Cold calling is fun.

Cold calling is especially fun here, given that half of the phone numbers don't work.

If you can't already tell, I have started off with the fund raising process. My main problems have been technical: phone numbers of companies that are not working, power outages in the office, internet outages in the office, and email server shutdowns.

Of the nine companies that I was able to reach so far, only one gave me a brush off. From the rest I received contact information for their corporate philanthropy departments. I have not received any responses yet to the proposals, but it looks promising. Next week we hope to perform in-person followups.

Another issue that we face with the competition is a lack of awareness. To address this issue, myself and two coworkers went on a local radio show on Saturday morning. We were invited by a local environmental NGO, and they had us prepare a script. Instead of this being a normal interview, however, we were thrown to the lions. The host decided to not follow the script and proceeded to try to trip us up with random questions. I don't believe we fumbled any of the answers, but I'm not sure if our message was clear. The host also asked some hostile questions, such as "Why are foreigners running this? Shouldn't this be run by Ghanaians? Ugh.

This weekend we are going back to the Volta region. We have Monday off, so we can go on a longer trip. Our destination is the Mountain Paradise Lodge, where we can do a few different hikes, rent some bicycles, and maybe do another canopy walk.

As usual, internet issues have prevented me from uploading all of my pictures from the lake cruise and Boti Falls. Facebook users can view them here:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/album.php?aid=25082&id=1628075351
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/album.php?aid=25086&id=1628075351

I finally have the pictures from my dinner as well.