In 9 days, I'm A-ghana be in Ghana!

Dude, I crack myself up! Well, hard to believe that we are now in single digits! I've finally decided on the sleep sac, I have my mosquito netting in hand and I am ready to go :)I have 6 days left of work (YIPEE!!) and am looking forward for this upcoming adventure. The excitement is building and I can't wait!!!

Yipee!!

If you'd like to check the weather when I am in Ghana, here is a link to the major city in the district we will be in...
http://www.yr.no/place/Ghana/Brong-Ahafo/Sunyani/

Just to give you a reference point, 23 degrees celsius=74 degrees fahrenheit &
27 degrees celsius= 80 degrees fahrenheit

But remember... there is always the oh-so-fun humidity to add to that temperature! I was reading a website the other day that said "humidity in the Brong Ahafo district averages between 75% and 90% throughout the year. AWESOME! :)

Yellow Fever? You can't touch this! :)

It's official... I am vaccinated and ready to head to Ghana in t-minus 18 days!!! Well, except for the whole can't decide on a sleep sac issue. Ive narrowed it down to two choices though! :)

It's time to meet the teammates...yipee skippy!!

Betty- lives in Chicago, originally from Slovakia, 33years old, worked for 10 years on HIV/AIDS research in Africa

Crispin- grew up in England but lives in NYC, created a profitable country in Australia and now sells boats

Beatrice- grew up in Haiti, getting her master's degree from USF (Florida) in Entrepreneurship and non-profit

Tim- lives in Wisconsin, works as a carpenter

Angela- lives in Santa Barbara (CA), works as a buyer for an aerospace company (her picture is of her at Macchu Picchu... I like her already!!! :))

KAren- lives in Canada (eh!), works as a librarian

Hailey- lives in Chicago, going to law school

Marc- lives in York (PA), finance major @ Penn state

Andrea- lives in Santa Barbara (CA), is the student affairs manager in the department of chemistry & biochem @ UCSB

Ashley- lives in Long Beach (CA), was on my team to Thailand, just graduated with a degree in Interior Architectural design

Jennifer- lives in Wisconsin, is the team leader, was the team leader for Thailand, works as a massage therapist

Sheri- the coolest, most hilarious, most modest, prettiest and smartest person on the team!! Hahahaha, I crack myself up!

So that's the team!! Here's to another great adventure! :)

P.S. Is anyone reading this thing? :)

Options, options, so many options...

Can you believe that Ghana is only 22 days away!!! Wow! I feel so unprepared! I go on Friday to get my vaccination of Yellow Fever and went back to the doctor on Monday to get a prescription for Malarone (instead of taking Lariam). The doctor prescribed me the amount of pills I asked for, and then after getting home, realized that I had told him the trip was only 10 days instead of 13... so I was short 3 pills! Ah crap! I called the pharmacy asking for 3 pills and they agreed but I had to head back there again yesterday to pick up the 3 pills. I also wanted to do a trial run with the Malarone before leaving the country and have now taken two pills... no side effects except feeling warm one hour after taking the pill and some weird dreams last night (of course, that could also just be the fact that summer FINALLY showed up in CA and it was warm in my room last night :)) I've also been debating back and forth between mosquito netting and sleep sacks... who knew that there were so many options?!?!?! I bought one mosquito net but then decided I didn't like the 'pop-up' feature so I returned it and now have the 'hang from the ceiling' kind. The sleep sack is a different story... I know have THREE different kinds chilling on my living room floor. You should see me hopping from one to the other trying to get a "feel" for which one will feel better/cooler/thinner/better coverage, etc. I have NO idea. Is this craziness or am I just completely ridiculous? So frustrating! I think I like the silk one better but am too cheap to pay the $65 for something I might only use once and will be gross and disgusting after me sleeping in it (showerless) for 10 days!!!!

On a side note... today my boss @ work mentioned to me that one of our clinical directors had heard about my volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity and wants to write an article about me in our agency newsletter that goes out to all our staff, all our directors, and throughout the community! Pretty cool... I don't feel that what I am doing is all that spectacular but if it helps me get the word out about volunteering... then I am all for it!

Well... at least I wouln't get Polio!

No one ever said getting vaccinated was easy... and of course, there are always speed bumps in the road! I went last week to get my vaccinations for Ghana and knew I was in for trouble when the first thing the travel nurse says to me is "uh oh... Ghana, we're going to need both arms." WHAT?! She said that Ghana and Kenya require the most vaccinations on the whole planet! Luckily, I'd already gotten a lot of the vaccinations for other trips but I still needed a Polio booster, Meningitis and Yellow Fever. She then informs me that they ran out of Yellow Fever yesterday and I will have to return in a few weeks... bummer! The good news though is that Kaiser understands preventative care and the other two vaccines were FREE (would have cost a few hundred at the travel clinic in Long Beach!). I got some anti-malarials (Larium) and came home to research them. Online there are reports of "may cause severe depression, psychotic thoughts, and homicide." Are you kidding me?!?! Can that really be better than malaria?!?! And I have to take them for 7 weeks eventhough I am only in Ghana for 10 days!! I am going to try to negotiate a different anti-malarial when I have to go back for the Yellow Fever... either that or try to keep your distance from me until September 20th!

I've never had a problem with vaccines before... but this time... YIKES! I developed a 101 fever, chills, headache, swollen joints, painful spine, pain where my head meets my spine, headache and a rash/hives all over my torso... good times,good times! I was sick for about a day and a half but I'm still assuming that my reaction to the vaccines were better than getting polio or meningitis so I am going to keep my complaining to a minimum! Can't wait to go back to get the Yellow fever and see what joys that vaccine brings with it!

On the up side, I just found out today some more info about the trip. We will be working in a community called Katakyiekrom which is in the Brong Ahafo region. Here is the website for the Habitat Ghana about this specific affiliate/region in Ghana.
http://www.habitatghana.org/affiliatemore.php?affiliateid=162 Interesting little fact... Nyame-Fie (the name of the region) means "house of God." It looks to be in the middle of the country near the border of Ivory Coast. It is in the middle of a Savannah area with few trees. We will be working on two or three houses during the time that we are there. We will be staying in a community center which says that it has electricity... I'm not holding my breath though! We will have "one barrel of water for showers." I'm not quite sure what that means but we'll see how it goes :)

That's about it for now... keep checking in :)