Dearest friends,
The following entry tells the story of my experience with the Deer Hunting Festival, Aboakyer, this past weekend. The deer hunting festival is one of Ghana’s most famous and brings people from all over Ghana as well as all over the world.
This morning I was thankful that the taxi was waiting at America House for me, making my favorite sound “Legon 1, Legon 1” meaning that as soon as I sat down the shared taxi would set off to campus. I stared out the window of the car imagining what this festival was going to be like, perhaps we’d get to help hunt the deer or maybe I’d get to witness native dances and songs. Considering that I had been waiting since the beginning of the semester for a festival, I couldn’t wait to get to Winneba.
I met up with Dana on campus and we headed down to Kaneshi Station to catch a tro-tro to Winneba. We arrived at the last stop to see a line of tro-tros along the road as well as a large dirt patch off the road filled with at least a hundred tro-tros going to different places. “OK, now the fun part of finding the Winneba tro begins,” I told myself. Dana and I walked along the road asking, “Winneba, Eye Hen” (Winneba, it is where?). Every person just pointed us to walk farther along the road, urging us to go to front. Eventually we reached the tro-tro in the front, which would drop us at Winneba junction, but it was empty. Anticipating that we might get a more full tro-tro inside the station, we ventured into the station itself. Walking among piles of refuse and over overflowing gutters, we got to the dirt patch that characterized tro-tro stations. Again we asked “Winneba, Eye Hen” and we were directed to a man under a tent that told us that the Winneba car was not yet here. So we walked back to the roadside and sat down in the now filling tro-tro headed to Winneba junction.
After about an hour, the mate shouts out Winneba junction and Dana and I alight. By the roadside are several shared taxis that will take us to Winneba for 40 pesuasas, says the Bradt guide. Spotting a taxi, we sat down and headed towards Winneba. Driving into the city we saw banner after banner with Aboakyer Festival in large letters, some with a deer and men hunting in the background. Loud music was blasting from every corner, and all the restaurants and hotels were festivally dressed with banners and streamers. Unfortunately, neither Dana nor I had brought the Bradt guide with us so I had written down some names of hotels and numbers. We asked the taxi to drop us near Sir Charles a very large hotel that we hoped would have space. We alighted at a junction and walked towards Sir Charles. A pleasant run-down hotel right on the beach, but unfortunately no one was at the reception to greet us or tell us if there was a room. There’s tons of other places, we told ourselves. Walking down to the Lagoon Lodge, a nice hotel the Bradt guide described as essentially “Budget, but beautiful”, we came across this very fancy hotel by the side of the lagoon that costed 30 cedis per night, well out of our range. Walking back towards Sir Charles, we wanted to check again at the reception. This time we met someone who told us, sorry it’s full. Walking along the roadside we began to get concerned as every hostel we stopped at was booked for the night. Frustrated and hot, we stopped at Halo Halo Drinking Spot to get some water and ran into a wonderful lady. She didn’t know a place for us to go but she hailed down a friend of hers that was a taxi driver and asked him to take us to a hotel of a friend of hers for one cedi. We stopped at that hotel, but it was also full. What then occurred was driving to every hotel, hostel, and motel in the area only to find they were full. We even pulled into one hotel that was half-completed. The whole front of the hotel was still under construction but there were a few rooms in the back that were finished, even this hotel was booked. Out of frustration we called back Lagoon Lodge, but even this was full. Crap!
Seeing our frustration the taxi driver noted that he knew the owner of Royal Beach and that it would probably be fine for us to sleep there. At that point sleeping on the beach sounded like a great option to ending this stupid hopeless chase. We arrived at Royal Beach and paid our three cedis at the gate to gain entrance. We were greeted by a dancing party of at least 20 men next to the bar. One interesting thing about this country is that a group of 20 dancing men is not strange to see, even if they seem to be almost grinding, it’s nothing sexual. Regardless, we grabbed ourselves a beer a sat on the beach, “At least we have somewhere to sleep”. We drank our beer and ventured into the ocean. This beach was aweful! Filled with trash and rocky on the bottom. We ventured cautiously over sharp rocks and occasionally were hit by either a diaper or a floating bra. Dana spotted a strange bungalow in the distance and we set out to go check it out. We crossed a lagoon and walked along the beach to this structure. We found a half completed structure with no walls and only the bottoms of the toilets. The left side was missing half the floor, but at least there was a roof. We looked at each other and decided, “It’s better than the beach itself”. This abandoned bungalow would be our home for the night.
Wanting to get setup before dark, we trekked back to where we had left our bags with two nice old men. Thankfully the bags were still there, so we grabbed them and they asked us, “Have you found a place to sleep?” And we responded, yes we have. Not wanting them to know where we were actually sleeping, we headed walked behind them towards the structure. In order to reach the bungalow we’d have to cross the lagoon with our bags. Putting them on top of our heads, we ventured into the chest deep lagoon, much to the amusement and confusion of the Ghanaian family on the shore. We trekked back across the beach and set up camp in our home for the night. We took our valuables out and buried them underground in plastic bags in the fear that armed robbers might come by at night. As it got dark, we set up pillows our of towels for ourselves and talked until we fell asleep. Barely an hour later, it started raining and only half of the bungalow had a roof that could sustain the rain. Dana woke up in a wet blanket, so we moved to the otherside of the bungalow and slept uncomfortably on the wooden floor.
The alarm went off, “Thank God”, I told myself. I had been rolling all night trying to stay comfortable on the hard wood floors. It was 5am and it was time to head to the actual festival which was starting at 6am. We awoke by moon light and crossed the cold lagoon with our bags. Changing by the bushes, we were ready to tackle the day, but really had no idea what was to come.
We walked out of the beach and followed the large group of people headed toward the center of town. Passing by goats along the way and a large pile of trash with both people and a cadre of pigs looking for valuables. Arriving in town, the streets were lined with people as if waiting for a parade. Suddenly, a group of 10 men marched by chanting, banging drums, and waving planks of wood and sticks. Another group marched by with their entire bodies painted in red. Another group of blue and white men and women walked by as the women in front held wooden swords and the men behind yellow planks and wooden deer antlers. This was the parade of people heading to the bush. Asking where to go, a small girl joined up with us to show us around. It seemed that most of the people were heading one direction so we decided to follow. Through the crowds lining the streets we walked through the town with the parading hunters. We asked our friend where they were going and she said to the Bush, so we decided we wanted to go to. We walked among a large group of individuals wearing red towards the mountains. This was the red team. For the Deer Hunting Festival there is a red group and a white group and every individual in the down is in one of the two groups based on family descent. We were following the hunters and members of the red group in pursuit of a Mountain way in the distance. Both the red group and white group send hunters into different parts of the bush to catch a live antelope. The first group to return with two live antelopes to the chief is pronounced the winner.
Most of the group stopped beside a large lake, that only a few were crossing. “Only men can go into the Bush, “ our friend told us. Wanting to get pictures and see the actual hunting, Dana and I agreed that I should still go. I gave her my backpack and all my valuables and ventured through the lake. At times it became deep and the mud below made you sink an additional two feet. Nearly falling several times, I leaned on the man next to me for support. Reaching the other side I realized that I had also left my sandals with Dana. Nonetheless, I walked with a group of men wearing red that were heading to the Bush. Walking over sea shells and mud without shoes was not comfortable, but I was excited as we inched closer and closer to the Bush. Suddenly, within a hundred yards of the bush I heard the loud beating of drums and whistling as a parade of over 400 people emerged from the woods. In the front was a man with a live antelope held in both of his hands. I stood to take pictures and was pulled into the excited mob. Marching and shouting with the other hunters, I was frequently smiled at and encouraged. “You are a real man,” some said, “Not many Obrunis come all the way to the bush” said others. Some took a more physical encouragement and took the red paint from their sweaty faces and wiped it on mine. By the time we came to the large lake again I was covered in red paint and sweating like crazy! Those on the other shore line saw we were arriving with the antelope and excited ran to the bank to meet us, realizing that we must hurry to meet the chief before the white group we ran the entire way through the lake and all the way back to the town. I broke off from the group trying to find Dana in this mob of over 2,500 people chanting and running. She wasn’t where I had left here and she unfortunately had my phone.
A friend I had made in the mob and I went around asking where the Obruni with red hair was. Most said she had left with the crowd. We ran from the very back of the line through marchers who laughed as they saw I was covered in paint from the Bush. As I stood on top of a large hill, I spotted her and sprinted towards her. The rest of the march back to the village we made together.
As we returned to the town of Winneba we paraded through the streets with the proudly held antelope in the front. It was an incredible feeling. Being pushed forward by this huge mob of excited dancing people that were chanting in Fante. I caught on with a couple of the chants and yelled as well. We marched through town as a mob for at least 30 minutes before we reached the Queen Mother’s house and then the chiefs house. As we marched toward the chief’s house, the chants became less powerful so I started loudly shouting the last chant “Yanim Soldja”. Hearing that an Obruni was chanting, people began responding “Kwasi Bruni” and the chant continued. As I continued the same chant I got closer and closer to the front until I was shouting the the entire procession and those in the front who could hear were responding.
All the kids in the crowd found this amusing, and ran up to the front to shout “Kwasi Bruni” when I shouted “Yanim Soldja”. As I continued chanting the group of kids grew to about 50 and we marched through the streets ahead of the group chanting on our own. The people along the streets seeing an Obruni leading kids and chanting were laughing and cheering me on. As we continued in the direction of the chief’s house and the ceremony for the Antelope/Deer, I was stopped by a TV station and a microphone was stuck in my face. “How are you enjoying the festival…What do you think of Ghana…How long have you been here…” I did my best to respond as I was sweating and was loosing my voice from shouting all morning.
After about half an hour of shouting at the top of my lungs leading these kids I was tired. My voice was gone, I had been running barefoot through the town for about 2 hours over rocky streets, and I was drenched with sweat. I waited for my wife (Dana)-she was my wife for the day just for simplicity and so I wouldn’t get so many marriage proposals and neither would she. When Dana arrived we sat, ate, and just relaxed to recover from what was an extremely crazy morning.
