A Little Bit of Accra

Here are a few observations I've made in the week I've been here that I think you may find interesting...

1. the traffic is INSANE. First of all, if there are rules of the road, the only one that's loosely followed is "drive on the right side of the road". Cars will go into the far left (oncoming) lane to turn left, do U-turns where ever they want, randomly form a third lane in the middle of the road... like I said, it's crazy. Secondly, all the big cars (trucks, SUVs) do whatever they please because they know they're safe if they get in an accident, so the littler cars have to do their best to stay out of the line of fire, so to speak. Everyone drives as fast as they can, or want, and it's usually right behind the bumper of the person in front of them. Cars are driven until they die on the side of the road. Literally. And then men come and help the driver push-start it. Trotros are dented and dinged up from hitting things and things hitting them, and are are know to have their brakes give out, but their the cheapest way to get around and their always packed.
2. there are lots of animals everywhere. Flocks of 1 to about 4 or 5 sheep graze on the side of the road. Chickens wander around the side of the road and around stalls. I hear rooster calls in the morning. There are a lot of medium-sized dogs. No really big ones, no really small ones, all look approximately the same, (smallish head with a pointed snout, slight body, and bottle brush tail) in various colours. There are many cats too. They all look like they are between the age of kitten-hood and adult-cat-hood, when they're thin and kind of gangly, but I'm not sure if they're kittens or just skinny. Dogs and cats go the stalls with their owners so you can usually find the cats milling around them, or, like last night, a dog curled up sleeping in front of it. 
3. sales. Holy cow. There are stalls lining the streets, packed more and more tightly the closer you get to downtown. They are three-walled structures that vary from ones made of wood that resemble fishing shacks with a wooden gate that closes and locks when the shop closes, to metal ones with a metal gate, to concrete ones with glass windows and doors on the front. You can buy pretty much anything from them, drinks, snacks, groceries, pharmacy items, shoes, clothes, have pictures printed, etc. There are also vendors who walk up and down stopped traffic selling items held in big bowls carried on their heads. This is very convenient in a trotro, since the top of head of the vendors reaches approximately the bottom of the window so you can just reach in a take what you want. They sell water sachets, phone cards, toiletries, gum, chocolate, belts, bicycle tires, sandals, and probably anything else you can think of.
4. there doesn't seem to be a huge emphasis put on property value here, though I've only been here a week so maybe it's different in different areas. Anyway, the areas I've seen have huge mansions and other nice homes next to decrepit buildings and slums. It's definitely different.
5. food. Breakfast wouldn't be breakfast in Accra without Milo! The milk used in Milo, coffee, and tea is a tin of Carnation condensed milk. There are two main types of bread, sugar bread and butter bread. They are baked in wood burning ovens in stalls on the side of the road and they are the most wonderful thing I've ever tasted. Banku is a starch food made of casava and corn that comes in a ball and has the consistency of raw dough. It's eaten with soup or sauce with meat (fish, chicken, and/or goat). You pinch pieces off with your fingers and press a divot in the center and kind of use it as a spoon. Kinki is the same idea except it's made only with corn and it has corn husks around it. Fufu is casava and another grain that's escaping me at the moment. Anyway, it's much stickier and it's swallowed without chewing. Oh, yes, and when there's goat in the soup, it's aaaaall the goat. I haven't had it myself because I don't think I could handle the rubbery skin. The staple food here is rice - plain rice, fried rice, jallof rice. It's very good, but it gets a little sickening when you eat it twice a day.

Hope that was interesting, I'll report more as it comes. Love you all, and miss you very much.
Emily