The morning of our first day in Ghana I got up at 5:15, went up to the observation deck and watched sunrise as Africa came into view. To start it was just me, Liz, Reanna, and Jeff, but as the sun rose it got a lot more crowded. I don’t know who told all of these people that sunrise happened today, but somehow word got out. We went to breakfast and then there Sheriff Gale, our inter port lecturer was to give one last performance. I had not got to hear him play as much as I would have liked, but I got to see the last performance. He is really cool and you should look him up on iTunes if you get the chance.
Liz and I were not sure what to do for the day since we weren’t sure if we were meeting my friend Tracy that day or the next. Since Tracy is working with Mercy Ships, she also had extremely limited internet and it was a little difficult to connect. Especially when the ship’s internet stopped working completely. It probably won’t be working for the rest of the time we are docked in Ghana. I bought a phone card to try to call Tracy since my phone was having issues, but I couldn’t figure out how to work it. Eventually I just turned my phone off and back on and it was fine. Figures…
We decided to walk around Tema. So we left the ship in search of the shuttle, which we didn’t find. However, we did find Josh and Yesenia who were also wanting to go into Tema so we joined up with them and went back onto the ship for lunch. On our second try at getting to Tema we picked up another guy, Adam, who had been sitting in the piano lounge looking bored and waiting outside for the shuttle to show up. It took a long time for the shuttle to show up and another person joined our group. With the new additions of Molly and Adam, there were now six of us.
When the shuttle finally arrived, we headed into Tema and then had to take a taxi to get to an ATM. We decided to wander around the market place for a while. It was fun, until we realized there was pretty much nothing to do in Tema besides wander around the overcrowded marketplace. Eventually we found some boys who had just gotten out of school and asked them if there was a school somewhere nearby we can visit. They decided they felt like being our tour guides and took us to a school. At the school we met a huge group of students. They all wanted to play with our cameras and take pictures of themselves (I thought they were about to start a fight over mine, so I took it away and hid it from them). A group of older schoolgirls, maybe fifteen year olds, were at the school and talked to us for a while. We high fived everyone and said goodbye before heading back to the market. The group of older girls came with us. They were very happy to show us where to find good chocolate, which foods we should try and what we should do while in Tema, and eventually helped us to get a taxi back to the ship. In my opinion, kids make the best guides.
Back at the ship I was finally able to get a hold of Tracy. She was coming into town that night, but we wouldn’t be able to meet her until the next day. I spent the rest of the night talking with friends, playing cards, and packing for the next day.
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