Rain

On the bus to Tamale, wedged between too many sweating bodies in stale, soft-rock ridden air, I am witnessing climate crisis happening.
The rainstorm yesterday was the official announcement of the second portion of the rainy season. The relentless torrential deluge drove us inside, pounding water in spurts and gushes through the hairline cracks between window panes. The Nalerigu dam had overflowed four days ago, fat and bursting from the steady, regular rains that came to East Mamprusi with me. Adding the punishment of a half-day's hurricane-volume lashing left miles of maize drowning in ugly, polluted runoff, and my fellow passengers gaping, scrambling over each other to see, muttering in Mampruli. The road to Walewale, ghastly even in the dry season, was transformed into kilometers of mud, four feet deep and sucking the tires of any vehicle heavier than a bicycle. Getting off the bus to lessen the load, we trudge through the mire, my Birkenstocks caked with mud upon reaching the bus again. Nasia township is flooded; the stretching fields of Savelugu district also under the swollen banks of the rivers and streams. Town after town has the steel-grey rain lapping threateningly at the edges of compounds, shimmering in cold ways in the breeze generated by more incoming clouds that three months ago were pregnant with promise and now breed only trouble.
The weather of mid-August is schizophrenic at best, shifting wildly from pounding heat to these desperate, sobbing rains, and back just as fast. It is only a pale preview of the emotional outburst expected from the clouds this coming September, rumoured to be a huge blow in an already decimating rainy season. The Burkina Faso government has decreed that it is only a matter of time before the re-opening of the dams to the north like last year, to once again save the savanna country by flooding the Ghanaian White Volta river. With the ground already so saturated, burdened with the water of the season thus far and the tears from last year's flood, the question gnawing at peoples' guts and minds is simple: Where will the water go?

Exit Signs

For three days, the funeral raging outside my window pounded the viscera-thrilling beats of talking drums, the ululating voices of women in mourning that wiped the common hip-hop off the air and reminded my insides that here, I was part of a deep, unfathomable Africa that I have come to glimpse, to fleetingly feel, to lust after and love. After weeks of its silence in the flood of westernized, "global" culture, wily Ghana was throwing everything she could at me to convince me to stay with her. I packed those belongings I would bring home, and released those I would sacrifice to the kindness of the people here, in spite of the strange beauty of her drumming and voice, the heartbeat of West Africa resonating in my chest.

Children in the road, women in the market, new acquaintances and strangers are kinder, gentler; men in the street restrain their habitual harassment towards a last chance at marrying a "white". Somehow the subtle shifts of the air are telling--they know I am on my way home. I imagine in some buried corner of their minds, in the areas that believe the white men manufacture cell phones with magic in addition to science, that the land, the ground, the rain has told them to behave; Ghana knows that a grave misstep of her people could jeopardize the effect of her drums and song. I buy my last helping of wagashi, take photos, exchange email addresses. My time in East Mamprusi is coming to an end.

The small puppy newly added to our compound household begins to follow me adoringly from the house to my office. At night, the goats wedge themselves against my door in a foul-smelling, innocent-if-stupid attempt at keeping me inside. The joking, half-pleading words of Sumnibomah women on my last visit repeat through my head: "You're not leaving yet, you're sleeping another night...". As my final load of washing dries under eaves pouring with rain--yet another of Mama Ghana's attempts at restraining me--I organize the last of my hours in Nalerigu into a schedule of last-minute errands, of simple tasks, of goodbyes. My last family meal passes. I give my final gifts.

In the early morning, I meet the motorbike called to take me to the transit station. Our load is cumbersome but manageable, as it was the first night I arrived. We ride carefully and reach our point of transfer; I buy my ticket, I stow my luggage, and I say my goodbyes to the driver.

The last bus of the week pulls out onto the Gambaga road turning south-west: towards Tamale, away from Nalerigu.

I fix my eyes on the sunrise over the Gambaga escarpment.

