Goodbye

1/27

Today at outreach we went to a private school we have been to several times. There are over 900 students and we treat about 200 kids. One boy had his head covered in white cream, as if his mother had been treating the head fungus at home. I started wiping the several day old cream off his head and the second I touched it he started squirming and crying. At first I thought he was just faking, but then I realized that by wiping the cream off I was wiping some skin off too. Then some places were raised and there were cuts that were oozing pus. The fungus had gotten so bad there were boils under the skin on his head. I told him to tell his mom to take him to the doctor. Turns out he was an orphan. His grandmother was taking care of him. Hopefully she will take him to the doctor and get him some antibiotics and maybe change his pillowcase!

Kasper, Louisa, me and fluffy at our host families house

1/28

Today was my last day at outreach. We set our table up under a covered area in the middle of the school. The kids here were very excited. They could not wait their turn in line and constantly wanted to see what we were doing. Almost every kid at this school had some sort of head fungus. The kids with the slightly longer hair are very difficult to treat because the cream cannot get to the scalp. I was told that the kids are required to have their hair cut short and now I understand why. After we treated all the kids and checked the teachers, we got some good pictures with the kids. They almost knocked us over trying to all get in the picture.

Amelia and me

me and Enoch

me with all the kids

1/29

This morning Ben left at about 5am for the funeral of his brother-in-law. Agnes, my host mother, stayed the night with Philomena, her daughter and the widow. Junior, Roselyn and I left at about 830. We arrived at the church for the service. At 5 that morning was the viewing of the body and the mourning. The body was laid on a bed and for some time people pray and cry. If you cannot cry then you hire someone to cry for you. By not crying you make it look as if you are happy the person died or that you killed them. And it is not just enough to “cry” the hired mourners really wail! Afterwards the body was put in a coffin, much like ones from home, and brought to the church. When we arrived the crying was over and it was just preaching and singing at the church. Everyone wears black on this day to the funeral. If you are family of the deceased, you where black and red. After the service we all walked down the road to the burial. People gathered around the grave and laid the flowers in with the coffin. We then went to a family members house for lunch. Everyone sat around and mingled and ate jollof rice and chicken. It is evidently also popular to drink before hand. Many of the younger men showed up obviously very intoxicated. Between eating and mingling people would go to the actual funeral. This is where chairs are set up under tents surrounding a shrine of pictures of the deceased and flowers. People would come up as they arrived and shake the hands of all those sitting on the front row. These are the family members. Then they would donate money to cover for the cost of the VERY expensive funeral. Once you donated money, you got a receipt. You would take this to the people playing music and they would stop the music and announce your name and how much you donated. If it was a sufficient amount people would clap. You could also use the receipt to get food and drinks. Agnes stayed busy most of the day attending to the guests and making sure everyone was happy. When I sat down to wait for some food. She snapped and told the people serving that I should have gotten my food first and to hurry and serve me. Several times today, 4 to be exact, young men came to me and either said I should marry them or asked if they could find them a “white lady” to marry. At about 6 when the funeral part was over, they put on modern music and people dance like they are at a club. At about 7 that evening I helped carry extra food and drinks to the car. We finally got home about 10. It was a very long day!

junior, roselyn, akosi, Agnes and junior, me, Roselyn's mom, Ben and Maabenaa

me and junior

1/30

Today was the second day of the funeral. Today everyone wears black and white. They tell people what pattern they will wear and most people showed up wearing an outfit made with that particular fabric. The church service this morning started at 7, but we did not get there until 12. It ended about 1. After the church service we went to another house for food. People would come in and eat then go to the same funeral part. At the funeral there were traditional drummers and again people collecting and announcing monetary donations. 

me with baby junior

Also at one point Philomena, the widow, stood up and started dancing. Then people would get up and surround her as danced around the chairs. People would come up and stick money on her forehead or just throw money at her. 

people dancing around the widow

We had more jollof rice, chicken and kebabs today. Because Agnes was going to stay with her daughter this night she would not be back at the house before I left the next morning. We said our goodbyes at the funeral. She was a wonderful host mother and she and her family really made this trip special.

