Harmattan is coming!

At this time of year at home, I know Coke should be rolling out the ever-so-traditional Santa Claus commercials.  I remember the old days when the hushed, excited choir would murmur, "Santa packs are coming!  Saaanta packs are coming!"  Santa Packs were, of course, the limited-edition printed boxes of Coke cans that came out at Christmastime.  Then, a good few years ago, it changed to "Holidays are coming!  Hooolidays are coming!"  Part of me appreciated Coke's acknowledgement that December didn't only mean Santa (and therefore Christmas), but a bigger part of me always knew the hat-tip was hollow.  Where in any of the Coke commercials have you seen a Solstice celebration, a single hanukiyah in the gleaming windows, or the Kwanzaa colors of red, black and green?

Anyway, Coke's little earworm is the tune I'm imagining when I read the title of this post.

Harmattan is the dusty season.  It's caused by sandstorms in the Sahara and lasts from December to February.  Harmattan is a time which brings a bit of cool relief from the hot season (it has been sweaaaa-tee around here lately).  It also brings low humidity, hazy days and thus bad photography conditions and cancelled flights, and I've heard it is the time when most locals catch their colds.

For the past couple of weeks, sunrises and sets have been getting ever pinker, oranger and hazier.  I've started to see mist high in the skies along with the sparse clouds.  Streetlights (when they work) have been illuminating columns of particles in the air above the roads.  And then, this morning, I looked out from my balcony towards the city, and realized I couldn't see any of the farther-away landmarks I'm used to spotting. 

Yes, harmattan is definitely coming.  I'll be away for two weeks of it over Christmas time, and I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like with the enthusiasm of someone who's never seen it before!

Work's been crazy - we had a hardware issue last week and were disconnected from the internet until Friday.  There's a huge project HQ wants us to complete which is above and beyond the annual targets HQ themselves set for us, and means we'll need to process about 1000 extra files, and the system we use to deal with those files was the only one that still functioned.  So we used the outage time for a lot of people to do preliminary work on a handful of those files to help me with my impending case load. 

It's like my colleague explained to my seamstress (working hard on my choir uniform, which looks gorgeous!): imagine you have no power; you can do a bit of work sewing by hand, and during daylight hours, but a lot of your bigger capacity is gone.  It was a four-day blow in a very busy office, and now we are totally backlogged.

We've got a choir show coming up on Thursday; any readers who are in Accra should come see.  Goethe Institut, 7 PM, entrance 5 cedis to benefit Street Girls Aid (check them out at www.said-ghana.com).  It won't last more than an hour.  We've been working very hard on these songs and it will really be a treat.

Last but not least, I took my German exam last week... we'll know this week how I did.  Although I definitely made a few mistakes, I also think I did a pretty good job.  Which would mean that next year (if I choose to continue) I'd be starting an advanced German course.  Advanced!  I feel like I could do with a repeat of the past level or two just to solidify my knowledge... I haven't been a very good student when it comes to doing homework, learning new verb tenses or studying at all outside of class time.  Though I can read magazine texts, children's stories and comic books with little assistance, I don't have the confidence to speak.  Hoping that two weeks in Germany will help with that - knowing that people will understand me if I just open my mouth, no matter if the pronoun ending doesn't agree with the number or whatever my worry may be.

Changes and transitions

Waiting at the dentist to be seen. Today is a day of appointments all over the world, as both my mother and Jens's are going in for (different) common but significant procedures. I wish them good surgeries, quick recoveries, health and strength.

The last week and a half has left me too preoccupied to blog. We are still without curtains in the big window in our bedroom, which has taken my thoughts up recently (as in, every time the sun rises at 6!). Also I've seen the doctor twice; once to test for infection and yesterday to discuss the results (no infection, hooray). Today I'm hoping a Ghanaian dentist can finally sort out these sensitive teeth where the Irish have failed; I really hope so!

Monday night marked the start of Passover, a holiday of change and transitions. More on that another time...

The coming of April has made me realize how much I miss watching spring emerge from winter. Here, sunshine and warmth are a given no matter what month it is. Even during the rainy season, they get an average of 5 hours of sun a day. My favorite part of the year has always been seeing life come from bleakness as the world reminds me of reasons to rejoice. I miss the lilacs.

