Bokoo paa

It is pouring outside which means I must write.

My arrival to Ghana was… in a hurry. I was trying to get out of the international airport as quick as possible so that I could catch the 6:50am flight to Kumasi instead of waiting for the 1pm one. I was already too tired… I couldn’t do it. My luck, blessings, persuasion tactics, the pity I exuded or the kindness of the person on the counter, whatever you want to call it or a combination of all got me into the early flight. On the flight I met this lovely professor of botany, specializing in apples and potatoes –yes, I did try to convince her to come to Querochaca, my family’s property where we harvest just that- doing research in Kumasi under funding by guess who- Gates foundation. We exchanged stories, I really loved her trip trying to get from Burkina Faso –I believe- back to England during the Icelandic volcano explosion; the story was fascinating and she was also a great storyteller.

As soon as I got out of the plane, Bob was already there to meet me. He and everyone in the home are too kind, talented and wonderful. I slept in during that Monday only getting up for tech call. My housemates planned a dinner that they had cooked for me and it was delicious. My home is a paradise haven. There is Bob, the project manager and his wife: Camille. They have been and worked all over the world, take their vegetarianism very seriously and are also committed to the cause, in a broad sense making a better world however they can.

Jay is the coordinator for the fermentation team, Columbia student and Allison is the biodiesel summer intern from the Carolinas. They are masterminds –you can tell-, this is what I learned the first time during dinner; the Myers Briggs test is taken seriously in this home: I am an ENFJ, I’m definitely not going to go into detail about this: All my L&I peers are probably reading this and dying.

Anyways, on Tuesday Jay took me on a thorough tour through the site and the lab.

I just realized I haven’t described what I am doing in Kumasi so here goes the short shpeel –there are plenty things I cannot disclose so don’t look for that sort of information on this blog, you can check out forum.susana.org for that-

Officially I am a summer researcher for Columbia University/Gates Foundation for the project called FS2BD (fecal sludge to biodiesel). And that is exactly what the project is: developing the technology to understand how/if we can produce biodiesel from fecal sludge- yes poop- for the summer I get to play with poop. I am here to understand the environmental and public health impact of the site by collecting gas samples as well as measuring the coliforms from our effluent –how much pathogen removal we are making- ok that’s enough of that.

Visiting the site, of which I have been hearing about for the past 9 months, gave me some perspective about what I can and cannot do during my stay here. Most of my focus will be developing some necessary protocols and doing some capacity building in generally useful tools such as google docs with the people working with us –quite an amazing, dedicated team-.

That night I came home for dinner and was relieved to have finally bought some contributions to our kitchen and to have some leftovers from the night before. I must admit I am pretty intimidated by the chefs –which means everyone in the home-, most of my cooking skills come from my meat eating times and most of my meal preparation since I became a not so adapt pescaterian generally include terrible carbs or raw salads, yes I crunch on those carrots. Although I haven’t been cooking yet, everyone in the house is pretty encouraging about it so I will, only if I have to though, I love eating local foods and I will try to get as much as I can of that first, working on it.

On Wednesday I worked on preparing my sampling map. Bob taught me a bit about google earth so here is a map with where I live and where I work-approximately-

Then Camille took me out for a walking tour of our neighborhood, if it could be called that, massive homes next to precarious settlements next to water coming from who knows where next to rice fields next to a major road with billboards- most in English rather than Twi (even though English is the official language and many people speak it, not everybody does, not everybody reads even so you wonder who the audience for these billboards are, I’m finding out)- next to trash -trash everywhere, trash burning because that’s the general practice-, next to churches-too many churches of any kind of Christian sect- next to all kinds of Mamas selling fruits, vegetables and prepared foods.

Camille introduced me to many storeowners that she knew by name, all nice people who encouraged my Twi- many were excited and nervous because the match between Ghana and France was going on and well I was all over futbol, an acquired love. I bought too much fruit and devoured it when I came home; it was a very nice walk. Every time Camille was asked Etesen (how are you?)  she would reply Bokoo paa (most people here reply Eye, which means good/fine), she said bokoo means something like smooth or cool, paa is a magnifier (very). I feel that is the only mindset that you can and should have while being here so she inspired this post.

 I live in Adiebeba close to Atinga junction. The transportation system here is quite impressive (terrible emission controls if nonexistent). So your options are trotros (vans), shared taxis or your own taxi. Today to get to the lab Allison showed me the trotro system and the shared taxi system. Pretty much you have to signal in the street in which direction you are going.

Here is Allison trying to get us to the lab.

Then the shared taxis stop at junctions so you can get off and walk, if you are at a station it only starts moving once it fills up going to the same direction; they have signs to show you where they are going. I did some work in the lab, attended a meeting and then headed home. Everyone in the shared taxis are my Twi teachers, I make them laugh with my mispronunciation but it’s getting better. Mama J was impressed today when I went to buy some fried rice that I mixed with gari and beans today when I greeted her and paid her all in Twi (I ate her food on Tuesday); I hope my Twi does get a lot better. Tomorrow there will be more exploration and more work! I will be reporting back soon!

Nanti ye

Afia

(People here give names depending on the day you were born, if I remember correctly according to what my mom told me I was born on a Friday (efiada))

Agyemang (colleague in the lab getting nervous when I tried to take his picture)

And trying to get revenge taking mine