1/31

This morning I woke up at 5 and got dressed so I could throw the last of my things in my suitcase and cross my fingers and weigh my bags. After sitting, standing, jumping and ripping seams on one bag I finally got it closed! When I went to the STC bus station that would take me to Accra, my fears were confirmed and my bags were 5 kilos over the allotted amount. I had already left behind clothes, toiletries, shoes, and what was left was necessary things. When I got to Accra, I had GHC8.80 left with me, which should have been enough to get me to the airport. The first taki driver I talked to said GHC15. I laughed and said GHC6. He got angry and walked away. I yelled back and said, “I though this was how your bargaining game worked. You say something ridiculously high and I say something ridiculously low.” He said he was being fair and gave me a good price. I ignored him and walked away. Another guy told me the same price and I started to get worried. This time I did not want to bargain so I straight up told him how much money I had. He said he would find someone going near there and would only charge me the money I had left. We had a deal and I made it to the airport with a backpack, purse and 2 huge rolling bags. My flight was scheduled to leave Accra at 11:15pm and arrive in Nashville after a layover in DC at 936am. I noticed the United counter was empty and there were no united workers at around 730. I found a United ticket and info desk. I said that I just wanted to confirm that my flight was on time. She said there were no flights scheduled for today. I whipped my ticket out and she typed some numbers into the computer and said it was rerouted via Frankfurt, Germany leaving at the same time, but arriving in Nashville at 540pm…So my already long day and a half has now turned into a really long 48 hours! I went through customs only to be asked what was in my bags and that was sufficient for them. Going through immigration was a little different. I knew my passport was expired, but I was told by immigration services in Kumasi that there was a one week grace period. The immigration officer told me the passport was expired and there was no such thing as a “grace period.” He told me instead of paying the fee for an expired passport and getting it restamped I could just pay GHC30 or $20. I told him all I had was a credit card. He told me I would need to pay or he would turn me over to his supervisor. I insisted that I only had a credit card and he told me to go downstairs, buy something and get cash back, but that when I returned upstairs I needed to some directly to him. At this point I knew he was lying to me. I said I would like to talk with his supervisor and the head of immigration and he immediately said, “don’t worry about it, go on.” HAH! I was so angry as I walked away. I feel so bad for poor people trying to leave and getting scammed by jerks like this. I knew by reporting him, it would go no where…things in Ghana are not like the US. That man would be fired on the spot for trying something like that at home! Finally I boarded my Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt at 11:15.

2/1

We arrived in Frankfurt at about 7am, German time. German is such a rhythmic funny language. I think I was tired and a little delirious because I had to think about something else every time someone spoke in the airport to keep from laughing. When we arrived our gate was occupied so they made us get out of the plane in the 14 degree weather onto the tarmac. (I was wearing capris and sandals!) Four hours later we boarded a plane to DC. Finally from DC to Nashville! Mom and Dad met me at the airport when my plane arrived at about 530pm. I was welcomed with a bouquet of BACON!! :)

me and mom with my bacon bouquet

me and dad

 I am so glad to be home and see my family and friends. I will always remember this trip and the people that made it so special. I now have many great friends around the world and especially in Ghana. I will someday go back to visit!

Thanks to all the support you blog readers have given me! 

