Christmas in Ghana...

...consisted of:

1. Opening presents
2. Eating breakfast
3. Playing with new toys
4. Drink Hot Chocolate
5. Going SWIMMING!  (It truly was awesome to go swimming on Christmas day)
6. Playing with new toys again
7. Skyping with friends and family

Christmas was great!  I feel so blessed to have a wonderful family who can adjust to any situation that is thrown at them.  Moving to Africa wasn't easy, but it sure is getting better and better.

I'm so grateful for modern technology that allows us to see our family from THOUSANDS of miles away!  It makes Christmas much sweeter.

Working together

I was fingerprinting people today when I witnessed something that really warmed my heart.  There was a man who came in with his newborn baby.  Really, that baby could not have been more than a month old.  He was carrying the baby on his shoulder and the baby was asleep.  Since I needed to fingerprint him, he needed to put the baby down.  Instead of setting the baby down by the window, he turned to the stranger behind him, didn't say a word, and just handed his newborn over.  The lady didn't say anything in return and just took the baby and held him while his daddy was busy.

The amazing part of this is that those two adults did not know each other at all.  He was in need and she was willing to help out.  He was not worried that she would run off with his baby or harm him in any way.  It was a complete "I trust you to hold my baby" even though he didn't know her.  I was absolutely amazed.  I made sure to work quickly with the gentleman so he could get his baby and made sure to thank the random lady standing behind him for assisting.  She acted like it was no big deal, as if she's done this for many people before.  The trust there was fantastic.

This is not something we would see in the states, and I think that is what saddens me now.  We are always so worried that someone might take our kids or run off with our belongings that there isn't 100% trust there.  I understand why things are that way, but it is still a little sad.

Watching that interaction today completely made my day....it was only 2 minutes of my day, but it put a smile on my face.  I need to be more proactive in helping others!  What a great example they were.

Swimming and Christmas

One thing we love about living in Ghana is that it is hot enough, year round, to go swimming anytime we want.  Yesterday, December 15th, we were in the pool for a good chunk of the day.  How amazing is that?  Ten days before Christmas, we are swimming in our pool....Crazy!  The only reason we got out of the pool was because the sun was going down, which meant the mosquitoes were coming out.

We are trying to make it feel like Christmas around here.  With it being 90+ degrees outside, it's hard to think Christmas is around the corner.  They don't really decorate around here because the decorations are super expensive and there aren't a lot to go around.  Thankfully, we brought a lot with us.

This is our Bethlehem nativity that my husband has had for awhile.  We are grateful it has survived all of our moves so far. 

We purchased this nativity here in Ghana.  I had to barter with the guy because he wanted an obscene amount for it.  Thankfully, he caved and gave it to me for the price I was willing to pay.

Consumables

No one can prepare you for your consumables order and storage.  This is our first post where we required a consumables order.  We were given 1 year to buy 2500 lbs worth of food to last us our entire time at post.  Well, we spent most of our home leave buying food.  It was ridiculous!  I can't express how much I absolutely hated that.  Not only did we have to find a way to pay for it, but we had to decide what we would actually use in a year.  Not an easy task at all.

We went to Costco with the boys and my mother in law.  I have to say, she saved me.  I was in the "lets buy this crap and get it over with" mode and she kept me sane.  There were several times when she said to me, "Just remember, once you open that the shelf-life isn't long so you might want to buy smaller containers of it.  She was a life-saver!!! 

The boys picked out tons of food, which I was grateful for.  If they were picking it out, that meant they would eat it.  I can't tell you how many times I've come home with groceries, only for them to turn their nose up at it or tell me "we are kinda burnt out of that".  They were troopers.

Our consumables were shipped in September and they just arrived at our house on Thursday.  Now the mistake we made here was listening to others tell us "Your consumables order should arrive at post around the same time as you do."  Because of this statement, we brought NO food with with us.  Why would we if our shipment was going to arrive same time as us?  BIG MISTAKE!  Thankfully our parents sent us care-packages of food. 

Now don't get me wrong, we can buy food here in Ghana.....it's just dang expensive.  There are some food items that are nearly impossible to find and when you do, you really pay for it.  For example, good luck find celery.  I found some once and it was $15 for a small stalk of celery that would've cost $1 in the states.  But it was CELERY and you can hardly ever find it here.  So we bought it and filled them up with peanut butter and enjoyed the snack!

So now that our consumables have arrived, we have had to figure out where to put them.  The housing in Ghana is good, but there is next to NO storage.  We had more storage space in London, which is notorious for not having enough space for anything.  So now we are trying to organize and see where we can fit things.  Here are a few pics so far....and know that most of this has been moved around since I took the pictures.

