For those of you that read Amanda’s blog as well, you will know that she was in a car accident three weeks ago…for those of you that don’t, now you know! She was in a taxi that got t-boned by another taxi that was trying to avoid a dog on the road. She was a bit banged up and bruised, but seems to be all healed up now with the exception of a bit of a sore knee that bothers her once and a while. It was probably one of the scariest times in my life. I actually called her as it happened and could hear shouting and ciaos and when she didn’t actually say ‘hello’ I thought I must have dialed the wrong number, so I hung up and called again. This time when she answered she was crying and said that there’d been an accident and she was bleeding! She was only a block away from the dorm, so I grabbed our friend Vincent and we ran down the street to her. I’ll never forget running up to the crowd of people that were around her and making eye contact with her as blood ran down her face, arms, and chest. Yikes! It turned out that most of the blood was from small cuts caused by the flying broken glass, and she wasn’t badly hurt. We all went to the hospital and got her checked out before taking her home. Thankfully one of the faculty from Malaspina was a nurse, and she was able to talk to the doctors and then assisted with the cleaning of cuts over the next few days. I would have done it, but was happy to have someone else take responsibility for all that!

The project time was a real success. Each theme team was able to provide some great knowledge transfer events, and even better they were able to make some great personal connections and provide info and resources to assist in each topic area in having some movement that will continue now that we are gone from Sunyani.
Yes, we are gone from Sunyani. The whole team left there on Friday. It was so sad to say good bye to all the great people we had met and the friends we had made. I think my favourite part of Ghana was also my biggest surprise, and that was the people here. Not that I thought they would be mean or unwelcoming, but I hadn’t really thought too much about it as my experience is that you can’t really know a culture until you are there, and so I didn’t give it too much thought. But to my pleasant surprise I was continually amazed at the kindness, hospitality, and generosity of the people here. We were welcomed into families, made friendships that were far closer and honest than many I’ve had in Canada, and taken care of in so many ways. I know many people that have been to Africa and say that you will leave a piece of your heart there…if the people of Ghana are an example of people in Africa, then I can see why. I will be leaving a piece of my heart here with all of the people that have touched it in the last 4 months.

There are more posts to come in the next few weeks; many more experiences and times to share about. For now, know that I am happy and relaxing on a beach! ...and missing you all, of course!! ;)