Exchange Rate

Just as I gave up things to come to Ghana, I find myself cataloguing the things I'm giving up in leaving it. I traded subculture for tribal culture; now I pass from not being allowed to show my thighs to having to shave my legs. I'm exchanging good white wine and a night life for bathing under the Milky Way. Sincere greetings from strangers for impersonal pedestrian safety; the sweeps of the Gambaga escarpment for the peaks of the Detroit skyline. The artisan community of Bolgatanga for the artist community of Toronto. Friends, family, familiarity and adventure, for friends, family, familiarity and history. Language barriers with common interest, for interest barriers with common language. Public transit that will wait for you, for public transit that arrives on time. Being "the white person" for being no one special, which is much more appetizing than it seems (I guarantee every EWB volunteer in Ghana has had a moment where they wanted to do terrible things to the next guy who reminded them they're a “Suliminga”).

But as I leave West Africa, I'm forced to take stock of the things I'm bringing home—obviously apart from Ghanaian outfits, Dagomba hats, and shea butter soap. I've taken enough pictures to drown my little ThinkPad laptop—they should be enough to give people a feel of what it was like, and just might be enough to help explain the things I've seen. I've taken recipes for food made with peanuts and fish, and the skill to eat it with only my right hand. I've taken an upper-leg strength and tone that can only come from perfecting the daily squat, and a right shoulder thinned but strong from carrying everything I need on it. I'm bringing a rear end bonier than usual from malarial weight loss and too many rocky jaunts on motorbikes. I'm bringing less-widened eyes, an understanding, a million questions. I'm bringing stories. I'm bringing hope.

And I'm bringing enthusiasm to convey my experiences, to use these four months in Ghana as the lever that moves the people of Africa closer to North American life. I haven't decided when to close this blog, because despite leaving Ghana, my placement is definitely not over. I have 8 months of explanation, sharing and storytelling to do—and thats apart from my almost inevitable battle with reverse-culture shock, as I come back into a world that is supposed to be familiar, but is so, so different than what I thought it was...

I've been told the most difficult part of this adventure is not leaving, is not the entry into a new culture. It's fitting yourself back into the one you left.

I'll keep you posted.

In Quiet Ways

While my back was turned, the trees of Tamale erupted into varying shades of yellow flowers; it is the closest thing to a Western change of season I've seen since I arrived, and it reminds me of how long I've been living, as the locals say, “in Ghana here”. The taxi I take to the CIFS office is driven by a laughing Dagomba man who asks me, after I've greeted him in Dagbani, how long I have been “in Ghana here”.

As July screeches to a close, I find myself in a calm scramble to tie up loose ends. My schedule is erratic and comprehensive, pocked with day-by-day activity notes: day-trip to Sumniboma, EWB report 3 submission, cook for host family, visit primary school, PARED diagnostic...

...As August opens, I find myself in a flurry of activity unexpected in the last weeks of July. Where I thought was a work schedule like an open plain is actually riddled with the moguls of donor NGO visits; where I thought I would have two weeks to wrap up without interruption, I must navigate my wrap-up between entertaining the wonderful people from CARE international, the World Food Program, the District Assembly, and our own CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency). I'm glad for the bustle and business; it keeps me on task, keeps my momentum up, increases the balance on my still-growing bank of experiences. I'm glad for the field visits and the travelling that accompanies them; it gives me an opportunity to say goodbye to the more inaccessible pockets of East Mamprusi that I adore so much.

A former JF in my district a few years ago advised me to “enjoy falling in love with Nalerigu!” Instead I've found myself in love with the small surrounding communities; with the hills and valleys, the rushing sound of the streamwater after a hot rain, the rocky roads, baobabs in Sumniboma and Kusasi dancers in Zarantinga. I feel as though Nalerigu is not home—nothing can stand in for the place where I grew up—but is a benevolent stopping place, full of bustle and enough activity to keep a girl on her toes. Whenever I climb onto the back of a motorcycle, though, on my way out on the dangerous paths and steppes that lead to the small communities we visit, I feel the closest sensation to coming home that I have had since coming to “Ghana here”.

