Different Regions in Ghana

There are 10 regions in Ghana. Regions are similar to a kantons in Switzerland, but they are a lot bigger!
Here are the different regions:
- Upper West Region
- Upper East Region
- Northern Region
- Brong Ahafo Region
- Ashanti Region (Kumasi)
- Eastern Region
- Western Region
- Central Region
- Greater Accra Region
- Volta Region

Fufu

One traditional food that is served throughout the country is fufu. It is a dough type food served with a soup. It is a food that can be found almost everywhere at every chop bar. It is called a chop bar because the way to properly eat fufu is to “chop” it with the thumb and the two forefingers and then place into the mouth and swallow. How is fufu made? Lets first take a look at the ingredients. In the southern parts of Ghana it is commonly made with cassava (roots from a plant found in Africa and South America) and plantain (large banana) while in the north it is made with yam.
Now lets look at how they prepare it. All of the ingredients are peeled and cut into small pieces and then boiled until fully cooked. After that all ingredients are placed into a huge wooden bowl and then pounded with a huge wooden stick until it forms a starchy ball. Next the soup has to be made.
The soup can be made using many different ingredients. The most common ones are tomatoes, garden eggs (aubergines, egg plant) and onions. Also, every soup contains one type of protein. The choices are: fish (fresh or dried), chicken and in special occasions they add dabodabo (duck), goat, cow or even antelope. So fufu can be made in a variety of ways!

The Central Market: buying clothes

Buying clothes at the central market is very different from buying clothes in Switzerland. There are no clothes shops like H&M, C&A or any shop we have in Switzerland! In the Central Market in Kumasi there is only one street to buy clothes from and there is a junction in the middle. And if you stand on the junctions and walk left, you only find place which sell clothes for boys, but if you turn right, you will only find clothes for girls! Also many of the clothes you buy, are not from stores or shops, but by people how have a stand (usually a table) by the side of the road. So every morning they bring all their clothes to sell to their stand and take home all the clothes they did not sell at the end of the day. There are stores as well, but they are usually really small and filled to the top with clothes! And you can find almost everything on the market if you know where to look.
Also there are not fixed prices! Meaning the seller can charge you any price! But if you’re smart you will argue with the seller until you find a price you both agree on (this can take really long sometimes!). For example, I wanted to buy a soccer shirt. The man selling the shirt wanted to charge me 20 cedi (about 16 Sfr.), but I don’t want to pay so much, so after much talking we agreed on a price of 14 cedis (about 11 Sfr.)! But not all sellers want to drop their prices. With some it is easier to bargain with then others! Buying clothes always takes a long time.

Life in Ghana

Ghana does not have winter, spring, summer or fall. Instead they have rainy season and dry season. Meaning, that for one part of year it rains very very much (rainy season) or they have no rain (dry season). Right now, we are in between dry season and rainy season. However, we have so far experienced a few rain storms!
The rain storms are really fun and cool (well, at least we think so!) When it rains here, it really rains hard! The water comes down in buckets! Everything is soaked within a 1 minute. And the rain is warm; so it is like having a really big warm shower! So Alicia and I sometimes just stand in the rain for fun!
But when we have a rain storm, the electricity sometimes (usually) goes out. That means blackout! So no more lights, no TV and no more refrigerator! This is a problem when we want to cook dinner; since we have no lights, we use candlelight! We can still cook with a stove, because we have a gas stove. Cooking by candlelight can be really fun, but its not easy since you can't see very much…so the food we cook during a blackout is usually not very good (too salty fried eggs, burnt potatoes, and overcooked fish ...)…. But at least we have fun!
Rain storms are really fun, but not great when you want to cook!

Teachers at school

There are 5 teachers at the Bosomtwe Community School. They are Madam Patricia, Madam Mercy, Madam Ramatu, Master Amankwah and Master Sarkopie.
Madam Patricia teaches Kindergarten 2 she has been teaching for 3 months. Master Amankwah teaches the 3rd grade student (he is only 20 years old!). He has been teaching for 4 months. He also loves to play soccer and plays for a local team. Both Madam Patricia and Master Amankwah live in the same village.
Madam Ramatu lives in the village right next to school. She walks only 2 minutes to get from her house to school every day! She is teaching the 1st and 2nd grade classes. She has been teaching for 3 years.
Madam Mercy teaches the Kindergarten 1 class. She loves to teach and gets along very well with all the students at school. She has been teaching here for 3 years. She takes the school bus every morning with Master Sarkopie to school.
Master Sarkopie has been teaching for a very long time. He has been teaching at this school for 4 years. He helps teach the 1st and 2nd grade class, but he mainly does the finance and accounting for the school.
Mr. Joshua is the principle of the school. He, with help from Ibi and Maud, founded the school. He has two sons (Emmanuel and Isaac) which attend school here. He loves the school, cares for the children and tries very hard to give the students the best education he can with the resources available.

Soccer Tournament

A few weekends ago there was a soccer tournament held by the local chief between the villages in his district. The chief governs the area of land given to him (he is the head of the ‘Gemeinde’ of this area). He wants the villages to have more contact with each other, so he holds a soccer game every year. This year there were four villages competing. They are called: Behenase, Abidjan Nkwanta, Nnuaso and Abuotem!
The tournament lasted all day! The style the soccer players play is very different from how we play in Switzerland. They play on a dirt field (there is no grass) and the ground is very lose, so they had to be careful not to fall! The teams played really rough and were not afraid to body tackle another player. It did not look very friendly… also some of the players did not wear shoes! They played only in their socks! But the people watching the game were all very happy, friendly and all enjoyed the games very much!
After a hard and tough games at the end of the day, one team (Behenase) had won the tournament! Mr. Amankwah, a teacher at our school, plays for one of the teams (but he could not play that day, because he had to teach). His team came 3rd.