Ghana is fantastically colorful, friendly and musically inclined. There is so much laughter and smiling, and general fascination with the world. There is pain and extreme poverty - and culturally things that make me feel uncomfortable - but it is such a beautiful, inviting country that I still find myself feeling at peace here. I do not know how to begin to explain the love I have for this country, nor the daily experiences I am having. From the food, to the children, to the traveling, to daily conversations - all of it is so fantastically wonderful and intensely difficult at times. It's exhausting daily.
As I walk along the reddish-brown dirt roads that weave in between small shacks and cement compounds, my mind strings together colorful sentences to attempt to describe what I am experiencing here in Ghana. My mind is constantly in motion thinking of a hundred different things at once. Processing my surroundings, as well as considering things outside the daily and bold motions of everyday Ghanaian life.
This trip is my last for a long time - though I hardly think I can stay away forever - I don't think I'll be back soon. But I am okay with this. I feel ready - ready for new adventures. Time to wrap up the NGO, say see you later and enjoy my time in this beautiful place.
Ghana: Forever a Second Home - How to Process
Walking through the familiar customs area of the Kotoka International Airport, I weave through the crowds, eager to find Joeshmail, my closest friend in Ghana (a 21 year old preschool teacher at a school I work at). Entering the main room, Joeshmail appeared with a big smile, waving at me -- and holding her hand was none other than HOUDA! Houda, last summer was one of our (me & my friends) favorite babies, (now she is two years old!). At school, Houda was always on our laps, (especially me or Emma's). She was a bit confused to see me, but at school the next day she came running up to me and even said my name (which she had not done last year). It was a very sweet surprise.
Driving back from the airport, the familiar sites and smells of Accra greet me. The stiffly hot air, the smells of trash, feces, mixed with fruits and meat, create a familiar smell that no longer phases me.Many people are walking around with baskets, buckets, bowls on their heads - filled with various items for sale. Everything from dish rags to super glue to plantain chips and tigernuts. Joeshmail escorts me to my new place, where we are staying in the back of a large family house (a friend of her boyfriends). The walls are pink, with large purple diamonds - there is a large ceiling fan, a table, a queen mattress, a toilet and an area to bath. We do not have running water, so we fetch water down the road every day to bath and to flush the toilet. It is comfortable (ghana comfortable) and I love living with Joeshmail. We spend a lot of time together, but I also have my own independence here and can go off on my own often.
And so I'm back and the adventures begin.
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| Houda in my glasses |
Water
In the US - and most other 'western' places we take water for granted. Drinking and bathing. Here it is not the same. Water is drunk from plastic bags called pure water sachets - you bite the corners off and drink. Water for bathing varies. Last year, we had running water and a trickle shower. Other years, I've done bucket showers but had a tap flowing nearby. This time, no running water nearby - we travel half a mile to get buckets of water and drag them back to our house.
for three days there has been no tap running. This has resorted to some expensive and time consuming showers. As I have taken a bucket and filled it with water sachets. Each one is about 500 ml of water. I use about 20 for a shower. Thank GOODNESS I cut my hair so short recently. I'm getting use to the hour long bucket showers that include biting 20 sachet and squeezing them into the bucket. It's almost like I EARNED my shower at the end of it. :)
So - be grateful everybody - for the things you have that you think of as necessities - because so often they are not things that other people around the world can count on, on a daily basis or even at all sometimes. This is just one example.
Watching Children Grow: Vision Seed & Home visits
Over the past four years, there is one school I have worked at for all four years: Vision Seed Academy. There I have had the pleasure of watching many children grow up. This has been such a highlight for me, seeing students whom when I first met them were barely talking, be going into Class 3 in September, now 8 years old! Isha Beauty and Naa Dromo have both consistently been special to me since 2009, the two of them have each called me when I am in the United States, (both of them are now 8 years and were 4 years when I met them) and I always end up spending the most time with them.
As I walk into the familiar grounds of Vision Seed I am greeted by the laughter and hugs of over 40 children as they all sing song my name and pull on my arms. It's a warm, yet exhausting welcome. Isha and Dromo are by the door, 'make way' Isha calls and runs into my arms, Dromo following behind her. Teachers welcome me back and ask what I've been up to the past year. I feel at home.
One of the days during this trip I took Isha and Dromo out for ice cream to celebrate and say farewell. Who knows if I will see them again? Traveling on a tro, small, clammy palms clasped in my own, Isha and Dromo chatter to one another in English (instead of Ga) about how I will take one of them to America - they are arguing over which one. I quiet them down by telling them I'm not even going to be in America next year. Wide-eyed they look at me - confused as I explain I'll be somewhere else.
After the field trip I escort the two children back home, through winding roads and many greetings along the way. Everyone wants to talk to the white girl with two small Ghanaian children holding her hands. After bringing Isha home, Dromo's mother wants to cook something for me. So I am escorted into her living quarters. A small dark blue room, with a tv and wardrobe. I don't notice it until later, but there is a small bucket in the corner. I later learn this small bucket, the same kind I use for bathing, is their toilet. I notice this as Dromo hops over there and pees and then comes back to sit on my lap. I try not to squirm. This is Ghana.
Though I could take a moment here to talk about the poverty in Ghana - the way most people live on less than a dollar a day - I think it takes away from understanding what I love about this country. Often times I will take about my sicknesses or having no water or other things that would drive a million people crazy I'm sure - and they tell me 'Jessye, you are not selling Ghana very well' - Well, I'm not trying to sell it exactly, but I do want people to see the kindness. Here was someone who can barely afford to take care of her own three children, cooking my dinner - and she even paid for my cab home. Thanking me profusely for helping her daughter with English and for loving her.