Best,
Ben
Monday, May 4, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
A day in the life
Hey everyone,
I spent the last entries giving you a sense of the crazy stories and interesting things I've been up to, but this time I want to give you an idea of what it's like to live here day to day in Accra, Ghana. This entry is a combination of different stories, so this didn't all happen in one day, but it'll help you see what life is like.
I wake up, it's exactly 5:58am, somehow I've managed to wake up right before my alarm now as I wake up at 6am everyday. Every night I'm asleep by 10pm because that's when everyone else in the house goes to sleep. The luke-warm water of the bucket shower is a welcomed wake-up as I use my imported bar of soap to lather up. When finished, I head over to the table and slice myself two pieces of bread and prepare some miloh (Ghanaian hot chocolate). Now it's off to America House, about a 10 minute walk-I pass by my friend Abigail at the corner and greet her with "Ehti Sen" (how is it?). Upon arriving at America House, I realize the taxi to Legon isn't here yet, so I sit and wait. Getting to class is always variable because I take a shared taxi and it doesn't normally arrive until about 7:15 when I have a 7:30 class and it can take anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes to fill up with other passengers. I can never be sure of when I'll get to campus regardless of how early I leave. Thankfully, this morning it's here in time to get me to campus in time. I drop off by the front gate and wait for the train of goats to finish crossing my path. Up ahead I spot the newscorner, a spot of sidewalk where a man has set out the newspapers. Like more pedestrians, I hover over the papers reading the front page until the man comes over and says, "Are you going to buy that", then it's time to shake my head and leave.
I arrive in my POLI 306: Africa and the Global System class and sit next to my friend Rachel. Right on time, the lecture begins with todays topic being The Affect of Globalization on Africa. He begins, "Despite the affects...the affects of colonialism...Despite the affects of colonialism on Africa...", unfortunately, he is reading pages 24-26 of our reading word for word as the entire class copies it down. Somehow, my classmates don't make copies of the reading and so have no idea that he's reading word for word or that the past 4 weeks have been just chapter one of this book word for word. Nonetheless, the class perks up with questions every once in a while which are mainly, "Can you say that again", "How do you spell that word". Overall, it wasn't interesting as I just followed along in the book underlining the paragraphs he read verbatim. Many classes in the University proceed in this fashion of people copying down the lectures words without critical analysis or questions.
Nonetheless, it's only 9:30 and I have the whole day ahead of me. My mission for the afternoon is to find for myself a pair of decent quality sandals to use as I prepare to travel for 6 weeks by myself through West Africa (more about this later). I decide to head down to Makola Market in downtown Accra. Walking out of the university, I stand at the tro-tro station by campus waiting for a car to say "Accra, Accra, Tema Station". After nearly thirty minutes one arrives overpowering the calls of "Circ Circ Kaneshi Station". I push and chove my way onto the tro-tro competing with other people standing at the roadside for the rare tro-tro. On the way on board, I loose my flip-flop and have to push my way back to pick it up, and thankfully am still able to get on the tro-tro. Soon after getting on the tro-tro the mate turns around and collects 45 pesuas (approx 30 cents) from everyone on board. I'm stuck between two large ladies and the one on my left keeps asking me to move over so people can get behind her, but because of the size of the lady on my right I can't move anywhere. It's starting to get hot, so sitting in the middle away from the windows, I sweat up a storm that I continuously dry off with my shirt.
The tro-tro stops at Tema station and I alight. I walk through crowds of people and small stalls by the road selling everything from bags to Okra to snails. Finally I arrive at the market, which is essentially an endless maze of alleys with stands lining both sides selling food, imported goods, bags, Chinese shoes, Fufu pounding sticks, pots and dishes. I walk through the maze realizing that there's a slight pattern to each section and some areas have more shoes than others. I start walking down an alley with alot of sandals and stop at at least 4 tables to view the sandals. They're mostly poor quality, mainly held together by glue and nothing like the quality of Teva. I actually see two shoes labeled with Timberland and Teva, but they are obvious knock-offs illegally named. I'm left with a choice between Tita, Sport, or the aptly named "Made in China" sandal with no brand name. At the fifth stall I decide that I can't find a shoe that will last me 6 weeks so I buy a cheap Sport brand for about 5 cedi ($3.50). I am amazed to see how much of the Ghana population works in this informal sector. Given the few businesses I see, it's almost as if 70% of people in Accra are in the informal business of selling something.
On the way back to Tema Station I weave my way through the crowds to the hackles of Whiteman and Obruni. Some are a little more desperate and try everything, one man calls out "Hey Whiteman...Obruni...Second Jesus". Eventually I turn around laughing at the fact that he called me second Jesus, most likely because of my longer hair and the facial hair I've been growing. I eventually return to Tema Station and stop at a large cart of bootlegged movies. Ghana has a very active sales scene of Hollywood movies that are bootlegged. In fact my host brothers' favorite movies are Matrix and Batman, we just watched Batman this weekend for the second time in a month. Regardless, I am particularly admiring of the sets of Will Smith, Bruce Willis and Denzel Washington. For the cost of 6 cedis ($4), I got about 30 movies ranging from Will Smith's MIB, Enemy of the State, Independence Day to Willis's Die Hard series, Sixth Sense, and Lucky Number Slevin to Washington's Deja Vu, Training Day and Remember the Titans.
Attempting to find the America House car in the jungle of tro-tros I ask mates who directly with their fingers mainly telling me which way to walk. Directions in Ghana are mainly hand pointing, there's no street names, no turn left here and right here, just "go that way". When you do give directions it's more like "Take a right at the Adenta billboard, a left at the big red crate, and look for the house with the red gate". Finally, I find the America House car and take a sit. I'm surrounded by Ghana's business people that have stocked up at Makola for their own sales. Under my legs I have a set of unidentified boxes belonging to the person behind me and under the seat in front of me is an Army's ration of brown tubes called Bayere (yams). My feet are mainly immobile as I can't spread forward due to the yams or backward due to the boxes. As the car is filling, business people stop by the car selling Yogurt, Pure Water, flashlights, steering wheel covers, miracle drugs, and bible verse books. I've already bought my items for the day, so I don't need anything, but I do buy a pure water for about 3 cents. Everyone in the capital drinks water from small sachets that have 500ml that are 5 pesuas (about 3 cents). Finally the car fills up and we are ready to leave. As if wanting to break the wonderful silence, a baby in the back starts crying. Attempting to block out the annoying sound of the baby behind me, I stare out the window. I take note of the "Ghanaian bumper stickers"-essentially every tro-tro and taxi has put a phrase on the back window with some yellow stickers. Some of the more interesting have been "Clap nice for Jesus", "Cry your own cry", "Oh friend, why?". It's interesting to observe how open religion is in this country. Most tro-tros say something from the bible or praise Jesus, whenever I get on a bus going long distance a preacher stands up and blesses the bus before we go, for meetings at my internship we'd pray before beginning. Christianity is a definite part of life and involves itself in so many different ways.
Thankfully, this tro-tro doesn't have any problems getting home. In a different story, my tro-tro yesterday had broken down in traffic so the mate paid everyone back the money and we had to find a new ride. Of course we were on a corner with literally 100 other people waiting so it took nearly an hour to get a new ride and even then I had to push and chove to get on it. I get down at America House with most of the car an walk home. It's right around 6:00 so it's time for dinner. I knock on the front gate and my host sister Ama opens the door. I greet her in Twi "Maadwo, ehti sen?" and site down outside the house. Seeing Jen, I let her know that I'm here and ready to eat so she warms up my dinner. Tonight it's Banku and Okra Stew. The banku is a large ball of fermented Kassava and corn dough that is your silverware for the stew. I dip my hand into the banku, take a small piece with my hand, dip it into the stew and eat it below the stew slips out of my hands. It's a struggle at first, but eventually you master the technique.
After a tiring day, it's time to sit down for the big family activity: watching our favorite TV station VIASAT 1: Your Number One Entertainer. As is the case for every Monday through Friday the nightly lineup is Hanging with Mr. Cooper, Cosby Show, Friends, and then CSI. In between the shows, this station offers very few commercials and tend to spend more time advertising its own shows and movies. As a result, we know what movie is on at any day of the week because we've seen the commercial at least 5 times. Nonetheless, we get sick of the commercials advertising Oprah which is on at 5pm and the movies as a whole which is easily a 2 minute segment. By the beginning of CSI at 9pm, the family gradually peters out. Some members start heading to bed during the show and other hold out to the end. Typically it's me and my host mother and maybe my host sisters that last until the end of the show. Jen and Ama lock up the house around 10 and we all head to bed.
So in between the crazy stories that I've shared with you the past couple months, there are those little things that are interesting that happen everyday. I hope that this entry has helped you understand some interesting things about Ghana and what's it's like to live here.
All the best,
Ben
I spent the last entries giving you a sense of the crazy stories and interesting things I've been up to, but this time I want to give you an idea of what it's like to live here day to day in Accra, Ghana. This entry is a combination of different stories, so this didn't all happen in one day, but it'll help you see what life is like.
I wake up, it's exactly 5:58am, somehow I've managed to wake up right before my alarm now as I wake up at 6am everyday. Every night I'm asleep by 10pm because that's when everyone else in the house goes to sleep. The luke-warm water of the bucket shower is a welcomed wake-up as I use my imported bar of soap to lather up. When finished, I head over to the table and slice myself two pieces of bread and prepare some miloh (Ghanaian hot chocolate). Now it's off to America House, about a 10 minute walk-I pass by my friend Abigail at the corner and greet her with "Ehti Sen" (how is it?). Upon arriving at America House, I realize the taxi to Legon isn't here yet, so I sit and wait. Getting to class is always variable because I take a shared taxi and it doesn't normally arrive until about 7:15 when I have a 7:30 class and it can take anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes to fill up with other passengers. I can never be sure of when I'll get to campus regardless of how early I leave. Thankfully, this morning it's here in time to get me to campus in time. I drop off by the front gate and wait for the train of goats to finish crossing my path. Up ahead I spot the newscorner, a spot of sidewalk where a man has set out the newspapers. Like more pedestrians, I hover over the papers reading the front page until the man comes over and says, "Are you going to buy that", then it's time to shake my head and leave.
