My Trip to Tamale

Saturday Amy, Angela, Megan and I went to Tamale. Angela had just gotten her own vehicle a couple of days before and needed to go to Tamale for somethings, since she was taking her car she invited us to go with her. None of us had been out of town for the past month or more and a trip to Tamale sounded like lots of fun.

Tamale is the closest town with a ATM and at 2 ½ to 3 hours away it is a long trip, the drive is only a little over 100 miles but the roads are so bad that it takes much longer than it would in America, and at any time you could have a goat or cow lazily walking across the middle of the road. Most of the time when you are going to Tamale you leave with the hospital driver who goes down there to pick up the volunteers arriving at the airport and drop off the ones departing. The flight from Tamale to Accra leaves very early in the morning and to get there on time you have to leave the hospital at 4:00 in the morning which is NOT very fun.

We planned on leaving later so Amy could help round at the hospital before we left. We left promptly at 9:30 and were looking forward to a girly day of shopping and getting to eat out at a restaurant something you don't get to do much in Nalerigu mainly because there are not that many restaurants. We listened to some music and talked during the drive and enjoyed getting out and seeing more of the country. We arrived in Tamale around lunch time and decided to go eat first, we had a nice lunch, I got the Crispy Noodles which was good but spicy. We then went to the bank so we could all get some money before we went shopping. As we pulled in to park Amy jumped out and went over to the ATM, after we parked Angela, Megan and I joined her. Amy had just gotten her money with no problem and I went to get mine. I started to stick my card in and it kind of felt funny like the part that sucks the card in was really far back. I stuck my card in as far as it would go and I could still hold on to it and the machine did not suck it in, I did it a couple of times and the machine would never suck it in. Everyone was standing there and asked what the problem was, we all looked at the and someone finally stuck the card in and the ATM asked me for my pin, I did everything and it all seemed just fine. I was waiting for my money and it spit my card out. I tried to get my card but could not reach it, after about a minute it sucked my card back in and said The machine has kept your card. I had know Idea what that meant or why it had kept my card but Angela thought that since I had stuck it in a couple of times maybe that was why and so she stuck her card in to get her money. BIG mistake the machine kept her card also, we now had two cards stuck in the machine Not good. Did I mention that today was a Saturday and there was no one at the bank until Monday? Angela then remembered that apparently if you do not take your card it will suck it back in and keep it and you have to go to the bank and ask for it back. There was a hospital truck going to Tamale on Monday so we could ride down on Monday and get it then but the thought of our cards sitting in a Ghana ATM all weekend was a little disturbing. Amy and Megan did there shopping while Angela and I did some shopping for Hollie and Mona since we could not do ours because first of all we did not have that much money and second of all we were coming back in to Tamale on Monday. We finished everything and set out for Nalerigu.

We back and had a nice Sunday and got ready to leave a 4 am on Monday to get our cards back.
We left dark and early Monday morning to go back to Tamale, we arrived in Tamale at 6:30 and dropped of two of the volunteers who were flying back home. The bank did not open until 9:00 so we went to the Baptist guest house to wait. At 9 we went to the bank and after waiting for a while we got our cards back safe and sound. We got some cash and did our shopping and headed back to Nalerigu. While we were in Tamale we went by the post office and I had a package from my family which was really cool. Another adventure in Africa LOL only in Africa.