This coming week is my last in East Mamprusi, and as the preparations to leave become more hurried, I look at the people I pass on the street and wake to the sound of in a subtly different way. I am happy—nervous, slightly frightened, but very happy—to be going home, but I am not pleased to be leaving the North. Even as the tension of these weeks becomes tighter, and the small, culture-shocking differences in the way people are grate on me like a steel emery, I think about not seeing the hills and the remarkable blue of the clear West African sky, and it feels strange and hollow. What surprises me the most is my reaction: I have been told many times that I will never want to leave Africa, but not that the prospect of going home would be more appetizing, but less scary. I feel almost as though I could leave the people—but the thought of leaving the land tugs at me in quiet ways...

Entrepreneurs

Hacking out a living in a developing country is no easy task—if you are lucky enough that personal circumstances do not complicate it, macro-economic trends probably do. Nevertheless, I have seen some inspiring examples of people taking their skills, talents, and assistance and turning them into business.

These are some of them.

Rita runs her dress-making business from the former office of my NGO. Under the old PARED masthead are wide-flung barn doors that open her workshop: a set of tables, six Chinese manual sewing machines with stools, and 50 different posters of dress, outfit and clothing style collections. After scraping together enough money for technical training in Kumasi, she can reproduce any of the over 500 styles with little more than a glance at them—and make you a purse from the fabric fragments to boot. Rita works 7 days a week, 51 weeks a year when allowing for funerals, weddings, and the annual bout of malaria. She also trains 4-6 apprentice seamstresses, which she says she is thankful for “because otherwise I would have no friends”. Rita's work is consistent and busy—and despite struggling slightly to pay rising utility bills, her business appears to be taking off. It's easy to see why: Rita is easy company, and a good tailor to boot.

Bobobo's is situated across the Bolga road from a ritzy gas station in Tamale, but their products can be found in stores along the main drag. Through a grant from the French development agency, the women of Bobobo's buy organic, ethical-cooperative-farmed mangoes from the Integrated Tamale Fruit Company (a current partner of EWB) for solar-drying and packaging. The fruit leather is sinfully delicious, and it is one of the few places to buy any sort of dried fruit in the Northern Region at all. The low cost and maintenance of the solar dryer has allowed them to branch into drying bananas, coconut, tomatoes, ginger and hot pepper, and revenue from these sales is directed into the procurement of a juicing facility to expand their product line. Finding this place was a boon to me in the North, where fruit is seasonal to the extreme. The fact that eating dried mangoes can be virtually pesticide-, emissions-, cruelty- and guilt-free is an added bonus.

Adoko can be found by locating the bobbing, roaming Rasta hat in the Tamale Metromass bus station. A musician from Bolgatanga, he learned the trade of carving wooden toys from the same man who taught him to play the guitar. Smiling warmly and flipping the tiny acrobats that spin through his handiwork, he's a calm centre of the swirling hurricane of humanity that is the permanent weather condition of the station. For Ghc1.50, the toys are meant to bridge the gap in income between gigs with his band—after all, he said, he learned to make them so he could stay away from hard labour in construction gangs, and still have the energy (and undamaged fingers) to play at night. Every time I see him, there is a new invitation to a new gig; I have yet to see if his playing matches his handiwork.

Many people believe that the road to sustainable development is paved with economics instead of good intentions. EWB partners such as the Rural Enterprise Project are making leaps and bounds to help take small business into the smaller towns of the North, and help them succeed—but it is nice to see that even without REP, some people are taking care of business.

Hello, Goodbye

As my placement draws to a close, the focus I previously directed to establishing and cementing relationships in East Mamprusi has turned to closing and honouring the relationships I've formed. Some require short goodbyes, scheduled on a lunch break or afternoon before I leave for Tamale; other, more important relationships require some planning, and some quality time. When I realized the time I had remaining in Nalerigu had dwindled to two weeks, I pushed aside other concerns and arranged moto transportation to the Sakogu area: I needed to say goodbye to Sumniboma.

