School Daze

Well, the inevitable has happened -- I am officially home schooling Alexandra. I didn't see it coming.

About 9 months ago, my husband and I decided to move our kids out of the school they had been attending. Several contributing factors hastened the decision, not the least of which was the cost for the three of them to attend the school.

The school was and is a good school, but when the new tuition schedule came out right before Christmas break (as in, Merry Christmas, F*&% You!), we found that our per term cost for tuition alone had doubled from $350 per kid to $700 per kid. Here's the simple math: 3 kids at $700 is $2,100 per term; 3 terms in a year is $6,300; taxi or cost of driving per month on average is $240 for 9 months is $2,160. A Grand Total of $8,460. And that doesn't include lunch.

So, as soon as we made this decision, we began our search for a replacement school. One that had the high standards we expected, closer to our house, and with a reasonable tuition. We looked high and low, searched the neighborhoods, checked online, asked for referrals and recommendations. And, then believe it or not, we found it! Right in our neighborhood.

SOS School is less than 3 miles from where we are now, and will still be only about a 20 minute drive when the house in Dawhenya is finished.

Sly and I drove to the school to check it out. It took 7 minutes to get there. Oh, my! The campus is big! There's a football pitch (soccer field to you Americans), a track field and a basketball court, a good sized library and a computer lab with computers for every student, and there's even a canteen... the kids won't have to buy their lunch out of the back of an Opel Astra station wagon any more. Oh, glory.

We quickly bought the application forms from the school and completed them right then and there, then listened politely and quietly to the nice lady at the administration office who gave us the tuition costs (Eeeeekkk! It's only 1/3 of what we're spending!) . She warned us, though, that there was a waiting list. Oh. How bad could it be, we naively thought, as we drove home. But it worried Sly way more than me, so off we went back to the school to talk to someone. We saw the nice administration lady, Gifty, who told us we should speak to the Headmaster

We added our name to the list to see the Headmaster, and a tall Ghanaian man came out of the office, looked at the list, and spoke aloud to my husband. "Zigah," he said, "do you know me?" Well, Sly wasn't 100 percent sure, but said the only thing he could say, "You do look familiar." And well he should, because apparently they were school mates in Tema Secondary School. "Bingo. We're in," I thought. Uh huh.

Then in late July we got a phone call from the school, telling us to bring the three kids in for exams the next week. Told ya, we're in! Sly still looks dubious. I convince him (and myself) that the test is merely to determine which class the kids were going into, A (the smart kids class) or B (the not-as-smart kids class). The kids go in, pens at the ready, pencils sharpened, erasers unused, minds alert, what could go wrong?

Most schools in Ghana start on September 11th. By September 7th we hadn't heard anything. Worried. Okay, maybe a little bit. Sly calls up his friend. The headmaster tells him that the exam rankings are posted on the bulletin board outside the school. Sly rushes out to check. Sean ranked 4th among the kids he took the exam with; Mike ranked 7th, and Alex ranked 6th.

I was so totally wrong. That waiting list was the reason for the test. They were taking the top contenders ONLY -- 4th, 7th and 6th place just ain't gonna cut it. The headmaster tells Sly that parents have until September 21st to decide if they will take an open spot, so there's still a chance for the kids to get in. So, we wait and wait and wait. September 11th comes and goes, and to take our minds off it, we go fishing (yes, again... it's habit forming!).

On September 14th, we get a late afternoon call: Mike's invitation letter is ready. YIPPEE!!!! Monday morning, we get our money order in place, find passport pictures, buy exercise and notebooks, and two uniforms. Mike's now in the school data base, and will be good to go for the next day. Tuesday morning, off he goes to school. One down.

On the morning of September 19th, we get another phone call: Sean's invitation letter is ready. Double YIPPEE!!!!! We're off to the bank within minutes for the money order. Same procedures repeated... money order, passport pix, books, uniforms. Thursday morning, Sean is off to school. Two down.

Here it is, September 26th. There is still no invitation letter for Alexandra. The headmaster has "hinted" to Sly several times that Class 2 has no openings. We thought he was kidding. Not. Alexandra is home with me, and we've decided to keep her home until she eventually joins her brothers at SOS. We'd thought about putting her in another school, but hate to have her go through an upheaval like that, only for us to pull her out again (hopefully) soon.

So, in the meantime, we've pulled out all of Mike's old books from Class 2 last year. We've bought half a dozen new school books and workbooks from EPP, the local bookstore to keep her current. We're quizzing her on multiplication tables and plurals of irregular nouns, we're going to teach her French and science, and about the environment, and even RMA (Religious and Moral Education) which will probably lean less towards religion (since we're both homilophobic) and more toward morality. And then we're going to pray very hard that that invitation letter comes soon.

Gone Fishing - Parts I and II

Part I

When I was a little girl, growing up in the urban populace of Union City, NJ, our summer weekends, when not spent down the shore in Seaside, was still a watery fun filled destination: we went to the lake. In those days, a popular weekend recreational spot was Cook's Pond in Denville, NJ. So early on Saturday morning, with my poor dad running on only about 2 hours worth of sleep (he worked the lobster shift at Typographical Union #6 in Manhattan so he only got home at about 6:00 am), we packed up our monster Ford station wagon with our Coleman ice chest, bags full of groceries, Koolaid, a case of Schaefer beer in cans, sand chairs, portable radio, towels, sunscreen, bathing suits and last, but not least, a half dozen or so assorted length fishing poles and tackle boxes. Yep, we were going fishing. The lake was chock-a-block full of sunnies and we were gonna get 'em... all of 'em. the five of us kids were ready -- we even woke up early to make a whole loaf of Wonder Bread worth of bread balls for our hooks.

