"No-Go To Togo"

So after a mind- and bottom-numbingly boring wait in the immigration building in central Kumasi, I was finally reunited with my passport (and it only took two visits and a two hour wait). What's more, it was complete with a visa extension, meaning that happily I was no longer illegally in the country. Good stuff. 

Long story short, I wanted to visit Togo with my new-found lease of freedom. At the border however, it turned out that my visa extension actually negates my visa. That is to say, the stay is extended, the multiple entry option is not. (i.e. I can go to Togo, but getting back into Ghana requires an 'Emergency Visa' which is horrifyingly expensive). The annoying part of all this is that I wondered if that would be the case, so I specifically asked the immigration officials in Kumasi whether I would still be able to travel in and out on my visa extension. They said it would be fine. Humph. So I didn't go over. A shame, but rather than weeping shamelessly on the frontier, I thought I may as well have a look around the Ghanaian side of the line. So the lesson learnt is one that we all knew already: immigration officials are the bane of all travelling.

To reach the border town of Aflao, I decided, in a moment of madness, to take a night bus from Kumasi. As ever, I was sitting next to a rather large woman, and there was neither one, nor two, but three screaming children in the back half of the bus. To top it off, on the other side of the aisle there were all manner of bags/sacks/jerry cans thrown into a big pile that reached up to the roof of the bus, all tied together with rope that must have had the tensile strength of blu-tac. Needless to say that by mid-way through the journey this had half-collapsed onto the poor woman at the end of our row.

Sleep was a precious and rare commodity thanks to more astonishingly vicious speed bumps. By midnight we had reached part of the N6 (the main road between the Kumasi and Accra - two largest cities in Ghana) that currently consists of a dirt track the width of a couple of runways. But it's not flat. At all. During the day time, it's a one and a half hours that is only marginally preferable to water-boarding. But at this time of night, I was treated to, what I least I thought was, a desperately romantic spectacle. All around us were hundreds of lorries, of all shapes and sizes, heading to unknown destinations and trying to meet deadlines. They would barrel through the moonscape together, kicking up dust that would swirl around in the scores of headlights. The forlorn sound of air-horns would disappear into the night air, before being replaced by the growing rumble of another gargantuan 18-wheeler as it would overtake: chassis rattling, suspension at breaking point. It took a number of bone-crushingly deep potholes (of which there are more than ample number) to shake me from my reverie.

We arrived in Aflao at around 06.00 in the morning, bringing the total journey time on one bus to the best part of 11 hours. Happily, this manages to break my previous record (from Belgrade to Sarajevo: for all of you out there who are thinking about slumming it across the Balkans at some point). 

So after the border debacle that morning, I had to change my plans. I have a feeling that a few people were secretly - and not so secretly - quite happy that I hadn't managed to reach Lomé. After all, the FCO travel advice for Togo hardly makes for optimistic reading: "…attacks on pedestrians happen in broad daylight...rise in violent robberies…theft is common…unofficial roadblocks…exercise extreme caution….etc." Perhaps it just wasn't meant to be this time.

As for Aflao itself, I read somewhere that it's the sort of place 'you will want to pass through as quickly as possible'. It's a typical border town. It's the complete opposite to Cape Coast (see previous post). It's as chaotic as anywhere I've ever been. The hassle is extreme. Not just to tourists, but to locals as well - there were men and women being pulled in all different directions at the same time as drivers' mates fought to get them on their own tro-tros. And whereas everywhere I've previously been, people talk to you because they're genuinely interested in what you do and what you think of Ghana, in Aflao you have the unshakeable feeling that everyone has an ulterior motive for wanting to talk to you. So I thought I'd press on.

I decided to visit the town of Keta. The hour drive east is worth the whole trip cross-country: Keta is situated on a narrow strip of coastline that lies between the sea and a lagoon . At times this strip reaches no more than 300m in width, where you're treated to bright yellow beaches, surrounded by palm trees on one side, and lush green swamps on the other. It's breath-taking at times. Keta itself is remarkably run-down. It could have been a ghost town. The onslaught of the sea means that many of the buildings on this part of the coast are crumbling onto the beaches. It's wonderfully atmospheric. The main sight in the town is Fort Prinzenstein, built by the Danes in 1784, before being sold to the British in 1850. It used to serve as a prison, until a particularly fierce storm caused it to half-collapse. Having made friends with a couple of boys in town, I was treated to a personal tour of the fort. Shackles, cannons and grind-stones all still in place, it was an eery and isolated place to visit.

