Day 8 (saturday)

Locals getting into a tro tro at the gates.

An interesting man I passed on the way home.  I learned that men wear black and red usually when they are attending a funeral and that they are also usually held on Saturdays.

Welcome to the jungle...in the middle of campus?

The entrance at the university engineering guesthouse.

I only woke up a couple times today but felt refreshed, sort of.  I was to meet Maureen at the place called “the gates” at noon.  I waited around and got there a couple minutes early.  I gave the tro tro cashier more than enough for my ride and when I asked him for change afterwards he said I only gave him the right amount, so I wasn't going to argue with him anymore (BE SURE TO ASK FOR YOUR CHANGE RIGHT AWAY OR GIVE THEM AN EXACT AMOUNT!).  I walked down a road just in case she might be coming from that direction, came back up to the gates then walked a short distance to the campus.  I walked around for a while then walked back to the gates and waited some more then decided to get some water and a snack and walked all the way back to the guest house (between a mile and two miles).  I cooled off and made some lunch.  Maureen came to the house with her surrogate (also known as her campus family) family from near the university and when I asked where she was, she said “I phoned the property manager to inform you that I was going to come get you after noon sometime and I did so early this morning.”  I probably lost 5 pounds walking around and sweating so much!  I was also just informed by Maureen that while we were in the supermarket a couple days ago, a man told her that in his lifetime he had only seen 2 great designers (apparently guys with many tattoos) and compared me to the likes of a national Ghanian footballer and David Beckham.  I thought it was pretty funny but he was apparently very excited to see it!   I spoke with my ma and Maureen was in the room so I introduced them via google chat (what a brilliant thing it's turned out to be!).   We went to the pharmacy and got some mosquito nets and finished putting them up. We went to the campus and walked around a bit and then we walked to the engineering guest house (which is the original place that I was supposed to stay but for the same price that I will be staying for the duration of my trip I would have only been able to stay for 5 to 6 days). From there we went to Maureen's “campus” family's home.  They were in the middle of prayer when we arrived and then they had dinner.  They began watching a movie and they had all seen it but were still pretty enamored with it...it was a christian based video but the acting was worse than a homemade movie but the message was nice (I just didn't have the heart to tell them that I wasn't enjoying it)...we got a ride back home instead of having to take a taxi or tro tro.  Her family was absolutely wonderful and I'm grateful to have met them (the mother had her legs amputated during an accident on campus in 1996).  While we were at the guest house I spoke to one of the uncles about politics (he was an interesting man from Accra who is a social psychologist doing some research here.  I woke up at 2 to use the restroom again (it's like clockwork) and watched a feed (script only) of the RSL match, found a free video one (it went out shortly after), then was able to google chat with my parents and they just turned the computer towards the tv and I watched the game that way. Laid back down around 4:30 once the game was over and I was able to chat for a few minutes.