June 4 We have landed!!!

After 2 hours of sleep the plane started to come alive, 5:30 am Ghana time. We landed in Ghana at 7:30 (an hour ahead of time) and walked off the plane onto the tarmac. Although it was hot it wasn’t as hot as I expected, but of course it was early in the morning. Walking into the airport and going through customs could have been like any airport in the States. Things went quite smoothly and as we walked out of the airport we were greeted with cheers and applause from PCV that are already in country, as well as the country director. It was very thoughtful and made us feel very welcome.

As we were driving to the PC HQ, we where surrounded by cars coming at you in every direction, and vendors selling their wares in the middle of the street. How someone does not get run over is amazing. The women had huge baskets on their heads, carrying anything from very large bunches of bananas, peanuts and several gallons of water, it was way cool to watch them not only walk and balance that on their heads, but also weave in between the racing cars passing few feet away from them. We arrived  and were welcomed with fresh pineapple and coconut juice. Very refreshing! After we had a brief opening ceremony including prayer from a Muslim priest, Christian Pastor and a Priest from the local religion. We then got up, introduced ourselves and had a shot of what tasted like some type of whiskey. This was followed by more instructions, paperwork (there is TONS of paperwork but this is the government) and a chance to walk around. We went to the market, where you can buy anything from shaving cream to all sorts of foods. Imagine an open air grocery store set up like the Fryeburg fair. Every vendor wanting to sell you something, the smells of food wafting in from every direction, wall to wall people and intense heat an humidity. It was in the 90’s by then and extremely humid. Complete chaos, I loved it. 

The afternoon was filled with more meetings and getting our gear into our hotel style rooms were we will spend the next few days. Dinner was simple pasta with a meat sauce some veggies,  and rice. I am now back in my room it’s 9:00 and I am gonna crash, having only slept a few short hours the last few days. Tomorrow we wake up at 5:15 and start all over again.