I wandered along the huge stretch of deserted beach, watching the spider crabs swarming near the surf, and the fishing boats pushed out of reach of high tide. There was only one other person on the beach, at a considerable distance, and I presumed they were appreciating the decaying, almost forgotten feel to this coastline as I was. At least, I did before they whipped down their trousers and squatted onto the sand…

I finished off the day back in my hostel in Aflao, and to relax I found myself watching Invictus in French on Togolese TV. The final scene was interrupted - and I kid you not - at the exact moment of the triumphant (we hope) last kick of the Rugby World Cup Final. It was 17.00 and time to announce the names of those who had recently passed away in Lomé. I turned this off after an increasingly depressing hour of waiting for the film to continue.

To make my way back to Fumesua and avoiding another night-bus, I had to take a tro-tro to Accra (3h30mins), change at what I'm sure is the most chaotic bus station I will ever go to in my life, and grab another tro-tro to Kumasi, hopping off at Fumesua right at the end of another 5 hours travel. Apart from what must have been a dozen police check points, the moonscape yet again, and a surreal 1h 20 minutes of watching Banlieue 13 in the back of the converted van, this passed slowly but without too much incident. I arrived back here to a wonderful meal, a much needed shower and a very comfortable bed. It was a quick blast east for a couple of days that didn't go at all to plan, but then again, that's what travelling is all about…

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: Having a baby throw up in our cramped and very full tro-tro. I suppose it had to happen.

"Cape Crusading"

On Friday I went on the first of my travels and took off for the Central Region (though less central than the Ashanti Region due to interesting but currently irrelevant colonial history). So I bought my ticket for the Kumasi-Cape Coast bus. On the dot of 09.53, we pulled out of the station and started the five hour trip to the coast. As is inevitable, I was squashed in between a coughing woman of sizeable proportions and a guy who slept with his head on my shoulder for the majority of the journey. It was a fairly straightforward blast south, interspersed only by some truly savage speed bumps.

I arrived in Cape Coast mid-afternoon and headed to (or should I say found) a hostel to drop off my bag. On the walk through the middle of town, it immediately became clear that obrunis  are far more commonplace than in Kumasi. The Central Region is arguably the most popular area of Ghana for tourists. Cape Coast itself has a wonderful, slightly decaying atmosphere to it. It's quaint, it clearly has a colonial past, and is compact enough to be able to walk everywhere. On the first evening, I went out on the balcony to watch the city as darkness fell: the taxis screeching, horns blaring, children shouting, and music playing from every other house. In my room, an inspired piece of design meant that the fan was right underneath the lightbulb - the resulting strobing effect certainly added to the sense of place, though it should have come with an epilepsy warning. 

The following day I visited Cape Coast Castle: a World Heritage Site that is said to have been the largest slave-holding site in the whole world during the colonial era, with up to 1,500 slaves awaiting shipment at any given time. The building is an astonishing mix of incomprehensible cruelty and spacious luxury. There are three separate slave dungeons - no windows, unbearably hot, and with walls and floors that have been scratched by iron shackles. The upper floors of the castle however were built for the British colonisers, are filled with spacious rooms and halls, and have windows looking out to incredible views and white-washed courtyards. The contrast is disturbing.

A short walk from the castle, I checked into another hostel (the previous night's was fully booked for the weekend). I followed tradition and booked a couple of nights in a dorm - something I always do when travelling solo: not only is it cheap, but it's a great way of meeting people from all over the place. But no matter where I go, I always seem to get the dorm with the German girls.  The place itself had a great outdoor restaurant/bar and was on the sea-front, leading right onto the beach. From here you could watch the family of pigs wandering over the sand, or, more impressively, the fishing nets being pulled in by dozens of locals, or the furious paddling through the breakers on the large and heavy wooden canoes. I spent the afternoon playing football with the children on the beach - fantastic fun - with moments of hilarity and an inexcusable Hand-of-God-style goal (erm, I won't mention names…).  

