Mole National Park

Saturday, June 12th, 2010
Mole National Park- Mole Motel Room N8

Today is the start of our two day excursion to Mole National Park. With Camil as our driver for a roundtrip fee of $25 cedis, we headed out. Although the roads were at first nice and smooth worthy of sleeping, the volunteer corps soon learned that 4/5ths of the trip would be dirt roads that were… VERY bumpy all the way through. Sitting in the middle row of the 4x4 Toyota with my butt extremely sweaty and sore from the road workout, I couldn’t imagine how much suffering that the two girls in the trunk area had to undertake. Besides the road discomfort, the sights along the way were quite entertaining. Mini huts made of straw, people crowding over fire pits cooking the next meal, Camil honking furiously to get the donkeys/oxen herds out of the road, and the occasional “healing Jesus crusade” banners flown across some of the poles in the small towns we passed through. Although there seems to be a strong Christian presence throughout the small towns, I’m slightly puzzled by why there doesn’t seem to be a large push for evangelism in the Islamic-dominated city of Tamale.

We arrived at the Mole National Park Gates, where the officer asked us for our student cards so we could get a $5 dollar discount to enter the park (originally $10 for non-nationals). However, all of us cried out (on the inside) in disbelief when he said, “this card doesn’t have an expiration date, so I’ll have to deem in invalid.” When the rest of my teammates looked down at the ground in disbelief/ready to accept defeat, I had to stand up for it and argue (mostly because I knew if I paid $5 more, my budget for the trip would be completely thrown off). So, with a bunch of “sirs”, I made my argument, using things like “everything is electronic now”, “it’s not our fault that the university doesn’t print expiration dates”, “if you would like to confirm that we are current students at our Universities, please call our Universities in person. Do you want their numbers?” I think the best argument would probably have to be the last one, as he looked at me with his eyebrows down. In the end, we did get our discount. Arguing techniques can be attributed to my father. Thank you. =)

We arrived at the hotel around 4:15 PM just as it started to drizzle. Max number of people in a room was four, so we split two/two/three; two girls/two guys in one room, and the other two guys plus Camil in the other. The motel rooms were… ok I guess. First impressions though were very bad as the bedsheets for the double bed was blood-stained, and there was no running water at all. But when we experienced the enhanced coolness of the environment and the great national park view we had when exiting the room from the back door, the experienced evened out well. The last safari started at 3:30 PM, so we decided to go swimming in the pool. Very chlorinated, it still was extremely satisfying to take a dip for 45 minutes or so.

After a failed attempt at Marco-Polo, I practiced some butterfly techniques, but it was still quite hard since I had no goggles. Next was dinner and watching the USA vs England World Cup match. The Mole special MEGA portion fried rice wasn’t really mega at all, but with the addition of a large amount of spicy tomato sauce and good eating tempo, I was quite satisfied. I ended the meal with an Alvaro, a carbonated Pineapple drink that is very sweet and tasty. They really should have it in the US.
It was a tie. USA 1, England 1, and the USA goal looked quite cheap as the ball literally just slipped out of the goalie’s hands and rolled past the goal-line. But Camil for some reason insisted that it was a good goal. Anyway, mildly satisfied with the fútbol results, we went to bed.