The three weeks that passed since my last visit had changed the place in the ways only good rains can. The maize and millet obscured the views of the village from the winding footpaths; the baobabs hung heavy with fruit where they once hung with flowers. My day-trip was poorly timed on both a Sakogu market day and a voter registration drive, and those who weren't out making their 4-day purchases were putting themselves on the political grid for the happily “compulsory activity” that is voting in their community. The Pastor had traveled to Gambaga for the periodic retrieval of the National Health Insurance Scheme hospital admission cards—we passed him on the road—but Doris, Mr. Sumniboma, the IFTs and the EQUALL teachers were all there, excitedly greeting me, happy that I had returned. It felt like an illogical sort of homecoming, so natural despite my language barriers, and so comfortable despite the lack of Nalerigu's amenities. On the way to the Chief's palace I was barraged with news: Doris' husband was returning from South Africa where he drove trucks, classes had vacated for a week, Mr. Sumniboma's mother's hut was threatening to collapse so she had to move into the spare room. For every item, I had a question—how was Doris' son? Is there any news on the Pastor's second wife? How is the teak seedling planting going? Have you been getting enough rain? The biggest news was splashed all over the village in the work and bustling activity of the women and kids. The District Assembly had approved a plan for the construction of a new 3-room school block for the community last week. In typical Sumniboma fashion, the entire community had begun breaking rocks for the foundation the next day. The many neat ziggurat piles of small stones stood like monuments to the incredible verve of this community. Especially when I realized the men had been seeding a new tree plantation, and the work was done entirely by young mothers and kids on vacation.

After sitting with the Chief, who thanked me for the mutual exchange of knowledge and asked me not to forget them, he suggested we take a photo of us together, so that they could have some record of my being here. The user-friendly nature of my camera preceded my teaching, and before I even got up to show them, they had figured it out. I promised to leave the photo with PARED; I wondered as I promised if it would wind up framed in the Chief's reception area, like the photos of his prominent brothers and sons.

The women wanted to give me something to remember them by, and to my delight, decided I should apply zaama, local henna on the hands and feet that dyes them a deep red. Doris and I talked for an hour, my hands wrinkling in the brown goo covering them. When we removed it, the colour was unbelievable, but the reaction from the women was incredible. Whooping laughter, excited hand-clapping, and the exclamation that I was a real Ghanaian woman now came rushing out of every house I went to greet. What a shame, I thought, that I only had 2 weeks.

The day was spent passing from house to house, explaining my intention and my obligation to leave, what Doris called “going to goodbye them”. Over and over, I was met with exuberant and surprised welcomes, swiftly followed by a look of disappointment that I was going “back to my place”. I left each house followed by cries of “God bless you!” and “Safe journey!”. Some even tried to give me kola—a cedi to purchase a traditional kola nut as a goodbye present, and enough money to buy ingredients for a whole meal's soup.

During late afternoon, standing by the motorbike about to depart for Nalerigu, the sadness hit me like a blow to the stomach. It wasn't like homesickness; I was missing Sumniboma already, and I hadn't even left. It was more regret that I may miss the leaps of progress that the amazing people of this village are fated for. To me, they are the poster-children for development—a whole community of Dorothys, in EWB-speak.

Remembering them cannot be difficult: they are impossible to forget.

For my fellow DRED heads at home...

Being at once a development worker, and a drama student, coming to a completely different culture sparked my interest in the performance art that culture breeds. It took me some time to find some examples of Ghanaian drama to experience firsthand; nothing up here is affluent enough to fund luxuries like theatres, and the school curriculums under-emphasize it, if it's present at all. But I finally found some—in the capital city of the Northern Region, and here in my home village. This is what I've figured out so far.

Drama here starts in dance--tribal storytelling of myths, or loosely improvised interactions between people dressed as chiefs and old gods at festivals. There is much more dance in these than drama, and the traditional drummers narrate the stories with a sort of morse-code with the drums. All traditional dance-dramas are non-speaking, although sometimes they sing. However, in high schools and through NGOs, western drama is being adapted to serve the needs of people here.