That night, a group of us (some volunteers from Sweden and a girl from Ireland) took a table outside and chatted about everything, from how to transport a dead dog to the vet, to practising questionable toasts in Swedish. It was a really fun and interesting group. (In contrast to some Canadian girls the next night: "I hate beer, but it's so cheap here I have it anyway.") The compulsory drumming started up and went on for what was unanimously declared as two hours too long. We clapped loudly and for a long time simply so that we could extend the relative peace between rhythm-bashing. When we finally turned in to our respective dorms, I was carried off to sleep by the sound of dogs barking, waves crashing, gravel shovelling and, best of all, an old man chuckling and talking to himself outside, before turning his inebriated ramblings on to some poor girl on the other side of the wall, doing her best to sleep.

On the Sunday I visited Elmina, a small but very pretty fishing town, a few kilometres to the west of Cape Coast. It's essentially a town split in two by a harbour area that leads to a lagoon. It's also home to St George's Castle - arguably the oldest extant colonial building in Sub-Saharan Africa (but you'd have to argue pretty passionately because it's been rebuilt and added to so much that there's little to be seen of the original structure). This trip ended with notching up far more conversations with locals than actual trips to the sights and attractions. I got on with a guy called Perry so well that he introduced me to his friends and gave me a tour of the recording studio they'd set up together. And they'd made some great music!

Heading back to Cape Coast, I spent the late afternoon chatting to people I'd met on previous days - not other volunteers, but the water-sellers, children on the beach and other locals. There was something to be really enjoyed about being able to greet them all on first name terms, in Fante with typical Ghanaian handshakes. I really felt comfortable - and what's more, like I belonged here. Even more so, when I saw a group of Americans who had obviously just arrived in Ghana: whilst we were all in swimming shorts and T-shirts, one poor boy was traipsing along the beach at midday wearing a bush-hat, a khaki shirt, green trousers with thousands of pockets, and great clumping walking boots. Fine if you're doing reconnaissance patrols in the DR Congo, but it did look a little out of place in the laid-back atmosphere around the beach.

It was an early start on Monday morning because I wanted to visit the nearby Kakum National Park before I had to head back to Kumasi at around midday. Kakum is famous for its rainforest canopy walk - seven rope bridges that total over 350 metres, 40 metres above the forest floor. It's unique in Africa and provides views otherwise inaccessible to us mere humans. I had heard stories about tourists being herded across it, queuing up, and generally spoiling everything that one might possibly enjoy. So I got there early. In fact I got there so early that the Park hadn't even opened. But this didn't matter - I joined a small group from a school in Derbyshire of all places, who had organised an early tour. We had the whole place to ourselves. The sounds of the rainforest were all around us, the humidity was soaring and the occasional five second rainfall would cool us for just a moment. The canopy walk is certainly not for those who are scared of heights. These are Indiana Jones-style rope bridges: swaying, creaking, and making the occasional loud crack. We got off to a good start when our guide told us: "It's almost always safe". Well that's okay then. But it was great fun - though the teacher in the school group was adamant that the students should go first to 'test' the bridge.

I was back in Cape Coast in no time - a quick pop back to grab my bag - before heading to the nearby square to get a bus back. The buses here have no timetables: they work on a 'it leaves when it's full basis' - so I had an uncomfortably long wait in a very hot bus. But after negotiating for street food in Fante, walking in the heights of the rainforest and challenging Ghanaian kids at their own game on home turf, I reckoned I could manage this one…

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: Having a minibus door slammed on my hand and yet feeling absolutely nothing at all, with no damage done whatsoever.

"Un Dimanche à la Piscine à Kumasi"

So this dimanche I thought it was high time to do nothing. But a relaxing sort of nothing, as opposed to a recovering-from-illness sort of nothing. After spending the majority of last week in bed, I felt that on Friday, when I returned to school, I must have looked like a recently-released hostage: pale, unaccustomed to daylight, desperately in need of a haircut and a little out of touch with the rest of the world. So, first things first, I got myself that much-needed haircut: I had begun to look like Captain Caveman. What's more, it cost the equivalent of 80 pence and, amazingly, it's just what I wanted. My fellow Year Abroaders from this year will, I'm sure, have a deep understanding and knowledge of the all-consuming, unbridled terror that grips you when having your haircut in a foreign country. A select few of you will be all too aware of my infamous "Egg Incident" in France some months ago… But here, there was no such misfortune.

