post...
Beach tomorrow? Keep your fingers crossed!
Peace. Love. Books.
Friday, June 4, 2010
She swallowed a dog...what a hog
Friday.
Oy vey, what a day.
It had been cold and raining all day long. Getting a cab was a joke today because we had to walk through mud puddles and my flip flops were getting sucked into the ground. Lucky for us, we got a taxi fairly quick, however it had no windshield wipers and all the windows were rolled down. Then the driver kept trying to make the metal blade work...obviously this did NOT work in successfully clearing the windshield, but made one of the worst screeching noises ever. Also, his windshield was cracked, and to fix it he just placed a huge sticker of Ghanas flag on top of it. Seriously, will I ever have a "normal" ride to work?
We got to the office and got right to work on trend forecasting. I tried for about an hour to get my internet to connect, but that never worked out for me. Because I couldn't connect to the internet I mainly worked on CAD drawings all day. I had a good flow going, so I just worked through lunch. After lunch we had to start...or finish...or continue folding and packing clothes for shipment. I think this task mixed with the crappy weather was the perfect recipe for crabby interns. And crabby interns make it hard to stay positive in a leadership position. That's all I will say on here about that.
When the end of the day finally rolled around the packing was not done, so 4 of us volunteered to stay after to help. Yes, it was a bit frustrating to sit around waiting for inspections to be done, but hello its part of the job of an intern. Again, that's all I will say about that here.....but we ended up getting home around 10:00, so it was a long day.
Of course on the way home it was once again taxi hell. (Sorry mom, but I had to say it). Thank God one of the guys from the office lives near us, because he helped us get a taxi home. First we had to walk down a dimly lit street to the main road to flag down a taxi. So we got a taxi and four of us crammed into the back seat. So we were driving along the rainy road, when we noticed that we were driving with no headlights on....so from the back seat we let out a nice CRIKEY! Needless to say, we were a bit slap happy. Then, next thing we know we are pulled over on the side of the road, and then turning around and going back in the direction we came from. Had we been alone, I think I might have wet my pants, however we just went along with it. We pulled over again and the driver got out and popped the front hood and started hitting the lights....back in the car I sat there as a photo of Obama smiled back at me. The driver could not get the lights to work, so we had to get a new taxi to take us the rest of the way. I'm not really sure he had his lights on either, but somehow we made it back to the house.
So, to answer the comment about the cookbook submission, I would definitely say add in the rock cakes...also called rockies and try to find a meat pie recipe too!
I'm going to fall into a deep depression this weekend if there is no sun.
Peace. Love. Short blog post.
Oy vey, what a day.
It had been cold and raining all day long. Getting a cab was a joke today because we had to walk through mud puddles and my flip flops were getting sucked into the ground. Lucky for us, we got a taxi fairly quick, however it had no windshield wipers and all the windows were rolled down. Then the driver kept trying to make the metal blade work...obviously this did NOT work in successfully clearing the windshield, but made one of the worst screeching noises ever. Also, his windshield was cracked, and to fix it he just placed a huge sticker of Ghanas flag on top of it. Seriously, will I ever have a "normal" ride to work?
We got to the office and got right to work on trend forecasting. I tried for about an hour to get my internet to connect, but that never worked out for me. Because I couldn't connect to the internet I mainly worked on CAD drawings all day. I had a good flow going, so I just worked through lunch. After lunch we had to start...or finish...or continue folding and packing clothes for shipment. I think this task mixed with the crappy weather was the perfect recipe for crabby interns. And crabby interns make it hard to stay positive in a leadership position. That's all I will say on here about that.
When the end of the day finally rolled around the packing was not done, so 4 of us volunteered to stay after to help. Yes, it was a bit frustrating to sit around waiting for inspections to be done, but hello its part of the job of an intern. Again, that's all I will say about that here.....but we ended up getting home around 10:00, so it was a long day.
Of course on the way home it was once again taxi hell. (Sorry mom, but I had to say it). Thank God one of the guys from the office lives near us, because he helped us get a taxi home. First we had to walk down a dimly lit street to the main road to flag down a taxi. So we got a taxi and four of us crammed into the back seat. So we were driving along the rainy road, when we noticed that we were driving with no headlights on....so from the back seat we let out a nice CRIKEY! Needless to say, we were a bit slap happy. Then, next thing we know we are pulled over on the side of the road, and then turning around and going back in the direction we came from. Had we been alone, I think I might have wet my pants, however we just went along with it. We pulled over again and the driver got out and popped the front hood and started hitting the lights....back in the car I sat there as a photo of Obama smiled back at me. The driver could not get the lights to work, so we had to get a new taxi to take us the rest of the way. I'm not really sure he had his lights on either, but somehow we made it back to the house.
