Abdulai-bla (small who resembles his father)

is my favorite and best friend here, living just close. It's really great. We talk about whatever is on our minds. He helps me remember things I said once, we argue (he is right a lot I will admit), he even shows me how to cook & makes fun of how I cook fish - with the meat actually white, not fried solid.

He draws well from his head, paints houses & cements floors, learned carpentry for 3 years, & fixes radios. He has a sense for shooting video too.

I invited him to a nearby village's youth association meeting I was invited to- made up of a group of creative & motivated & excited people hoping to "fill the gap" in the places they live empowering themselves. Know what you want before someone tells you. Yeah.

The Youth Clans

Visit me regularly - the 20 some's who speak English and look for things to do, the older school kids who act cool, the younger school kids who cause trouble and are obnoxious, the 6-10 crowd who plays on my acrobatic bar, and those under 6 who are hilarious because they are silly and have parties across the road parading & dancing & drumming.

Happy Stomach

Food is scarce, yet people are eating- including me. If there are not enough vitamins & minerals your stomach gets big and sticks out.

I get lazy when it comes to food, luckily if I'm hungry people will feed me - tizert (pounded millet)with okra or baobab leaf stew. Once I encountered BushRat stew, a local delicacy, but the taste is um, quite, yes -a bit gamey.

I try to stay stocked with eggs & laughing cow. Everything has to be bought at market or the Big Town. Tomatoes too but that's harder cause they get squashed and go bad. There's tomato paste in small tins which I just learned to open - rub the tin fiercely on a stone until the lip just peels away! Clean & pretty.

But the price of a can will also buy me local chop - my favorite being sold in the AM between 7-9ish (Rice & Beans- it's just rice in the afternoon). If I happen to have woken up energized and fetching water I will often stop and get some in a bag then eat it for lunch and dinner with additions.

Sometimes I have hot smooth porridge from a neighbor made with millet, ginger and other nice things. Sometimes I save that for dinner too. It is good with local peanuts which I can get by walking around since people are cracking them all day. Another yummy treat is KuliKuli- a large ring shaped crunchy snack made of pounded & fried peanut- each costing a penny and good with tea.

Though people cannot drink tea without bread which is very funny to me since I drink tea almost daily, whether it being morning chai with local honey & milk, afternoon lukewarm tea cooked by the local sun with sugar, or night tea- an herbal blend or mint if my stomach aches with Ghardia which comes and goes. Look it up. But don't worry, I take antibiotics- sometimes.

Total Dissolution

This is to all you Power Yogas out there (meaning Naomi) - we got this tape at a Thrift store for a $1 (there, not here). I transferred it to audio because it happens to be one of the best classes out there (I spent a month going to local free trials) so this week I have been stretching with the sun going down & sometimes BBC or the soccer match would accompany me- though I am not sure Tony would agree that's a power yoga move.

Guniea Worm Photos

TIME MAGAZINE ONLINE
www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1707059,00.html
by my talented (closest in distance) Peace Corps Buddy

25

Appropriate Old Picture from Ceremony Day

Tomorrow Is My Birthday - I will be A Quarter

Now is the time to write me that letter or email you always wanted or send me that Gatorade powder, mac & cheese powder (you can skip the noodles), duct tape, tea, fun, good paint/ brushes, dv tapes, 16mm short ends, 35mm film, or if you are feeling adventurous pizza and ice cream.

I am actually attempting to make ice cream right now, condensed & powdered milk, sugar & cocoa. We'll see...

Tomorrow My plans are dressing like a present, a Wedding, African Cup of Nations game & much much more.

Fire Fire Everywhere

Like a parade, like a dance, like setting everything on fire. It is a holiday to remember the dead and an old story of a chief's small son who got lost so the village went to search for him with torches. They found him by a big tree so in the reenactment the torches are flown through the air onto the live (therefore indestructible) tree. It can be quite dangerous but I had a boom mic bodyguard and I got to witness 5 villages of them over two nights and taped them all from different angles. I somehow do not have my battery charger with me so editing later.

The Sea Ride

The Lorry (trotro) I take between Tamale and my village goes on a road that looks as I would imagine the ground of the sea. It is wavy, bumpy, carpeted with red dirt, holey, and I get sea sick. There are holes in the bottom and to start it they pinch wires. I took a picture got it developed and hung it up.

Swing!

Me and my new partner in crime built it. We chopped three tall trees, stuck two deep in the ground and the other across - some rope and a broken desk chair later a glorious swing! It is the beginning, the beginning of an acrobatic playground. I have high hopes, a trapeze? Parallel bars? Balance beams? I think so.

The Famous Village

When I tell people in Tamale where I live many exclaim - oh! Something happened there once. I have heard different stories, the government came with a tank to break up some kind of civil dispute but the people attacked them and the troops fled and left the tank, the government gave them a bus that they didn't want so they set it on fire, and a horse ran up a baobab tree and left hoof prints that are still there.

I asked a trusted fellow from my village to explain, he did and it was long and complicated involving chiefs and tribes, and indeed some kind of civil war where more than 40 important people got shot about 10 years ago. Mr. Superstar Alidu, the guy I work with often and is a superstar cause he is awesome had one of his eyes shot out in the war and will give me a detailed account at a later time. And that tree fell down a couple years ago.

