To get to Kumasi from Cape Coast, there is unfortunately no STC bus, so you HAVE TO take the Tro-tro, which is a mini-bus filled with 22 passengers (4 per row), with fish, pineapples or babies on the lap and not a tiny bit of spare place!!…I forgot to mention the systematic broken windscreens and the complete absence of seatbelts even for the front seat! We were of course the only whites, and were quite happy to use the local transport even though the driver scared us a few times. Fortunately, I sat next to a nice Ghanaian student and Kath managed to sleep a bit. Therefore, the 4 hours of journey went pretty fast for both of us. After a quick taxi, we arrived in Jachie.
We discovered our new home for the next 2 ½ months: a very cozy flat in a shared house with a courtyard.
I think it is a very good balance to live as such: within a Ghanaian community (one of the families has 7 children) and still having our privacy. We have indeed a lot of space for us two: a spacious dinning/living room, a big room with 2 beds, a bathroom and toilets. 
No kitchen…Here people cook outside in the courtyard. But anyway, we rarely have to cook as Abena, our Ghanaian mum, generally cooks for us. 
We could not believe that TACCO has just got an old TV and a DVD-player, and put new fans on the ceiling so that volunteers can feel more like at home! Even if we felt at the beginning: it is such a luxury and we don’t need that at all. I must confess that we really appreciate watching a bit of TV in the evening even though we cannot see the eyes of the actors (as the screen is not centered), especially after tiring days of work and when you cannot really go out for a drink in town as you do not want to travel by night because there is no tro-tro by night and anyway you do not want to end up in a taxi on a dark countryside road with a tropical heavy rain that prevents the driver from seeing anything!! (that what happens to us on our first night). And even a walk here is very tiring here as everybody stops you and wants to know how you are doing, where you are going, etc…therefore TV is here a good way to relax and escape the animated Ghanaian life.
Our daily life
As I have mentioned, we do not go out in the evenings as we are pretty scared of the roads by night. However, we will find a way to experience the night life in Kumasi, probably next Saturday, since Holly and Pete are coming over for the week-end from Cape Coast. Anyway, when you get up at 5a.m and you teach from 8am to 5pm, the evenings seem very short. We enjoy having our early dinner at 6pm following by an hour or two of reading or TV (when there is no power cut). Also, I have started since this week to go running in the dark Ghanaian countryside at 5am 3 times a week with Tony and Pati, who live in our house. It is a 35 minute’s jog on the way in and various funny exercises on the way back. I am using my torch to not fall because of the bumpy roads.
After two weeks spent here, we got used to:
-sleeping under our nets
-the heat
-the roosters singing their ‘cocorrico’ and the children crying just next to our windows from 5am (because here everybody goes to bed at 9pm and wake up at 5am!! Like the sun…)
-the religious meetings just in front of our windows where people sing and shout very loudly some evenings. When they happen, you just have to stop your phone conversation or watching TV as you cannot hear anything.
-filtering and boiling the water
-spraying with our magic anti-repellant
-taking the water from the well for dish washing and washing-up.
-flushing toilets with a bucket to spare our water tank!
-washing teeth with a bottle
-washing our clothes trying desperately to whiten our whites!!!
-the apocalyptic storms
-and last but not least the numerous and hazardous power cuts!!!
Thus, once you get used to these and helped with the unexpected extra comfort (fans & TV), we now feel very well at home and enjoy our quiet evenings even in the darkness! J
Week-ends
The first Sunday, Kwame, the young TACCO volunteer whom we see almost everday as he nicely takes care of our well being, brought us to Kumasi to show us around.
This was really good fun and also very helpful as it is hard to get a map of the town. It is just very messy! We also find both good shoes to walk. So far, I have spent most of my Saturdays in Kumasi. The main reason was going on internet. But I actually really enjoyed walking around in Kumasi. It is a city full of life! 
I love its market: it is so crowded, noisy, full of food, shoes, watches, material…and we can negotiate a lot! For that, I had to learn some very useful sentences, such as ‘it is too expensive!’, ‘reduce it’…I start to have some habits such as buying a big coconut which you drink and eat with a quickly made spoon with the coconuts skin. Delicious, refreshing and filling! I now even enjoy being the only white in the whole market! Last Saturday, we went to our first restaurant with Kath, the Baboo Bazar Cafeteria, which is made for foreigners. We enjoyed our Indian food with our first ice-cream in Ghana!!On Sunday here, everybody goes to church and everybody get dressed very smart!! I mean everybody. And God is present everywhere. Bible extracts are written on the shops, houses, buses… So far, I experienced a Pentecostal church (a charismatic church) which was very different from any church I have been so far: a small assembly, lots of dance and songs (and shouts!), extremely long (more than 3h and in Twi, the local language!). I have now found out that most services last more than 3 hours in Ghana whatever the community. Last Sunday, we went to the main Anglican Church in Jachie: long as well but similar to the one I used to go in Cambridge. I think we will keep going to this one. I could wear my shirt-top-hat made by the seamstress of the village. I had bought myself the material in the market of Kumasi. I like the ensemble a lot and will probably make more clothes as it is very cheap (around 10euros everything included).
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