So, to answer the comment about the cookbook submission, I would definitely say add in the rock cakes...also called rockies and try to find a meat pie recipe too!
I'm going to fall into a deep depression this weekend if there is no sun.
Peace. Love. Short blog post.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Meat pies and FanYo
Thursday.
I am giving up on trying to swim in the mornings. I went to the pool at 6 today, and once again it was closed. RUDE!!!
Well as luck would have it, I walked out to get a taxi this morning and ended up with the baby in my lap. I just wanted to take the little babe home. She can't be much older than 1 year, and she wears the sweetest little green and white striped uniform with white ruffle socks and shiny black shoes. So, I got into the taxi and sat the little one right in my lap. She just snuggled in and fell right asleep. So so sweet.
When we got to the office we went right to work in the design room, working on sketches for new stamps and designs. I ate my rock cake, and sketched for most of the morning. Until we spotted a huge snail, and watched him slide across the ground. Then we went up to a fair trade meeting, but had to leave early for an appointment we made with Auntie Gina.
When we were at her house she told us that she worked at a school, and someone said oh can we come! Little did we know that we would actually be going one day. We took a taxi out to the school where she is the assistant headmaster. On the way we got pulled over by the police and the driver had to get out. Then the police came to my window and asked my why the car was so congested. I did not understand, so I was like huh? Then he said, why are there so many of you in this car? So, I looked him in the eye and said...Uhhh the driver said he would take all of us. Then the cop smiled and said, yes, that is what I thought. So I wonder what the driver gave him as an excuse.
But back to the school.... It was a rather awkward experience, because for part of the time we just had to sit in the headmasters office. I felt like we were getting in trouble. We did go on a tour of the school, and when we got to the library, my hear just broke. It was such a small room with maybe 50 books in it. The reference section literally has 5 books in it. After our tour we had to go back to the headmasters office. We were sitting there, and then they brought in some black plastic bags for us. Side note...in Ghana, there are black plastic bags that most food is placed in. However, whenever I see these bags I instantly think of dog poop bags. So, whenever I see a black bag with food in it I laugh. Today inside our bags were two meat pies and a FanYo. Meat pies are meat and veggies inside a pastry shell. FanYo is strawberry frozen yogurt. I have been a little nervous to try both of these, but today I knew I had to eat them because it is very rude to decline food that is offered to you.
Let me tell you....I am now in love with the meat pies. Mmm mmm mmm. Also I had another sausage. You should be so proud of me for trying these new foods and not wanting to vom. So now I can get my meat and yogurt fill.
We had to take a taxi home from Aunti Ginas, and once again about 10 taxis pulled over to pick up the Obrunis on the side of the road. Thankfully one agreed to take us, and thankfully we drove on the correct side of the road this time.
My batik ended up turning out ok, it was not the colors I had hoped for, but it is still pretty cute.
Now a short Q and A:
1: Pepo is from Spain, and that is how he is such a pure breed of dog.
2: Katie I am getting your comments and I am Loving them! For some reason I just can not comment from my bb.
3: The taxis that I take are small cars, three in back and one in front....or more. TroTros are big vans that hold at least 15 people. Google trotro Ghana and I think a good article comes up.
Peace. Love. Meat Pie.
I am giving up on trying to swim in the mornings. I went to the pool at 6 today, and once again it was closed. RUDE!!!
Well as luck would have it, I walked out to get a taxi this morning and ended up with the baby in my lap. I just wanted to take the little babe home. She can't be much older than 1 year, and she wears the sweetest little green and white striped uniform with white ruffle socks and shiny black shoes. So, I got into the taxi and sat the little one right in my lap. She just snuggled in and fell right asleep. So so sweet.
When we got to the office we went right to work in the design room, working on sketches for new stamps and designs. I ate my rock cake, and sketched for most of the morning. Until we spotted a huge snail, and watched him slide across the ground. Then we went up to a fair trade meeting, but had to leave early for an appointment we made with Auntie Gina.
