You know you're in Africa when...

... at least 5 of your friends have typhoid in the same week.

That's right... typhoid. Last week all of a sudden everybody became quite ill. At first a bunch of people thought it was malaria, but once two of them got tested and found out it was typhoid, everybody else got tested. Typhoid is passed through contaminated food and drink. I was afraid I had it too because I had some of the symptoms last week so I went and got my blood drawn. Thankfully, MY vaccination worked, unlike some people's. Although when my test results came back, it showed two positives and 6 negatives. It sucked because the guy who analyzed my blood sample told me I had to see the doctor to see what to do. Well I spent 47 cedi to talk to the doctor for 5 minutes where he told me that I don't have typhoid, those two positives are from the vaccination. Grrrrr. At least I don't have typhoid. Although I'm sort of bummed that I can't be a part of the Cool Kids Typhoid Club. Obviously Africa has messed with my mind. I'm still going to tell my African Music and Dance teacher that I have typhoid b/c I used that as an excuse to sleep through our extra practice Saturday afternoon. In my defense, I truly have not felt well recently, although it may just be a virus.

Friday night was a pretty chill night. I got my blood test results back, which at first were inconclusive until my 5-minute doctor's visit today. I'm still bitter. Anyway, after getting the results with a friend, we met up with another friend, bought some pirated movies and dinner ingredients and went back to his house. It was a lot of fun. Leah and I made dinner for Josh and his brothers. We made teriyaki chicken, mashed potatoes, and boiled veggies. Yummm. We also watched the Bourne Ultimatum. AWESOME movie.

Anyway, Saturday night was supposed to be a fun experience. I had tickets to the Wyclef Jean, Eve and Mario concert and was planning on seeing it with a bunch of friends. Well we got there around 11:30 p.m. and all of the gates to go inside were padlocked. Red flag! All of the people in there were locked in. None of the artists had even gone on stage yet and it was supposed to start at 5. T.I.A. The volunteer girls and I decided there was no way we were going to be locked inside a stadium. Absolutely not. Instead we and the other people we were with decided to go to Honeysuckle where I had some chips (French fries!) and went over to a friend's house to watch TV. SNL's Best of Christopher Walken is classic.

Sunday was a pretty lazy day. Just hung out and lazed about most of the day. Later in the evening I went to Champs for dinner and watched their Sunday night movie. I was exhausted though so I fell asleep 3/4 of the way through in one of the booths. The part I watched was good though! I made sure to be home pretty early that evening.

Monday so far: I woke up pretty early and ran some errands before my pointless doctor's appointment. At least my doctor was very nice and I went to a clean, respectable clinic. The perks of knowing people who have lived here for most of their life...

Anyway, hopefully I'll be pretty productive this week. I have a presentation coming up as well as some final papers. Eek! Hope everything is going well for everyone else. I'll be back in Texas in less than 3 weeks!!! What a bittersweet thought...

Love from Accra!

Tidbit of the day: 10% of the number of people ever born are alive today... according to BBC.