Nearing the end

1/18

Today at the hospital Dr. Boateng’s lesson was on religion. One woman said she has been fasting and praying hard to get better. Dr. Boateng went on about how God is at your side whenever. You do not need to make a show to get him to listen to your prayers. It was actually a very good soapbox! This afternoon Dr. Gyasi and the anesthesiologist came in for a hysterectomy. The woman was 41 and had 1 daughter. Dr. Gyasi said she was still young and wanted more kids so his goal was to salvage the ovaries as best he could. They used spinal anesthesia so she was only numb from the hips down. Unfortunately the incision and work was done about the area under anesthesia. After the incision she started screaming and moving her hands to the cut. They tied her hands down. Dr. Gyasi continued operating. He found the tumor and stuck a probe into it to hold it in place and be able to pull up on it. At this she began to go into a kind of shock because of the pain. I had to hold her arms down. I tried holding her hands and stroking her arms to calm her down, but you could tell she was feeling every bit of it. They finally put her under general anesthesia before they started removing the tumor. The tunor was about the size of a melon and was situated just between the ovaries. After removing the tumor he also removed her appendix. Her chart said nothing about it being a problem, but maybe he just wanted to save her another operation sometime possibly in the future. 

the operating room

When I left the hospital it was getting dark. A man was pulling out of the hospital and asked if I lived in Atonsu, which I do, and gave me a ride all the way to the house! He has a mother-in-law and a friend in Atasemanso Hospital. He knows a lot of Peace Corps volunteers and works with the road designing and engineering. He was very nice and saved me a tro ride and a walk in the dark. Two weeks from today I will be home!

1/19

Today Dr. Boateng would not let me leave the hospital until I took some medicine for the bites on my legs. I had to get a patient card and be registered in the system. Then I sat in his office and he took my blood pressure. Then wrote a prescription for an antihistamine, cortisone cream, and an antibiotic. He did not ask if I had any allergies or if I was currently on any medication. I took the antihistamine and applied the cream, but did not take the 1000mg Amoksiklav tablets.

1/20

Today outreach was again just me. Enoch and Chief came, along with the medical supervisor for Ghana from Accra. The kids were crazy today! They were all huddling around me. One little girl asked if I was from America. I said that I was. She then asked if that is where Jennifer Aniston lives. When I said yes she got so excited and went running to tell her friends. A lot of these kids had ring worm…more than usual. But most of the kids had tine scars, that I could do nothing for but clean off to make them feel better. Some kids even pick off scabs so they have a reason to come to us. I usually give those kids a lecture about how an open wound just leads to infection and by pulling the scab off they are increasing the chance for a scar. I don’t think they really understand the danger of having an open wound here, but it makes me feel better letting them know. One girl had what looked like a tiny cut on her elbow, but when I went to clean it off puss started coming out. Then I realized her whole elbow was swollen and this was a boil. I pressed the edges to get as much puss out as I could, then put some cream for boils on it. Most kids, like her sit there with terrible wounds and don’t even flinch. Other kids have a scar or tiny scab I barely touch to clean and they pretend like it hurts so bad. Overall I am really impressed with the pain tolerance of these kids. American kids should take note!

the table with equipment at outreach

treating fungus

the kids are crazy about the obruni

1/21

Today Louise and I met in Kejetia. We went to a little street place for some breakfast. We got fried egg on bread with coffee. The people on the street that make these do such a good job and it is super cheap! For 2 eggs mixed with onion and pepper, fried, with bread and butter, coffee with milk and sugar-I usually like black coffee but they make it without asking how you take it-is only GHC2! Which is about $1.30. 

goats on the roof of a trotro

We then went to find a tro going to Essase so we could go to Owabi Wildlife sanctuary just outside of Kumasi. We were sent all around Kejetia to find the tro. Finally we found a tro going to Essase. We paid and got on and waited for it to fill up. The town is only about 13km outside of Kumasi, but after almost 2hours we were getting worried. Finally after traveling through the middle of nowhere on dirt roads the tro stopped and said, “last stop.” We asked the driver if this was Essase. He laughed and said that we passed Essase a while ago. He took us back and told us that a little town with maybe 3 buildings was Essase. We got off and started asking some locals how to get to Owabi.. None of them knew what we were saying much less what we were talking about. Finally one man spoke some English and said that he did not know Owabi. We pulled out the Bradt guide and showed him a map with the names of where we were trying to go. He laughed and said there are about 5 Essases is Kumasi and we were at the wrong one!! Abouit 3 trotros passed going away from town but when they came back by they were full and did not even stop. We waited for about 2 hours.