I arrive in my POLI 306: Africa and the Global System class and sit next to my friend Rachel. Right on time, the lecture begins with todays topic being The Affect of Globalization on Africa. He begins, "Despite the affects...the affects of colonialism...Despite the affects of colonialism on Africa...", unfortunately, he is reading pages 24-26 of our reading word for word as the entire class copies it down. Somehow, my classmates don't make copies of the reading and so have no idea that he's reading word for word or that the past 4 weeks have been just chapter one of this book word for word. Nonetheless, the class perks up with questions every once in a while which are mainly, "Can you say that again", "How do you spell that word". Overall, it wasn't interesting as I just followed along in the book underlining the paragraphs he read verbatim. Many classes in the University proceed in this fashion of people copying down the lectures words without critical analysis or questions.
Nonetheless, it's only 9:30 and I have the whole day ahead of me. My mission for the afternoon is to find for myself a pair of decent quality sandals to use as I prepare to travel for 6 weeks by myself through West Africa (more about this later). I decide to head down to Makola Market in downtown Accra. Walking out of the university, I stand at the tro-tro station by campus waiting for a car to say "Accra, Accra, Tema Station". After nearly thirty minutes one arrives overpowering the calls of "Circ Circ Kaneshi Station". I push and chove my way onto the tro-tro competing with other people standing at the roadside for the rare tro-tro. On the way on board, I loose my flip-flop and have to push my way back to pick it up, and thankfully am still able to get on the tro-tro. Soon after getting on the tro-tro the mate turns around and collects 45 pesuas (approx 30 cents) from everyone on board. I'm stuck between two large ladies and the one on my left keeps asking me to move over so people can get behind her, but because of the size of the lady on my right I can't move anywhere. It's starting to get hot, so sitting in the middle away from the windows, I sweat up a storm that I continuously dry off with my shirt.
The tro-tro stops at Tema station and I alight. I walk through crowds of people and small stalls by the road selling everything from bags to Okra to snails. Finally I arrive at the market, which is essentially an endless maze of alleys with stands lining both sides selling food, imported goods, bags, Chinese shoes, Fufu pounding sticks, pots and dishes. I walk through the maze realizing that there's a slight pattern to each section and some areas have more shoes than others. I start walking down an alley with alot of sandals and stop at at least 4 tables to view the sandals. They're mostly poor quality, mainly held together by glue and nothing like the quality of Teva. I actually see two shoes labeled with Timberland and Teva, but they are obvious knock-offs illegally named. I'm left with a choice between Tita, Sport, or the aptly named "Made in China" sandal with no brand name. At the fifth stall I decide that I can't find a shoe that will last me 6 weeks so I buy a cheap Sport brand for about 5 cedi ($3.50). I am amazed to see how much of the Ghana population works in this informal sector. Given the few businesses I see, it's almost as if 70% of people in Accra are in the informal business of selling something.
On the way back to Tema Station I weave my way through the crowds to the hackles of Whiteman and Obruni. Some are a little more desperate and try everything, one man calls out "Hey Whiteman...Obruni...Second Jesus". Eventually I turn around laughing at the fact that he called me second Jesus, most likely because of my longer hair and the facial hair I've been growing. I eventually return to Tema Station and stop at a large cart of bootlegged movies. Ghana has a very active sales scene of Hollywood movies that are bootlegged. In fact my host brothers' favorite movies are Matrix and Batman, we just watched Batman this weekend for the second time in a month. Regardless, I am particularly admiring of the sets of Will Smith, Bruce Willis and Denzel Washington. For the cost of 6 cedis ($4), I got about 30 movies ranging from Will Smith's MIB, Enemy of the State, Independence Day to Willis's Die Hard series, Sixth Sense, and Lucky Number Slevin to Washington's Deja Vu, Training Day and Remember the Titans.
Attempting to find the America House car in the jungle of tro-tros I ask mates who directly with their fingers mainly telling me which way to walk. Directions in Ghana are mainly hand pointing, there's no street names, no turn left here and right here, just "go that way". When you do give directions it's more like "Take a right at the Adenta billboard, a left at the big red crate, and look for the house with the red gate". Finally, I find the America House car and take a sit. I'm surrounded by Ghana's business people that have stocked up at Makola for their own sales. Under my legs I have a set of unidentified boxes belonging to the person behind me and under the seat in front of me is an Army's ration of brown tubes called Bayere (yams). My feet are mainly immobile as I can't spread forward due to the yams or backward due to the boxes. As the car is filling, business people stop by the car selling Yogurt, Pure Water, flashlights, steering wheel covers, miracle drugs, and bible verse books. I've already bought my items for the day, so I don't need anything, but I do buy a pure water for about 3 cents. Everyone in the capital drinks water from small sachets that have 500ml that are 5 pesuas (about 3 cents). Finally the car fills up and we are ready to leave. As if wanting to break the wonderful silence, a baby in the back starts crying. Attempting to block out the annoying sound of the baby behind me, I stare out the window. I take note of the "Ghanaian bumper stickers"-essentially every tro-tro and taxi has put a phrase on the back window with some yellow stickers. Some of the more interesting have been "Clap nice for Jesus", "Cry your own cry", "Oh friend, why?". It's interesting to observe how open religion is in this country. Most tro-tros say something from the bible or praise Jesus, whenever I get on a bus going long distance a preacher stands up and blesses the bus before we go, for meetings at my internship we'd pray before beginning. Christianity is a definite part of life and involves itself in so many different ways.
Thankfully, this tro-tro doesn't have any problems getting home. In a different story, my tro-tro yesterday had broken down in traffic so the mate paid everyone back the money and we had to find a new ride. Of course we were on a corner with literally 100 other people waiting so it took nearly an hour to get a new ride and even then I had to push and chove to get on it. I get down at America House with most of the car an walk home. It's right around 6:00 so it's time for dinner. I knock on the front gate and my host sister Ama opens the door. I greet her in Twi "Maadwo, ehti sen?" and site down outside the house. Seeing Jen, I let her know that I'm here and ready to eat so she warms up my dinner. Tonight it's Banku and Okra Stew. The banku is a large ball of fermented Kassava and corn dough that is your silverware for the stew. I dip my hand into the banku, take a small piece with my hand, dip it into the stew and eat it below the stew slips out of my hands. It's a struggle at first, but eventually you master the technique.
After a tiring day, it's time to sit down for the big family activity: watching our favorite TV station VIASAT 1: Your Number One Entertainer. As is the case for every Monday through Friday the nightly lineup is Hanging with Mr. Cooper, Cosby Show, Friends, and then CSI. In between the shows, this station offers very few commercials and tend to spend more time advertising its own shows and movies. As a result, we know what movie is on at any day of the week because we've seen the commercial at least 5 times. Nonetheless, we get sick of the commercials advertising Oprah which is on at 5pm and the movies as a whole which is easily a 2 minute segment. By the beginning of CSI at 9pm, the family gradually peters out. Some members start heading to bed during the show and other hold out to the end. Typically it's me and my host mother and maybe my host sisters that last until the end of the show. Jen and Ama lock up the house around 10 and we all head to bed.
So in between the crazy stories that I've shared with you the past couple months, there are those little things that are interesting that happen everyday. I hope that this entry has helped you understand some interesting things about Ghana and what's it's like to live here.
All the best,
Ben
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
My weekend in Volta and other things
Dearest friends,
We arrived in Volta at about 10am after having been on the bus for about 3 hours. We arrived at a hotel and pulled up to the building which was marked with the name "The Brick House". Mr. Gyesi got off the bus only to come back a few minutes later to say, "Umm...the president of Ghana will be here in 30 minutes". About an hour later, 5 police motorcycles, 5 police cars, and 5 SUVs drove by in a procession. He drove through a gate marked on both sides by policemen and given the parade of reporters walking through we decided to do the same. We walked through the gate, Me, Billy, Dana, Talia, and Mary and stood up near the crowd. The cameras crowded around the man that emerged from the large black SUV wearing a hard hat. The president had come to the hotel because the manager was building a mall and the President decided it was a good stop on his encouraging development tour. So there I was, standing in this big crowd near the President of Ghana. We inched closer and closer and evenutally go within a foot of the President, close enough to shake his hand. However everything was recorded and we weren't respectfully dressed to shake his hand, so we didn't. The President finished his speech and walked over to the building site, looked the plans, and shook the hands of a large group of visitors from a church in Scotland & Germany that had arranged to meet him. Me and Tali rushed to the end of the line to try and get a handshake as he went around, but we were just a couple seconds too late. Nonetheless, I was within a foot of the President of Ghana and that was pretty dam cool!
Later that afternoon we traveled down to Wli falls, the tallest waterfall in West Africa. It stands at a height of nearly 200 feet and pounds onto the lagoon below with massive force. Almost our entire group walked into the water and bravely trekked through the waterfall. The next day we visited the Tofi Atome Monkey Sanctuary and I fed small monkeys bananas. We made loud kissing noises and the monkeys started coming from throughout the trees. As we held onto the bananas strongly, the monkeys would reach out from the trees and peel the bananas right from our hands!
At my internship, I've been spending the past couple of weeks evaluating the organization's Micro-credit program. I've traveled all over greater Accra meeting with GHAFUP groups to conduct group interviews about the successes and failures of the micro-loan program. The work has given me key insight into the challenges of grassroots development work. Microfinance is a very tricky business. Although it's not the key of People's Dialogue, it tends to be main reason for members joining the Federation. From what I could tell, repayment has been a significant problem for a number of reasons. The first is that many people use the loan to buy materials for their business (i.e. Fish mongers buy fish to smoke, store owners buy provisions) and use the income generated by the selling of these products for immediate needs. The primary needs are school fees, food, and emergencies (i.e. relative sick). After these immediate needs are met a small portion of the original loan is invested in the business so the impact of the loan significantly diminishes rather than increases over time. When there aren't complementary programs that alleviate the press of these immediate needs, this is a common occurrence. So after several months the impact of the loan is gone and they are left to repay it. In addition, some members of the Federation have joined primarily for the possibility of loans and will pay back the loan if they know a new one is coming. Some individuals have the capital to pay the loan back, but would rather use it for other things like feeding kids, if a new loan is not coming. Without a new loan coming there's no incentive to pay it back. Because PD is not an MFI, there isn't always money available to make loans for everyone who received a first loan, so repayment level is hurt. Nonetheless, there has been a significant impact of the loans on individuals as they're able to start businesses when they were doing nothing before, put their kids through education, provide for families as widows, and build there businesses from a table on the side of the street to a store. This is part of what I'll be putting into the evaluation I'm preparing for the office. I'd be glad to talk more about what I've learned, but most of it I don't want to put up online.
