Guest

Hello from the Republic of Georgia, lovely readers of Katharyn’s blog! You may be confused right now. “But wait”, you’re thinking, “I thought Katharyn was doing Peace Corps in Ghana. Also, why is she talking about herself in the third person?” Well, you weren’t wrong! And she isn’t! This is Christopher, writing an insofar unprecedented guest post to write about the awesome African adventures K-rizz and I had together.

Seeing as (if you’re a regular follower of the blog) you’ve already seen the photos and heard the rough itinerary we had, it’s my turn to step in and provide some fresh-to-Ghana accounts of what Katharyn’s life is like. And, luckily for all of you, I kept meticulous notes of what we did, so I would never forget things like “-fried egg sandwich yum breakfast” and “-play scrabble, CRASH”*

As someone who’s a mere 7 months [almost 8] into his own Peace Corps service, one of the first (and last, and middle) things I noticed was how obvious it was that Katharyn is almost done with hers. When Katharyn jokes with Ghanaians, they laugh.** When she interacts with sellers of streetfood, they treat her like she belongs there.*** Even when she would admit later on that she had no idea what she was doing, she certainly looked like she knew what she was doing. Comforting from the “I’m depending on you as a guide” perspective, but even more so from the “I hope her everyday is relatively happy and stress-free”. So rest easy, parents and grandparents and other concerned family members! Or, at least, mostly easy.

As for, you know, the things we actually did, here are some of the highlights (in a very loose chronological order):

-Canopy walk at Karkum National Park. I will say I was a little disappointed by the lack of monkeys, elephants, lions, and every other animal that years of learning about Africa almost exclusively through the Discovery Channel have taught me are omnipresent throughout the African continent. Despite the dearth of pachyderms, however, there is something to be said for walking on a rope bridge suspended high in the rainforest. Even better was the coconut we drank/ate afterwards, and then the french fries and beer we had after that in the (wait for it) Rainforest Cafe (ha! get it?).

-New Year’s Eve dinner, spent at a literal beachfront restaurant. As someone who grew up in the Midwest (which, as you all know, is known for its sandy beaches lined by palm trees), this was a rather atypical New Year’s Eve. And as much as I love popping champagne bottles while thumbing my nose at the -10F weather outside, I’ll take the sounds of waves while nomming a hamburger and talking to my best friend on the beach any time. After dinner we went to a spot and had a lovely conversation about what our post-PC plans were (or, rather, what Katharyn’s plans were, as mine haven’t progressed much beyond get back to America eventually). The actual passing of the year was rather anticlimactic–we were both in bed by 12:07AM, a feat befitting our “we’re-both-23-and-living-in-third-world-countries” lifestyles.

-The trotro rides from the seaside resorts up to Katharyn’s site. Now, I know that “highlight of trip” might not come to mind once I remind you how terribly uncomfortable the seats are on trotros, how surprisingly large the potholes on the roads are, and how mind-bogglingly cramped it can be when you shove 6 people onto a beach that in a reasonable country would seat 4. BUT, is there really any other way to better say “bonding experience”? I think not. Trotros are one of those things that no manner of verbal, pictographic, or videographic description can every really get across–you just have to do it. Like so much of the rest of the trip, I (somewhat) enjoyed these otherwise terribly uncomfortable experiences because they are the same sorts of things Katharyn goes through on a weekly basis.

-Going to the post office in Bolgatanga. So, here I am, a week into the trip, and we’ve finally arrived in Katharyn’s home base. She had been expecting a few packages from family and friends, so we made a stop into the Post Office. Now, I’ve heard from letters and e-mails and phone conversations just how tight Katharyn is with the people who work at her Post Office. Knowing this, as her first VISITOR FROM AMERICA!!@@! I wanted to try my best to make a good impression, to show that Katharyn knows some quality people back home. The conversation went a little like this:

Me: Hi! I’m really glad to meet you, Katharyn says a lot about you.

Mail Woman (MW): You have an insect on your leg.

Me: I… what?

MW: You have an insect on your leg. It is big.

Me (noticing the elephant-sized bug, frantically swatting away): Oh god! I’m sorry!

Of course, at this point, I had swatted this bug, the largest bug I’ve probably ever seen outside a zoo, somewhere inside the Post Office. The American in me proceeds to freak out, images of Ghanaians years later retelling the tale of the jerk American who, upon his first visit, proceeded to unleash a plague of insects upon the good mail people of Bolgatanga. After a few seconds I realized that the woman didn’t seem too concerned, and I tried to laugh it off.

Me: That happens to me a lot. Insects seem to love me.

MW (frowning): Why?

Me: I don’t know, I just get a lot of bug bites.

MW (leaning away slightly, suspiciously inspecting my bite-ridden legs): Are you okay?

Me: I… yeah… really, it’s not a big deal.

After that, Katharyn came back from consulting with customs guy, providing a much-needed relief of the palpable awkward I had built up. A second trip to the post office a few days later yielded much better, less awkward conversations, but this whole interaction is a perfect illustration of how much of my first interactions with Ghanaians went when Katharyn wasn’t there.

-Playing with Katharyn’s kittens. There’s not really a story behind this, just that her kittens are freaking adorable. I think I’ve written quite enough already

–I hope this gives you a little more insight into how the trip went.

*These are, verbatim, some of my notes. I didn’t say everything we did was interesting.

**A skill I haven’t been able to master in my own country quite yet.

***Unlike my few attempts to procure food without her assistance, which usually ended up with me frantically shouting nonsense: “But, b- I- I just wanted… the beans? Not this.”

—Christopher