Be careful what you wish for...

As I had hoped, my trip to Accra was eventful, relaxing at times, and gave me plenty of quiet time to think and regain some of the energy I would need to face another influx of volunteers at the CCS homebase. What I didn't bank on was spending almost an entire week in Accra. Let me explain.
I will begin on Friday morning. I was up at 4:00 AM with Catherine to be driven to the airport in Accra where she would depart for home. George came with us to accompany me to New Horizons School later in the day. Our trip to Accra was fairly smooth despite being pulled over at roadblocks several times (once we were pulled over by a cop with an AK-47 slung over his shoulder simply so he could get my name and tell me how beautiful I was--as flattering as this may sound it was not what I wanted to hear after being woken up at 5:00 in the morning, especially considering he scared the crap out of our driver over nothing). We dropped Catherine at the airport and said our goodbyes. I didn't bawl my eyes out, but I did cry afterward. I wasn't quite sure what to do without my trusty support system beside me anymore.
George and I went and got breakfast at this ridiculously overpriced restaurant after discovering that Vasili's Bakery (this place with great muffins and fresh filtered coffee according to the Bradt Guide) had closed a year earlier. Then I checked in at my hotel and we headed to New Horizons. We met with the secretary, Joycelyn, and were asked to wait in her office until the director, Salome Francois, arrived. After a while I was escorted to her office. She didn't actually arrive until around 12:30, so I sat and watched while the students did wood-working and then practiced a dance number to a fairly catchy Ghanaian song. When she finally called me into her office the first words out of her mouth were "Who are you and why have you come here?" This was another "uh-oh" moment for me. She said that she was really confused as to why I had come to the school, especially since she had no idea who I was or who Cross-Cultural Solutions was. It turns out Joycelyn failed to tell my program director about the proper procedure for requesting a school visit and thought that she had the authority to allow us to enter the property. Miss Francois was not impressed--normally people have to send a letter directly to her explaining their intentions at the school and who they are (which I completely respect considering the vulnerable nature of the individuals that her facility serves). Of course Joycelyn had reassured CCS that our frequent phone communications with her would be enough to be given a tour of the school, so we didn't have a letter and all I could do was apologize profusely and try my best to explain why I was so interested in seeing the school. Miss Francois also seemed a little put off by the fact that I had chosen the CCS program over a volunteer placement at her school and was under the impression that I had come to Ghana to grant money to special needs schools and had chosen a government-funded school over her private school. Unfortunately Miss Francois' husband was ill that day and she needed to accompany him to a clinic to receive an injection of some sort. She said I was welcome to wait until she returned so we could talk further. I waited another 2 hours. Our second meeting went a little better than the first and I was able to clarify why I was in the country, why I had chosen CCS, what my interest in New Horizons School was, and that in the future my education might justify returning to Ghana to perform research at schools like New Horizon. When she realized how much I cared about the students she really warmed to me and she apologized for the mix-up that Joycelyn and CCS had put me in the middle of. She told me about her struggles establishing the school and gave me information on a parents' advocacy group she founded (PACID). I promised to write her an email to better introduce myself and my learning objectives in Ghana with hopes that I could visit the school within the following two weeks.
After the meeting I returned to the hotel, grabbed some food at the restaurant and chatted with a teacher from Ohio who was running away from his career for a year. I wandered around Osu for a bit and bought a bunch of baked goods from Frankie's along with some pretty ripe oranges from a woman at the side of the road (for anyone who has eaten a Ghanaian orange you will also appreciate how rare it is to find a yellow orange). I then proceeded to pig out in front of the T.V. while watching re-runs of American sitcoms. It was heaven.
My friends arrived in Accra late Friday night. On Saturday morning we checked out Koala Supermarket (my mouth was watering at the assortment of food and brands they had) and then headed to a huge African craft market. I must say I now pride myself on my haggling abilities and my knowledge of what things SHOULD cost here. The merchants in the market had really racked up prices and were surprised when I said things like "I have a friend back in Hohoe who could make me the same thing for half that price". I also find that throwing "Get real buddy" into the negotiation really makes the quoted price drop. I managed to buy a good-sized drum with a carrying case for $45GH after originally being asked to pay $80GH (partially thanks to a pricing war between two neighbouring merchants). I was thrilled! That afternoon we went to the Accra Mall and saw Toy Story 3. It was surreal, but very enjoyable. For dinner we headed out to an Indian restaurant and had some top-notch curry dishes with naan. Soooo good! I was exhausted afterward so I opted out of clubbing and headed back to the hotel with Kelly where I passed out pretty early.
