Auntie Joe: Advice 102

Today was very overcast so I got to wear pants all day long!!! Big shocker. It was lovely. I miss wearing pants and hoodies.

This morning I got up and went to buy some bofroot for breakfast. I was sitting with Auntie Essie and Belinda, waiting for them to cook when a whole bunch of the kids from the village came over and sat down with us. One of the girls, she must have been around 9 years old had a 2 month old baby on her back. I asked if I could hold him and they just handed him right over. His name is Calvin. He didn’t cry at all and wasn’t scared of me like a lot of the babies are; most scream at the sight of an obruni. I handed Calvin back to the little girl and she grabbed his arm, swung him up on her back and tied him place with her fabric...I am not so sure how good that is for a little tiny baby’s arm to be swung up like that, but the kids just cling to their backs and are almost stuck there like a magnet. I am bringing some 2yrd pieces of fabric back since a couple people were interested in seeing how the kids are tied onto their backs.

The power went off around 9am today and didn’t go back on until about 4:30pm. The fans were all off, so being outside was much cooler. Plus, being overcast and about to rain, it was super nice out today. Ironic because that kind of weather at home is considered crappy, but here it is warmly welcomed.  I read my book a lot today and then got my lessons ready for class later on.

While we were sitting outside, Auntie Joe came up to us and wanted to talk. We started talking about raising kids and discipline as a parent. It ended up being a 3 hour conversation all about her family. She said that it is so important to show your kids to be well behaved and have good discipline because you are their role model and they will follow you.

She says that if you bring forth (get knocked up), then your kids will see that and THEY will bring forth when they are young too and then their children won’t be educated and they will bring forth early too.

She said when her children were growing up and old enough to go to work, she would call them to make sure they were actually at work....EVERYDAY! Sounds a little bit drastic right? Get this, she also asked to talk to their boss each day to make sure that they weren’t lying to her and that they were actually at work. She always knew where they were and always made sure they weren’t lazy.

She said it was important for men to learn to cook, and even if they are bad at it, as their wife you have to praise them for it because they tried to do something on their own. She also added that someday you will make something that tastes like crap too and your husband will eat it anyway because he loves you, so you have to return the favour.

Next she came to naming your children. She has 5 kids:

-Her first born is Juliette. She said she looked through baby-name books and since Juliette was born in September, and lots of people’s names in September started with J, and Joan of Arc is good and strong, she picked Juliette....ya, I’m not sure how that one makes sense either...Juliette lives with her husband and children in Italy.

-Next is Kingsley. He is the first boy, so he needs to be the ‘king’ of the household since the father is dead. I actually kind of like this name for a boy. He lives with his wife and daughter in Chicago.

-Next is Mavis. Apparently that doesn’t mean anything, but she is her last born.
-Then there is Isaac. She said that Isaac means humble and since they already have a strong girl and a king, they need a humble man. He just got married this past December and lives in Takoradi (here in Ghana) with his wife.

-Then comes Sampson. Auntie Joe said that if anyone comes to harm his brothers and sisters, Sampson would stand at the gate and say, “NO! I AM STRONG. YOU WILL NOT HURT THEM.” (Since Sampson is a strong name). She also acted this out by raising her arms up and spreading her legs out to demonstrate blocking anyone trying to get in the gate. He is almost done his undergrad in pharmaceuticals in Accra.

-Then comes me, because Auntie Joe said that she would adopt me. She also said that I should come back and visit Ghana for good, marry a Ghanaian man and then I can be a part of her family forever. How sweet.

She then proceeded to show us LOTS of pictures of her family. She also tried to get us to watch a 2 hour video of Isaac’s wedding and engagement parties, but we thankfully escaped that once...thank you power outages?!

I REALLY want to video tape one of these conversations sometime so you can experience what kind of language she uses. It’s SUPER entertaining.

Class today went really well. There were no facilitators today; Kujo is gone now, Uncle Ernest has been gone for 3 weeks (he also works for the government and has to regulate the voting process going on right now), and Auntie Julie was traveling. It was just Petra and I.

We did review for the exam that we have a week from today, tomorrow we will do the same, and then next week is it! Exams and Graduation. We are almost done, folks. This is crazy.

Here’s hoping the power stays on for the rest of the evening so we have fans for sleeping...