When we were at her house she told us that she worked at a school, and someone said oh can we come! Little did we know that we would actually be going one day. We took a taxi out to the school where she is the assistant headmaster. On the way we got pulled over by the police and the driver had to get out. Then the police came to my window and asked my why the car was so congested. I did not understand, so I was like huh? Then he said, why are there so many of you in this car? So, I looked him in the eye and said...Uhhh the driver said he would take all of us. Then the cop smiled and said, yes, that is what I thought. So I wonder what the driver gave him as an excuse.
But back to the school.... It was a rather awkward experience, because for part of the time we just had to sit in the headmasters office. I felt like we were getting in trouble. We did go on a tour of the school, and when we got to the library, my hear just broke. It was such a small room with maybe 50 books in it. The reference section literally has 5 books in it. After our tour we had to go back to the headmasters office. We were sitting there, and then they brought in some black plastic bags for us. Side note...in Ghana, there are black plastic bags that most food is placed in. However, whenever I see these bags I instantly think of dog poop bags. So, whenever I see a black bag with food in it I laugh. Today inside our bags were two meat pies and a FanYo. Meat pies are meat and veggies inside a pastry shell. FanYo is strawberry frozen yogurt. I have been a little nervous to try both of these, but today I knew I had to eat them because it is very rude to decline food that is offered to you.
Let me tell you....I am now in love with the meat pies. Mmm mmm mmm. Also I had another sausage. You should be so proud of me for trying these new foods and not wanting to vom. So now I can get my meat and yogurt fill.
We had to take a taxi home from Aunti Ginas, and once again about 10 taxis pulled over to pick up the Obrunis on the side of the road. Thankfully one agreed to take us, and thankfully we drove on the correct side of the road this time.
My batik ended up turning out ok, it was not the colors I had hoped for, but it is still pretty cute.
Now a short Q and A:
1: Pepo is from Spain, and that is how he is such a pure breed of dog.
2: Katie I am getting your comments and I am Loving them! For some reason I just can not comment from my bb.
3: The taxis that I take are small cars, three in back and one in front....or more. TroTros are big vans that hold at least 15 people. Google trotro Ghana and I think a good article comes up.
Peace. Love. Meat Pie.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Qdoba!
Wednesday. What I wouldn't do for Qdoba right now!
Welcome back sunshine.
Before I forget I would like for all of you to pray for sun this weekend so that we can all go to the beach! :-)
While you are all fast asleep each morning, I am going through taxi hell. This morning four of us went to grab a taxi, and there were none in site. So we stood on the side of the road and waited for awhile until one finally pulled over. We went through our usual talk and got in. Then the driver threw it into reverse and turned around and started driving the other way. So we were like woah woah woahhhh where are you going. I guess he thought we were going to a different stop, so we got out and had to wait again. When the next taxi pulled over there was a baby laying on the front seat. So, we got in and Maria had to hold the baby on her lap. Then we had to pull over and drop the little babe off at school. The driver was running to the school, while we were just sitting in the car....late for work. We considered just taking the taxi and leaving. It would be so nice, because we would always have a car to take us around. But, then the driver came running back down the hill. So once again we were on our way and we hit so much traffic. The driver decided to take a "short cut" that did not end up being so short, and we basically had to drive through a river to get back to the road.
Finally we made it to work. I went into the office and got design teams organized and then met with the designers. We had to do a little more folding, but not as much as we thought
Then we had a good brain storming session about what we were designing and we really got some great ideas, but then it was suddenly the end of the day, so we went home.
It just must be my unlucky day, because I got stuck in yet another taxi from hell. Fist the woman in the front was pressuring us for money, then there was another child in the car who would not stop looking at us, then we had to make like 10 stops and the car smelled and I wanted to vom.
We got home and went to the pool but it was closed, so rather than swim and work out I went back for another street sausage. Yep.....I said another. It is just so good and they give you a spicy mustard powder to dip it in. Then after I ate that we went to dinner. It started to rain so we moved the tables under a covered area surrounded with beads. Eli made rock cakes but by the time we got there she only had 2 left! That just tells you how good they are. I was only able to ge one and that just isn't going to cut it.
