Hello, friends.
Our orientation week has been jam packed, so how am I finding the time to write?
Well, I'm sick.
Whomp-whooomp.
I think about 4 or 5 of us are sick so far today. We've been dropping like flies, starting with someone on the first morning here. We were all warned about it, and it's perfectly normal. We all have bateria that live in our stomach, based on the food we eat, and different regions have different bacteria. The bacteria in Africa and the bacteria in America are quite different, so if you're here for a while, you WILL get sick as your stomach starts to adjust to the new bacteria. The nurse was running around like crazy between dorms this morning, says it's always like this for the first few weeks.
So, instead of going to an art gallery and a masoleum, I'm sitting here with dry toast, tea, and Pepto-Bismol. Apparently, when you're on anti-malarial meds, you shouldn't drink water before you eat in the morning. Oops. But, I'm glad this inevitable first case of diarrhea is happening during orientation, not during the first week of school. Knock on wood.
Other than that, life in Africa has been great. I had a moment of "Oh God, Colleen, what did you get yourself into?" on Monday, but the NYU in Ghana staff have done an excellent job of helping us get adjusted. It's a small program, only 43 students, so we're all getting to know every other person. The people on this trip are extremely interesting, are super aware and many are very well-traveled. (I, of course, am not.) It is nice to meet people who share my odd interests and are also not theater people. Someone's really interested in sound, someone's really interested in accents and languages, someone's really Christian, someone's really spiritual, someone's really an internet geek. I had a debate over the current location of the Ark of the Covenant with someone while standing in the Modern Languages department at the University of Ghana yesterday. There are a couple people with North Carolina connections, and so I've talked with people about Montreat, Cheerwine, and Cookout. There's one other PHTS student, and one person who lived with two PHTS students last year and therefore knows a ton about what goes on there.
Something that's also inspiring is how much people in this program care about what's going on here and in the rest of the world. We had a community service fair, where organizations came to talk with us about volunteering for them this semester... everything from orphanages to AIDS organizations to schools, and we were all so conflicted because we wanted to volunteer everywhere. In the past, NYU in Ghana has had a 95% participation rate in community service. That's incredible.
We've been running all over Accra, eating good food (oh my god Ghanaian food! Fufu with groundnut stew!), having lectures on history, religion (yay), language, cultural do's and don'ts... it's been rather busy, especially since it takes forever for a group of 43 to do anything on Africa time. Pratically, I think Africa time is going to be the hardest thing for me to get used to. Everything takes FOREVER, and we've been constantly running late. I HATE being late. I'll be at PHTS 30 minutes before class. (Let's hope Africa doesn't change that habit.)
I also know my schedule. At least, I'm 95% sure this is my schedule. The Twi class might change days, which would mean my Religious Studies course might change, but this is the general idea. Most of my classes are being taken at the NYU academic center, with one at the University of Ghana.
Monday:
Elementary Twi (local language)
Tuesday:
The Life of Muhammed (this class taken at the University of Ghana)
Wednesday:
Community Psychology
Thursday:
African Popular Music
Post-Colonial Practices in Studio Art
Friday:
Every two weeks I'll have a recitation to supplement my University of Ghana class, catching me up on African history and culture.
This is the lightest class schedule I have ever had. Ever. I'm sure Lindsay and Amy and other PHTS students reading this are saying, "WHAT?!" To compare, let's look at my 2nd year spring schedule, which is the one I can find most easily in my email.
Monday:
Acting II
Stage Management/Dramaturgy
Directing
Tuesday:
Modern Art
Language
Wednesday:
Script Anaylsis
Design II
Voice and Speech II
Collab
Thursday:
Modern Art
Language
Friday:
Actor/Director Collaboration
Form and Content
Voice and Speech II
Acting II
As such, the fact that there's only one day where I have more than one class is shocking. ALSO, while these classes have homework, there aren't outside shows or rehearsals or that kind of thing. During the days I'll probably be out volunteering. I wanted to audit Arabic at the University of Ghana, but it clashed with a lot of my NYU in Ghana classes.
It is extraordinarily clear that I am supposed to be here right now, and I feel like a lot of my time is being spent figuring out why I'm here. It's really beautiful. A lot made sense to me when we had our chat on Religion in Ghana. In talking about African Traditional Religion (ATR), the professor spoke about how ATR is focused around the belief that the material world is imbued by a spirit force, and that we human beings are to interact with that force.
...which also happens to be my personal theology.
I'll go into more detail about school, volunteering, life, etc., when I start actually diving into them more than just these interactions.
But know that life is lovely, diarrhea and all.
Send me updates, thoughts. There's no place on earth I'd rather be right now, but that doesn't mean I don't love and miss all of you.
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