School

I am in Tamale for the day today. My new situation is a bit different than I expected. The good news is that the house is only about 70 feet from the school. We only have to ride our bikes the 7 km when we want to come into town. Today we made the ride for the first time, it is a challenge as the roads are all very sandy. After the bike ride, we have to wave down a taxi or a trotro (bus) to get the other 38 km to Tamale.

The house isn't a house, more a motel. All the rooms (6) open onto a veranda and there are two showers a kitchen, and two bathrooms in the middle. the shower is the only one that works. To cook, we have a portable gas stove. One of the other teachers, the only other female, cooks every night during the week. We also get hot lunch from the school. Both meals are rice seasoned with fish and tomato past every day it seems. We also have rice for breakfast, served with sugar and milk. It is called rice water, but tastes like warm rice pudding.

The kids are great, though they speak almost no englsh. After school, they come over to our place to watch us, play with us, examine our stuff, and so on. In class, they are rowdy, but they seem to be learning. We have been working with 3 and 4th grade. It seems that some of them understand everything and some understand nothing, so it is hard to devise lesson plans. We hope to teach the 5 and 6th graders starting next week. The other teachers don't show much interest in us, except one, Alhassan, who likes to talk to us.

Last night, I cooked dinner, rice and peanut soup. Since three of the teachers had gone to town, we fed two local girls. Everyone said they liked the food and ate a lot of it!!

It is incredibly hot. When we get out of class (12-1), all I can do is sit in the shade and read. Around 4, I start to feel like a person again. We sleep outside at night, on the outer veranda in our mosquito net, so that we can feel the breeze. I was scared the first night, but the locals assured me that it's very safe.

We will start work for the mango farm next week, though I am not sure exactly what we will be doing as the trees were only planted 3 weeks ago and don't need much tending.

I am off to visit Wahab's mom, Sala and have some fufu for lunch!