some more pictures

me feeding a mona monkey at the boabeng-fiema monkey sanctuary where the monkeys live with the villagers

me at the king's palace

me, leif, julie, dimi, niklas, katja, linde, eva, and marius with our (awesome) guide dk at mole park on safari with the elephants :)

some of us with an american friend we made during our travels on the roof of our boat on lake volta

more pictures :)

the students of class 6 at my school during a rainstorm

my bedroom

me pounding fufu for dinner while my sister helps and my mother watches

me and some of the students from my school on an excursion to the "big tree" (the biggest tree in west africa)

pictures! (finally)

ok, so i just spent an hour adding tons of pictures but it seems that it didnt work so ill try again soon. sorry! this one is me in a traditional outfit at my house on my way to church.

so its been a while...

hi everybody! sorry that you havent heard from me in a while. im living in a very small village that doesnt have any internet so this is probably only the second time that ive been on a computer since i got here. i only have 12 minutes left on the clock, so i have to talk fast. im living in a village called akim asantemang in the eastern region and im teaching in a village called moffram. everybody here is extremely nice and im enjoying myself very much. the village that i teach in doesnt have any electricity or running water and most of the houses are made out of dirt. theres a primary school and a junior high in the village right next to each other but usually im in the primary school where i have my own class. the kids are so great. for about the first three weeks i was teaching i would go home every day with bags of fruit that the children had brought for me. theyre some of the nicest kids ive ever met. all of the teachers are nice too and are always helping me out when i need it. i love the town i live in but very few people there speak english (since its such a small village) so ive been learning the local language (twi). this past weekend i travelled to winneba (a beach town on the coast) for a night with some of the other afs volunteers. im very lucky because three other volunteers live relitively close to me and one of their families here is also hosting a german girl too. ok, im just about out of time but ill try to get back to the internet soon. thank you to everybody for your nice thoughts here, on facebook, through my parents, etc. miss you all tons!

akwaaba

so i just wanted to let you all know that i made it here alive. i got in late friday night after two loooong days of traveling. more on everything later, but i just wanted to say that im alive.

gateway orientation

so as we speak, i am sitting in the dulles conference room at the doubletree hotel in queens. i have decided that queens is terrifying, btw. my mom dropped me off yesterday and ive had orientation activities ever since. ive been rooming with this girl, sara, whos going to ghana on the community service program too. there are five americans going to ghana (4 girls, 1 boy) and the other three (beside me and sara) are going to be attending school. we're doing our orientation with the five americans who are going to portugal (3 girls, 2 boys, all attending school). everybody is really nice, which is great because we're going to be together for a while. the portugal students are going to be flying with us to london, where we'll split up after our layovers. then us ghana people have a four day orientation in a hostel in accra after we get there. our flight leaves jfk at 10:50 tonight, so i have a lot of time to kill. our flight doesnt get into ghana until tomorrow night, their time. more later, im going to go nap.

no thats not it

darn, that wasnt everything that i needed to say. i forgot to say... IM LEAVING HOME TOMORROW!!!! i just got back from a truly american dinner (all you can eat chinese buffet) and now im trying to finish packing. my suitcase stiiiiill weighs 65 lbs and i really dont want to pay the $50.  hopefully my mom will mail me some stuff if i ask nicely. well im going to go to bed and hope that the packing fairies finish everything for me while i sleep.