waiting in one of the Essase towns

 Most of the people we very friendly, but this one man was obviously on some kind of drugs and came up to us. He was trying to speak English, but was mumbling and not coherent. At first it was funny messing with him, but then we tried ignoring him and I was talking to someone else about how to get home if a tro did not come soon. The other guy came over and grabbed the nice man and started saying stuff and all we got were a few 4 letter words. Finally a big truck with a 15 foot trailer came by. We all jumped on the trailer. He would take us to the main road where we would be able to get a tro for sure heading to town. About 20 people jumped on. The crazy man ran towards me as we were about to drive away. He yelled something and grabbed my back. He scratched my back and ripped my shirt. The car pulled away so nobody could do anything, but I was very shaken up. I have never felt that scared or helpless this whole trip. Everyone on the truck felt very bad for me. They paid our way home and one woman gave me a rag to wipe all the dust off of me. –Being on the back of a truck on dirt roads means we were COVERED in dust! When we got back into Kumasi we were too exhausted and freaked out to go to the REAL Essase and to Owabi so we just scratched that trip and went for a cheap dinner and went home.

1/22

This morning Louise and I went to Kumasi Polytechnic to watch Anthony play volleyball. After spening a few hours there we went to Bonwire. We were hoping this day would be better than the day before. Bonwire is one of the five original Kente weaving Stools in Ghana. On the way the trotro broke down. Thankfully after about 10 minutes the driver got it started again. We were dropped off in a little town. A man came over and took us to a building where some weavers are. There were about 10 weaving stations. The thread is stretched out about 15 feet in front of the weaver. The weavers toes go in little hooks that separate the strands of string after each pass by the bolt of colored string. Then a piece of wood packs the string after every pass. For single weave you just thread the string back and forth. For double you can alternate the colors and finally for triple, the most complicated, they thread some colors only partially through the strings to make the patterns. The walls were covered in fabric. Some fabric was single kente with a print or painting on top of it.

weaving kente

me weaving!

me and our guide

1/24

Today I spent my time in the consulting room at the hospital with Dr. Boateng. When he went on ward rounds I stayed and check BP, pulse and respirations for all the patients waiting to be seen. The doctor’s office doubles as the examination room. Dr. Boateng sits at his desk and the patient sits in a chair at the side of his desk. The assistant in the room who puts all the information from the chart onto a computer system rings a bell for the next patient to come in the room. Sometimes there are 2 patients in the room: one being seen and the other waiting. Because Dr. Boateng owns the hospital, he not only sees and oversees treatment of the patients but also signs checks for both the hospital and the restaurant he is opening, checks over receipts, reads all scans and does the work of what it takes a whole administration at a hospital to do. So while a patient is in the room a number of people wanting check signed and other things tended to, walk in and out. I was getting frustrated at all the interruptions, but he has been doing this for several years so I am sure he was not phased.