Overall, I've learned a great deal about grassroots community development work, mobilizing individuals for self-help, the difference between on the field and in the office work, and the potential of the poorest of the poor in Ghana to improve their lives.
All the best,
Ben
We arrived in Volta at about 10am after having been on the bus for about 3 hours. We arrived at a hotel and pulled up to the building which was marked with the name "The Brick House". Mr. Gyesi got off the bus only to come back a few minutes later to say, "Umm...the president of Ghana will be here in 30 minutes". About an hour later, 5 police motorcycles, 5 police cars, and 5 SUVs drove by in a procession. He drove through a gate marked on both sides by policemen and given the parade of reporters walking through we decided to do the same. We walked through the gate, Me, Billy, Dana, Talia, and Mary and stood up near the crowd. The cameras crowded around the man that emerged from the large black SUV wearing a hard hat. The president had come to the hotel because the manager was building a mall and the President decided it was a good stop on his encouraging development tour. So there I was, standing in this big crowd near the President of Ghana. We inched closer and closer and evenutally go within a foot of the President, close enough to shake his hand. However everything was recorded and we weren't respectfully dressed to shake his hand, so we didn't. The President finished his speech and walked over to the building site, looked the plans, and shook the hands of a large group of visitors from a church in Scotland & Germany that had arranged to meet him. Me and Tali rushed to the end of the line to try and get a handshake as he went around, but we were just a couple seconds too late. Nonetheless, I was within a foot of the President of Ghana and that was pretty dam cool!
Later that afternoon we traveled down to Wli falls, the tallest waterfall in West Africa. It stands at a height of nearly 200 feet and pounds onto the lagoon below with massive force. Almost our entire group walked into the water and bravely trekked through the waterfall. The next day we visited the Tofi Atome Monkey Sanctuary and I fed small monkeys bananas. We made loud kissing noises and the monkeys started coming from throughout the trees. As we held onto the bananas strongly, the monkeys would reach out from the trees and peel the bananas right from our hands!
At my internship, I've been spending the past couple of weeks evaluating the organization's Micro-credit program. I've traveled all over greater Accra meeting with GHAFUP groups to conduct group interviews about the successes and failures of the micro-loan program. The work has given me key insight into the challenges of grassroots development work. Microfinance is a very tricky business. Although it's not the key of People's Dialogue, it tends to be main reason for members joining the Federation. From what I could tell, repayment has been a significant problem for a number of reasons. The first is that many people use the loan to buy materials for their business (i.e. Fish mongers buy fish to smoke, store owners buy provisions) and use the income generated by the selling of these products for immediate needs. The primary needs are school fees, food, and emergencies (i.e. relative sick). After these immediate needs are met a small portion of the original loan is invested in the business so the impact of the loan significantly diminishes rather than increases over time. When there aren't complementary programs that alleviate the press of these immediate needs, this is a common occurrence. So after several months the impact of the loan is gone and they are left to repay it. In addition, some members of the Federation have joined primarily for the possibility of loans and will pay back the loan if they know a new one is coming. Some individuals have the capital to pay the loan back, but would rather use it for other things like feeding kids, if a new loan is not coming. Without a new loan coming there's no incentive to pay it back. Because PD is not an MFI, there isn't always money available to make loans for everyone who received a first loan, so repayment level is hurt. Nonetheless, there has been a significant impact of the loans on individuals as they're able to start businesses when they were doing nothing before, put their kids through education, provide for families as widows, and build there businesses from a table on the side of the street to a store. This is part of what I'll be putting into the evaluation I'm preparing for the office. I'd be glad to talk more about what I've learned, but most of it I don't want to put up online.
Overall, I've learned a great deal about grassroots community development work, mobilizing individuals for self-help, the difference between on the field and in the office work, and the potential of the poorest of the poor in Ghana to improve their lives.
All the best,
Ben
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Passover in Ghana
It was back-breaking lifting brick after brick carrying them towards the inside of the school. For about an hour we lifted 20 pound cement bricks and carried them into the insides of the 3 foot high walls of the school we were building. We were on a volunteer trip that morning to build the library and computer lab for a small school outside of Accra. The objections I have to the short-term mission trip mentality aside, it was an interesting way to begin the Passover day. We sweated in the hot sun, plastered mortar on the walls of the school, and lifted bricks onto the walls. Although we completely very little and the masons had to do much of the work, it was an ironic experience to be doing hard labor on the day before the passover seder. Although it was for a very different purpose and we surely won't building Pithom and Raamses, it was still a connecting experience to my Jewish history.
We returned to campus at around 2:00 and it was time to prepare for the seder. The weekend before Naomi and I had bought most of the ingredients including South African sweet wine, plates, forks, cups, etc. The Tuesday before the seder I had traveled all over America House getting ingredients to make the mail meal: Yams and Tomato Stew. That afternoon, me and Dave cut tomatoes and onions while our host sister prepared the yams and our host Mom combined the ingredients into a delicious stew. While we prepared the meal, Naomi and Abby were active on campus preparing the seder room. The seder took place in the 3rd floor TV room of the International Students Hostel, where the TV was broken so we didn't have to compete with the Liverpool-Chelsea Champions League game that was going on at the same time. Our seder table was two white tables put together with a white table cloth and comfortable chouches surrounding it. We had set up about 20 settings. On the table were our plastic cups of salt water, Elijah's cup (which was composed of the top-half of a water bottle wrapped in Kente cloth), a plate of Spinach (our green vegetable since Parsley was not available), Shitaw (a spicy Ghanaian spice that we used because we had no Horse Radish or Maror). Our seder plate used spinach, a raw egg, Shitaw, very delicious Charoset, and a smelly chicken bone that I saved from my dinner on that previous Sunday that we had to keep in it's own plastic bag because it smelled awful.
The seder was a cross-cultural sharing experience. We had about 20 people there including Esther and her parents who had come to Ghana for about a week. We had around 10 Jews total and the rest of the people were interested people from our program who wanted to experience a Jewish seder. The experience of leading a seder, for myself, was very unique. We began by explaining the items on the seder plate, dipped the very bitter spinach in the salt water to symbolize the tears of the Jewish slaves in Egypt (the spinach was bitter because it had accidentally frozen in the fridge and defrosted), retold the story of the Exodus through the children's Hagada as we passed it around the table. We joined in rousing songs of Dayenu which Naomi as part of her family tradition lead in Baptist retorhic and we all sang the chorus together. We ate our Matzah that Abby and I had amazingly managed to get through a Chabad group that was conducting seders with some Israeli companies in Accra. We ate our Matzah and Charoset sandwiches which was a favorite item for most people in the seder-the recipe I copied off the internet and the sweet wine we had got worked out excellent. We drank our cup of wine, four sips rather than cups because we didn't have enough wine. It was unique to reflect on the fact that this seder was occuring in the one of the slave capitals of Africa. That the history we experienced was not distinct just to Jews. Conducting the seder barely 2 hours from Elmina Castle, a huge hub of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade was a unique experience. Then came time for the meal, a very traditional Ghanaian dish that was a huge hit. After the meal we sang Hag-Gadya and Who Knows One in English together. Both songs were enjoyed by all, especially those who weren't Jewish. Hag-Gadya tells the story of the awesomeness of God through a later of one item destroys another, all of which you are meant to say in one breath. The song of Who Knows One recounts each number one to thirteen and what's important in Jewish history about each number, all of which you are meant to recite in a single breath at the end. Two of my non-Jewish friends turned to me and Naomi, my co-leader, and said, "This was probably one of my favorite nights in Ghana".
Conducting the seder is an empowering experience, having a seder in Ghana is an insighful experience, and sharing the cultural of Judaism with you non-Jewish friends is priceless.
Best,
Ben
We returned to campus at around 2:00 and it was time to prepare for the seder. The weekend before Naomi and I had bought most of the ingredients including South African sweet wine, plates, forks, cups, etc. The Tuesday before the seder I had traveled all over America House getting ingredients to make the mail meal: Yams and Tomato Stew. That afternoon, me and Dave cut tomatoes and onions while our host sister prepared the yams and our host Mom combined the ingredients into a delicious stew. While we prepared the meal, Naomi and Abby were active on campus preparing the seder room. The seder took place in the 3rd floor TV room of the International Students Hostel, where the TV was broken so we didn't have to compete with the Liverpool-Chelsea Champions League game that was going on at the same time. Our seder table was two white tables put together with a white table cloth and comfortable chouches surrounding it. We had set up about 20 settings. On the table were our plastic cups of salt water, Elijah's cup (which was composed of the top-half of a water bottle wrapped in Kente cloth), a plate of Spinach (our green vegetable since Parsley was not available), Shitaw (a spicy Ghanaian spice that we used because we had no Horse Radish or Maror). Our seder plate used spinach, a raw egg, Shitaw, very delicious Charoset, and a smelly chicken bone that I saved from my dinner on that previous Sunday that we had to keep in it's own plastic bag because it smelled awful.
