Building a Community Center in Ghana

I think what I am beginning to enjoy most about Ghana are the little things, for example:

1. Heavy traffic and some light shopping.

Hey everyone!

Check out these new videos:

1: This is the first site visit. You can hear J explaining the building needs, see the students all paying attention and get a glimps of the school complex. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hUTKOY6pyM

2: This is a short clip of the canopy walk in the National park. Scary! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Kzf4SyBSRk

3: Killing time at the work site where one student teaches the school kids a special song... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0ntg6DGSt4

Today was our first time back in Abrafo-Odumasi since the welcome ceremony. Rather than jumping right into the build we took the morning to revisit the site and reevaluate the different design ideas. The “principle” of the school was not present to review the designs, so J and the students discussed their ideas with Samuel, who is the Ghanaian construction manager for the project.

Watching the students design their ideas for the computer center has been incredibly interesting. They have genuinely taken to heart not only the site (building location/environment) and its possible future uses to heart, but they have also embraced the community and its surroundings as inspiration for the plans.

So we took out a thermometer on the worksite Friday and the mercury rose to the VERY top at 120 degrees! True, the temp was taken in direct sunlight... but, then again, we work in direct sunlight. Later, we wraped the thermometer in a tissue and the temp topped out around 103 degrees.

Crazy.

Hagar is a woman from Abrafo-Odumasi, about 52ish years old. She works as a guide 5-6 days a week at Kakrum National Park (with the canopy walk) and farms on Mondays (her day off). Hagar is the original link between Miami and Abrafo-Odumasi and the root to the story about how the university started building here.

This is a little video I shot of our Welcome.... I think you will recognize J!

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osB3hnzR120

This is a video shot by one of the passengers on the Flight 166 from New York to Accra. If you read the original post you will know what is going on. If you haven't... READ IT!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzxPS38jafM

The change from an urban to a rural environment has been incredible. Only a day ago we were spending hours waiting in the dusty and dirty streets of Accra, where people glared at us from corners and venders tapped at our windows with goods stacked on their heads. Now the roads are closed in by dense jungle on either side and when clearings break through the magnificent wall of green, people standing in doorways or lounging beneath low hanging branches smile and wave feverously (well most of the time, we still get glared at or stared at or shouts of “ ‘eh brunies!”).

Hi everyone! Thank you for continuing to read the blog, despite our relative silence over the past week. We have been traveling in the northern regions of Ghana in the "cities" of Wa and Bogatonga. Needless to say, not a whole lot of internet access (let alone anything else).

Regardless, everyone has been thinking about the design for the community computer center. There are some really great ideas! Hopefully once we get back to Hans Cottage (our main living location for the 3 weeks of building) in 4 or 5 days we can post some of the design ideas.