In NGOs, role playing is being utilized as a means of community outreach and social justice work. Role-playing modules that look suspiciously like Boal work are brought into rural communities and used to address issues like women's rights, HIV/AIDS stigmatization, pollution and bush burning, and to explain intervention projects for everything from water and sanitation to the installation of teak plantations. In rural and urban areas alike, Ghanaians have embraced the "energizer"--warm-up drama games that break up the monotony of the myriad workshops and long discussions that occur in the development community. I dont know who introduced it, but I think it's wonderful--it's great to see proud, well-dressed Ghanaian professionals clapping their arms together like crocodiles and still retaining their dignity with their peers.

In high schools, drama clubs and theatre projects are an after-school activity. They occur both in the local language of the school and in English, and more often than not, are written by the students or staff themselves. It is most common for the plays to be moralistic and educational in theme and tone, trying to teach good practices such as hand-washing, respect for women, and using latrines. That being said, I've found that excretion humour--the poop joke--is a universal standard, and is wholeheartedly embraced by Ghanaian high school populations in their drama. Technically, high school dramas in Ghana happen a lot like high school dramas in Canada: simple sets of furniture and props are used, and changed for a change in setting; students wear costumes that are easily recognizable to help to identify the roles they play, and they tailor language, speech patterns and accents to reinforce character. The structure of the plays is often simple, chronological, and familiar to me from my own high school. The difference is they're usually performed outside.

From my understanding, famous African playwrights such as Wole Soyinka are more often produced in the south of the country than here in the Northern Regions. There are also African stories that are the cultural equivalent of Oedipus Rex (adaptations of the original? I dont know--the people I've talked to think it's an African tale), possible evidence that drama that is too contentious to be put onstage here is shifted into literature.

Film, through the influences of Bollywood (India), Nollywood (the booming Nigerian film industry) and Hollywood, has crept into the popular culture of Ghana. Movies written and filmed in the Dagbani language are readily available in the large cities in the North--I'm bringing one home, although I'll barely be able to understand what's being said. These movies show the merger between traditional Dagomba culture and contemporary culture in Ghana fairly well--and the language barrier almost recreates the feeling I had getting off the plane.

Almost.

"Come and Buy!"

Every 3rd day, Nalerigu begins to buzz with extra activity. Trotros and lorries ferry people and goods from surrounding villages to the centre of town starting as early as 8am. Street food sellers, and shops on the main drag or close to the marketplace itself have already been preparing for the influx--people from rural villages for miles around travel here as Nalerigu becomes the economic centre of the district. Market day draws out almost every housewife and most husbands for errands and social interaction--even the American doctors at the BMC make the trip in their green pickup trucks. And for good reason: in Ghana here, market day is certainly an experience.

My walk from my house to the market takes me past my office, the Coca Cola distribution point, and the best Wagashi seller in town. Chronically incapable of resisting, I spend 20 pesewas--roughly 20 cents-- on the deep-fried local cheese and munch happily through the path as it narrows conspicuously past the threshold of market stalls. There are many avenues into an open-air market; I start at the right-hand side, partially because of a lack of human congestion, but mostly because it brings me straight to the African traditional medicine stalls.

I greet the young man operating the stall, and begin asking the questions I never had the nerve to ask until now.

"What's that?" I ask, pointing to a bag of beige grass and dirt.

"Elephant shit", he tells me.

I'm told the half-skinned crocodile skulls, elephant skin, ocelot pelts and various other endangered animal parts come from Nigeria--the popular answer for the origins of other things equally illegal. The row of traditional medicine supply stalls all have different mystery suppliers--the bird heads and tortoise shells come from "the big man", or "a special place", or simply "Guinea". They are supposed to treat any number of problems, both physiological and social--it is just as likely to receive a potion or treatment for jealous neighbours as it is for a nasty headache. The young man running the stall begs me for my telephone number, so he can follow me to "my place". I tell him he better learn a new trade first; there are few ocelots in Canada.