Pepo got to come with us to dinner tonight, and there is a dog named Jack who I think belongs to Eli. So Pepo and Jack got to have a little play date, while we all tried to make up voices for them and act out what they are saying. I don't think the rest of the group thought this was very funny because they didn't stick around for too long after.
I broke down today and paid to have my laundry done. I did a small load the other day, but it has been so rainy that I never had time to do it during the week. So when I woke up today and saw the sun, I decided I better just have it washed. How nice to come home to a clean basket of laundry.
Oooo and I got a cell phone today, so maybe if you are lucky I will call you one day
Remember, pray for a sunny Saturday.
Peace. Love. Clean clothes.
Welcome back sunshine.
Before I forget I would like for all of you to pray for sun this weekend so that we can all go to the beach! :-)
While you are all fast asleep each morning, I am going through taxi hell. This morning four of us went to grab a taxi, and there were none in site. So we stood on the side of the road and waited for awhile until one finally pulled over. We went through our usual talk and got in. Then the driver threw it into reverse and turned around and started driving the other way. So we were like woah woah woahhhh where are you going. I guess he thought we were going to a different stop, so we got out and had to wait again. When the next taxi pulled over there was a baby laying on the front seat. So, we got in and Maria had to hold the baby on her lap. Then we had to pull over and drop the little babe off at school. The driver was running to the school, while we were just sitting in the car....late for work. We considered just taking the taxi and leaving. It would be so nice, because we would always have a car to take us around. But, then the driver came running back down the hill. So once again we were on our way and we hit so much traffic. The driver decided to take a "short cut" that did not end up being so short, and we basically had to drive through a river to get back to the road.
Finally we made it to work. I went into the office and got design teams organized and then met with the designers. We had to do a little more folding, but not as much as we thought
Then we had a good brain storming session about what we were designing and we really got some great ideas, but then it was suddenly the end of the day, so we went home.
It just must be my unlucky day, because I got stuck in yet another taxi from hell. Fist the woman in the front was pressuring us for money, then there was another child in the car who would not stop looking at us, then we had to make like 10 stops and the car smelled and I wanted to vom.
We got home and went to the pool but it was closed, so rather than swim and work out I went back for another street sausage. Yep.....I said another. It is just so good and they give you a spicy mustard powder to dip it in. Then after I ate that we went to dinner. It started to rain so we moved the tables under a covered area surrounded with beads. Eli made rock cakes but by the time we got there she only had 2 left! That just tells you how good they are. I was only able to ge one and that just isn't going to cut it.
Pepo got to come with us to dinner tonight, and there is a dog named Jack who I think belongs to Eli. So Pepo and Jack got to have a little play date, while we all tried to make up voices for them and act out what they are saying. I don't think the rest of the group thought this was very funny because they didn't stick around for too long after.
I broke down today and paid to have my laundry done. I did a small load the other day, but it has been so rainy that I never had time to do it during the week. So when I woke up today and saw the sun, I decided I better just have it washed. How nice to come home to a clean basket of laundry.
Oooo and I got a cell phone today, so maybe if you are lucky I will call you one day
Remember, pray for a sunny Saturday.
Peace. Love. Clean clothes.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
I chew fufu
Well...I finally made it through a full day at the office.
This morning I tried to go swimming before work, but when I got to the pool it was closed for chemical treatment uGgggggg RUDE! So I just went back home and sat on the balcony for awhile.
Some of the interns did not come into work this morning because they are still sick, so those of us leaving for work actually made it out of the house at a decent hour. We flagged down a tax, and first he tried to over charge me, so I said no. But then he decided that he would give me the normal price and off we went. Somehow I got stuck in the front seat, so he asked what my name was, and because I was annoyed that he first tried to rip me off and was now trying to pick me up, I told him my name was Wendy. Then he asked for my number. So, because it is about a 20 minute ride there is usually some small talk involved. I learned that he would like to go to America and be a rapper like 50 cent. So I asked him to bust a rhyme....and of course he did. Fail. So, then he just turned on some music and sung a long. I didn't think that we would ever make it to our stop.
We got to work and everyone was a little hyper in the office, so we danced around for a little bit before we started work. No joke, we really danced around the office. Then three of us went into our design room and started folding the shipment that is going out this weekend. The shipment is huge, and the buyer wants everything in bags. How sustainable of them.....NOT. We ended up packing all day, and double checking our shipment info again and again.