My Dad, at least when it came to fishing, had the patience of a saint... most of the time. Or at least for the first 3 hours or any combination of two dozen instances of tangled lines, lost bait or the removal of the dreaded sunnie (or even worse, the errant lake eel EEWWW!!!!) from the hook, whichever came first. After that, we were on our own.

I'd like to think that besides my height, the bump on my nose, my great love of books, and weirdly shaped toes, that Dad passed on something else. Maybe fishing is in my blood. So, given that legacy, on Sunday, off we went to Aylos Bay. As you may recall from previous blogs of mine, Aylos Bay is right along the Volta River, and because we planned on spending the night we had a little cabin attached to a floating barge in the river. Primo fishing, we figured.

The river was choppy and dark, but we could spot little fish swimming in the shallows along the shoreline, not many but enough to whet our appetite. Good ol' mom (me, of course), set up the hooks and lines, bobbers for some, sinkers for others, and the worms of course. Now, my kids are not all that squeamish, but they don't really like squeezing the worm into halves or quarter pieces and then see both pieces wriggling. But, alas, our worm supply was limited so there is little choice for them.

Bingo! Within minutes, Mike has snagged the first fish.



A cute little tilapia only about 2 inches long, but still a keeper... no catch and release for us, no sir, there's a frying pan with cooking oil awaiting us and this little dude has got his name on the list. Sly does his part of the job in the fishing gig, he takes the fish off the hook. Mike's re-baited, and away he goes. Bingo! Mike gets fish #2, only minutes later. Process repeated. Many, many, many times with a little variation to break up the monotony: "Mommy, can you give me a bobber? Mommy, can you take my bobber off? Mommy, I want more [less] weight on this. Mommy, my hook is snagged. Mommy the line is all tangled. Mommy, Mommy, Mommy...." By the end of the day, I had a new appreciation for my Dad.

Even a heavy rain storm didn't stop the fishing. I mean the fish are already wet, so what do they care about a little rain. But by the time darkness fell, Mike had caught 5 fish, Sean caught 2 and Sly caught 1. Apparently, the fish could smell the testosterone and completely ignored Alex and me. We'd been keeping them alive in a bucket, but now they were destined for the fridge.


Our cabin had electricity, fortunately, and (cold) running water, a fridge and floor fan, but no television. Knowing Ghana as I do, I quickly brought out the emergency board game and a deck of cards, so the kids were good for a few hours before exhaustion caught up with them.

By 5:30 am, we were "up an' at-em." Within minutes (again), Mike caught another fish. And then another. By the time we were ready to leave at 11:30 to head home, Mike had caught another 4, Sean another 1, and I finally caught one. All told, we had 16 nice little fish to take home and eat, and eat them we did.

End of Part I.

Part II

A mere two days later, we were off again to Aylos, this time with a friend from NYC and his 13 year old son. Kofi had his own gear, which he told me proudly cost him $50 from a yard sale in White Plains. Hmmm. "So, Kofi, I didn't know you liked fishing," says me. "Oh, this is my first time!," he responds. Okay, now I know what the deal is: I've got 2 more rods and reels and lines and hooks to take care of.

We're lucky enough to snag 2 cabins side-by-side, so we claim the fishing dock.


Try as I might, I cannot convince Sean or Evan that they should use drop lines. No, for them, it's got to be the spinning reels. My work is cut out for me. Alex and Mike want the simple drop lines, so I tie some line to the last eye on a little pole, bait their hooks and off they go. Mike drops the line and a fish jumps on. No kidding. I hadn't even started on the other poles, and there's a fish for the frying pan. It went like that both days. Mike dropped his line in the water and a fish came out. Almost always.


After I explained the basic concept of casting to Evan a couple of times, he promptly went and tangled his line. He never could get the hang of tightening and loosening the drag to release the line. But to give him his due, Evan did eventually catch a good sized fish, and the smile he broadcast, braces and all, was well worth my trouble.

Poor Sean. The fish avoided him like the plague. They weren't even going after his worms, but if Mike stuck his line in the water right next to him... BINGO. And wherever Mike had been when he caught a fish, whether it was this part of the pier or that part of the dock, Sean claim jumped the spot. but it didn't matter. Then, finally, after about 3 hours, Sean snagged his first fish of the day. And Sly promptly fumbled it and dropped him back into the water. If it weren't for bad luck, Sean had wouldn't have had any that day or the next.

And Kofi, well, he was absolutely certain that there was a H-U-G-E fish out there, with his name on it, right in the middle of the river. So, despite my subtle warning ("Kofi, you are never going to catch a fish with that plastic worm," he insisted on using the 6" purple glittery plastic worm ("but it looks real!"). I can sense you are rolling your eyes at this point. I did, too.

As for me, I took a couple of yards of line and attached a little hook to it and threaded on my worm. Then I hung them from the nails jutting out of the planks of the dock. Who knows. Night falls, we pack up and head up to the cabins for the dinner and bed.

When we awoke at 5:30, we found Kofi quietly waiting on the dock for us. Apparently, we had his cigarettes. The poor guy was having a nicotine craving to beat the band, and he'd been up for a full hour before we even opened our eyes. However, the fishing lines were dropped into the water almost before Kofi could take his first drag.

The day started much like it ended yesterday, with Mike catching one fish after another. By the time we were ready to leave, Mike's tally was at 7. And Mommy, well, Mommy did good. Remember the drop lines I left, well one of them had a whopper on it! I pulled that baby up nice and slow, so he wouldn't be the one to get away.



Maybe it was all just luck, but I'd like to think it was my guardian angel. Thanks Dad.