First day of Classes

May 26, 2016

Today was a great, but very tiring day. I woke up, 7:48 am, beating my 8:00am alarm and I checked my phone. Saw the few snapchats my friends sent me, read the messages from my mom and checked the schedule for the day, realizing that it was our first day of school. As I continued to get ready for breakfast, I got my “school supplies” out (consisting of a pen and a notebook, ‘the essentials’). I waited for Shayla and we then headed to the patio for breakfast. We had scrambled eggs and beans or what Auntie Anne would call “a British breakfast”. I enjoyed my plate and half of Shay’s scrambled eggs, and once I finished, headed to the room to fold some of my clothes and take a nap before the class.

For some reason, the first day of school is always exciting to me. It’s fun to see who’s there, how the professor will be and who are the brave ones sit in front and claim their unassigned seat for the rest of the semester. This was somewhat different. When I headed to the classroom, or the conference room, I sat in the back with Jada. We arrived early, watching Dr. Henrietta Abane setup her PowerPoint, as I was getting my notebook ready. Dr. Abane introduced herself, and explained the lesson of the day. The topic was an Introduction to Ghanaian history, cultural groups, demography and resources. We learned our Fante name as an ice breaker and since I was born on a Monday, my name is Adjoa. We then continued to talk about the location and history, geography, demography, cultural groups and resources of Ghana. The class was 2 1/2 hours, ending at 12 PM.

After class, a few of the students and I went to go see Ellen, our seamstress, and picked up the dresses that we had her make. Shay and I used up all of our data, so after seeing Ellen we went to vodaphone to add more data to our hotspot. A few of the students from the group were also in vodaphone, so we all waited for each other. Shay, Jade, and Jessie had to go back to the guesthouse to get ready for our singing, dancing and drumming class (SARD), so the remaining of the group waited for each other to head to St. Monica’s for the second part of our class. As we were waiting, a man who came out from vodaphone went to his car and drove around stopping right in front of the group. He noticed that we were Davidson students and he happened to be from Virginia. He told us that he’s been in Ghana for the past 8 years, and he was very happy to see us there. He wished us well and continued to drive on. We left vodaphone and got a taxi to head to St. Monica’s. Marlene, Will, Bess, Josh and I made it work to fit in the taxi. We stopped for food at a place called “Los Amigos” and I was very happy to see that name. When we finished, we realized we were going to be late to the class. We arrived a few minutes late, and the rest of the group had already picked out a drum and bag. I picked my drum, named her Lavinia, and along with the drum came a beautiful bag. We were introduced to our instructors and we shortly began with our singing lesson, followed by our dancing lesson, and lastly our drumming lesson. My favorite was the drumming because I enjoy playing instruments. Classes ended at 6:00pm and I was glad because I was very hungry! Leaving with our new drums in their drumbags,  we got a cheap cab and came home for our fish stew, rice and veggies dinner. While we ate, a local seamstress, Obayaa waited in the lounge with yards of batik fabric, bags and print fabrig backpacks. The colors were beautiful.  After some in the group made purchases, I went to my room to rest and watch a movie. I felll asleep during the first two minutes.

I’d call this a very successful first day of school.