The seder was a cross-cultural sharing experience. We had about 20 people there including Esther and her parents who had come to Ghana for about a week. We had around 10 Jews total and the rest of the people were interested people from our program who wanted to experience a Jewish seder. The experience of leading a seder, for myself, was very unique. We began by explaining the items on the seder plate, dipped the very bitter spinach in the salt water to symbolize the tears of the Jewish slaves in Egypt (the spinach was bitter because it had accidentally frozen in the fridge and defrosted), retold the story of the Exodus through the children's Hagada as we passed it around the table. We joined in rousing songs of Dayenu which Naomi as part of her family tradition lead in Baptist retorhic and we all sang the chorus together. We ate our Matzah that Abby and I had amazingly managed to get through a Chabad group that was conducting seders with some Israeli companies in Accra. We ate our Matzah and Charoset sandwiches which was a favorite item for most people in the seder-the recipe I copied off the internet and the sweet wine we had got worked out excellent. We drank our cup of wine, four sips rather than cups because we didn't have enough wine. It was unique to reflect on the fact that this seder was occuring in the one of the slave capitals of Africa. That the history we experienced was not distinct just to Jews. Conducting the seder barely 2 hours from Elmina Castle, a huge hub of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade was a unique experience. Then came time for the meal, a very traditional Ghanaian dish that was a huge hit. After the meal we sang Hag-Gadya and Who Knows One in English together. Both songs were enjoyed by all, especially those who weren't Jewish. Hag-Gadya tells the story of the awesomeness of God through a later of one item destroys another, all of which you are meant to say in one breath. The song of Who Knows One recounts each number one to thirteen and what's important in Jewish history about each number, all of which you are meant to recite in a single breath at the end. Two of my non-Jewish friends turned to me and Naomi, my co-leader, and said, "This was probably one of my favorite nights in Ghana".
Conducting the seder is an empowering experience, having a seder in Ghana is an insighful experience, and sharing the cultural of Judaism with you non-Jewish friends is priceless.
Best,
Ben
Monday, March 30, 2009
A very crazy weekend in Kumasi
My dear friends,
This past weekend was perhaps one of the craziest I've had since coming to Ghana. We went as a whole group to Kumasi in central Ghana for a three day trip. Here are some of the highlights.
We had just arrived at the Kente Cultural Center. Walking into this large building we were hawked by dozens of sellers that noticed an entire bus of Obrunis just disembarked. Inside the building were about 20 Kente weaving machines with an aisle around the outside where the sewers were displaying their work for sale. You couldn't go a foot without being pulled in one direction or another, called by a salesperson saying "My friend", "Come see", "two cidi", or something of the like. Along the outskirts of the building many salespeople tried to get out attention through the small windows as we walked past. After purchasing a couple things I left the building and headed back to our bus. We had attracted quite a bit of attention and there were at least 50 people standing by the bus waiting for us to return. Many were sellers, others were kids who would say "give me money" or "can I have some money for food". After a few minutes the bus opened and we got on. About 12 people were on the bus meaning a big portion of the group was still inside. As we sat on the bus, people outside were banging on the windows and shouting trying to get our attention. It was quite stressful, but we decided to just close the shades so it limited the amount of space they could use to shout at us. My friend Clara had been asked what her name was as she had gotten off the bus in the first place by a man with a diamond ear stud that looked about 19 years old. When she got back on the bus this man was thre waiting for her with a bracelet that said Sara and asked her to pay the ridiculous fee of 14 cidi (worth about 1 cidi), so she refused to buy it. The man had written her name in the bracelet, I suppose, and he was visually displeased. He poked his head through the bus door several times trying to get her to buy it, but it wasn't her name and it was way overpriced. Rachel got up to the door and put her back onto it to keep it closed so he couldn't keep popping his head through to bother her. As this was going on the banging and shouting of people outside trying to get our attention continued, and Billy aptly described it like we were in Jurassic Park. So, Mary spotted a man selling bags and she thought he was gesturing 2 bags for 5 cidi so she called him to the door to bargain and buy. When she got to the door, Rachel opened it and she found out it was one bag for 7 so she wasn't interested. Nonetheless, our diamond-eared friend was at the door and let out a stream of curses saying "F****** white girl, you f****** white chicken" referring to Clara. Mary was not pleased with how he was trying Clara and trying to force his way into the bus while cursing. She remarks, "You can't talk to my sister like that" and knees him in the chest. He is not quite pleased with this turn of events and leaves. 5 minutes later he comes back with a 4 foot long, thick tree branch and starts hitting the windows of the bus. We are quite freaked out, but realize that he cannot break the windows. Nonetheless, for 10 minutes we saw him angrily circling the bus shouting at Mary to "Come out and fight like a man". It was quite an interesting experience as you can tell, but in the end we left and no one was harmed.
For the weekend we were staying in the same hotel as the Black Stars, the Ghana National Football Team who on Sunday competed with Benin in a World Cup qualifying game. While in the hotel on Saturday night I met several of the black stars and even got a picture with Appiah, the team captain.
Yesterday was the Ghana-Benin qorld cup qualifying game. We arrived at the stadium around 1, unneccessarily early for the 5 game, but just wanted to make sure that we'd all get seats. About an hour after arriving, Stephanie and I got bored of sitting around. We saw a large section of about 300 colorfully dressed people that were up and cheering and banging sticks, so we decided we wanted to join. We approached this section of what we later learned were the National Supporters Union, a group that travels to all the Ghana games to support the team, and were immediately welcomed. We started clapping with them to the beat of their own small band they had in the back and they even gave us seats. For several hours before the game we were dancing in a coordinated fashion lead by four people who were facing the group from the front all doing the same moves so that we copied. We put our hands over each others shoulders, all 8 rows in a line, and jumped 5 steps to the right and five to the left; we made swimming motions with our hands; we shouted Amen in unison and waved our white handkerchiefs. It was like sitting in the ASU student section but with 10 times more coordination and enthusiasm. By the time the game started I was already tired. Nonetheless, in the first 60 seconds of the game, Ghana scored on Benin, the person who scored was named Prince (one of the people I met and took a picture with). As he scored, the section passed up a huge flag that covered the whole section and we all jumped up and down. The dancing and coordinated cheering continued to half time and I was completely exhausted at the half. I had made some nice friends with the people next to me, and my friends Molly and Liz had been there with me the entire time, Stephanie had some time before. After the half, even the leaders of the cheering seemed tired. I mentioned to Liz how crazy it would be if we could get the whole group to do the chicken dance. So I being in the second row made eye contact with the main leader and tried to teach him the chicken dance, he missed a couple of the steps but people did alright with it. I was heavily thinking about going up in front of this group to lead a couple dances so started talking with Liz and Molly and Kristen about dances to do. As the leader tried again to do the chicken dance, I worked up the courage and went down to the front row. I turned around and was facing a group of nearly 300 jumping fans who I had never met and who were ready to copy my every move. It was quite an adrenaline rush! So, I started doing the chicken dance and the other leaders caught on and did it with me. Soon nearly 250 Ghanaians were doing the chicken dance to the accompaniment of the drum band in back-their favorite part was wiggling the but and getting lower. After doing the chicken dance for a little, it was time for a new dance so I lead the Macarena. This was a huge hit! Everyone was sticking their hands out, across their chest, on their waste, on their butt, and then wiggling the butt and clapping. I looked to my friends for inspiration to a new dance, Liz suggested the YMCA hand scan, so I did it. There I was in front of 300 fans who were scanning their hands and bobbing their head. I did a couple of other moves, but after about 15 minutes I was flush out of ideas and went back to my spot. I was welcomed with dozens of back pats, smiles; I had made 150 friends in about 15 minutes!! :-). Liz and Kristen also lead several dance moves as the game went on and then it ended as Ghana won 1-0. The crowd was ecstatic as we through up the flag again and jumped around waving our white handkerchiefs. After waiting for most of the crowd to clear, I headed back to the rest of our CIEE group. I was immediately stopped by a couple members of our group who had seen me up on the "jumbo tron" several times. Right afterwards I was stopped by a member of the CIEE staff who informed me that she had just gotten a call from Mr. Gyesi who had gotten a call from one of the CIEE staff at another program in Ashesi who recognized several CIEE people on TV. Apparently, I was on TV during the qualifying match!! How crazy is that! During that game I commanded 300 people in the chicken dance, screamed my lungs out in Twi songs, and was on international television as one of the Obrunis in this very enthusiastic crowd of Ghanaians that cheered the entire game. As you can guess, it was probably one of the funniest and most ridiculous moments I've ever had.
As you can tell it was quite a trip. I met two men that are doing a documentary on African football and I'm in the documentary now. I met a group of regular supporters of the Black Stars who have made me an honorary member and I will be going to their meetings in Accra. What a crazy weekend!
Miss you all!
Best,
Ben
This past weekend was perhaps one of the craziest I've had since coming to Ghana. We went as a whole group to Kumasi in central Ghana for a three day trip. Here are some of the highlights.
We had just arrived at the Kente Cultural Center. Walking into this large building we were hawked by dozens of sellers that noticed an entire bus of Obrunis just disembarked. Inside the building were about 20 Kente weaving machines with an aisle around the outside where the sewers were displaying their work for sale. You couldn't go a foot without being pulled in one direction or another, called by a salesperson saying "My friend", "Come see", "two cidi", or something of the like. Along the outskirts of the building many salespeople tried to get out attention through the small windows as we walked past. After purchasing a couple things I left the building and headed back to our bus. We had attracted quite a bit of attention and there were at least 50 people standing by the bus waiting for us to return. Many were sellers, others were kids who would say "give me money" or "can I have some money for food". After a few minutes the bus opened and we got on. About 12 people were on the bus meaning a big portion of the group was still inside. As we sat on the bus, people outside were banging on the windows and shouting trying to get our attention. It was quite stressful, but we decided to just close the shades so it limited the amount of space they could use to shout at us. My friend Clara had been asked what her name was as she had gotten off the bus in the first place by a man with a diamond ear stud that looked about 19 years old. When she got back on the bus this man was thre waiting for her with a bracelet that said Sara and asked her to pay the ridiculous fee of 14 cidi (worth about 1 cidi), so she refused to buy it. The man had written her name in the bracelet, I suppose, and he was visually displeased. He poked his head through the bus door several times trying to get her to buy it, but it wasn't her name and it was way overpriced. Rachel got up to the door and put her back onto it to keep it closed so he couldn't keep popping his head through to bother her. As this was going on the banging and shouting of people outside trying to get our attention continued, and Billy aptly described it like we were in Jurassic Park. So, Mary spotted a man selling bags and she thought he was gesturing 2 bags for 5 cidi so she called him to the door to bargain and buy. When she got to the door, Rachel opened it and she found out it was one bag for 7 so she wasn't interested. Nonetheless, our diamond-eared friend was at the door and let out a stream of curses saying "F****** white girl, you f****** white chicken" referring to Clara. Mary was not pleased with how he was trying Clara and trying to force his way into the bus while cursing. She remarks, "You can't talk to my sister like that" and knees him in the chest. He is not quite pleased with this turn of events and leaves. 5 minutes later he comes back with a 4 foot long, thick tree branch and starts hitting the windows of the bus. We are quite freaked out, but realize that he cannot break the windows. Nonetheless, for 10 minutes we saw him angrily circling the bus shouting at Mary to "Come out and fight like a man". It was quite an interesting experience as you can tell, but in the end we left and no one was harmed.
