Neena

I received a local name today. Everyone at the office was very insistent that I have one. Which is really funny to me because I don't think I'd ever ask someone their name and then immediately say, oh that's great, I'm just going to start calling you Steven. Anyway... My local name is Neena. I can't for the life of me remember what it means. Everyone here keeps telling me how easy Dagbani is but I'm not so sure about that. First of all, they usually just have me repeat back phrases without translating them for me. So I'm just spitting back meaningless syllables without any context letting me know what the words might mean. I'm finding that most interaction here is just nodding and smiling and moving on without trying to make sense of things.

For those who want to know (I'm looking at you, Megan!) I think my address is: Baobab Financial Services PO Box 550 TL E/R, Tamale, Ghana. But I have no idea how to get mail at this PO Box or even where it is so don't send anything yet. I'm not even sure if it is my address. Let me ask around some more. Doing everything takes a good bit of effort here. It's not like I can just walk into a store and get whatever I want. Things are mostly available at a market so it's like searching through a giant junkyard sale. And it's not like there are set prices, most things are gotten through a great bit of haggling. So purchasing things is like my own personal nightmare. I tend to hate talking to anyone at a store back home; being greeted by an employee and asked if I'd like some help is usually enough to scare me off. So to be in a place where I HAVE to bargain and rummage and interact is stressful enough to keep me from doing it too often just yet.