If anyone in Accra is reading this, I'd also like to extend an invitation to an event happening 10 days from now, on Saturday the 30th of April. Accragio (my choir) is participating in a benefit concert in aid of Japan, along with many other musicians, magicians and performers. It's at the Mensvic Hotel swimming pool in East Legon. The catch is that a ticket costs 80 cedis (or 150 for a pair), but the consolation is that it all goes to help survivors of the earthquake(s) and tsunami. Come if you can. I've heard it'll be great; the choir certainly will be.

Tonight I am missing a performance of a Chinese disabled people's performing troupe which I think would be inspiring and fascinating to see. Denver has a group like this, I think, and I never got a chance to see it.

Maybe some day...

Does anyone know where we can find cheap but modern curtains in Accra? We are going to look at fabric shops on the weekend after seeing 3 mostly disappointing curtain shops already. It doesn't make sense to pay 15 or 20 cedis a yard for fabric that's not something we love, but at some point I'd like to be able to sleep late in the darkness again!

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aaaanother house update

LL (that's Landlady) said the house was being cleaned up professionally on Monday.  When we called to check up on it, she insisted we'd be "pleasantly surprised" with what we saw.  Aimee the Roomie and I went over Monday night to check it out.  Not Clean At All - open paint cans, smears on the floor, dust all over the place.

Meanwhile, Jens got a phone call yesterday evening, saying that the mattresses we had ordered were ready.  (As the new place is unfurnished, obviously we'll need something to sleep on until the shipment comes in, and we'll use them as guest mattresses once our real ones come in.)  So he went over there to take the delivery and put them somewhere.  He reports the place is now sparkling clean.  All that remains is the cooker (stove/oven) needs to be installed and the internet needs to be set up.  (their promise of last Friday became Tuesday became today...)  If they take much longer, I'm convening a wild party in our flat.  We're directly above their office.  That'll force them to leave the office and go get our internet set up!

Tonight we're off to yet another concert at the Alliance Française (well, March is Francophone Month at the Alliance, so I guess it's full of special events).  The Ivorian Dobet Gnahoré is apparently a singing, dancing, drumming sensation, and we get to see her for the bargain price of 6 cedis.  


The choir's fantastic fun.  I'm in a four-strong alto section along with seven tenors, six sopranos and two basses.  We have a show on April 30th, a benefit for Japanese tsunami/earthquake victims.  The director is dynamic and devoted.  I am so, so excited to be singing again.


In personal news, I'm inches away from calling a local dentist.  My teeth are starting to go crazy every time I have something cold and/or sweet.  No fruit juice in Accra?  I don't think so!  My No Worries guide (in-depth insider-insight Yellow Pages written by expats, for expats) has a good list of recommended dentists, so we'll see.

Trouble Magnet

In the past few days, I've been steps away from trouble more times than coincidence.

On Monday, some guy had stopped me on the street to chat just outside of B's place.  As I was talking to him, a car rear-ended a truck behind my back.

Yesterday I checked out the Koala grocery store, and the woman in front of me in line got into some kind of trouble.  When I listened in, the owner was telling her to call someone, and that she had broken the law, and he was getting a police officer.  Then the police officer came in and told her to come with him, but she said she hadn't known what she did was illegal and she wanted to stay and talk here.  She retreated into the store, and the officer came in after her 10 seconds later.  I didn't want to be around to find out what had happened.

Then, in the taxi going home from the store, the driver was pulled over for a random check of his license.  All was well, but it still made me uneasy!

Last night I went to check out an amateur choir, as I mentioned briefly in the last post.  I got a taxi and asked for the Goethe Institut, which the driver didn't know at all.  And though it's marked in the right place on Google Maps, a search of the map on my phone put it half a mile away!  It's right next door to NAFTI, the National Film and Television Institute, which map search has a mile in the wrong direction in central Accra.  Again, if you're not searching for the place by name but just browsing the map, the marker shows up in the correct place.  Of course the driver knew NAFTI but hadn't a clue where Goethe, directly next door, was.
Lesson learned, friends: don't always trust maps.  Not even Google ones.

As for the choir, it's small, predominantly but not totally made up of expats, and definitely amateur.  I don't know if anyone has ever mentioned "blending" to this group.  Still, they sing a good mix of classical, pop, art and African stuff, and I'm really excited to start singing again.  Everyone is friendly and high-spirited.  Just one month till I'm back in town for another rehearsal!