Making Of The Ghana Flag

 One of my now traditions when I return to Ghana is having a pedicure done. AND having the Ghana flag put on my big toes. Mercy, the name of my pedicurist, has really upped her game. When we started this tradition over a year ago, she was totally freaked out drawing a five pointed start freehand. Now....well I will let you judge.

 

 And the Final Product

I think they came out pretty awesome. I told Mercy I was going to get Wife to have hers done with me when we visit Ghana in May. I'm not sure Wife was so excited about the idea.

Back To Ghana

 It was sooooo boring. Just being home after the excitement of Sicily and the proposed transformation of our life. I mean I was back for 10 days. Too long. Time to get out again. So it is off to Ghana to get back in deep with Theodora Africa Project. 

I am actually just cooling my heals in an airport lounge in New York's JFK airport where I have a 6 hour layover before my last flight to Ghana. And I need to catch a nap here for jet lag management. 

Much, much is going on with the project since my last post on on this forum. But it is late so I will just set this up as a placeholder. 

More to come soon.

Groundhog Day

You may recall from January this post about the incredulous experience of being told that the only means the neighboring apartment had for reaching the roof to repair an air conditioning unit was through the apartment I was using. And the subsequent multi-day saga of having work men haul themselves, their equipment, the old unit and the new unit through the rather small living room of the apartment. 

 What are the chances that something like this could happen again? Evidently 100%. Sure enough, the very first Saturday of my stay, the weekend where my goal is to relax and recoup energy from the long trip, there is a knock on the door. It is the compound security. The next door apartment has another air conditioning unit out. May they come through mine so they can access it? I suppose I could say no. Come back in two weeks when I’m gone. But if the shoe were on the other foot, I wouldn’t want that to happen. So instead, I had four hours on Saturday afternoon of people schlepping in and out of my apartment with tools and heavy air conditioning units.

 

Then in a new development this morning, Tuesday, I awoke to no electricity and no water. A high end unit like this advertises it has backup power supply. But I get the impression this whole complex was built on the cheap. I think it is time for me to find an alternative.

The Joys Of Accra Apartment Living

Ghana - pronounced in this case with an exaggerated first a - sort of elongated and exhaled - Ghaaaana. To be accompanied by a shaking of one's head in resignation.

This is an exclamation I here often driving here with my long-time driver F (met within the first 20 minutes of my stepping outside the terminal on day one of trip one in February 2019) and my longest tenured VA whom I've known almost as long. The expression is typically used when we encounter any of the myriad inanities or frustrations that crop up in a lean economy like Ghana. It is sort of like when you bitch and bitch about something. Then you use this as the catch-all term for 'What can you do? That's the way it is?"

I feel that way about renting short-stay apartments here.

 I have now made 10 trips to Ghana and have stayed in apartments in all but the first two trips. To be charitable, let's just say that the standard for workmanship and maintenance in short-term rental units is a bit lacking. There is literally always something not working. The apartment I have been in on this trip and the last, has a refrigerator that sort of keeps food cold, a fan/light hood over the stove that doesn't seem to be connected to any electrical power, an ironing board with no cover, a washing machine with no rack or lines for hanging clothes to dry. The internet modem was on its last legs and would go down at least once a day (It was replaced.) All these are kind of...well...what you expect. But I had an experience that was totally novel during the trip. 

Last Sunday, I was eating lunch when there was a knock at my door. It is my next neighbor. Their air conditioning unit is not working. The unit is on the roof. The only way to reach the unit is by placing a ladder on the balcony of my unit! Of course, I said it was okay, I didn't want people to go without A/C. Through out the afternoon, people are going up and down, in and out, bringing new A/C units up and old one's down. All the while trying to not destroy my apartment and looking sheepishly at me.

Sunday evening arrives and they are not done. They want to come back on Monday but I will be in the office all day. It is not until Thursday that I am in the apartment and they can finish. 

Now I am thinking...Who designs the utilities of a building so they can only be reached by going through a 3rd party's unit? There is no other way to get to the roof of this apartment complex? Seems weird.

Ghana.

All Hail Monkey Brain The Mighty

 You are all very, very familiar I am sure with the Monkey Brain. You may not call it that. You might call it your sub-conscious. You might just think it is you being you. It is that voice in your head that never, NEVER stops going on and on and on about all the things you should be worried about, concerned about, haven't considered enough about, haven't planned enough about. 

In Yoga, the Monkey Brain is one of the aspects of the play of consciousness that makes us feel separated from the universe. It makes us feel small rather than expanded. Insignificant rather that great. We spend A LOT of time on the yogic path trying to develop the discrimination to just let the Monkey Brain ramble on and not give it energy by focusing attention on it. If you want to know one thing that will disturb your peace-of-mind, it is letting yourself get caught up in the pedantic rantings of your Monkey Brain. 

I am happy to say that after many decades of hard spiritual practice that my Monkey Brain is still able to throw moves at me and take me down out of a state of peace. The sages tell us not to let this bother us too much but because the influence of the Monkey Brain is actually one of the hardest of all things to overcome. It is still depressing though after so much work. 

My Monkey Brain has found the perfect, I mean the PERFECT foil to lever me out of internal peace...Traveling Internationally During Covid Times Where Testing (and other things) Are Needed to Get On Planes! Ah yes, what better food for Monkey Brain then having to get a variety of tests and other paperwork done just days before you leave AND hope they show you are not infected.

I just got into Ghana again on Thursday. This is my fourth trip to Ghana since the pandemic. Each one has had its own set of issues associated with getting the testing and paper work write. If you remember last trip, they added a step requiring you to upload your Covid test results to the African CDC and get  QPR code or they wouldn't let you on the plane. This trip's Monkey Brain food was over the Covid Test itself.

First, it took forever to find a resource where I could get the test within the 72 hour period as it was the Labor Day weekend. That got Mr. (or Ms.) Monkey Brain started. I finally got a test at Walgreens that was a 24 hour turnaround which was wonderful. And in fact I got the results back in just a few hours. What I didn't pay close attention to was the specific name of the type of test. If I had, I would have noticed the test was a NAAT test, not the PCR test that is required. Now the Walgreens site says this rapid test is a PCR test. So why it is titled differently, I don't know. The important thing is I don't really pay attention to this until after I am already in route.  

My money saving itinerary has me flying on a domestic ticket to Houston, staying overnight there, and then getting on my international flight which is on a different ticket. I spend a number of hours at the hotel researching what is a NAAT test? What is a PCR test? I find that the PCR uses the NAAT methodology. So a PCR test is a NAAT test. But are all NAAT tests PCR's. Clearly not. Nonetheless I save these pages of discussion to show at the airport if I'm called out on this. Then I find a place only 10 minutes from the airport that does drop in PCR 1 hour result testing. Great, this is my back up plan. IN THE MEANTIME, Monkey Brain is going crazy ranting on all the permutations and all the things that can go wrong, blah, blah, blah.

I get to the airport early in case I am going to have to run out and do the testing again. It is very crowded. A harried agent, dealing with many different flights and requirements, looks at my requirements. He picks out two, neither of which are the Covid test. I have those. He checks me in. What the &@#!*.

I get to Washington Dulles where I get my Ghana flight. I show my docs. He barely glances at the Covid test and sees "NEGATIVE" and that's that.

Thanks Monkey Brain. Thanks for showing me how far I have to go in my spiritual development...which I suppose is just another aspect of Monkey Brain.