Day 30

Today is Agona market day! I quickly finished up my notes and emails and got into a taxi for Agona. The other girls were already there when I got there so I hopped onto a computer and did everything I needed to do. I got an email from one of my best friends from High School that totally made my day. I have so many plans for when I am back in Houston for a couple of weeks I don’t think it’ll be physically possible to do everything I want to do and eat as much as I want to. I emailed a few professors and friends and got an email from my dad that cracked me up. My siblings are keeping things very interesting around the house. Steven has been busy making sure his room is just as clean as his friends’ and Katie is throwing parties and telling my parents last minute like she usually does. Typical Katie and Steven. Once we were done in the café King took us to a ‘fast-food’ place that served rice, cole-slaw, and chicken. Mama brought it home for Jackie and Lauren last week and they haven’t been able to stop talking about it since. So once we had our food we went down to the bar to get fantas and eat our food. They weren’t joking. The food was so good I’m pretty sure we’re going to eat it every time we’re in Agona. It was the most western we’ve felt since being here. We were sitting around a table eating our ‘fast-food’ with utensils and drinking soda. Mama Doris’ family owns the bar so we always see Nana there or some other family member. King’s Uncle was in there and he told us he was a shoemaker that could make us Tom like shoes out of the beautiful Kenti cloth. We see people weaving the cloth everywhere so once we find the cloth we like we’ll bring it to him so he can make them for us. We finished up and made our way to the market. We didn’t get very far before it started raining. Ghanaians HATE rain. Everyone runs for cover like they’re made of sugar. King had a ‘hide-out’ that we could stay in until the rain let up. Once it did we finished getting groceries and headed over to the corner of the market where they sell fabric. I promised one man last week that I would come back and look at his fabrics once I had more money to spend. He has decent prices for his fabric and a pretty good selection of them. I bought three yards for 15 cedi (8 USD) that I plan to make into a pencil skirt. Then while the other girls were looking at these really cool mats to buy I went a couple stalls down and found even better fabric. The woman was about 70 and didn’t understand anything I was saying but her son helped translate for me. She had really nice prints that could be worn in the states and this gorgeous fabric called ‘Amelia’ for SUPER CHEAP. I’m talking 1.50 cedi a yard. That’s like 80 cents a yard for gorgeous fabric. I bought 4 yards of one of them and Cassie bought a few yards of similar fabric. I might come home with suitcases full of just fabric if I’m not careful! The other girls needed to buy yams so they left Cassie and I to venture in the clothing area of the market. We looked at the jerseys and shorts but nothing caught our eye so we went looking for the other girls but couldn’t find them so we ended up getting lost. I felt like a little kid in a grocery store and just kept thinking that we needed to stay put. So Cassie and I waited by this stand selling bowls made out of dried up watermelon shells. In Northern Ghana they dry watermelons out and treat them so you can use them as a bowl. After a while King found us and brought us to Jackie and Lauren where they were eating fan-milks. It’s frozen chocolate milk in a bag and the closest thing to ice-cream here. We each bought one and separated to go home.

XOXO

Natalie