1/25

Again today I sat in the consulting room with the doctor. Before he arrived I went around to visit all the patients. There was a boy admitted after I left yesterday. There were about 7 nurses standing outside the male ward. They all told me to go check out what was going on inside. There was an 18 year old boy sitting on one of the beds with his knees up. It looked like he had a huge dressing on his knee, but then I realized it was not a dressing and was a HUGE tumor. It was mostly white with some bloody spots and a little bit of skin. It was probably the size of a small watermelon. I walked over to talk with the boy. I asked him how long this has been here and his answer was, “yes.” I then asked if he spoke English and he said, “no.” haha His chart said he had the tumor for 2 years. It was removed once but has since grown back, obviously. The doctor diagnosed it as sarcoma. They have not done tests to see if it is malignant or has metastasized. The tumor smelled so bad! It looked like there was still some gauze wrapped around it. I pointed it out to the nurse doing the dressing. When he pulled it off, I realized it must have been from a very old dressing because a layer of skin had grown over it and a huge part of skin was torn off when he removed the gauze. The boy was in so much pain. He was trying not to grab his leg and was crying. It was very sad, and got even sadder when they said his only option might be amputation. They are going to test for malignancy and then make a decision. Right now his Hb is 3, which means he is very anemic, so the doctor is giving a total dose infusion of iron and erythropoietin and hoping to raise the hb some so they can operate. There is also a man in one of the special wards from Kentucky! He is a missionary and had been here with his wife fro 5 years. He came in complaining of abdominal pains and chest pain. The ECG revealed a minor MI. He and I were talking about how many people come into see a patient with the doctor. Along with Dr. Boateng and myself about 10 nurses go on rounds with the doctor. This would be a rare occasion at home. Recently I realized that my host family gets the E! channel. I have been watching Kendra, the Kardashians, E! True Hollywood Stories, and Behind the Scenes episodes. The other day I walked in the room and the family was watching it too. I love watching those shows, but I also know that is not a depiction of typical American life, but when that is the only view some Ghanaians have of America, it is no wonder they think we are all rich and crazy!

1/26

Today was my last day at Atesemanso Hospital. I cleaned the wounds and did the dressing for the man with the bed sores and the boy with the sarcoma on his knee. They determined the tumor was malignant and decided to amputate. Sometime this week or early next week when his Hb is high enough they will amputate. 

me with one of the patients

the nurses

me and Dorcas

the Hospital entrance

the female ward

a typical patient chart

looking down the hall between the female ward and private wards

For lunch I ate with one of the nurses. I bring a lunch that my host mothers packs, this week was fried egg sandwich and I also brought nuts and dried fruit mom and dad sent from home. She was eating fish with kenkey and spicy chili. She ate the fish eye the backbone and every part of the fish. 

her food....

She asked what the nuts and fruit were and she tried some and said it was not very good. I tried to refrain myself from commenting! Today was also the last Projects Abroad meeting. Most of the volunteers are new so it was not too difficult to say goodbye to everyone. 

Gabby, me and Anthony

1/27

outreach

Hippos and Hospitals

1/10

Dr. Boateng at my hospital is quite a talker, but has a lot of interesting things to tell me about his practice. Everyday during rounds there is some lesson and today’s was about treating appendicitis and avoiding surgery. He administers a combination of about 4 drugs to treat the inflammation and infection. The medication basically kills the appendix and leaves it a lifeless almost tendon. Then there is no need to operate. The patient is the hospital for about a week and usually never returns. Surgury here can be dangerous, when you think about the risk for infection, loss of blood, and cost. The man with AIDS is doing better today. He was moving around and sitting up in bed. I was happy to see him feeling a little better. The man who underwent the hemorrhoidectomy was discharged today. After the hospital I went into town to pick up a package. The tax on my packages is usually under 10GHC, but today they made me pay 47GHC!!! I was furious! They do not have a good system for charging people. They make you open and show them everything in your package. Sometimes they ask for some of it. Umm…NO! If they were typing in a brand and quantity in a computer to get a price and used it for every customer I would feel better.  Instead they look at things and decide what they think I would cost. Some people get shoes and clothes…they have no way of knowing and charging for maybe a real Louis Vuitton bag or even a knock off! But they charged me $15 for a bottle of vitamins! I mean they price I paid to pick up the package was almost the price mom and dad paid for the items inside! CRAZY! Tonight I watched a full Nigerian film with the family. I was determined to sit through it. It was actually not that bad. I mean it was the typical soap opera style film where the wife is kidnapped and the husband falls in love with another woman and turns out both women are pregnant, but in this version one woman is a witch and they use a preacher to shake the Bible and straighten things out. Everyone was happy in the end. …don’t worry I will bring a movie or two back for everyone to see! :)