For the weekend we were staying in the same hotel as the Black Stars, the Ghana National Football Team who on Sunday competed with Benin in a World Cup qualifying game. While in the hotel on Saturday night I met several of the black stars and even got a picture with Appiah, the team captain.
Yesterday was the Ghana-Benin qorld cup qualifying game. We arrived at the stadium around 1, unneccessarily early for the 5 game, but just wanted to make sure that we'd all get seats. About an hour after arriving, Stephanie and I got bored of sitting around. We saw a large section of about 300 colorfully dressed people that were up and cheering and banging sticks, so we decided we wanted to join. We approached this section of what we later learned were the National Supporters Union, a group that travels to all the Ghana games to support the team, and were immediately welcomed. We started clapping with them to the beat of their own small band they had in the back and they even gave us seats. For several hours before the game we were dancing in a coordinated fashion lead by four people who were facing the group from the front all doing the same moves so that we copied. We put our hands over each others shoulders, all 8 rows in a line, and jumped 5 steps to the right and five to the left; we made swimming motions with our hands; we shouted Amen in unison and waved our white handkerchiefs. It was like sitting in the ASU student section but with 10 times more coordination and enthusiasm. By the time the game started I was already tired. Nonetheless, in the first 60 seconds of the game, Ghana scored on Benin, the person who scored was named Prince (one of the people I met and took a picture with). As he scored, the section passed up a huge flag that covered the whole section and we all jumped up and down. The dancing and coordinated cheering continued to half time and I was completely exhausted at the half. I had made some nice friends with the people next to me, and my friends Molly and Liz had been there with me the entire time, Stephanie had some time before. After the half, even the leaders of the cheering seemed tired. I mentioned to Liz how crazy it would be if we could get the whole group to do the chicken dance. So I being in the second row made eye contact with the main leader and tried to teach him the chicken dance, he missed a couple of the steps but people did alright with it. I was heavily thinking about going up in front of this group to lead a couple dances so started talking with Liz and Molly and Kristen about dances to do. As the leader tried again to do the chicken dance, I worked up the courage and went down to the front row. I turned around and was facing a group of nearly 300 jumping fans who I had never met and who were ready to copy my every move. It was quite an adrenaline rush! So, I started doing the chicken dance and the other leaders caught on and did it with me. Soon nearly 250 Ghanaians were doing the chicken dance to the accompaniment of the drum band in back-their favorite part was wiggling the but and getting lower. After doing the chicken dance for a little, it was time for a new dance so I lead the Macarena. This was a huge hit! Everyone was sticking their hands out, across their chest, on their waste, on their butt, and then wiggling the butt and clapping. I looked to my friends for inspiration to a new dance, Liz suggested the YMCA hand scan, so I did it. There I was in front of 300 fans who were scanning their hands and bobbing their head. I did a couple of other moves, but after about 15 minutes I was flush out of ideas and went back to my spot. I was welcomed with dozens of back pats, smiles; I had made 150 friends in about 15 minutes!! :-). Liz and Kristen also lead several dance moves as the game went on and then it ended as Ghana won 1-0. The crowd was ecstatic as we through up the flag again and jumped around waving our white handkerchiefs. After waiting for most of the crowd to clear, I headed back to the rest of our CIEE group. I was immediately stopped by a couple members of our group who had seen me up on the "jumbo tron" several times. Right afterwards I was stopped by a member of the CIEE staff who informed me that she had just gotten a call from Mr. Gyesi who had gotten a call from one of the CIEE staff at another program in Ashesi who recognized several CIEE people on TV. Apparently, I was on TV during the qualifying match!! How crazy is that! During that game I commanded 300 people in the chicken dance, screamed my lungs out in Twi songs, and was on international television as one of the Obrunis in this very enthusiastic crowd of Ghanaians that cheered the entire game. As you can guess, it was probably one of the funniest and most ridiculous moments I've ever had.
As you can tell it was quite a trip. I met two men that are doing a documentary on African football and I'm in the documentary now. I met a group of regular supporters of the Black Stars who have made me an honorary member and I will be going to their meetings in Accra. What a crazy weekend!
Miss you all!
Best,
Ben
Friday, March 20, 2009
Too interesting to wait
Dearest friends,
So there I was, on the back of a motorcycle with a nice man who was the Assemblyman for the village of Abotoase, gliding through the town on our way to a meeting. It had been a very busy morning. Mr. Kumaa, the leader of GHAFUP and myself had traveled on Tuesday to Abotoase a town about 4 hours from Accra on the Northern shore of the Volta Lake. The Klagbokorpe group of GHAFUP had submitted a proposal to the office for a 10-seater KVIP toilet facility and it was our job to assess the situation on the ground and my job to take the information and make a proposal to submit to our partners for funding. The previous weeks I had spent developing questions for meetings with the GHAFUP group, the WATSAN (water & sanitation committee) and focus group discussions one of just men and one of just women.
The night before we arrived at about 5 and were surprised to immediately be greeted by the very important and hospital Assemblyman for the district. Unexpectedly, he thought our arrival was to assess a water project that was beginning in Abotoase in April so he had scheduled meetings for us with Abotoase GHAFUP and the WATSAN under that premise. After a short discussion, we resolved the problem and agreed to meet with both groups about both issues. In the afternoon we toured around Abotoase, saw sets of clogged KVIPs, overwhelmed boreholes. The town of Abotoase has 5 boreholes for about 5,000 people, and so they are very slow of overwhelmed by long lines of anxious women and children waiting to go to school. Frequently fights break out of water and 80 buckets surround the slow moving water waiting to be filled.
The day began as Mr. Kumaa and prepped for the meeting with Abotoase GHAFUP that we hadn't originally prepared for. We arrived at the site and after about half an hour, about 20 people were sitting on benches waiting for the people from the office to "talk about the water project". I was the main representative of the office, a big responsibility and Mr. Kumaa was the representative of the federation GHAFUP. I talked about the specific activities of the project and asked them how they saw the project as well as what benefits it would bring to the community and the group. The response was overwhelming. The project itself was a mechanized borehole with pipes to 15 distribution points, vastly expanding the speed and capacity of the water supply in the town. People sited benefits like more trust and awareness of the GHAFUP group, finally something is happening after complaining at the district assembly for water for several years, better health for the community. I walked out of the meeting very happy about the potential thisproject was bringing to he community. Plus it was an idea proposed by the people themselves who were affected and will be maintained by the people themselves through user fees. It's a real grassroots solution.
Then came the meeting with the WATSAN committee. It was a very productive meeting as I began to see that there were many actors doing different things in the community (i.e. District Assembly, NGOs, WATSAN) all of which had different projects, but when some fell apart no one was coming to fix them. So they fully supported our proposal for a KVIP in Klagbokorpe and I was fortunate to meet a very nice man who has worked as a sanitation officer for Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) for the past 13 years who was greatly helpful in me understanding toilets and sanitation. After the meeting with met with the Paramount Chief of Tapa district, meaning the most important chief of nearly 100,000 people to inform him of the project. At that point I was amazed at what I was doing and what responsibility I held as a representative of the office.
I hopped off the motorcycle and sat down in some chairs behind the table under a large tree. The Klagbokorpe group was meeting today, amazed that a whiteman had come all the way from the office to talk with them about their little toilet project. After about half an hour there were 40 people sitting under that tree waiting anxiously for Mr. Kumaa and I to begin. The Assemblymen introduced us and our purpose, Mr. Kumaa stood up and explained the values of the Federation, and then it was my turn to lead. I stood up in front of 40 people I didn't know and spoke the little Twi I could to introduce myself: "Yefre me Fo Kwasi. Mefi Amerika aburokyire na meye mi internship waw PD..." (My name is Grandfather Kwasi, I am from America overseas and I'm in an internship with PD). At that point it was onto the discussion, I explained the purpose of my being there the project itself and asked them to explain to me how this idea came about and they thought the benefits would be. We then broke off into smaller discussion groups and I conducted a discussion first of men with 4 GHAFUP members and 4 community members and then a discussion of 4 GHAFUP women and 4 community women. What I learned was extremely interesting.
In Klagbokorpe, a town of nearly 3,000, there isn't a single public toilet facility. As a result, people use the bush or Lake Volta to make toilet. The problem is that there are big problems with both. While going toilet in the bush several complained about getting bit by snakes, one person's relative died because they couldn't get tothe hospital in time. Another danger is that small children may encounter a dangerous animal and not know what to do so either run or will get attacked by it. For women, many are shy and it isn't proper for a man to see you when you've declothed yourself to shit. In the bush, women will frequently run into men or men will be waiting there to see them naked. The other option for shitting (sorry pardon my language, in Ghana shitting is a very acceptable term not derogatory in any fashion) is using Lake Volta. The main problems with this are that the water is also used for washing, bathing, and cooking. Community members complained of many problems like Cholera, blood in stool (Bilharzia), diahrea, and other things as a result of drinking or using the polluted water. In addition, the crap sinks to the bottom of the lake but is flushed up again during the rainy season when it washes back into the town.
After these meetings, we saw that it was necessary to set up two KVIPs 10-seater each because of the number of people in the village. The group them took us to the two sites, which were approved by the DANIDA sanitation officer to be appropriate for the facility. The important factors were that it was more than 150 yards from the water and that the facility be water tight. This means that the tanks into which the excrement falls must be cement on all sides so that it can be pumped out by a truck when it is full. The small user fees that will be charged by the GHAFUP group who will be maintaining the facility will pay for periodic cleaning and waste removal as well as be contributed back to a revolving fund for other projects. People's Dialogue projects act like somewhere between a loan and a grant, there isn't full cost recovery, but much of the initial cost is paid back into a fund which will be used for other projects. In addition, the community members also take a portion of the funds as their profit as they are running the business. It's a very effective and community-based and led strategy.
