First Days in Ghana - Exploring Accra

I didn't know what to expect Ghana to be like. I had never been to anywhere in Africa before so the lot of my knowledge came from quick Google searches and what I've heard from teammates who have visited before.

When we first landed in Accra five days ago, I immediately noticed how humid it was compared to the East Coast. However, since I grew up in Hawaii, I'm fairly used to high humidity so it oddly felt like home. There's actually a lot of similarities I wasn't expecting. Since Ghana is near a similar latitude as Hawaii, the climate is also similar so in hindsight it's not surprising a lot of the flora is the same. I noticed a bunch of trees, shrubs, and flowers that I have right in my backyard.

When we left the airport, it was after sunset so it was hard to see anything past headlights that first night. However, when we drove around Accra later that week, I was able to see more of the city. I noticed how even though there were some high rises, a lot of buildings were incomplete with uncapped rebar sticking out of them. People would walk along the streets selling goods that were stored in baskets on their heads. Drivers would honk frequently at each other just to let other drivers know that they're there (which seems similar to New York City but much different than home when people rarely honk at each other).

Before we left Accra for Sogakope, we were fortunate enough to meet with two different potential contractors for the VAM Girls Academy. The meetings were very productive and they seemed to kickstart the real work of the trip.

Sogakope is much smaller than Accra. There's no real cluster of buildings other than a few groups of shacks and houses here and there that form smaller villages and marketplaces. Again, there were a lot of unfinished or abandoned buildings.

Most people travel by motorcycle or they just walk. The groundskeeper at VAM's site doesn't seem to have any type of vehicle and just walks everywhere which seems pretty intense to me considering the nearest village area is a 20 min drive away.

One particular delight on our daily to commute to the site is looking out the car window to see goats everywhere! They're even more adorable here since they're really small and seem like babies compared to ones back in the States.

On site, we were able to document the existing structure on VAM's land as well conduct a simple soil test and survey the area. We surveyed where the new school is expected to be built which was a learning experience for all three of us there. None of us had created a topography map to the extent that we were attempting so it took us a while to really get the hang of it. We also learned that while the ground appears relatively flat, there's a general slope across the site which is important to account for in our design.

This afternoon we were able to visit the local brick factory that the previous travel group found. We looked at several different sizes of bricks and roofing material. We were also able to see the machinery used to form the bricks which was much more complex than I would have expected. The bricks are formed from clay taken within walking distance of the factory and need very little maintenance once installed.

Tomorrow we will be meeting with more contractors and material suppliers before heading back to Accra.