Bawdia... 18.2.06

Week 3

The trip to Bawdia takes about 6 hours in total. All of us packed our things to go as we still had to decide who was staying there and who was coming back to Cape Coast to work with CEJOCEP.

We used every form of public transport in one day!
The first mode of transport was our faithful friend Henry the Taxi driver. (He just never stops smiling!!)

Then we took a tro-tro (Ghana's rickety minibus service) to Takoradi.
Once there we all piled out and piled in to an STC bus (like the Simpsons School bus, only about 50 more people rammed in.)

The first part of the journey we realised we had got onto the singing bus!!
(It soon made sense why prayers and songs were taking place when we got onto the road to Tarkwa!)

The road is very under construction and the dust creeps through every shaking part of the bus! You end up thickly coated in orange dust and joining in the songs asking for safety on the road! When we got to Bawdia were had a nasty run in with the taxi driver there who wanted to charge us extortionatley more just because we look like rich tourists, (where is Henry when you need him!)

All was soon forgotten when we trapsed up the hill to view the guesthouse where the Adjei's live. (This has now become Matt and Debbi's home for the next six months!) It is a beautiful place tucked away at the top of a small hill, surrounded by trees and plants.

-------------------------------------

We found out that Mr Adjei is a keen story teller, just like our Fante teacher and we spent much of the night listening to Anansie stories. Debbi and Matt in turn told some English classics which amused him very much!

-------------------------------------

We had a tour around his Arboretum, that the previous volunteer Lanner had help to set up. It is incredible! 30 acres of forest land with medicinal plants, herbs all kinds of fruit and spice trees, insects, butterflies, pond life and everything else. Beautiful to stroll through in the day, (probably very scary at night as Matt has found out there's a beastie lurking in the mists!)

Wearing our African clobber we were introuduced to the Elders of the village in a wonderful ceremony where we were made to feel very special. We also made a new friend for life in local villager - Tarzan the Gong Gong beater!

The school tour proved to be quite interesting, as the old building was in such a state it had collapsed on some of the primary school children during a lesson. It is now the mission of the village to build a replacement building. There are also talks about creating a computer room where the teachers can be trained to then train the students after them.

(written by Lucie)