A trip to the nearby swimming pool was, I thought, a good way to make use of the sun again. I had the place to myself for the majority of the day; listening to African hip-hop remixes being blared out at many thousands of decibels, while the two staff members would dance in the shade of the deserted bar. I kidded myself that I was doing exercise when for the most part I was definitely floating around for ages in the middle of the pool. Think the start of The Bourne Identity, but if he hadn't lost his memory and had decided to go on holiday for a bit of respite instead. 

When eventually a family did turn up, I got talking with the children and they asked me if I could help them to learn to swim properly. There's nothing like giving demonstrations, tips and advice on a technique before watching them give it a go -  as they sink like a lead weight. But we made progress as we got on. Funnily enough, they knew of me as a teacher before we spoke - they'd seen me around the area before. This is becoming a common occurrence:  I'll walk around and hear little children, who neither have I spoken to before nor do they go to the school in which I teach, shouting 'Niiiick! Morning-o! [Ghanaian-English for all of you linguistics fans]' everywhere. It's like a glimpse into a celebrity lifestyle. Being an obruni, I rather stand out here. I long ago became accustomed to being stared out wherever I go; whether it's on the minibus, walking home from school or just being around town, 99% of heads turn my way. I can't help but think that I'm not entirely deserving of all this attention, and whether it's all really necessary - yet on the rare occasion that I've seen another obruni here, I guarantee that I was staring at them far more intently than anyone else around. So I'm not one to judge.

I'm really looking forward to getting back to a normal week at school. There's sure to be plenty more incident with the minibus, more Social Studies and English lessons, a token 'practice' on the keyboard and the chance to get back to a favourite book: it's one that I've read before, yet I still can't for the life of me work out how the Ukrainian terrorists are going to get off the world's largest oil-tanker without having to blow it up, causing the Kremlin and possibly the US President to fall in the process. I look forward to finding out though...

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: To help fifty to sixty pupils squeeze onto the minibus, I took one for the team and became the luggage rack. This selfless act tragically ended with the lower-most bag leaking what I chose to believe was water, all over my trousers for a good twenty minutes or so before we reached school.

"The Guy Who Came in with a Cold"

Last Friday the inevitable happened: I was ill for the first time here.

'What heinous disease could this be?', I hear you ask. Bilharzia? Lassa fever? Multiple bites from the tsetse fly? No. I had a cold - large and incapacitating - but a cold nonetheless. As a result, Friday and Saturday were a more sedate affair. That said, I went to another wedding on Saturday morning. Another wonderfully flamboyant service that got more and more packed as the ceremony progressed - it seems that the start time of "09.30 prompt" on the invitation was interpreted by some as: "Turn up whenever -  during the vows would be ideal."

So this 'cold' pretty much went by Sunday afternoon, which is what makes what followed a little unexpected. On Monday morning I woke up at 04.00 with just about all the symptoms of any disease you can think of. I'll spare you the details. Thinking I'd play it safe, I popped to the clinic to check out what it could be. Immediately, there was a wonderful moment in the reception where I caught sight of a public health information poster and noticed that I ticked all the right boxes for someone with cholera. A less-than-comfortable wait to see the doctor - and a wonderfully-timed dash to the clinic's toilet - was followed by a blood test. This involved the nurse looking at me gravely, and saying sombrely: 'I'm sorry…' before she jabbed my thumb, multiple times and with much vigour.

Malaria tends to be the default diagnosis here - as indeed it was for me before the test came back negative. Indeed, the majority of people in the waiting room - if they haven't got a tap stuck on their big toe, or an arm recently missing - will be there because they have the symptoms of malaria. They'll be given some pills, and they'll make a fairly quick recovery. In my case, it was decided that I probably had some viral infections (nice and specific), so I've been put on plenty of tablets and should generally take it easy. Fun. So what do you do when you're off school and should spend the day in bed? Write a blog of course. So here you go.

