Hello again, friends and family! I hope all is well back in the United States. Life is going great here in Ghana. I am still having an awesome time teaching, and living at the boarding house is getting to be more interesting and fun as I meet more kids here. The past week I've been a few new people who stay at the boarding house and I've become better friends with some of the kids I already knew. There's one girl, Faustina who I have been talking to who is very interesting and fun to talk with. She is a really nice person, but has tons of interesting stories about all the fights she used to get into! It's hilarious to hear her tell these stories because she always cracks up laughing about how she used to fight girls in her school, or beat her older sister. She definitely seems a lot nicer now and she says she hasn't fought anyone in a long time, which is very good, because I really don't care to get beaten up while here. I enjoy talking to Faustina because she is really open and we are always discussing our faith and how we believe we should treat others. It has been great getting to know her.
I have also been getting to know some of the older guys pretty well. A couple weeks ago, we had a holiday on Tuesday, so that Monday night all the kids were allowed to hang out during the time when they normally do their homework. Some kids had heard me beatbox so they asked me to come beatbox in the "chillout circle". I wasn't exactly sure what that meant, so I went to go lay down some fresh beatz and then some kids started rapping over it. It was really cool and a couple of the kids were pretty good and making up rhymes on the spot(also known as freestyling). So this past Saturday night a few guys asked me to beatbox some more, but no one was really stepping up. It was still cool, I just got to talk with the guys for awhile and I talked about where I was from. Some of the guys were still trying to keep the rapping going, but nobody was really doing it, so...
I had to step up to set the pace
There wasn't any competition so I knew I'd win the race.
Opening my mouth, I started spit flame out,
And buy the end I had bought the whole game out.
And that was the rap I "spit", more or less. The guys were going crazy, thinking it was awesome and really good. After this we got into talking about rap and Hip Hop, and so I got my laptop and showed them some of the Hip Hop I like, which isn't the horrible noise you here on rap radio stations... They thought it was really good music, and I felt good that I had shared some REAL rap with them. It was cool getting to know these few guys better and I'm glad I'm starting to make some friends close to my own age.
Backtrack to Friday. That evening, I went out to Sir Max, a hotel/restaurant owned by Lebanese people. We went out for Ms. Charity Apam's birthday(This is Jennifa's assistant in the classroom). It was Jennifa, Ms. Apam, Mr. Owusu(teaches same grade as Jennifa), Mr. Freeman(another American teacher who has been here in Africa for 3 years), and myself. The hotel was really nice, with a swimming pool, and even hookahs you could rent!(Although we didn't rent one!) Me and Jennifa split a salad and I had some beef shwarma, which was incredible! I was so excited to be eating Mediterranean food in Ghana! It was a great time and the food was very much appreciated. Saturday we just hung out at the school all day, I was quite thankful for the relaxing day. Yesterday we went to church here at the school, with all of the boarding students. The church service was fun and the praise, with drums and keyboard, clapping and dancing, was slightly more lively than the worship at the Church of Christ we've been going to... I really enjoy the worship at the Church of Christ, but this was a nice change from the hymns that we sing most Sundays. The class was also nice, and the lesson was really good! This past weekend was a lot of fun and it was a great weekend, but like all other weekends, it went by too fast! But such is life.
So today it's back to teaching. Thankfully, this week is a very easy week for us because all the art classes are having unit tests. Last week was a pretty good week as well and I taught a few classes throughout the week, all of them going smoothly and without problems. Also, on Thursday I went to the High School music club to try and teach some of the kids guitar. I wasn't sure how this would go, but it went surprisingly well, especially because I had the only tunable guitar with 6 strings. I just went over some of the basics and showed the kids a few chords. The kids were actually catching on to it, and when I passed my guitar around there were a few kids who could really remember a lot of the chords and even were able to transition between chords while playing. I'm excited to continue helping with the music club, and I could see that the kids were all very excited as well. The next club meeting will be this Friday so I will be sure to let everyone know how it goes.
Thanks for following me on my adventures here in Ghana. Also thanks to everyone who is praying for me and thinking about me! I miss you all! And I hope life in the States is going well. I am doing great over here, and I am so grateful for each day I am blessed with.
Much love to everyone!
-Jordan
