Smelliness

I'm not a terribly smelly person in Canada. Deodorant was always more of a habit than a necessity. Oh, there are exceptions of course, like those summer days working in the kitchen at The Lower Deck. But even then if there was a smell of sweat, it was hidden under the litres of grease and condiments I spilled on myself daily.

Apparently being transported from a lovely temperate spring to the tail end of the Ghanaian dry season has put an end to my BO immunity. I've been bathing twice a day, each usually followed three milliseconds of sweatless glory, but this is clearly not enough. By 6:30am, I am again afraid to sit next to people lest I enshroud them in the visible green cloud that must surround me.

Fortunately, as I said, I came in at the tail-end of the dry season and it seems I have made it through. After three weeks or so, I can officially say the rainy season has begun. While there are still often extremely hot days, they are interrupted by amazing rainfalls followed by days full of cool, moist breezes.

Today is one of those days, and I have to smile at the familiarity of the feeling. Very little time in my life has been spent so far from the ocean, and it's hard not to notice that the air is different. Bunkpurugu does not have a permanent water body, and even though the rivers are beginning to fill, they are not exactly the St. John. But you know that smell in the air right after it rains? Well, Ghana has it too.

The wind is blowing in through the window, almost thick as it brushes my arms and cool as I take it in. I've felt this feeling so many times before. It was there while I was sitting on a log outside my tent in Fundy National Park. It was there while I was posing for a picture with Jack Sparrow on the waterfront. It was there in my parents house in July, with all the windows open, getting ready to go down to the concert.

Now it's here in Ghana, while I'm sitting in the office, thinking that maybe I'm not so far away after all.