I thank Dromo's mother extensively for the meal and then head home. Another one of those long days.
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| Isha (left) Dromo (right) and I at ice cream parlor |
Sticky Fingers, Pounding Fufu and MASH: The Coming King
At The Coming King, another school I work at, I receive perhaps the warmest welcome - staff and kids alike screaming ' Auntie Jessye!!!' and hugging me into extinction. At first it used to frighten me and I felt liked simply because I was white and therefore different, but through time I have come to accept and understand the boundaries and welcomes. I love the kids and staff at this school, and likewise I am also deeply cared about. There is a system of reciprocity we have established, both from my returns and interns and art classes - as well as from general kindness toward one another. Bouncing from classroom to classroom, everyone is asking if I will come to their class. I promise to visit everyone. I teach short lessons, explain to the teachers what is happening with the NGO and enjoy the delicious rice with tomato stew that is my favorite food in Labadi. (Seriously, last summer we made the Auntie write us a recipe we loved it so much).
Working with the babies, rice slips between my fingers with an orange oily stew staining my pale hands as I fed babies with my finger tips - the rice that does not want to ball up easily. Diapers to be changed, methodically throwing diapers away and putting new ones on, kissing cheeks and tickling bellies for the all too cute smiles. It's a routine I know.
Later, I move to my upper level classroom and we do some writing exercises. Followed by a series of MASH games (an old school matchmaker game) and several different cootie catchers. The kids greatly appreciate the game MASH and when I return a few days later, they are still playing it in their notebooks.
One of the days I was there, it was their last day before vacation so they were pounding fufu. A playdough like consistency that is sticky, and must be pounded for quite a long time until it is finished. It is made from plantain and cassava. It's one of my favorite Ghanaian foods. Uncle Nat, the headmaster, snaps a picture of me attempting to pound the fufu. Everyone is laughing.
The Coming King will forever be a special place for me. It was the place last year - where a bunch of students trampled me and broke my foot. But it is also such a special place, with wonderful teachers and students. The cement compound, across from the beach, with its falling apart walls and chipping paint, will forever be a place of warm comfort - with its loud singing and delicious rice with tomato stew.
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| This is the fufu process! |
Playing Mom
Adelaide is 5 years old, with a bright smile, great hair and a desire to play and laugh. Her mom does not like having her around the house - apparently her mom is often sick and so Joeshmail often has Adelaide sleep at her place for a night. For two nights of my visit I played mom to Adelaide. She came home with us after a long day at her school, I would bath her and feed her dinner, read her books (I had brought two kids books for some friends who had small kids) and draw pictures with her. Around 8, I would place her in the middle of our bed and kiss her goodnight. Joeshmail and I would sit at the end of the bed talking or reading, and then would slip next to her. One time she woke up and wasn't feeling well so I held her in my arms, and we fell asleep like that entangled limbs and all.
Tomorrow morning Joeshmail, Adelaide and I are going to Kumasi (another city) for four days. Then Joeshmail, Fred (her bf) and I will go to Kokrobite (a beach town) for the weekend - then I'm off to Kenya.
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| This Adelaide on her ice cream trip. She was very excited. |
Highlights and Lowlights
In the intrest of the skimmer reader -- here are some highlights and lowlights
high
- delicious Ghanaian food - from fresh pineapple and mangos, to indomie, fufu, omotuo and more!
- omotuo = balls of rice served in soup
- indomie = kinda like ramen but served just the noodles and with eggs and vegetables
- fufu = mashed plantain and cassava, takes a long time to make - served with soups
- Houda surprising me at the airport (thanks to Joeshmail)
- warm welcomes at all the schools and being reunited with students and friends
- traveling to Pokuase for Joeshmail's cousins graduation ceremony and seeing a new area in Ghana
- Taking Joeshmail shopping in the central of Accra with markets piled high with everything from clothes to pots to pig hooves and live snails!
- having a 5 year old student sleepover for two nights (and getting to play mom) (Adelaide)
- new hiplife music to learn and dance to!
- dozens of babies laughing and smiling
- hundreds of photos taken
- successful last lesson plans in schools I've been teaching at forever
- good transitional conversations about the NGO
- familiar faces and places
- three days of sickness (two times) both required a trip to the pharmacy, one day I couldn't even get out of bed.
- finger slammed in a tro-tro door
- not enough hours in the day to see everyone I want to see - not enough time to see everyone I want to see
- not enough fufu or omutuo for my liking!!
- never enough time with Joeshmail, going to miss my sis so much!
- the no water to bath was kinda a drag, but what can you do! This is Ghana. :)
Here are some more pictures for the visually inclined:
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| Philia classroom - exams |
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| Vision Seed Girls (Jess, Isha, Vicki and Dromo) |
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| Dancing day |
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| Isha loves to dance |
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| Houda being a goof |
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| Michelle goofing |
So now Kenya
Leaving Ghana one week from today, I'll be traveling all this week and won't have much access to email and what not - plus I wanted to get this done. :) I'm sure I'll update you in the Kenya blog about the trip to Kumasi and Kokrobite if anything eventful should happen.
Next Monday, I head back to Kenya for two weeks - haven't been back for three years. Am very excited to see my family and friends there!
THANK YOU FOR READING! :-D
Hope to see some of you in September.
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