The rest of the day we spent touring the area. I encountered one image that I think will always stick with me. We came to the main KVIP for Abotoase, and it was completely full. For almost a year there hasn't been money to empty the tanks and replace the stolen pipes. I went totake pictures to notify the office so maybe we could issue a loan to repair the facility. Every stall door I opened, I was met by a completely full toilet, filled to the brim with crap and covered in a layer of moving white maggots. After seeing the decay of the main facility for many of our members, Mr.Kumaa wisely decided (out of the passion he has for other GHAFUP members) that we should figure out a way to repair it. We talked with the assemblyman for quite some time about what is needed to fix it and developed a cost outline of a 750 GHc loan (about $600) that could completely rennovate the facility. Because they will be charging for the use of the facility and there are thousands that need it but have nothing now, they will be able to make back the full cost in about 14 months. So we will take with the People's Dialogue office about making a micro-loan to the group for that amount to undertake this business venture. Once completed, it will be the groups job to maintain the facility and recieve the profit after the loan is paid back.
Now I am left with all this information, charged with the mission to create a proposal for a toilet in Klagbokorpe and a micro-loan proposal to rennovate the KVIP in Abotoase. It was a very interesting couple days and I grew immensely as I became empowered by the work and the potential I saw in the ability of people to solve problems themselves. I think it's key to invest in the people to solve the problem, to build the facility and maintain it so they will make sure it is kept in order and the benefit is fully within the community. I saw many other toilets that broke down after being built by an NGO and then were neglected, but I actually have faith that this one will stay for generations. It's a thrilling thing to see the difference that I as one person can make just by helping people translate a small, ineffective proposal they sent the office telling us about the issue, to using their stories to make a full scale proposal for an international donor, to guiding them in how to complete this project. The impact on the community will be enormous. Klagborpe has been around for many many years and has clamoured for toilets to NGOs and the District Assembly, but no one has come. The fact that the Federation, a group of 35 community members themselves can bring the project to the community themselves is a crowning and empowering achievement. I only pray that there is a funder out there willing to consider the project.
Just thought it was too important not to share!
Best,
Ben
So there I was, on the back of a motorcycle with a nice man who was the Assemblyman for the village of Abotoase, gliding through the town on our way to a meeting. It had been a very busy morning. Mr. Kumaa, the leader of GHAFUP and myself had traveled on Tuesday to Abotoase a town about 4 hours from Accra on the Northern shore of the Volta Lake. The Klagbokorpe group of GHAFUP had submitted a proposal to the office for a 10-seater KVIP toilet facility and it was our job to assess the situation on the ground and my job to take the information and make a proposal to submit to our partners for funding. The previous weeks I had spent developing questions for meetings with the GHAFUP group, the WATSAN (water & sanitation committee) and focus group discussions one of just men and one of just women.
The night before we arrived at about 5 and were surprised to immediately be greeted by the very important and hospital Assemblyman for the district. Unexpectedly, he thought our arrival was to assess a water project that was beginning in Abotoase in April so he had scheduled meetings for us with Abotoase GHAFUP and the WATSAN under that premise. After a short discussion, we resolved the problem and agreed to meet with both groups about both issues. In the afternoon we toured around Abotoase, saw sets of clogged KVIPs, overwhelmed boreholes. The town of Abotoase has 5 boreholes for about 5,000 people, and so they are very slow of overwhelmed by long lines of anxious women and children waiting to go to school. Frequently fights break out of water and 80 buckets surround the slow moving water waiting to be filled.
The day began as Mr. Kumaa and prepped for the meeting with Abotoase GHAFUP that we hadn't originally prepared for. We arrived at the site and after about half an hour, about 20 people were sitting on benches waiting for the people from the office to "talk about the water project". I was the main representative of the office, a big responsibility and Mr. Kumaa was the representative of the federation GHAFUP. I talked about the specific activities of the project and asked them how they saw the project as well as what benefits it would bring to the community and the group. The response was overwhelming. The project itself was a mechanized borehole with pipes to 15 distribution points, vastly expanding the speed and capacity of the water supply in the town. People sited benefits like more trust and awareness of the GHAFUP group, finally something is happening after complaining at the district assembly for water for several years, better health for the community. I walked out of the meeting very happy about the potential thisproject was bringing to he community. Plus it was an idea proposed by the people themselves who were affected and will be maintained by the people themselves through user fees. It's a real grassroots solution.
Then came the meeting with the WATSAN committee. It was a very productive meeting as I began to see that there were many actors doing different things in the community (i.e. District Assembly, NGOs, WATSAN) all of which had different projects, but when some fell apart no one was coming to fix them. So they fully supported our proposal for a KVIP in Klagbokorpe and I was fortunate to meet a very nice man who has worked as a sanitation officer for Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) for the past 13 years who was greatly helpful in me understanding toilets and sanitation. After the meeting with met with the Paramount Chief of Tapa district, meaning the most important chief of nearly 100,000 people to inform him of the project. At that point I was amazed at what I was doing and what responsibility I held as a representative of the office.
I hopped off the motorcycle and sat down in some chairs behind the table under a large tree. The Klagbokorpe group was meeting today, amazed that a whiteman had come all the way from the office to talk with them about their little toilet project. After about half an hour there were 40 people sitting under that tree waiting anxiously for Mr. Kumaa and I to begin. The Assemblymen introduced us and our purpose, Mr. Kumaa stood up and explained the values of the Federation, and then it was my turn to lead. I stood up in front of 40 people I didn't know and spoke the little Twi I could to introduce myself: "Yefre me Fo Kwasi. Mefi Amerika aburokyire na meye mi internship waw PD..." (My name is Grandfather Kwasi, I am from America overseas and I'm in an internship with PD). At that point it was onto the discussion, I explained the purpose of my being there the project itself and asked them to explain to me how this idea came about and they thought the benefits would be. We then broke off into smaller discussion groups and I conducted a discussion first of men with 4 GHAFUP members and 4 community members and then a discussion of 4 GHAFUP women and 4 community women. What I learned was extremely interesting.
In Klagbokorpe, a town of nearly 3,000, there isn't a single public toilet facility. As a result, people use the bush or Lake Volta to make toilet. The problem is that there are big problems with both. While going toilet in the bush several complained about getting bit by snakes, one person's relative died because they couldn't get tothe hospital in time. Another danger is that small children may encounter a dangerous animal and not know what to do so either run or will get attacked by it. For women, many are shy and it isn't proper for a man to see you when you've declothed yourself to shit. In the bush, women will frequently run into men or men will be waiting there to see them naked. The other option for shitting (sorry pardon my language, in Ghana shitting is a very acceptable term not derogatory in any fashion) is using Lake Volta. The main problems with this are that the water is also used for washing, bathing, and cooking. Community members complained of many problems like Cholera, blood in stool (Bilharzia), diahrea, and other things as a result of drinking or using the polluted water. In addition, the crap sinks to the bottom of the lake but is flushed up again during the rainy season when it washes back into the town.
After these meetings, we saw that it was necessary to set up two KVIPs 10-seater each because of the number of people in the village. The group them took us to the two sites, which were approved by the DANIDA sanitation officer to be appropriate for the facility. The important factors were that it was more than 150 yards from the water and that the facility be water tight. This means that the tanks into which the excrement falls must be cement on all sides so that it can be pumped out by a truck when it is full. The small user fees that will be charged by the GHAFUP group who will be maintaining the facility will pay for periodic cleaning and waste removal as well as be contributed back to a revolving fund for other projects. People's Dialogue projects act like somewhere between a loan and a grant, there isn't full cost recovery, but much of the initial cost is paid back into a fund which will be used for other projects. In addition, the community members also take a portion of the funds as their profit as they are running the business. It's a very effective and community-based and led strategy.
The rest of the day we spent touring the area. I encountered one image that I think will always stick with me. We came to the main KVIP for Abotoase, and it was completely full. For almost a year there hasn't been money to empty the tanks and replace the stolen pipes. I went totake pictures to notify the office so maybe we could issue a loan to repair the facility. Every stall door I opened, I was met by a completely full toilet, filled to the brim with crap and covered in a layer of moving white maggots. After seeing the decay of the main facility for many of our members, Mr.Kumaa wisely decided (out of the passion he has for other GHAFUP members) that we should figure out a way to repair it. We talked with the assemblyman for quite some time about what is needed to fix it and developed a cost outline of a 750 GHc loan (about $600) that could completely rennovate the facility. Because they will be charging for the use of the facility and there are thousands that need it but have nothing now, they will be able to make back the full cost in about 14 months. So we will take with the People's Dialogue office about making a micro-loan to the group for that amount to undertake this business venture. Once completed, it will be the groups job to maintain the facility and recieve the profit after the loan is paid back.
Now I am left with all this information, charged with the mission to create a proposal for a toilet in Klagbokorpe and a micro-loan proposal to rennovate the KVIP in Abotoase. It was a very interesting couple days and I grew immensely as I became empowered by the work and the potential I saw in the ability of people to solve problems themselves. I think it's key to invest in the people to solve the problem, to build the facility and maintain it so they will make sure it is kept in order and the benefit is fully within the community. I saw many other toilets that broke down after being built by an NGO and then were neglected, but I actually have faith that this one will stay for generations. It's a thrilling thing to see the difference that I as one person can make just by helping people translate a small, ineffective proposal they sent the office telling us about the issue, to using their stories to make a full scale proposal for an international donor, to guiding them in how to complete this project. The impact on the community will be enormous. Klagborpe has been around for many many years and has clamoured for toilets to NGOs and the District Assembly, but no one has come. The fact that the Federation, a group of 35 community members themselves can bring the project to the community themselves is a crowning and empowering achievement. I only pray that there is a funder out there willing to consider the project.
Just thought it was too important not to share!
Best,
Ben
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Hello!
