Avra, if you make me eat that I WILL throw up.

When I last left you I was about to go to the reggae beach party. What an experience that turned out to be. Avra, Duncan, Jonis (one of our German friends), Kristen (another US friend), and I all took a taxi to the beach. When we got there, they tried to charge us 3 cedis to get in and we weren't feeling it, so we began to walk up the road to find a way to sneak in. About 5 min. up the road we decided to go through the 5-star hotel that was situated on the beach. You would assume such a place would have security- eh? They did, and we paid him off for 5 cedis. Unfortunately, the man who had originally charged us entry saw us come in from the hotel and proceeded to follow us down the beach yelling. All in all, we had a little tiff with the man and some Ghanaians came to support us and we got in cheaper. Probably not worth it in hindsight, but a pretty interesting adventure.

I spent most of Thursday stressed out. I found out that the nutrition class that I need in order to still be on track at Elon is only one credit hour here. It is 4 at home. I immediately jumped on the computer and sent an email to the head of my department, my adviser, and one of my teachers from school about what I should do. Luckily, the Physical Education department at Elon has amazing faculty and they talked me through how I could make the class count and still graduate on time. All this relieving information, though, I did not find out until late Thursday night, so during the day Avra, Duncan, and I went to a pool at a nearby hotel to relax. It costs 3 cedis for the day, but I got to suntan, jump rope, swim, and play some pool. Also, we were some of the few people there so it was nice not to have too many people staring. At night the 5 Elon girls went to dinner with Dave's (the Elon student who was here last semester) roommate. It was a really good time and I am happy to be meeting more Ghanaian people.

Friday Avra and I went east with a friend of a friend of her family. The woman we met, Danielle, had created a non-profit organization called Fearless Planet and is working on three main projects to better the life of Ghanaians. The particular project that we went to look at was one where Danielle was helping Ghanaian farmers to start growing organically so that when the palm oil was produced it would be of a higher value to companies and the farmers could receive more money. First, we visited a meeting with around 50 farmers. It was awesome how gracious the people were to Danielle and I was interested to see that a lot of the farmers were woman. We were at the meeting during lunch time, thought, and as usual, Avra decided we should try the Ghanaian food. Bad idea. The cools served us normal Bankou and soup with meat but the meet looked like it was party of a stomach. I have taken anatomy and could not come close to telling you what that could have possible been. Not knowing how to eat the meat, or if it was safe, Avra and I had to think on our feet. We did not want to offend the cook so I reached down to look in my bag and "accidentally" knocked over the table holding our food. Avra made an "attempt" to save it and we were saved from the possible death by meat. After the meeting we went to the "plant" where the palm oil was being made. The reason I put quotation marks is because the plant was just a cement floor with a roof over it and palm fruit everywhere. There were chickens running around and goats all over the fruit and the woman were using their mouthes to separate a lot of the fruit. Needless to say, Danielle was very upset. She had to try to explain to the Ghanaians why the plant could not be run like this and why companies would not buy such thing. It was interesting how little concept the Ghanaians had of hygiene and how easy it was to get frustrated with their lack of knowledge. We went back to Accra after the visit- did I mention that we road in Danielle's chaffered SUV with AC for all three hours? Heaven.

In the car Danielle told us all about how she came to live in Ghana and how she now has a 9 yr. old son, Ryan, and an Italian-Spanish partner, Daniel. Avra and I offered our babysitting expertise any time that she needed it and she invited us to join her for dinner at her amazing house in the downtown Accra. Ryan is a very cute little boy and definitely a nerd. He loves to play on his computer all day and has red hair and big glasses. I can't wait to babysit him! When we got to the house, Daniel had made us amazing onion appetizers, salad, and this great pasta. We had a little red wine and champagne with dinner and finished with chocolate ice cream with caramel on top. I was so excited the whole time I could barley talk. They all invited us back whenever we would like and Avra offered to work with Danielle on her website of Tuesdays. Also, Danielle has contacts all over Ghana whom she is planning help us use during our travels. As if they hadn't done enough, Daniel drove us to meet a group of our friends at Champs Sports Bar (yes, they have one here with ESPN and all). It was karaoke night, and Avra and I signed up to sing Sexy Back but never got called up.

Sorry this was such a long entry, I will try to stay on top of things better in the next week. We are planning to go to the beach today, though, so I better get going.

Congrats to Stephen for finishing API and continuing his journey towards becoming the best pilot the US Navy has ever seen.