Cereal is a staple in our home!

This picture was taken after half the boxes had been opened.  We still had a lot to unpack!

The sad thing about all of this is that we used almost all of the weight restriction for one years worth of food!  I think a family of 4 should be given a larger weight allowance, especially families who have two growing boys who eat us out of house and home!  Thankfully, amazon ships to DPO addresses and we now have an amazon prime account. 

Boxes

Our HHE came last week and I'm proud to say that we are almost completely unpacked.  SHOCKING!!!  How, might you ask, were we able to pull that off so quickly?  Well, my husband is a freaking ROCK STAR and worked feverishly this weekend.  Our garage is completely filled with empty boxes and this is what one corner of the "man-cave" looks like:

Once all the boxes are cleared, it will then be time to purge!  We have so much stuff that we don't need.  I'm grateful we live in a country where we can donate the smallest things and it makes a huge difference to that person.  Our housekeeper took a box of clothes that were too small for our boys and gave it to her sister, who just lost her husband and had no money to buy clothes for her son.  And if our housekeeper doesn't take something, we can donate it to an orphanage or to our guards, or to a friend of a friend, etc.  It is so motivating to get rid of things so those who need it can use it.

Craziness in the house

Yesterday, our HHE from London arrived!!!  We were beyond excited, as most people would be.  We packed out of London at the end of August.  We were told that our stuff would be shipped immediately so that it could meet us in Ghana.  Well, that never happened.  Two weeks after arriving in Ghana, they sent a request for our things to be shipped.  I was not happy..... but that is besides the point now.  WE HAVE OUR HHE!

So yesterday we spent 7 hours straight, unpacking our things.  I tried in vain to get the kitchen unpacked, but wasn't successful.  I only had 5 more boxes to go, but my back and brain were hurting so bad that I had to stop.  Nate got most of the living room unpacked, as well as part of all the bedrooms.  He's so efficient when it comes to getting unpacked and organized.

As we were unpacking today, we get a knock on our door.  Today is the day for the maintenance crew to come and test out all of our electronics, air conditioners, appliances, water distiller, etc.  So now we have an additional 7 men buzzing about the house, trying to make their way through the river of boxes. Our housekeeper/cook (whom we adore), Janet, let them know that they chose the wrong day to come.  :)  So right now we have 12 people trying to navigate our house.

What a crazy 2 days it has been.....

P.S.  I slept on MY MATTRESS last night and it was absolutely wonderful!  It's amazing the difference a good nights sleep makes.

Pictures

Taking pictures in Ghana is not easy.  There are so many pictures I want to take....and yet still have been unable to.  The Ghanaian people are not fond of you taking their picture for many different reasons:

1. Some still believe that taking a picture of them will steal a part of their spirit

2. They want you to ask permission first, out of respect (can't fault them on this)

3. They want you to pay them

4. They don't want you making fun of them on a website.

So I've been very cautious about taking pictures around here.  I have asked permission several times, and was rejected.  Had I given them 1 cedi (equal to about $0.50), they probably would've allowed it.  Here are a few pictures I either snuck, or received permission to take:

This is one of the plantain trees in our yard.  Through-out the compound, there are tons!

Makola Market.  This is where the Ghanaians go to shop.  This was really early in the day so there weren't as many people.  When we were walking to this area, two little girls started chanting "Obruni, Obruni", which means "white person".  They were adorable.

I asked permission to take a picture and I'm grateful they said yes.  These girls are about 13 years old or so and carry all sorts of things on their heads.  It is quite a talent and I can only imagine the headaches they might get.

This is the middle of the walkway in the market.  Everyone was throwing the trash here to be collected and then burned later.  You avoid the puddles at all costs.

This lady is selling bags of water on her head.  No idea how much it weighs, but you know it's a lot.  We've been advised not to drink this water.  It was tested recently and 80% of the bags tested had some sort of feces in it. 

This is wicker corner.  You can watch them make the furniture or you can place a special order.  It's amazing what they can do and how fast they do it! 

Ghana has been a transition for us, but we are adjusting well.  I think it's going to be a great 2 years!!

Starting back up

I've come to the conclusion that I need to start my blog back up.  It's going to be slow going, but possible.  I don't have a ton of time on my hands, but I have enough to capture all the interesting (and boring) things that happen in my life.  Plus, now that we live in Ghana, I thought it would be nice to inform others of what this country is like.  Before moving here, I searched for blogs that detailed information on Ghana and found very few.  Most of them hadn't been updated since 2007 so they weren't as informative as I had hoped.  Maybe, just maybe, I can remedy this.....