Illness also brings up that universal linguistic problem of how to respond to someone asking: 'How are you?' It's the most natural thing to ask when meeting either friends or strangers - far more so in Africa than in Europe - and more often than not you reply, as standard: 'I'm fine, thank you.' All well and good. It's expected of you. But anything else you say is viewed as deviating from the norm and is therefore suspicious. Sometimes if you get creative with your answer, they'll ask you again. But 'Fine' is not always applicable to the situation! When I was teaching in France and I would ask pupils how they were, I'd always get that standard response. They could have been on their deathbed or hopping around with a bear-trap on their ankle, and they'd still be saying 'I'm fine, thank you'. This is the predicament I found myself in (not the bear-trap incident you understand…). Rant over.

Looking ahead to the rest of this week, I'm aware that tomorrow I'll be hitting the half-way point of my time in Ghana. In fact, my everyday routine at the school will be changing for good in just a few weeks. The school has been kind enough to let me use July as a month to travel around a bit. Having always been one to grab my trusty green backpack (okay, it's my dad's, but it's become something of a companion to me) and do some travelling, I can't wait to see some more of Ghana. My plan is to do three trips, spread out over my last month, to different parts of the country. Popping back to Kumasi at various points in between means that: a) I can go back to school for the days that I'm around; b) I can travel light; c) It also means that I should be able to give a running commentary to my faithful blog followers (I'm going out on a limb with the plural form). Otherwise there's a chance that I'd have to write a War and Peace-esque finale - and those who know me well, know my deep loathing of a 'high' word count. I could try to outline my travel plans here and now, but  - and this can be regarded as a gross generalisation or not - Africa seems to have a way with spontaneity and the unexpected. 

All will be revealed in good time…

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: Spending 20 minutes pushing the school minibus around the playground to try and start the thing.

"The Short Good Friday"

So I've been living in Ghana for a month now and it's absolutely flown by. 

School is still going well - the lessons move at a good pace and there's always a very positive atmosphere around the place. Even marking English homework throws up plenty of smiles. Whilst going through exercises where the students had to write a letter to a friend, I came across some wonderful introductions such as : "To set the ball rolling, I hope you are as fit as a fiddle and swimming in the pool of happiness" along with, "I hope you are drinking from the cup of Mr Healthy."

We finish school an hour earlier on Fridays - a point that the students are not unaware of - and generally the final hour is filled with lots of noise, running around and general contagious excitement. This Friday my duties too, it seemed, became suitably relaxed. With marking and teaching over for the week, I ended up with students at the keyboard, trying to remember some of the pieces I play back home, whilst using the excuses: "None of the Es seem to be working on this keyboard" and "it's not long enough" in order to mask my considerable shortcomings. This was immediately followed by a wander into the heaving playground, shaking yet more hands, and ending up doing kick-ups and general ball 'skills'  - greeted with undeserved applause and cheers - surrounded by dozens of baying children. A good end to a week.

On Saturday I was lucky enough to go to a Ghanaian wedding - Moses, a teacher at the school, was getting married in the nearby town of Ejisu. So having dressed up in a suitably Ghanaian way (Eric was kind enough to lend me one of his African design shirts), we hopped on a tro-tro and before we knew it the ceremony was in full swing. The service was all in Twi so perhaps I'm not the best person to give a detailed analysis on the wording of the vows or on the personal relevance of the hymns. But it didn't matter because it was a feast for all the senses. Bright colours everywhere, patterns of every description, microphones (with the compulsory feedback issues), loudspeakers and music galore. At regular intervals guests could and would get up and dance up at the front, waving their handkerchiefs, twirling around and generally doing anything they possibly could to send the temperature and humidity shooting up off the scale. All in all it was a day to remember…

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: To add even more excitement to a morning's rounds in the school minibus, someone placed a distressingly large gas canister marked 'Extremely Flammable" underneath my seat.

"Goal Posts in the Gold Coast"

Having been at the school for a couple of weeks now, I think it's about time to share my experiences - it is after all the reason that I'm actually here. A typical day goes something like this:

05.40: Wake up (60% awake and upwards will do). Shuffle, eyes-closed, into shower. Cold shower/buckets of water to complete the waking up stage.

06.10: Minibus leaves house to drop off boarders at school.

06.25: Minibus starts picking up day pupils from surrounding area. Cue incident and general excitement (see previous post).