Things started to go downhill at 12:30 AM when I woke up and just made it to the washroom in time to avoid being sick all over the hotel room floor. I was up all night and by 6:00 AM I had nothing left in me. I woke Kelly up and told her I needed to go to a hospital--the pain I was experiencing told me this was a bit more serious than food poisoning. While I tried to stop my head from spinning Kelly got on the phone with contacts in Accra and the U.S. Embassy. Everyone recommended the Trust House Hospital, which was conveniently located just down the road from our hotel. I wasn't ready to leave until 9:00AM because I was moving so slow and after the two minute walk to the hospital I felt like I was going to pass out. I layed down in the waiting room while Kelly (bless her heart) looked after my paperwork, paid fees, and demanded that I see a doctor ASAP. They had me in a consultation room in 15 minutes. I was really dizzy and weak, so the doctor got me in a wheelchair and sent me for lab testing right away. While we were waiting for the initial results (they essentially screen for malaria and that's it at first) my limbs went numb. When my muscles contracted and I found I was paralyzed and my face was going numb too I started to freak out. Kelly rushed me back to the doctor. His first exclamation of "Oh shit" didn't do much to reassure me--I had never experienced paralysis before and didn't know how serious it was. They took me into a side room, lifted me onto a table and hooked me up to an IV. After the saline had been running for a few minutes my muscles finally relaxed and the feeling started to come back. I can't even begin to explain how relieved I was. The doctor took me back to his office and told me the lab tests were negative for malaria but my white blood cell count was through the roof, indicating a bad infection. They were going to admit me to the hospital immediately.
Before I describe the hospital I just need to say how lucky I was to have Kelly there to help me. She somehow managed to keep her cool despite the fact that she had never been in a hospital before and was now trying to navigate me through a foreign medical system. She made sure I received the best care possible and covered all my hospital expenses up front because I was in no shape to run out to the bank. She was a life-saver, perhaps literally.
The hospital itself was really nice. The staff were extremely kind and made sure everything I needed was looked after. They even came around to greet every single patient at the beginning of their shifts. I had a bed with clean sheets behind a curtained-off area in a room with three other people. The room had a T.V. with satellite and was cleaned at least twice a day. We had our own washroom with a shower that had hot water and toilet paper was provided free of charge. We had good meals brought to us three times a day and the kitchen staff made me special meals because they knew I had food allergies. It was honestly nicer than any hospital I have ever been in back home, which was lucky for me because I was there for five days. I was continually being tested for different illnesses and infections and on day 2 they decided to perform a 3-day culture on one of my samples.
I only had two books with me and I finished reading them on the second day. The satellite offered one decent channel with American shows but had a tendency to re-run the same episodes over and over. This left me with a lot of time to think. First of all I freaked out because I had so much scheduled that week including weaving lessons and in-service workshops with the teachers at my placement. Then I started missing home. Then I started missing social interaction in general. And this led me to mull over a lot of the things I have experienced since arriving in Ghana. I missed the kids at my school like crazy and hated that I was losing my second last week with them. However, I also realized how exhausted Ghanaian social norms have made me. There was one morning at the hospital when I felt particularly hopeless and started to cry when a visiting CCS staff member asked me how I was. She immediately told me to stop crying because expressing emotion like that is socially unacceptable here. She then opened up my curtain and the next thing I knew I had the three other patients and their families lecturing me on how I shouldn't cry because I needed to be strong for my family and God would look after me. In an attempt to make me feel better the staff member then went on a tangent about how God decides when it's our time to go and maybe it was my time to go but I shouldn't be sad because it was what he wanted and hopefully he would decide to heal me so I could see my family again. Let's just say this made the situation harder to deal with. I miss the way people approach problems like this back home.
I was released from the hospital on Thursday afternoon. I had a bacterial infection in my digestive tract and was given antibiotics to continue taking after I left. I just finished them all today and I am feeling much better. I will post more tomorrow night. My computer time is up! Hope everyone back home is doing well!