Training Day 3

The third day of training was mostly uneventful (except for losing power three times during the day) so I will primarily discuss observations that I have had.

I've noticed that, even after losing all of this weight, if you put food in front of me, I can manage to eat. Until I left the US, I had been really good about logging all of my food. It got more complicated when the food choices weren't readily available to watch their nutritional value. It also got more complicated as I was more reluctant to admit to myself what I had eaten.

For lunch today I chose to have red red. "Red Red" is a popular Ghanaian bean and meat stew served with fried ripe plantain. It earns its name from the palm oil that tints the bean stew and makes the bright orange color of the fried ripe plantain. My portion was about half of what you see in this picture, but I still managed to exceed my daily goal by far.

Red red. (Not my photo)

In addition to the included breakfast, two "tea" breaks (with sandwiches), was this lunch and on top of that I went out to dinner. During dinner I was found commenting on my ability to eat so much and was told that they have a diagnosis for this disorder. They call it the Workshop disease or Workshopitis. The main symptom of this disorder is a pot-belly. I'm glad we're nearly finished with this training.

So this is my opportunity to talk about my general observations. I notice that the Gariba Lodge has access cards instead of room keys. Unfortunately, they tape the room number right to the card so they lose the security advantage of the key card.

A little unclear on the key card concept

I saw a sign that I hadn't seen before restaurant called Wooden. The sign for men's and women's rooms showed the typical symbol except the couple are clearly in distress and in need of the room. It gave me a chuckle.

On our way to dinner I reminded Ernest of a great story that our driver told us when I was here last time. Ernest told me that I was remembering the story incorrectly. Here's the story.

One day a sheep, a goat and a dog took a taxi. The taxi driver insisted on being paid up front. The sheep paid his fare. The dog paid his fare but needed some change in return. The goat refused to pay and insisted that he would pay when they arrived at their destination. Just before they reached their destination, the goat jumped out and took off. The driver got angry and refused to give the dog his change. This explains how these animals behave when they see a car. A goat always runs away from the car so that he won't asked to be paid. The dog chases the car trying to get his change. The sheep doesn't move because he's all paid up and has reached his destination.

We went out to dinner at the Marian Hotel -- this is where I stayed the last time I was here. Ernest, Phillip, Eddie and Peter all came. Ernest's wife, Jeanette, arranged for Peter to take Ernest out to thank him for all of his hard work.

I decided to top off my day of diet havoc with a big bowl of groundnut soup with chicken in it and rice balls.I managed to eat nearly half so I probably only had about 800 calories.

Peanut soup with chicken and rice ball. (Also not my picture)

When I got back to my hotel, I found that the internet was not restored from the last power outage so I couldn't blog -- a welcome reprieve for one evening.