27 Sept ….
The half marathon was yesterday! It went really well! Here’s what Went Down.
The race director was really awesome and arranged for all of the Peace Corps volunteers in West Africa to stay at the Salvation Army in Accra. So, that night morning we all woke up at the Salvation Army, at 03:30, and ate some bananas. A bus came to get us around five (they said they would be coming at 4:30, but, listen people, this is G-hana) and they drove us to the halfway point, where the people running the half got down. This was me, so I got down. It was a Total gas station. We waited around for a while (again, G-hana) and then we started, about an hour late (G-hana). The starting line was just a line drawn across the road and they used a starting gun. Actually, in the half, there were several people in wheelchair bikes that competed in their own division. So, they went out first, and then the runners left. And we ran for a long time. The first maybe fifteen minutes were overcast, but then the sun came out. And a lot of the course was uphill, and, for a while, pretty busy trafficpeople wise. But! It was great! I really enjoyed it. It was interesting seeing who passed you in the beginning and then later seeing that you will pass them again. Passing someone that passed you, like, an hour ago, is very fulfilling (in a selfish way, I know, but still.) So I just ran and listened to music and fistbumped kids and ignored other people who were talking to me because I couldn’t hear them (this is really no loss, as people would have been saying things like ‘oh, where are you going?’ ‘oh, why? you should stop, you look so tired.’ etc.). And then, after 2 hours and 45 minutes, I was done. And I was tired, but feeling very very good. I wanted to finish in less than 3.5 hours, so yeah! And there was a lady who was giving ice massages! Yeah! Then we waited around for other people to finish. Kimmie, another PCV was the second female to finish the full marathon and won lots of money! Andy did really well too. One of the other Ghana PCVs running got lost in the middle of the race and had to call to see where to go. This isn’t as lame as it sounds, as everything was suuuper disorganized. There were mile markers that were just blank (____ KM/____ M)(G-hana). After everyone was done, we pretty much just lazed around, went out to eat (a philly steak burger wannabe with corn inside? okay!), Kimmie bought us all icecream with the 300 cedis (!!!) she won for being second and we went to bed early. Oh! Speaking of food! The night before the marathon, I ate the best Italian food of my life. And I’ve been to Italy. The place was called Mamma Mia’s and was Le-Git. The owner came out to greet us and he was a big Italian man who, upon seeing one of us cutting our spaghetti, feigned horror and said “Ah, you a-murdered my spag-hetti!” in an extrememly stereotypical Italian accent. He brought us real, rosemary-infused olive oil and made the best pizzas ever. Andy and I split a small veg pizza and a spaghetti neopolitana (sp?) and died of fatty happiness. It was fine paaaaa.
3 Oct….
Okay! We’re back in Accra now, after a Lovely Beach Vacay. We went to the same place that Peggy and I went to over Christmas last year – the Hideout – and had a pretty good time of getting there. The only thing that didn’t work out was, when we got the station where the lorries to Takoradi left, the tro that was leavin only had one seat left. So, instead of being able to leave right then, we had to wait for another two hours for a second tro to fill. Oh well. It’s really amazing how used to aimlessly waiting around you get here. So we sat in the tro and ate spring rolls (Accra really is a magical place) and enthusiastically greeted the people who slowly began to fill the tro (“Oh! You are welcome!”). After we got out of Accra, we made pretty good time. It took about four hours to reach Takoradi, we got dropped right at the station where the next tro we needed was leaving, left Takoradi within about ten minutes and then, after reaching the middle town, got on the last tro to Butre, the village where the Hideout is located. This was all very lucky, because if we had missed that last tro, we would have had to take a taxi and that would have been much, much more expensive. So we got there fineo and thus began beachy happiness time. Over the next few days we did lots of Scrabble playing, reading, ocean-playing, goat and cat-feeding and padding around in minimal clothes. It was great because we were the only people there and it was really quiet. One morning we walked to this little coffee place that was run by this rasta dude. It was seriously just a little table area, outside in the jungle, and his little living space and a little outdoor kitchen. It was cool because it was in the middle of nowhere. We played mancala. After a few days, we went to Cape Coast and stayed with Nancy, the super sweet PCV at Cape Coast School for the Deaf. She lives on the fourth and top floor of a story building. It’s super breezy, with a view and just a really cool place to be. We made eggplant parmesean and had a really nice night just talking. In the morning, after pancakes, Andy and I headed back to Accra, where we: ate delicious rice pilaf, ate a doughnut on the top floor of Max Mart and played Scrabble, demonstrated our Accrasavvy by always taking the correct tros and stayed with a nice woman named Tina. Yep!
4 Oct….
Here I am, still in Accra. I’m here for super exciting medical checkups – pooping in cups has never been more fun. I’m going to the dentist for the first time in Ghana and then, later, even more excitingly, the dermatologist. Whoa, I knoa. Who knows, maybe I will eat more doughnuts, too? Probably.