The traditional medicine booths segue in three directions into hardware materials and dated electronics, cheap Chinese-imported sandals, and bowls upon bowls of Ghanaian rice and maize for sale. The market sprawls in a complex maze of stalls, shelters and sellers, with food and ingredient sellers roughly linked by a winding path, fabric and cloth sellers dotted throughout, and electronics, kola, beauty supplies, pots and utensils, and ready-made clothing and shoes on the perimeter. The noise is impressive and joyous; the colours are intense. I squeeze through teenage girls with baskets, children selling local frozen sugar concoctions, and women with babies on their backs and grain sacks on their heads. When I reach the food and ingredients, the women erupt into a chorus of "Suliminga, come and buy!" I'm offered local okra and bananas from Techiman, hundreds of kilometres to the south. I pass up both, but buy tomatoes and garlic--I plan on making pasta for my host family.

The Fulani man who owns the first fabric stall I ever entered greets me in lispy French, takes my hand and leads me under the shelter for his wares. When he asks to know what I'm buying from him today, I have to disappoint him--I'll bankrupt myself if I buy any more gorgeous Ghana cloth.

Finished with my purchases, I saunter home under the sun--stopping, out of utter weakness, for more delicious, heart-attack-inducing wagashi, and to greet a shopkeeper friend with beautiful facial tattoos. Two children selling bean flour donuts from containers on their heads follow me home, skipping, giggling and demanding I buy 50 pesewas worth of their food.

I wait til they draw close, spin around and chase them away, as they shriek with laughter.

Between Safehouse and POW camp

The 86 elderly women crammed two to a room in the dilapidated compounds I visit come from different tribes, different villages, and even different districts. They have one thing in common: forced from their homes, they live in squalor in Gambaga, the capital of the East Mamprusi district, under the care and rule of the local chief. Like most refugees, the brutal conditions they live in now are still much better than the ones they left behind. Unlike most refugees, the conditions they fled were imposed on them by their own communities, the places they grew, and raised families in.

The Gambaga Witch Camp was established over 100 years ago, when a local Muslim religious leader demanded that instead of publicly killing the women in the locality deemed as "witches", they should be sent to him for care and "de-witching" under traditional authority. Eventually, custody of the camp and all the women in it was transferred to the Chief of Gambaga, but the conditions, concepts and practices that both inspired the camp and maintain it all remain. The camp walks a thin line between women's shelter and POW settlement. Most of the women accused of witchcraft arrive at the camp heavily drugged and beaten; once put into the custody of the chief, he exposes them to traditional shrines to determine whether they are actually witches--regardless of their testimony or opinion on the matter. If they pass the test, they are sent back to their homes, the witness of the Chief enough to largely clear them of suspicion. If they fail, they are settled at the witch camp--but not before a process of "de-witching", in which they have the small gods of the shrines invoked against them, and are fed potions designed to impede their "spiritual powers".

The man who introduced me to the women is from a local NGO called the Friends of Disadvantaged Women and Children, formed specifically to protect the human rights of those charged with witchcraft in Ghana. He tells me that most common reasons for women being sent to the camp are sickness without treatment, poor harvests, and bad dreams or epilepsy, all blamed on old traditionalist women. In the same breath, he tells me that many of these women ARE witches, and not just women accused of witchcraft; he claims that polygamist practices prompt women to "witch-hunt" the children of their fellow wives, to assure the success and inheritance of their children. This attitude is far from the last contradiction I encounter on my visit here; I am told the women will answer any question I put to them, then find questions about the reasons they are at the witch camp, and whether or not they consider themselves to have "spiritual powers" not even asked of them. The women are allowed to come and go from the camp as they please, but they are required to farm for the Chief even in their advanced age, and with no familial support, have very limited means of securing a supporting income. The ones who are fit enough travel far into the bush to gather firewood; the ones who are not sit in the compound, waiting. Some even have young children sent for them to care for, adding injury and collateral damage to an already insulting situation.

Mariama Aleedu has a sharp mind and bright brown eyes for a woman of her 60's; she has been living at the witch camp for 6 years. When I ask her if she enjoys living here, she tells me of how they suffer hunger, poor living conditions, and unshakable, heart-numbing apathy. When I ask if she would like to go home, she tells me gravely that it isn't safe. Efforts by the Chief and organizations like the Friends of Disadvantaged Women have been made to ensure the stay of these women is more comfortable than at present, but no one has even begun to tackle the issues that force these women here in the first place. The seething, roiling problem that is women's lack of rights in Africa is corroding lives in many ways--the Gambaga Witch Camp is an example of some of the more complex.

