Last Sunday I arrived in the Netherlands again. I absolutely loved Ghana! There are a lot of differences between Ghana and the Netherlands. To inform you a little more about these differences I am going to post my last two updates. In this update I will tell you what a typical day in Ghana was like for me.

05:00-06:00 to 08:00-09:00 Most of the kids woke up somewhere around this time. This is because sunrise in Ghana starts around 5 am and the kids' dorms don't have curtains. After this they started their daily chores.

07:00-07:30 to 08:30-09:00 I usually woke up around this time. I started my morning by taking a bucket shower. This actually takes pretty long compared to taking a normal shower.

08:00-08:30 to 09:00 After having breakfast my day started around this time. I either helped the kids finish off their chores or I played with the kids who were already finished. The kids' daily chores varied from cooking, doing the laundry and sweeping the whole house and garden. They literally swept the whole garden including the gravel drive-way, I also helped doing this, but it felt absolutely useless. Although it might seem a little odd to sweep the whole garden, Ghanaian people are very proud people. One of their ways to show their pride is by making sure that their house/garden looks neat and clean.

9:00 to 11:00 I usually spent this time playing with the kids or helping them with some schoolwork.

11:00 to 12:00 By now most of the kids were vast asleep, they often took a nap as the don't sleep very long at night and the weather is very hot. I either relaxed a bit, played with the kids who were still awake or I did some groceries at the market in town.

12:00 to 18:00 The rest of the afternoon was spent playing with all the kids. Somewhere in between I had lunch, but this was sometimes at 11 am and sometimes at 2 pm.

18:00 to 20:00 I often used this time to chat with the other volunteers, have dinner and put on long sleeves against the mosquitoes.

20:00 to 22:00 Depending on the amount of energy the kids and I had left, I either played with the kids or read a little. I usually went to sleep around 11 pm after taking another long bucket shower. I often fell asleep immediately, dreaming about yet another lovely day.

Although all of this actually seems quite ordered and structured this was absolutely not the case. Ghanaian people live day by day and don't really care about structure. Although at times this is not incredibly handy, I did get used to it pretty quickly!