The Dancing Horse

This week was full of treats like this. I had seen the white horse in a village tour of the chiefs palace before and was told he could dance. I had forgotten about him until I looked up at the turn of the crowd toward the big white flash. The horse wore a sort of mask, almost medieval looking, but completely made of leather tassels that resembled hair over his face. His rider wore short stirrups and kicked to the music but the horse would jerk his head and lift his feet in such a way that proved this horse could dance.

Dancing Dances

(In order of appearance)

At the conclusion of a funeral - or just cause, it is called the Tora and is for only women, though men beat the drums for it. The woman stand in a line and two at a time run/ dance toward the other with a sort of skip, hop and jump and bang butts together! I did try...

A dance for the men - this involves a big swingy woven shirt that comes in plenty of different pretty color combinations. They also wear a little slightly floppy hat that is often a velvet material. They swing around in this dance and people put coins on their foreheads. Kind of a free for all including dancing drummers - and the best part - a screeching woman.

There was a "dance party" thrown by the Guinea Worm Eradication Team who provided a generator, music and sporadic educational commentary. As I approached the dance I thought it would be just people dancing, but no, it was a big huge circle of everyone and then some would go into the middle to dance to a song I think they picked. I did not. I had some Fear. But if forced I was planning on pretending to be an acrobatic ballerina, as if that is how americans dance... My favorite dancing couple was an old old man and young young girl, basically just shuffling about.

Here's a good one I finally got to see - The men dress up like women with wigs, snug clothes, skirts and tutu like things. Then they shake their booties.

Shooting Guinea Worm Concert

Promised to be and lived up to being quite an event - Live instruments, musicians, lights, a stage, acrobatic dancers, and Miss Ghana. The stage was set up as you would imagine so I was picturing quite a mad scene what with weaving my way through a crowd of people to shoot, but it wasn't to be.

The area in front of the stage was off limits to everyone but us photographers so I got front and center - it appeared, as I was shooting, that the whole concert was in fact for me - if I panned the camera you would see a sea of people starting from the ground and going all the way to the sky as people were standing on the tops and sides of buildings. A couple of times all the power went out and people ran around getting the backup backup generators going.

The Deaf School

I went to visit a new friend Peace Corps Volunteer who teaches art there. The place is probably 40 km/ 2 hours traveling public transport or riding a bike and less than an hour if I somehow went direct. I certainly want to visit more. It is like out of a Herzog film.

There is an angular playground that no one plays on, crowded bunk rooms (though more are being built), and a mess hall. There are announcements at dinner - a big kid stands on top of a table. One big kid is particularly noticeable- everyone is scared of him and he walks around like a real tough guy, like a clown charachter.

The art stuff is hard for me to look at without feeling some pain but it is really great. They have done abstract self-portraits and kente weaving.

Baobab Trees

I had a feeling that is what they were. The fat dwarfy old stumps that stand tall and I-almost-fall-of-my-bike-from-looking-at-too-long. There is one I can see from my home that is about 80 years old. I need to make a map and count them. Someone please send me The Little Prince. It needs a Dagbani translation.

BATS

There are many. The wake me in the middle of the night. What are they doing up there? Thumping, squeaking, falling? Having parties I assume - but on this particular night the party was so loud (celebrating the departure of the bees?) that I was certain there was one in my room. Mostly because I heard a story of that happening (to Cheri) and then people tried to shoot them, while indoors... I never heard the full story. Should I?

Killer Bees

My second night back we sprayed the killer bees that were hanging out in my roof with out permission. They are usually not out at night, that is, unless they are sprayed. I noticed some buzzing and all of a sudden I realized that they might be a bit angry about the spray. I ran inside and two got in, but I got them with my shoe. The people on the ladder exclaimed and ran away too. They left me alone with the Buzzing. I quickly accessed that I better turn my lantern off and get inside that net of mine.

I actually started out calm as any evening, recording audio of myself telling about the day, but then the buzzing got louder and louder and louder. I realized the little red light on my recorder should be turned off and that, as I could not see anything, there could be bees all around me. Since they smell fear too they must be attracted to me. So I wrapped myself and pretended to be a cocoon in my sleeping bag, which I actually do use in the currently cold mornings. I played music for myself to drown out any buzzing noise but the loud beating of my heart did not cease.

I actually thought I might die, and if not then, mostly of fright, in the morning when the bees would be waiting for me. I lay in fear for about 4 hours, and finally let myself out of the bag for air and passed out. The next night -- BATS.

Maps

Right now that seems to be a big focus of mine. Villages close by and this one. I don't know my way around yet though I love riding around, the weather right now is real nice, the winds, cold mornings, dry heat...

It Is The Best Bike

I got one in the New York City of Ghana - Kumasi. There are actually old buildings there, and seas of people. My first impression of the town was poor because of bad traffic but then upon walking around it was amazing. I like it a lot.

The bike is a small black Raleigh with dual suspension shock absorbers. I didn't realize what that meant until my reluctant test drive. I thought I wanted a cruiser bike - one of the old fashioned ones with the curved handlebars and big comfy seats. But then I rode, rather, gli-ded on the dirt road through potholes and all. I was blown away and had to get it.

Now I spend my days thinking about it and what I can do to make it happy. Today I bought it a nice black wire basket, a small silver bell, and a back rack for carrying water. I almost bought a big beautiful black and yellow seat but I wasn't sure it was the perfect one so I held back. I have been promised a polka dotted one from a friend so I am going to see how that fits. I also though about getting a shiny nifty red visor helmut, but again, I already have a helmut so I am going to wait until I have more money, since I suppose a stove might be more important (is it?).