Arrival!

We arrived on Friday morning, at 8:30 (3:30 NYC time!), and got to the NYU residence about two hours later. It is, as I had been forewarned, rather extravagant. Security guards posted at the entry to the gated residence let the buses (available to us from 8am-9pm) in and out. It consists of four connected houses, each of which has an enormous common room, dining room, full kitchen, downstairs bedrooms and two more upstairs. My roommate and I share a huge room with more closet space than we have stuff for, a bathroom almost half the size of the bedroom, and a balcony! I’ve already (as I even anticipated) found myself struggling with the incongruities of the NYU privilege and separatism from the local culture. For example, our first meal was at an American restaurant called Frankie’s, air-conditioned and ultra-modern, a huge TV playing music videos, and filled mostly with European and Asian tourists. I am at the same time grateful to feel secure in our accommodations and the precision taken in orienting us to what is indeed quite a different culture than what we’re used to.
Although I’m thrilled to be here and eager to really launch into exploration of the neighborhood (we are in an area just east of Accra), city, and country, I also have to admit that I am somewhat frustrated with the agenda thus far. “Orientation weekend” sends me back to the painful planned socialization I could barely endure in high school, freshman year of college, and now in the last year of my undergrad experience it’s really too much. I’m not big on group activity, preferring independence at every point, and to couple this disinclination with our privileged American NYU status I feel rather uncomfortable. But nonetheless, it is just the first weekend, now technically the third day in Africa, I have absorbed a lot already and there is so much ahead. Once the rhythm of our weeks picks up I believe my discomfort will pass.