Here Today, Ghana Tomorrow

Well, as you can imagine, a full twenty-four hours of travel is bound to be full of boredom, chaos, stress, you name it. But, as it happened, it didn't end up being so bad, even if it wasn't quite literally a smooth trip. The first leg of the flight (from JFK to Heathrow) included an hour and a half so full of turbulence, it felt like we were dice being violently tossed in a giant's hand. The woman next to me was shrieking and sobbing in fear, clutching her baby with her life. After things calmed down, we finally made it to the airport where we got to enjoy 6 hours of waiting. Luckily there was a group of over 20 students from NYU on the flight from London to Ghana (many had been on the previous leg of the flight as well) so we kept each other as entertained as possible. The second flight seemed to go by even slower than the first but once we got there, nothing else seemed to matter.
As soon as I stepped off the plane and onto the tarmac, my eyes were swallowed by an incredible wave of lights. Draped over the terminal and a giant Akwaaba (Welcome) sign were thousands of beautifully flashing christmas lights, just my taste. The lights initially kept me distracted from the 80 degree  humid blanket wrapped that around me, startling my snow-accustomed self. After getting our passports stamped, we waited for our bags and a Ghanaian soccer player from the world cup team walked by! He was wearing an incredible shirt with Ghana printed on the back. Fans didn't gawk over him to his face (as some one joked--like Americans would over Justin Beiber), but politely shook his hand as he powerfully walked through the crowd. After about an hour of waiting, we finally all had our things (nothing lost!) and we headed for our dorms!
There are two separate living arrangements. About twenty of us got on a van to Church Crescent (where I live) and the rest went to their dorm (Solomon's Lodge). After a ten minute drive through what was pretty hard to see, but passing a military base, some homes, a school, stray dogs, some people and more christmas lights, we pulled into our gated community, which consists of four homes. We all got out of the van and waited in the lot in the center, that tied our houses together.
My friends Lauren and Kaleigh and I had requested to live together, so we weren't surprised to see we all lived in 4C together. A man who shares our building brought us inside the fourth building. We opened the door to an open living room with really high ceilings, couches, a TV, a huge table and chairs. In the next room, we have a huge kitchen and laundry room which, along with a bathroom, consist of our downstairs. Upstairs, there are two bedrooms. One is our bedroom, which has a perfect deck with windows and glass doors making up our wall. We also have our own large bathroom! In the other upstairs room are two boys, one of whom is also, coincidentally, in the school of social work! I think we'll all get along really well, but, as amazing as the house is, I'm sure very little of our time will be spent here.  
I'm realizing none of this is even about the actual country yet, which I guess makes sense since we got home at about midnight and I haven't really been outside yet. Tomorrow we start orientation so I guess the experience starts then, and I can hardly wait!