High Tide

I round the corner on the path to work to meet a seething mass of bodies, cloth, and grain sacks. The World Food Project truck has finally come, and villagers from all around the district are steadily flowing into Nalerigu, congealing into a solid wall of people filling the courtyard in front of the PARED office. They come with bags hitched to their bicycles, donkeys and carts patiently waiting and grazing—some villages have even hired trotros to cart their spoils back to their homes. I can't help thinking this is a strange sight to witness in front of my local development organization.
The rainy season of 2007 was disastrous for the Northern Regions of Ghana. Widespread droughts followed by torrential rains caused the dams in Burkina Faso to overflow; the resulting deluge covered most of the region, and put acres of farms, homes, belongings and lives under 10 feet of water. The majority of the East Mamprusi district—subsistence farmers all—had their harvest and their topsoil washed away with their belongings, leaving them with nothing to eat, and nothing in which to grow anything new. The UN-funded World Food Program asked PARED to facilitate the distribution of food aid to the thousands in the district that would qualify as beneficiaries. I know that PARED, as a development organization that believes Africa can feed herself, doesn't support the concept of food aid on principle. I also know they agreed because increasing numbers of skinny legs and distended stomachs were meeting them in the rural villages we serve.
The sheer numbers of people lining up to collect these staple grains are staggering. My counterpart Sidik processes each one, finding their name on a 40-page list-by-community, and recording their presence with a purple-inked thumbprint. The large white bags of Ghanaian-grown maize and Burkinabe beans waiting to be taken away are stacked behind the office girls, an 8 foot high wall of sandbags against the flood of human hunger rising steadily as the time since the last successful harvest lengthens into 2 years. I look around me into the faces of the Ghanaians waiting to recieve, and recognize people I've met in Zambulugu, the La-atarigu blacksmith and his wife, the dry-season farmer from Gbandaa who gave me my first cassava. Almost the entire population of Sumniboma is there; I am greeted excitedly by 10 and 20 people at a time, all sporting broad smiles, all inquiring after my health, and when I will visit next. The sunny and friendly Ghanaian temperment is nigh-unquenchable, it seems, even as they stand in lines in a gesture tantamount to the admission that they are slowly starving.
We talk about the rains, and “how much better they are”. They never say what they are better than; it goes acknowledged without being stated. It is much better this year than last-- and every time I see the clouds roll in, I hope that the earth can swallow the worst of the sean's deluge still to come.

School is In

A sea of pink shirts in military formation greets me in English as I walk into the classroom. The 63 students clad in the unisex short-cropped haircuts and rosey livery of the Nalerigu Area Secondary School are crammed into worn and vandalized old-fashioned wooden desk-and-chair combinations. They have been awake since 6:30, dressing, sweeping their school grounds and dormitories, visiting the dining hall for porridge, and standing in line. They are already falling asleep on their feet, slouched against disinterested arms on the surfaces of the old desks. I'm invading their Social Sciences class, however, and having a grinning white girl this thrilled to be teaching seems to be a rare occurance. Within 10 minutes, they're asking tough questions about contentious issues; within 15 minutes, I'm getting a very clear, very interesting perspective on education in a country that recites litanies about teaching being the only road to development.
Having a background in constructivist education methods made me completely unprepared to face 60 adolescents trained in a very militaristic fashion. The same institution that claims to be grooming the leaders of tomorrow that will change the world is demanding their imitation of the leaders of today. Compliance appears to be the golden rule: the hierarchy of the school is strictly enforced, with the headmaster strictly controlling his teachers, prefects in charge of every class and dormitory, and the voices of boys clearly out-ranking and out-powering girls in classroom activities. The questions I am asked are fraught with undertones of chauvinism; “In Ghana here, we have this polygamous marriage; how many wives can I take in Canada?” “In Canada, if I have a wife, how many children am I allowed to make her bear for me?” “In Ghana here, they say that there is this thing where men have sexual intercourse with other men, and other deviant behaviour—is it illegal in your place?” I find my answers redirecting the question towards the girls of the class, sitting quietly and demurely, gaping at my pallor and smirking at my ease of speech. I find myself reacting with vehemence—“homosexuality is not a deviant behaviour where I come from”, “In Canada, you would need to ask your wife how many children she wanted to bear for you—and you would have to listen to her.” “In my place, if you marry more than one woman, they put you in jail.” The gasps, giggles and barrages of questions morph into discussions on the differences between attitudes and values here and in the West; it becomes apparent that the teenagers in front of me have never thought that maintaining a developed country is so much work.
I leave the class a twittering mass of voices in excited conversation; almost everyone is discussing something about Canada, development, or me. I leave the class satisfied, but slightly disturbed; to me it has become clear that there is a lot of work to do with the youth of today, before they can forge a better tomorrow.

