wanna-be big and burly

last wednesday i was driving with 2 associates to a school where we teach kids. the road...hmph... how do i explain this road???! the school is on top of a hill, a hill of rocks. people are literally carving out of rock to build homes there. getting to the top is best done with a 4x4 pick up truck. it is just the most brutal road, if you can even call it a road. so, anyways, i am driving and i see some young punks sort of filling a part of the road with dirt so that the pothole isn't quite the size of a volcano but more like a crater. when young guys do this they are doing it out of the very sweetness (i say it with sarcasm) of their hearts which in turn they hope to get a "dash", a little somethin' somethin' for helping us drivers. we made it past them without them troubling us but i knew they would be waiting for me to come back down the hill. now, we finished teaching and we left the school and got back on the road and...yep, there they were. Four young punk kids, who yes, put effort into filling a hole, but not enough effort, in my opinion, to warrant a "dash". but what these guys did was put 4 cement blocks in the road so you could not pass. you had to stop and give them something for them to move the blocks. well, i pulled up to the boys and opened my door and got out. i said, "ohhhh, i see you need me to help you? please, i would love to help you!" i'm not sure they heard my accent or what and they just stared at me. i proceeded to the cement blocks and picked one up and hurled it (thanks P90X!) out of the road and did it with a second one as well and the guys shouted, "ei!! obruni!!" (obruni is white person) then i got back into the truck waved at them nicely and we drove away. we were laughing and watching them in the rear view mirror. they were just standing, not moving, just staring at us. i am not sure they knew what to think. i know some ghanaians think we foreigners are very weak, and yes, sometimes compared to them we really are. but then other times...hmph, my farmer tough-girl attitude wants to come out and feel all big and burly and take on the world!