First Day of School!

(Written August 22nd, retroactively posted internet permitting!)

In my 17 years of school, I have never had a first day like today. The day started out like every other first day. I woke up, got ready, and even took my “first day” photo! 

I had no idea where my classes were because acronyms were used for all of the buildings. For example, I was supposed to go to LLT, but because none of the Ghanaians I spoke with have taken a linguistics course before, none of them knew where the lecture hall was. After some wandering and some very helpful locals, I learned that LLT stands for Linguistics Lecture Theatre. (Keep in mind this was all happening before 7:30 AM because my class was scheduled to start at 7:30 AM.)

Finally I found the classroom… only to find it empty. Later I learned it is totally normal for professors not to show up for class in the first week of the semester, but it is still the duty of the students to sit in the lecture hall for the first 45 minutes of the lecture period in case the class does occur. I was scheduled to have four classes today, but only one of them took place. Some of them do not even have assigned locations yet, even though we are in the first week of school. Like I said, it was a first day unlike any other. 

I’m accustomed to living in California, where time is money, but here in Ghana time is simply time. In Ghana it is senseless to go to a restaurant hungry because on average they take such a long time to bring food that you would be ravenous by the time the food got there. I find this is simply because Ghanaian food takes a long time to prepare. In California there is a saying, “Patience is a virtue.” Well in Ghana it’s a necessity. It’s hard moving from a culture where everything needed to be done yesterday to a culture where things can simply be done tomorrow, but it is most definitely a way to learn patience, which is a skill I’m still establishing. 

I found this photo in a coffee shop the other day, it’s very appropriate for the region.