Zachley's Pandemic

This pandemic has been haunting Ghana since its birth 50 years ago. Zachley’s Pandemic is when your breath smells zachley like your ass! I don’t know why Ghanaians think chewing on wood is the same as brushing them with a tooth brush and tooth paste. Both of which I must mention are available everywhere in Ghana. The breath is bad, it could drop an elephant from a mile away.
Why we are on the medical topic, you might be interested to hear about my worm and my witch doctor. Better known as Ateiko…my landlord! He says he is a doctor, but nobody knows his qualifications, besides the fact he has been practicing medicine for 35 years. I came home from Takoradi with a hook worm in my foot, according to the Peace Corps. It was a red, puffy, itchy line across the top of my foot, starting at one of my infected lovely bug bites. I showed Ateiko and told my foot for conversation sake at the dinner table (you can do things like that in Ghana at the dinner table). I told him I was going to the chemical store (pharmacy) tomorrow to get medicine for the hook worm. He said it wasn’t a hook worm and I should be worried. He informed me it was a different type of worm, but he didn’t know the English name for it. He said the only way to get rid of it is to cut a small hole in my foot and grab the end of the worm. You wrap the end of the worm around a stick and twist the stick until the worm is all the way out. If you ask Betty, a woman I work with, I should mash the pill up till it is a powder, then cut my foot open and put the powder in the cut. I am going to sneak to the chemical store tomorrow and lay low till it goes away, or Ateiko and Betty forget.
Our village has meetings every Tuesday morning. It is 4 to 5 hours of arguing, screaming, clapping, and laughing. At this meeting I told the community that I would teach computer lessons on the early 90s model computer that has been donated, assuming that it works. I’m not exactly a computer wiz, but I will be teaching very basic skills like how to turn the computer on and how to type.
At the village meeting we also discussed the serious crime wave that is sweeping our small town. Coconut thieves! Please, don’t worry about my safety, I am happy to announce the vicious criminals have apprehended. They are being held until they pay their bail of $50 (big money in Ghana), reimburse the people whose coconuts they had stolen, and buy a bottle of gin for the community. What would we do without that bottle of gin? I know I could never forgive the thieves without it!
I went on a trip to New Town, it is the boarder town between Ghana and The Ivory Coast. We went on the beach, my Supervisor Cynthia and I, and it was a beautiful drive…for the most part. I learned that Ghanaians who don’t have latrines, which is the majority of the people who live in coastal villages. They make their bawl movements, #2s, poops, commonly called shit, but I like who the Ghanaians put it best, toilet. The Ghanaians make toilet on the beach. They dig small cat holes and toilet in them, some but not all fill their holes. I did learn on our little trip that Ghanaians get diarrhea to, at least 50%, it’s not just the PCV. And, it’s all orangeish yellow, my guess is from all the plantains they eat. It was not the prettiest drive ever. I’m just happy that mine is one of the more clean beaches!
Today was the first day of the African Cup of Nations! Ghana beat Guinee! It was pure chaos and excitement in my village. It’s the happiest I’ve ever seen them.
Well, my time is up! Till next time…