Monday 21 May 2007

Next month I miss claires wedding and I am gutted about it. It is horrid to miss such special times and even worse as Claire has been telling me about Clare and Pru's beautiful bumps and I may not even get to see them until they have had their babies. We are missing so many peoples special moments and sad times when we should be there for them and the phone is not enough. It is horrible to miss things and such is the life we have - when we are in England we miss people here and visa versa. Kwajo and Nayah of course now face the same problem as Kwajo misses Jack, Unity, Faith and all his other friends but when he gets home he will miss Benty, Kwaku and all the other kids (and Nayah is going to be devaststed to leave her constant supply of besotted and doting Uncles). Most especially I expect they will miss the freedom of going to play with friends on a whim which they simply do not have in England. But now we have a greater appreciation of what we have in England - not least friends, family and the forest. So we miss you all hugely and when we do get back we will miss home here, To have two places to love though means double the number of wonderful people in our lives and now we have two houses for the next few years we can move back and forth more easily. For now we send all our love and very best wishes to those whos special times we are missing. We are trying to concentrate on our happy memories with you and looking forward to the good times to come.
So we are here I sit typing with the sound of eight kiddies laughing and chatting in the background. Kwajo occasionally shouting this is Jungle Book - my favourite shush shush!! They have been playing for most of the afternoon and since Kwame is still in the north it is the uncles who have made a trip up on the roof to collect the balls!

So as you can tell we are settling down nicely I am now "Kwajo Nayah Maamee" and it is lovely to be greeted on your way home at night. Patrick has left for home and Africa is walking him to the top road as is traditional here - I am promised he will return with beer and since we have had light all day and into the evening then it may even be chilled - a holy grail I can chase all around Accra.

We did not make it to the beach today but we are less than half an hour from Kokrobite - nicer than being close to work - especially as I now mainly work from home. So what has at times seemed a rush descion with the house now seems a good one. The drains are fixed and he comes next week to concrete against the rains. It was cheaper than other options and so of course it does have its downfalls - the roads to the area are rough as hell, it is marshy around so there are mosquitoes, the water is not constant and robberies have happened (although on the isolated newer side). However. Roads everywhere can be a problem and at least we don't suffer the noise and worry of pasing traffic for the kids. Mosquites are everywhere (even the upper east when currently it seems it never rains) but we have installed nets and screen doors. In some areas they have no pipe water and even where they do it has not run for a year - so our couple of days here and there pales into insignificance, especially when we have remembered to fill the containers. Robberies are an increasing worry and everyone talks about it - however in compasrion to London the crime is less. If a robber or a stanger wanted to reach here they would drive down a dead end where everyone knows us - friends have come to wait for us and have been questioned in no uncertain terms. God forbid if they did get in they would never get out as robbers here are still routinely murdered (which of course is part of the reason why they carry weapons which makes them so much more dangrous). In addition we leave nothing of value in the house and have installed various bits of bugular proofing.

Amsuingly the lights just went off - horrified at my inability to even light a tilly lamp without getting cross the children quickly dispersed. Ten minutes later I have still failed to light the lamp but the lights have come back on and all of the children have returned. Benty has even brought a load of washing to iron as his house has 'low current'. Daily this beautiful land copes with the kind of disasters that I imagine would have a devastating effect on the UK economy (thinking for example of our inability to cope with snow or 'leaves on the line') but in general I am amazed at the patience and reoursefullness of most people. Kwajo for example screamed because the movie stopped and Nayah because of the dark. The kids just quietly upped and left and off course I was shouting at the tilley light and throwing match boxes. Maybe I am dangerously close to a sterotype and you can say people here are just used to it - but we have been here over nearly four months and that is a long time in the life of a child.

Thursday 17 May 2007

lakeside lazing

so we went fishing on lake volta for Darrens birthday. An absolute idil of rain forest, still water and fish - the rods went down a storm with the locals. And of course we cried and cried and cried. Unbelievable to think he has been gone five years and although the shock is less it is truly hard to realsie we miss him now more than ever. Every time I see Kwajo and Nayah playing and just how in love they are it is impossible to imagine one without the other. Up till now there are moments it is impossible for me to imagine myself with the absense of him.

And so we came back to Accra and the city - light off and other peoples shit coming up through our drains. Truely a country of extreames. Light off means I am typing this in blackness so excuse mistakes. Kwame has travelled north with my first pay check to buy all the things you get cheap in the north. It was terribly exciting to get paid millons and millons and carrying it to the bank in a sack!! July 2007 the money changes though and although the song on telly promises "the value is the same" it won't be the same getting thousands not millons and being able to carry it in a purse!

sorry this is awful as I can barely see the keys and am sweating horribly without the fan - I'm off for a shower - although I doubt there is any water in the tap.......