Later in the afternoon we gave quality control a quick workshop on how to fold. It is actually quite tricky trying to get everyone to fold the exact same way. But a few of the women seemed to really understand what we were getting at. So, hopefully we will get the quality control team to fold as they inspect to save time in the end.
We left the office right at 5 today,because we were just in the zone from folding all day long. We grabbed a taxi, and we were driving really slow, when suddenly I looked up a head and there was a huge mass of cattle walking through the street. We started cracking up, because it was just no big deal to everyone on the road, they just drove around them.
We came home and finally went swimming. It was so nice and refreshing, and we had the entire pool to ourselves. On the way to Elis for dinner, I had a sausage from a stand off the side of the road. It was so good ans spicy, but tomorrow I will let you know if I regret eating it or not. :-) Today we had fufu for dinner. Once again this is a dish that you eat with your RIGHT hand, and you do not chew it. You rip a glob of dough off and scoop the stew. I liked the stew, but not so much the baL of glob.
Ok, now another Q and A section.
Michael: I thought you said I could put that drum in my packed luggage with a bunch of clothes around it? You better say this method is ok....
My food situation: we are on our own for food, but there is a really good "chop bar" down the road from us called Elis Spot. So, for 4.50 cedi, aka $3.00 we can buy the dish of the day. We give her a head count of who will be eating the night before and then she makes that amount for us. And she makes the BEST rock cakes. It is something like a mix between a scone and a muffin. I am completely obsessed with them and I will likely had a serious weight gain from them. I put in a request for them today :-)
Ok, I think that's all for now.
Peace. Love. Rock Cakes.
This morning I tried to go swimming before work, but when I got to the pool it was closed for chemical treatment uGgggggg RUDE! So I just went back home and sat on the balcony for awhile.
Some of the interns did not come into work this morning because they are still sick, so those of us leaving for work actually made it out of the house at a decent hour. We flagged down a tax, and first he tried to over charge me, so I said no. But then he decided that he would give me the normal price and off we went. Somehow I got stuck in the front seat, so he asked what my name was, and because I was annoyed that he first tried to rip me off and was now trying to pick me up, I told him my name was Wendy. Then he asked for my number. So, because it is about a 20 minute ride there is usually some small talk involved. I learned that he would like to go to America and be a rapper like 50 cent. So I asked him to bust a rhyme....and of course he did. Fail. So, then he just turned on some music and sung a long. I didn't think that we would ever make it to our stop.
We got to work and everyone was a little hyper in the office, so we danced around for a little bit before we started work. No joke, we really danced around the office. Then three of us went into our design room and started folding the shipment that is going out this weekend. The shipment is huge, and the buyer wants everything in bags. How sustainable of them.....NOT. We ended up packing all day, and double checking our shipment info again and again.
Later in the afternoon we gave quality control a quick workshop on how to fold. It is actually quite tricky trying to get everyone to fold the exact same way. But a few of the women seemed to really understand what we were getting at. So, hopefully we will get the quality control team to fold as they inspect to save time in the end.
We left the office right at 5 today,because we were just in the zone from folding all day long. We grabbed a taxi, and we were driving really slow, when suddenly I looked up a head and there was a huge mass of cattle walking through the street. We started cracking up, because it was just no big deal to everyone on the road, they just drove around them.
We came home and finally went swimming. It was so nice and refreshing, and we had the entire pool to ourselves. On the way to Elis for dinner, I had a sausage from a stand off the side of the road. It was so good ans spicy, but tomorrow I will let you know if I regret eating it or not. :-) Today we had fufu for dinner. Once again this is a dish that you eat with your RIGHT hand, and you do not chew it. You rip a glob of dough off and scoop the stew. I liked the stew, but not so much the baL of glob.
Ok, now another Q and A section.
Michael: I thought you said I could put that drum in my packed luggage with a bunch of clothes around it? You better say this method is ok....
My food situation: we are on our own for food, but there is a really good "chop bar" down the road from us called Elis Spot. So, for 4.50 cedi, aka $3.00 we can buy the dish of the day. We give her a head count of who will be eating the night before and then she makes that amount for us. And she makes the BEST rock cakes. It is something like a mix between a scone and a muffin. I am completely obsessed with them and I will likely had a serious weight gain from them. I put in a request for them today :-)
Ok, I think that's all for now.
Peace. Love. Rock Cakes.
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