1/11

Today at the hospital I helped change several dressings. One was a woman who had a tumor removed from her abdomen. The stitches went all the way from below her belly button to her sternum. She was admitted with a distended abdomen, so there had been severe sepsis. A drainage tube was coming out of the abdomen near the scar and another was a nasal tube that was bringing fluid out from inside the stomach. The tube directly out of the abdomen was attached to a bag, but the one from the nose was just draining into a plastic bag on the floor. I cleaned and changed the dressing over the wound and around the drainage tube and ten we removed the nasal tube. I think the nasal tube should have been left in longer or maybe a clean one put in, because there was still thick yellow fluid draining out, The 24-year old man who has been in the hospital for over a year with the bed sores had a surgery this weekend. They attempted to remove the edge of the sores and close them up. The skin just does not seem to want to adhere to itself and close the wound. The stitches are separating and you can see from the fluid coming out of the wound that there is infection.

This afternoon I helped cook dinner! I fried the plantain. We started by cutting and soaking the plantain in salt water. Then using red palm oil on a skillet over a coal burning chimney grill I friend the plantain. The family thought it was funny that “obruni was frying the plantains.” They all were taking pictures of me and were impressed at my frying skills…I don’t think they know how much bacon I eat! :)

frying plantain

1/12

Today they pulled the drainage tube out of the woman with the abdominal mass removed. The whole in her abdomen, where the tube was, drained for several minutes and they kept pressing her stomach to remove all the fluid. The man with the bed sores is not doing very well either. The stitches where they attempted to close the inverted sore had split apart and the skin refuses to bind together. After the hospital for our weekly meeting, Projects Abroad took us to a Soccer game. We saw the Kotoko team from Kumasi take on the Cape Coast Dwarfs. Kumasi won! There were several new volunteers that arrived this week. They were from America, Denmark, and Canada.

1/13

Today for outreach, because I am the only medical volunteer left, it was just Enoch, Chief and myself. We went to a school we had been to before Christmas. At this school the first time the kids cried and were terrified of white people. This time they all wanted to hold my hand and they chanted a song that basically means “welcome white lady.” The older kids asked where I was from and when I told them I was from America, they asked if I knew Obama. I told them we were best friends.

1/15

This morning I left Kumasi by myself to travel to Nkoranza and meet the other volunteers for a weekend trip. They went to several places I had already been so I just met up with them to go the Bui National Park. My trotro arrived fine in Nkoranza and I met up with my new roomates, Casper and Louisa, Jan, Camilla, Catherine, Marguerite, Louise, and Anne. We went to a hotel called the Pony Hotel up the road in Wenchi.

1/16

This morning all the new people were feeling ill, so Anne, Louise and myself made the trip alone to Bui. We first went to the trotro station in Wenchi and ate breakfast at a little stand at the entrance. We had fried egg, bread and coffee. It was delicious! 

Me, Louise, and Anne at breakfast

We then found the tro heading to Wenchi and got on. After about 2 hours of driving down dirt roads and scary wooden bridges we arrived at the Bui village. When we got out of the tro we asked the driver what time he would retun that afternoon so we could get a ride back to Kumasi and go home. He said this was the last trip of the day and the next tro would arrive at 530 the next morning. We all were only prepared to stay the one night before with clothes and money. So we figured everything up and decided we came all the way out here to see Hippos at Bui that we would scrape the money and stay the night. We booked a room at the camp and prepared for the hike to the fishing village. We were also not prepared to walk very far so I only had sandals. 

Anne and Louise walking

our guide...note the flip flops and socks...

We walked for about 2 hours to the village where we rested while the guide prepared the canoes. Several village kids came over and were showing off in front of us. 

me and Louise

me with the kids

the kid in the red was hysterical!

