Welcome to Winneba

Here we are at Winneba! We're staying at a lovely hotel at the quiet south-end of the campus of the University of Education. Actually almost all of town is quiet, so that's not saying much. But compared to every other place we've stayed in Ghana, it's extremely quiet -- only the ridiculously loud frogs croak about at night, and there are some roosters too, but it's not loud enough to keep us awake.

I like Winneba a lot, probably because it's a smaller town than Cape Coast (the smallest town we've stayed in, so far). The traffic isn't bad at all, the weather is cooler and breezier, and food is much less expensive than anywhere else we've stayed. For some reason I've found it easier to talk to (some of the) people here, partially because the town seems less tourist-weary than Cape Coast, and partially because I'm getting more comfortable at it, myself.

So who would've guessed that the Pro Vice-Cancellor here is a phonetician?! A phonetician who got his Ph.D from UCLA?! I would have never discovered this, except by accident this morning. I'd gone to see a professor in the Ghanaian Languages department, but he wasn't in. I was just going to leave him a note, but his secretary offered to show me to his office just so I'd know where to meet him, later. We were walking to his office and passed by a door that said "Phonetics Lab." I was surprised, because Winneba doesn't have a department of linguistics, and because the phonologist I've been in contact with never mentioned a phonetics lab (although all your linguists may chuckle at that -- no real surprise there!). So I asked the secretary who was in charge of the lab, and she mentioned a man's name and asked if I'd like to meet him, so I said yes. A minute later we were climbing 4 flights of stairs to the top floor of the administration building, and a few more minutes later I was meeting Professor Jonas N. Akpanglo-Nartey, who studied under Peter Ladefoged a couple of decades ago and who jointly opened the Winneba lab with him in 1986 (I think). He seemed just as excited to meet me as I was to meet him, and promised to show me the lab and introduce me to the graduate students who use it, including three who just finished their theses! Our appointment is for Monday, and I'm really excited for it.