Homesickness is this weird beast that lives beneath your bed, but instead of catching you at night it creeps up on you and goes BAM! at any point in the day. And then there's nothing you can do. It's also not the normal homesickness - I miss my mom, dad, home - it's I miss my country, my food, my friends, my water, weird things that can't be accounted for in a phone call. But what are you going to do?
I have left Accra and good riddance! Kumasi is beautiful. It's a large city, but much calmer than Accra and it feels much more manageable. I really enjoy my home as well. The area that I live in is gorgeous and the house is very western. The husband was a chief, however he passed away last year and I live now with my homestay mother and her sixteen year old daughter. There is also a four year old grandson.
Two things that have made it golden: 1) a ceiling fan and 2) coffee in the morning. My first morning I literally thought I had died and gone to heaven. I am hoping that given time the family will open up and we can entertain some conversation - it always takes time, even more so in a culture that doesn't spend much quality time together. At least in this family we all eat at the same time, even if it is in different rooms.
They also own two dogs. Dogs are an interesting subject in Ghana. As I understand is true in many poor countries, animals are not treated as pets. In a place where you can barely feed yourself and your family, why would you spend money feeding animals? And to think I even spent money buying the dogs... not to mention my horse.
I asked Ama (host sister) what the dogs names were. She began laughing. I paused and then sheepishly said "Unless they don't have names..." "No, they don't have names," she responded. Not only do they not have names, but the four year old makes a habit to not only chase the dogs around, but once he ran up to one that was lying down and kicked it in the ribs for absolutely no reason. I yelled at him and told him that it wasn't nice, but really, what power did I have? I don't know what kind of punishment he gets for hitting the dogs normally, if any at all.
This morning when I walked out of the house the dogs were outside the door. I leaned over and beckoned them with my hand and they stood back staring at me wagging their tails as if all they wanted was to come up. When they finally did approach me and I pet them, they went crazy with excitement. They started jumping on me and running after me and wagging their tails and licking my hand. They were so attention starved, and it made me realize how incredibly much animals rely on us, and what do you do when no one is there to give them what they really want? And at what level is their importance compared to a human beings'?
Personally, in a family that can afford the large house I'm living in with a gate and two cars, I would think they could give their animals a little attention. But it's just not in the culture.
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