After one kid licked the dirt for our entertainment we stopped showing them as much attention. We then walked a little further to the water. 

our canoes

We took a 30 minute canoe trip on the Black Volta to an area where there are usually hippos. During the canoe trip we noticed these little black bugs that were on us. Once they sat for a while the spot started to sting, but otherwise we did not notice them. When we knocked them off they would leave a little blood spot. Several times I would look at my legs and they would be covered in these bugs. We parked on a sand bar and watched 2 hippos interact in the water in front of us. They would mostly stare at each other, but occasionally they made noises and would yawn and show off their huge mouth and teeth. 

me and Anne

hippo!

yawning

Louise and Anne

We watched them for about an hour then made the trip back to the village we were staying in. 

dirty feet after the walk

Thankfully there was water, but we had a local woman make dinner for us because there was nothing else to eat in the village. We ate rice and tomato sauce. We had to walk about 50 yards to a shed in the back of the village to use the bathroom, but the smell, the fact it was a hole in the ground and that there was no light led us to just go in the grass behind the building. It did not seem as strange as it should though because that’s how everyone in the village, or in most villages for that matter, goes to the bathroom.

            Much of the land around where we were staying is used as a lumber yard. There were sounds of chainsaws throughout the day. Also up the river a company is building a dam for electricity. The dam will flood almost all of Bui. Many animal species including the hippo could be wiped out from this area. The people in all the surrounding villages are being relocated. I think it will be about 19 more months before they are finished and will begin flooding the area.

The sun sets very quickly near the equator so after eating a quick dinner and going to the bathroom it was almost dark.the light in the room was not much to speak of so we quickly got ready for bed and played cards until we felt tired. We tried to go to sleep about 8:00. The sounds of people, bats hitting the roof and windows, roosters, goats, sheep, birds, possibly monkeys, insects crawling around, the complete isolation and darkness, and heat from there not being a fan kept us awake. I decided not to check my watch and just lay there. I kept feeling those flies biting me even though we doused ourselves in bug repellent before we went to sleep. When I did check my watch I thought it had to be 3 in the morning, but it was only 11:56!

1/17

By 230am I was angry, tired, hot and restless. I noticed the other girls awake too so we turned on the lights and talked. We did not sleep the whole night. When the lights came on I realized my legs were COVERED in red bumps. I was itching like crazy! There were also giant larvae looking insects crawling on the floor. Finally 5 o’clock came and we got up and got ready to meet the morning trotro. Getting out of the room was a slight issue because the door can be pushed from the outside but there was not handle on the inside to pull it open and it was a tight door jam. 

opening the door

We finally got it open. In the hallway was a giant spider and many more larvae insects. The guy who runs the lodge walked us down to where the trotro comes. There were about 10 people waiting fort he tro with us. When it arrived it was compeletely full. Only 2 or 3 people got off at our stop and everyone crammed in very quickly. We were determined to get on and get home, however. Several men got out and sat on the roof and then we sat behind the front seat on the engine piece facing the back of the tro. Including the people on the roof there were 26 people in the trotro that should legally hold 13 people! It was very tight and a very uncomfortable 2 hour ride back to Wenchi. When we arrived we ate breakfast at the little place we ate at the day before. After standing up and getting circulation in my legs, I realized how bad and how much my body was itching from the bugs. The guide had told us they were “African Black Flies.” We the n found a tro heading back to Kumasi and made the trip home. Once in Kumasi we went for lunch at a local place and got really good spicy fried rice. After this trip we just wanted to go home, sleep, and shower! We did not bring clothes for an extra day and did not plan on showering since we were only suppsed to be gone the one day! We were pretty filthy! When I got back to the house the gate was locked!! The family was out for the afternoon and I had forgotten to call and say when I would be home. So I went down the road to a little pub and got a drink and read and watched TV until they got home. It all worked out in the end, but this was by far the most eventful trip I have taken! I also have 123 very itchy bites all over me!! 

bites

this is just one of my legs covered in bites!