Takoradi, Ghana

We got back to Takoradi in time to each lunch on the ship, which was necessary because there were no restaurants anywhere. We decided to check out the Takoradi markets and it started raining again. We switched up the group a little bit and we all decided the rain was fine. There wasn’t much in the markets except for food and random junk. I was surprised by how un-touristy Ghana was. I have been collecting a magnet from each country because our walls are magnetic and I thought it would be a fun thing to collect. I looked all over and never found any magnets. It was even hard to find postcards and the ones we did find were really ugly and poor quality. Even though there wasn’t much, we just walked around for a while taking it all in. We all ate dinner on the ship again and I decided to just stay in for the rest of the night cause it got dark early. Some people went out to bars and stuff later but to me Ghana seemed like kind of a sketchy place to go party.
The next morning I went to an orphanage with a girl named Emma and about 20 other SAS people. Emma independently found this orphanage and organized the whole trip. She talked to the orphanage and asked if they needed anything and they said 75 children didn’t have shoes and they needed shoes to go to school. She made an announcement on the ship asking for shoes and people asked if they could donate money instead. She ended up raising $800. She bought 75 pairs of shoes, paid for every child’s school fees, bought supplies and donated the rest of the money to the orphanage. It was awesome! We were able to play with the kids for 3 or 4 hours. We started out by coloring with the kids and I brought some crayons so I handed them out. After a while, some kids started teaching some Semester at Sea people how to play the drums and before we knew it, there was a dance party going on. The kids started singing and dancing and it was amazing! Later on, they took us to their church and we saw a little bit of the village. It was very cool. We played with the kids for a little while longer before leaving. It was sad to leave but we had so much fun. That was definitely my favorite day in Ghana.