Aaaaaaand we're back

It has been a long, sad, sweaty, and ridiculous past two weeks. I sit here in the Peace Corps office in Accra wearing the same dirty clothes I've been cycling through since I left site two weeks ago. I'm tired, my feet are dirty and ripped open in places from my sandals, and I still have another three hours to go till I'm actually back at site. For now I'll just try to do a little recap of my latest travels because I'm not sure when I'll get a chance to update my blog again.
Close of Service (COS) conference was a huge mix of emotions. Happy to be together as a group, sad because its the last time we'll all be together in Ghana, happy to be leaving Ghana, sad to be leaving Ghana. A lot of laughs over our Fufu awards (PC tradition) and fun times spent poolside and oceanside. It was a pretty calm conference considering it was our last one. I think we are all just ready to move on. I did get my date and book my flight home. I will be officially arriving in the United States on November 26, so mark your calendars!
After COS I travelled to Togo and Benin with my friends Sam and Kathryn. I had planned a pretty rough schedule for us with towns to visit and things to see and for the most part we did get to see everything we wanted to. The differences between Ghana and the two countries was unbelievable. Besides the national language being French- the culture and the people were just so different. I'm really glad I got a chance to travel to Togo and Benin because it really made me appreciate Ghana for what it is and what it isn't. The food in Togo and Benin was incredible and there were a lot of cool places to go and things to see but the people were very difficult to deal with. While they were not as "in your face" as Ghanaians can be, they were constantly charging us more money (the white man price) and being completely unfair about it even when we haggled with them. Riding motos (with helmets) was pretty terrifying in the big city of Cotonou and the dirty roads of smaller towns like Ouidah. Overall it was surprising to see how truly developed Ghana is in comparison to these nearby countries.
I would like to write more but my mind is a little scatterbrained this morning. I realize now that I have two months to go and I have a number of reports to write, grants to close, and things to do before I can even think about packing up to leave. COS conference focused a lot on life after Peace Corps and it's really made me think about what I need to do- jobwise, lifewise...
I am really excited to actually be home for the holidays for the first time in two years. It will probably be strange... and definitely cold.
I promise to write more about my trip and post some pictures soon...