Our first couple days in Africa have been excellent. After a fairly long day of travel, we finally arrived at the Accra airport and were greeted by high temperatures and humidity. All nine of us packed into a van, along with all of our luggage, and headed into the bussling metropolis that is Accra. The many new sights, sounds, and smells were almost a sensory overload, but a stop along the way for some local ice cream soothed the nerves. After weaving through masses of traffic, we made it to the Projects Abroad office. There, we met the other volunteers before we headed to our house. The house belongs to the lovely Mrs. Afrifa, whose family and numerous other folks stay with her (pictures on the way). We enjoyed a badly needed nap and ate our first Ghanian meal, which consisted of fried plantains, a bean dish, rice and some scrumtious pinneapple. From there, it was back to the office for their "quiz night", a social event where the volunteers can congregrate. I thnk the main attraction was the pizza that was served, which tasted exactly like the pizza we have in the States.

Today, we have explored downtown Accra with another volunteer that works at the office, Kirsty. We drove to the main gig in town, Oxford Street, a crowded and colorful marketplace and main drive in the city. Immediately, we were surrounded by friendly Ghanians who wanted to sell us everythng from belts to artwork. After escaping the bombardment of vendors, we ate at a local kitchen, where I had fresh fried fish and a sample of much of the local quisine.

The rest of our time in Ghana we are pretty busy. Tommorrow, we go to the slum to participate in the "Medical Outreach", which will be very interesting. Also on the agenda for the week are a day trip to the Cape Coast, as well as to a nearby national park, where we will get a lesson on African history, as well as the issues facing modern Africa.

I cannot express how excited I am to be out on this adventure! Hope all of you back home are enjoying yourselves and living everyday to the fullest. I'll try to post some pictures next time I have internet (should be about a week). Keep it real.