Dearest friends,
Life as always has been exciting the past two weeks! Yesterday, I went on an adventure with my host family to Akosombo Dam-the largest Dam in Ghana. On route to the dam, we saw two monkeys perched on the side of the road, a very rare sight. On the way to the dam we stopped at my host mother sisters house, which was very much what I percieved all of Ghana to be. The houses were rectangular, mud-made with palm fron roofs. When we arrived in the village we started touring around a nice man named Joseph showed us around his home and fed us Womentausen, the smalled fish I've ever seen with a sweet corn meal called Abolo. After sitting with the family for a while, we headed off the to Dam and recieved a tour. Wahab, my host brother is afraid of heights so we had a good time making fun of him for that on the way to the dam. The Aksombo Dam is on the Volta River and created the Volta Lake, the largest man-made lake in the world. The dam itself creates about 161kvolts I believe and supplies electricity to much of Ghana as well as Togo and Benin. After recieving a tour we headed back towards the town of my mothers sister and stopped along the Volta river at a fishing village to buy fish. At the fishing village I was adamantly followed by a fishing women who told me I should take her as my wife. When I said no, she said "But I love you, but I love you...say you love me too". The next fve minutes of conversation was me saying "No, No, I don't love you, sorry". At the fish market we bought the largest fish I've ever seen that had to have weighed about 25 pounds, it was like a small shark. So we headed back to the village and picked up a chicken that Auntie's mothers sister had provided to us as a gift. Armed with a chicken, a mini-shark, and a dozen small fish we headed home. On the way home we killed 40 birds with one stone and picked up mangoes, nkruma (Okra), onions, a large sack of rice, dried clams, and crawfish. So it was a very loud and full car. Nonetheless, there was a true feeling of family and we laughed and joked in the tro-tro.
My internship has really kept me busy. I've visited Old Fadama, the largest slum in Ghana, to sit it on three of the group meetings and conduct a interview session about the success of micro-business loans. I helped Philip, the emerging leader of GHAFUP, to develop a report about his travels auditing project loans. I am now working on evaluating People's Dialogues HIV/AIDS program that is funded by none other then AJWS-it's a small world. The work I'm doing with this is extremely interesting as I'm starting to understand the perceptions of slum dwellers towards HIV/AIDS. So far I can tell that many percieve it to be caused by witchcraft, a curse, or a result of past transgressions. Many percieve it to be transmitted by touch and that they should isolate persons with HIV so that others won't get infected. I'm learning a ton about self-help and about this organization's work in Ghana.
Last weekend was also particularly interesting as I traveled to Kumasi with a friend of mine named Dranaya. We left Accra at about 6pm and arrived in Kumasi at midnight, we got on a tro tro at 12am that was the most sketchy ride I've been on. We stopped along the route so people could get out and pop a squat by the side of the road. Within 5 minutes of getting on the tro there was a huge argument that spurred as one women paid the fair but lost the ticket-so one row was shouting at another and then the back joined in and the whole car was shouting for 15 minutes at least. Finally it stopped. At one point we stopped for what I thought was a bathroom break and a man and a women got off together and went behind a building, but then the mate noticed and ran after them and shouted at them for 5 minutes, I'm pretty sure whe was a prostitute and was servicing him. My view was supported as they both came back zipping and buttoning their pants. So we stayed in Guosu in a nice appartment that Dranaya owned. The next day we wondered around the time as Dranaya and I socialized with many of his friends-this was where he grew up. Eventually we made our way to the local hopsital where I recieved a tour. Then we headed to Mim and got a tour of Mim's water production facility. This was very interesting because Dranaya, having worked for the Identification service of the government, told them he was from the Identification Service and asked for a tour, after whipping out his card they agreed. It was fascinating! So then we took a walk through the bush to the timber production facility but didn't get a tour because it was closed. So we headed home and the guys (3 of us) cooked dinner for ourselves-Banku and Okra soup, my favorite. The night was a little interesting as there was a Ghanaian girl that Dranaya wanted to link me up with who later offered to wash me. When I looked at her confused she said "Are you scared, are you shy", so I said "no fine, let's go". She asked me to wait, but eventually told me "Go shower, tommorrow I will wash you". It was quite funny. So the next day we headed to Lake Bosomtwe, a very beautiful large lake that apparently is very far from Kumasi. We took one tro after another and eventually ended up in a town of Dranaya's friend who went with us to the lake, but we took three more tro-tros. Finally arriving, we spent about 2 hours at the lake as we ate lunch, drank palm wine, and I went on a small walk to a secluded spot where I could sit and reflect. It was a beautiful lake. Getting on a bus at about 4 I headed back to Accra. I got into Circle tro-tro station pretty late around 9:30 and it was quite intense. It was loud and hectic. A man pounded on the tro-tro I got in claiming I had insulted him and wanting to fight me. Thank God I was in a tro-tro already.
So as you can tell things have stayed interesting. This past week I finished my Twi class, hopefully I did well. My drumming class is very interesting as we are now studying our third song. And of course my internship will stay interesting as I start the evaluation and attending a workshop on HIV/AIDS for slum community members sometime soon.
Much love to all of my friends and family. I wish that I could be there to celebrate all the joys with you and be there for all of you during your hard times. I miss you all very much.
Yebehyia Bio,
Ben
Life as always has been exciting the past two weeks! Yesterday, I went on an adventure with my host family to Akosombo Dam-the largest Dam in Ghana. On route to the dam, we saw two monkeys perched on the side of the road, a very rare sight. On the way to the dam we stopped at my host mother sisters house, which was very much what I percieved all of Ghana to be. The houses were rectangular, mud-made with palm fron roofs. When we arrived in the village we started touring around a nice man named Joseph showed us around his home and fed us Womentausen, the smalled fish I've ever seen with a sweet corn meal called Abolo. After sitting with the family for a while, we headed off the to Dam and recieved a tour. Wahab, my host brother is afraid of heights so we had a good time making fun of him for that on the way to the dam. The Aksombo Dam is on the Volta River and created the Volta Lake, the largest man-made lake in the world. The dam itself creates about 161kvolts I believe and supplies electricity to much of Ghana as well as Togo and Benin. After recieving a tour we headed back towards the town of my mothers sister and stopped along the Volta river at a fishing village to buy fish. At the fishing village I was adamantly followed by a fishing women who told me I should take her as my wife. When I said no, she said "But I love you, but I love you...say you love me too". The next fve minutes of conversation was me saying "No, No, I don't love you, sorry". At the fish market we bought the largest fish I've ever seen that had to have weighed about 25 pounds, it was like a small shark. So we headed back to the village and picked up a chicken that Auntie's mothers sister had provided to us as a gift. Armed with a chicken, a mini-shark, and a dozen small fish we headed home. On the way home we killed 40 birds with one stone and picked up mangoes, nkruma (Okra), onions, a large sack of rice, dried clams, and crawfish. So it was a very loud and full car. Nonetheless, there was a true feeling of family and we laughed and joked in the tro-tro.
My internship has really kept me busy. I've visited Old Fadama, the largest slum in Ghana, to sit it on three of the group meetings and conduct a interview session about the success of micro-business loans. I helped Philip, the emerging leader of GHAFUP, to develop a report about his travels auditing project loans. I am now working on evaluating People's Dialogues HIV/AIDS program that is funded by none other then AJWS-it's a small world. The work I'm doing with this is extremely interesting as I'm starting to understand the perceptions of slum dwellers towards HIV/AIDS. So far I can tell that many percieve it to be caused by witchcraft, a curse, or a result of past transgressions. Many percieve it to be transmitted by touch and that they should isolate persons with HIV so that others won't get infected. I'm learning a ton about self-help and about this organization's work in Ghana.
Last weekend was also particularly interesting as I traveled to Kumasi with a friend of mine named Dranaya. We left Accra at about 6pm and arrived in Kumasi at midnight, we got on a tro tro at 12am that was the most sketchy ride I've been on. We stopped along the route so people could get out and pop a squat by the side of the road. Within 5 minutes of getting on the tro there was a huge argument that spurred as one women paid the fair but lost the ticket-so one row was shouting at another and then the back joined in and the whole car was shouting for 15 minutes at least. Finally it stopped. At one point we stopped for what I thought was a bathroom break and a man and a women got off together and went behind a building, but then the mate noticed and ran after them and shouted at them for 5 minutes, I'm pretty sure whe was a prostitute and was servicing him. My view was supported as they both came back zipping and buttoning their pants. So we stayed in Guosu in a nice appartment that Dranaya owned. The next day we wondered around the time as Dranaya and I socialized with many of his friends-this was where he grew up. Eventually we made our way to the local hopsital where I recieved a tour. Then we headed to Mim and got a tour of Mim's water production facility. This was very interesting because Dranaya, having worked for the Identification service of the government, told them he was from the Identification Service and asked for a tour, after whipping out his card they agreed. It was fascinating! So then we took a walk through the bush to the timber production facility but didn't get a tour because it was closed. So we headed home and the guys (3 of us) cooked dinner for ourselves-Banku and Okra soup, my favorite. The night was a little interesting as there was a Ghanaian girl that Dranaya wanted to link me up with who later offered to wash me. When I looked at her confused she said "Are you scared, are you shy", so I said "no fine, let's go". She asked me to wait, but eventually told me "Go shower, tommorrow I will wash you". It was quite funny. So the next day we headed to Lake Bosomtwe, a very beautiful large lake that apparently is very far from Kumasi. We took one tro after another and eventually ended up in a town of Dranaya's friend who went with us to the lake, but we took three more tro-tros. Finally arriving, we spent about 2 hours at the lake as we ate lunch, drank palm wine, and I went on a small walk to a secluded spot where I could sit and reflect. It was a beautiful lake. Getting on a bus at about 4 I headed back to Accra. I got into Circle tro-tro station pretty late around 9:30 and it was quite intense. It was loud and hectic. A man pounded on the tro-tro I got in claiming I had insulted him and wanting to fight me. Thank God I was in a tro-tro already.
So as you can tell things have stayed interesting. This past week I finished my Twi class, hopefully I did well. My drumming class is very interesting as we are now studying our third song. And of course my internship will stay interesting as I start the evaluation and attending a workshop on HIV/AIDS for slum community members sometime soon.
Much love to all of my friends and family. I wish that I could be there to celebrate all the joys with you and be there for all of you during your hard times. I miss you all very much.
Yebehyia Bio,
Ben
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