08.20: Breakfast at school: after being awake for the best part of three hours, this generates more excitement than you might think.

08.30: School starts (and the hysterical small children screaming and running around stop) Teaching/Marking/Planning/Reading

12.30: Lunch. Huge portions of yams/stew/rice/plantain/banku/kenkey etc

13.10: Teaching/Marking/Planning/Reading

15.00: Home time - and a wander along the dirt tracks waving, greeting and often shaking hands (the really cool Ghanaian handshake where you both click against each other's third finger) with everyone and anyone.

School is great fun. Not only have I gained the prestigious title of "Sir Nick", but some of the students actually salute me. Needless to say that this is an idea that I'll be bringing back to the UK with me and will subsequently be trying to implement. It feels like it's a real novelty for the students to have an obroni  ('white person/foreigner') around them at school - but this plays into your hands when trying to teach a group of thirty restless teenagers during the final period on a Friday. I could have taken a lesson on Methodology in Political Theory and they still would have hung onto every word.

I've taken a number of English classes and Social Studies classes so far and it's been interesting to compare my time working as a teaching assistant in France with my time here in Ghana. During an English comprehension exercise, we were looking at a text on the subject of AIDS. A student put their hand up and, in the class of thirty, explained that they were HIV-positive and asked what could be done to prevent the transmission of the virus to others. So apart from the fact that I'm working in a school, Ghana and France can't really be compared. It's a different world, but it's one that I'm relishing the opportunity to get to know.

Early on, during a standard venture out into the playground, a swarm of small children (after working in secondary schools, you forget just how small some children can be) pounced on me from out of nowhere and before I knew it I had been smothered by dozens of them. It took a good five minutes of shaking hands, high-fiving and the occasional pat on my head before I escaped and tasted sweet freedom once again. I returned to the main school building with the high-pitched calls of 'obruniiiiiiiii' trailing in my wake.

On Saturday morning I was up at 05.00 (no, that's not a typo) to go running and play football with the boarders. In what can only be described as miraculous, there are 21 boarders who, along with me, like to play football . And so, after a warm-up of jogging in rhythm down dirt tracks whilst blaring out African songs for motivation (far better than our standard British warm-up of "twice around the football pitch…"), we started the game. I'd forgotten just how much I enjoy a good old 11-a-side match. Moments of world-class skill, some Sunday League defending and plenty of goals. And the inevitable last quarter of the game (or third in my case) where no-one can muster anything faster than a gentle walk across the pitch. What could be a better way to start the weekend?

As if that weren't enough we finished the day by getting a group of teachers together to go and watch the Champions League Final (sorry pedants, but they don't use an apostrophe) at the nearby hotel. Ghana is a country made up of Chelsea supporters -  due to their Ghanaian player Michael Essien and the fact that it's the only decent Premier League team with a healthy number of African players -  so this match was a big deal. We piled into the bar and the whistle blew for kick-off. Our audience was on the verge of tears when Chelsea were 1-0 down with just eight minutes to go. And then, with only two minutes left on the clock, Drogba (an Ivorian, but Ghanaians don't seem to mind if he scores) equalised. Eruption. Jubilation. Hugging, high-fiving, dozens of handshakes for everyone, shouting and cheering. Which gives you some idea of the reaction when Chelsea eventually won on penalties. I honestly thought my die-hard Chelsea-supporting friends were going to jump fully-clothed into the pool in celebration. The hotel managers, in their shirts, ties and badges, rushed out from wherever they'd been 'working' that evening and started jumping up and down, fist-pumping and hugging us as though we were brothers who had been separated at birth and who were now finally reunited. Anthems rang in our ears for the remainder of the night. Ghana is a country where football really matters. That suits me just fine... 

Ghanaian Vehicle Moment of the Week: Being a passenger in a taxi so low that we were constantly bottoming-out whilst driving irresponsibly close to a tanker carrying a gigantic black cylinder bearing the words: "Atomic Energy Commission"

"Drive Hard with a Vengeance"

When imagining the five hour journey from Accra to Fumesua, I had all sorts of ideas about what could lie ahead, built up from a little previous experience, accounts from others and, for the most part, stereotypes: would we tip over on every corner? Would it be so hot that we end up discovering the melting point of 'human'? Would the ride render me unable to sit down for months after? The answer was most unexpected.

