Today was my birthday, and it started off pretty well (though embarrassing). When I got into the dining hall everyone started singing and Blalock gave me a card that everyone had signed (Katie had also drawn me one and put it on my bed in the morning.) And then at dinner I got another round of Happy Birthday sung to me and they even made me a cake. It was all so sweet!
The first thing we did was to visit the Makola Market to get our fabrics for Ginatu. It was seriously overwhelming because there were just so many choices and the prices were all different, so I ended up buying a lot more than I will be using here and honestly, probably just too much in general. I blew about 220 cedis on fabrics and when I got home I was just like "Ugh!" oh well. I know that I will end up using all of it eventually, I just don't know what for yet. I really hated having to buy 6 yard increments because that's so much more than I'd ever buy in a store, but I guess I can create a sort of collection with continuity for my Etsy shop since I'll have so much of each fabric. I'm still not pleased that I spent so much, but I know I'll be happy later when I'm at home and can pull out my cool Ghanaian fabric to craft with.
After the market visit, we went to the school of social work to support Dr. Okech as he gave a speech. Both he and the professor from the university gave pretty interesting lectures, but I was still kind of drifting off, unfortunately. I think it was a combination of the heat, a lack of sincere interest, and some lingering exhaustion. At one point during the lecture a girl came in with a tray stacked with cold water bottles and started passing them out to us (we were seated to side the side, separated from the Ghanaian students) and that was the first time I've really felt bothered by our elevated status as westerners. My eyes literally sent wide and I was honestly pretty appalled by it. I just kept thinking that everyone else in the room was probably just as hot and just as thirsty, yet we were being served like royalty. I hated it and I felt so guilty taking the water and drinking it. I really didn't like that feeling at all.
However, after the speeches and some response questions from the students (which I really enjoyed hearing), we were told to spend the rest of the time just talking to the college students. And of course, I freaked out. But it was actually kind of awesome. Even though I was nervous about speaking to them and had no idea what to savor do at first, they were so friendly and welcoming that it became ... I won't say easy, but easier. They all genuinely wanted to speak with us, so that really helped. I will say, I also had another kind of strange feeling during this whole chat session because I felt like I was approached / fawned over less than the other "obrunis" in my group. Not that I have any desire to be fawned over, but it did kind of make me feel bad, because I felt like the fact that I wasn't white made me less interesting to them. I felt a little left out and that wasn't a great feeling. I did meet a couple of girls who were very sweet and even gave me their names to find them on Facebook, which was cute. One thing I really loved was how modest and surprised they all were whenever we gave them compliments. It was very sweet. Overall, I did really enjoy getting to interact with the students and visit the university, even if there were a couple of rough patches in there.
The last thing we did was to go to a batiking workshop at Esther's home. It was so wonderful! I seriously had a ridiculous amount of fun! I really loved her story of how she just decided that the job she was previously doing wasn't for her, and decided to go into creating things she really loved. She was such an amazing teacher and I think that we all thoroughly enjoyed being there. The fabrics that we all created were just beautiful and she was so impressed, as we're we. I think that all of us definitely want to try to recreate the technique back in Athens! I'd say this was definitely a great closing activity for the day. It was a long, rough day with some bumps due to the exhaustion and heat, but everything turned out okay in the end.
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