I ended up on a bus with air conditioning blasting out from every angle, huge reclining seats and a widescreen TV that was showing an oddly gripping and wholly outlandish drama in Twi.  As a result these five hours absolutely flew by (and the two sisters were reunited at the end, both living in luxury, and only one man was left speaking in tongues).  I was met at my stop in Fumesua by Eric - a teacher, my new guide and all-round nice guy - and we travelled to the house where I would be staying for the duration of my time in Ghana.

A very good room was made great by the fact that my pillows (which are actually the right shape, unlike the French ones I've been dealing with this year) are covered with cartoons of penguins, reindeers and snowmen. A token bit of unpacking was followed by some Ghanaian-sized portions of rice and a delicious stew, before I headed to bed for an early night. And that was when the storm hit. The power went out and I lay on my mattress in the pitch black, my room illuminated by flashes of lightning every other second. I just listened. The sound of the rain hitting the roof and the ground outside was biblical. I fell asleep with a huge grin on my face…

Mornings consist of waking up at 05.40 or so and jumping onto the rickety school minibus to do a few rounds around the surrounding villages to pick up the students. These journeys are great fun. Key features of the minibus include: half the casing of a television in the passenger footwell, presumably to cover the exposed wires/gaping hole in the floor; the sliding door that excels in reaching its resonating frequency at dual carriageway speed; and the ability to tilt what I'm sure is well over 45˚ without rolling.

It doesn't take long before you're completely unsurprised by anything during these journeys. Today our school minibus drove along the hard shoulder on the wrong side of a dual carriageway, towards oncoming traffic. It's all about the excitement. Anyone can drive on the correct side of the road. We are also taking strides in finding out how many children can fit into a minibus (I'm afraid a punch-line doesn't follow). We managed a good deal over forty today (five of whom were wedged between the passenger seat and the dashboard - and I was sitting in the passenger seat). This all well and good until you go around a roundabout, your entire bodyweight pressing against the passenger door and you suddenly ask yourself: just how trustworthy is that piece of rope that long ago replaced any semblance of a door handle?

Whilst bouncing along, you suddenly realise that half of your brain is constantly churning out contingency plans and escape routes. One such moment came when we were parked on the hard shoulder of the dual carriageway, rain thrashing against the windows. I was standing up in the passenger seat, facing the rest of the seats in the bus, having had to manoeuvre myself to open the door.  It was at this moment that we heard that urgent and unmistakable sound of a huge lorry's horn, again and again, coming towards us. Or should I say two of them. Looking out of the rear windscreen, two pairs of headlights, side by side, loomed out of the sheets of rain. I felt like Harrison Ford in The Fugitive when the bus is lying on the railway tracks and he looks up to see the light of a train coming straight for them. Two trucks barrelling down the road, one trying to overtake the other. There's that moment where you're acutely aware of everyone tensing and the pulses quickening. You find yourself measuring distances and spotting where the soft landings are…

But this stayed purely theoretical. In a rare moment of sanity one of the huge trucks (and these things are absolute behemoths) seemed to have realised that trying to overtake another oversized vehicle whilst straddling the hard shoulder in the pouring rain was probably not going to do anyone any favours. The trucks passed and so did the moment.

One last thing to add on the topic of driving in Ghana is that if you believe that someone has overtaken your vehicle too recklessly, is travelling too slowly or has a generally disagreeable driving style, you (and more often the not any passengers you are carrying) must take the following action: 1) Catch up/slow down until you are alongside the perpetrator (no matter the impracticality or the downright danger to yourself and other road users).  2) Take your eyes off the road for an inappropriate length of time in order to death-stare at your opponent. 3) If this action elicits little to no response, then you are well within your rights to hurl some abusive phrases in Twi at the offender. 4) Keep on staring. 5) Now take both hands well away from the steering wheel in order to gesticulate wildly at everyone and anyone. 6) Return to normal driving style, but - and this is an important point to note - be sure to complain incessantly and at volume about the idiot in said vehicle to the next person with whom you talk. Note: Hours may pass between the aforementioned incident and the latter conversation - but you won't forget and everyone needs to hear about it because it has pained you so.

Happily, life at the school is rather less manic. A topic for the next post I think...