Boarding the M Train

My apologies to any readers for the disruption of my regularly scheduled blog update. I was quite indisposed this weekend, and actually feeling positively malarial.

Ha. Haha. Hm.

My previously sympathetic-but-cavalier attitude towards boarding the M Train shifted when a six-legged bloodthirsty someone bought me a ticket. Despite almost-continuous use of my bed net (and always when there is question of the mosquito-proofing of the room, like mine at the compound), religious and timely consumption of my antimalarials, and confident pumping of every immuno-booster known to man into my system, what some of my fellow JFs considered inevitable for me finally occurred, and I promptly got malaria. Indeed, they're probably shocked it happened so late in the game. It crept upon my liver like a well-executed poisoning. It was ingenius in its subtlety. It happened like this:

Monday July 7th: Feeling ill; went for a blood smear to see if I had filled the vacancy in my liver. Test was negative for malaria. I went home, took a nap, and felt okay. Tricky, tricky.

Friday, July 18th, 1am: I wake up to what I feel could only be someone boring through my abdomen with the thing that built the Chunnel. I take an immodium, hoping the gas relief will kick in. I toss, turn, put my rear in the air, and do all manner of other embarrassing things in an attempt to help stem the pain. For my hubris, it increases.

Friday, July 18th, 3am: Vomiting begins. Despite it being seemingly impossible, pain increases. I give up trying to find a position to sleep in, and concentrate on not crying.

Friday, July 18th, 4am: I run out of things to vomit. Curiously, vomiting does not cease. Small unintentional groans and moaning start to emit from what I can only assume is my throat. All my attention is focused on trying to get the sun to come up so I can go to the hospital and have someone knock me out.

Friday, July 18th, 4:30am: The thought angrily occurs: "What the @!&% did I eat?!"

Friday, July 18th, 5:15am: I hear noises outside, and stumble out of my room. Doris is fetching water. I ask her when the hospital opens. She tells me the hour: 8am.

Friday, July 18th, 5:17am: My eyes cross, and I fall over in pain and hopelessness.
Soon after collecting me from the floor, Doris tells me there is emergency care open all night that could take me right that instant. I restrain my urge to suffocate myself for my inadvertant stupidity.

Friday, July 18th, 5:30am: I lurch to the hospital with Doris in tow. I stop three times to vomit. In lieu of stomach acid or food, I expel the ninja-turtle green fluid that holds the bubbles in a carpentry level. I absentmindedly wonder where I've been keeping that stuff in my body, and why suddenly it's in my stomach.

Friday, July 18th, 6am: The blood smear they took from my finger comes back positive for malaria. They march me to the men's ward. They yank down my Snoopy pyjama pants, exposing my cave-tanned white rear to 12 emaciated and previously bored Ghanaian village men, and stick me with an injection that is supposed to stem my vomiting. For their efforts, I vomit in the sink. For 10 minutes.

Friday, July 18th, 6:15am: An American doctor that runs the hospital happens to wander into the mens ward and decides that having a frail-looking white girl this wretched in public simply wont do. He sends me down the path to his house, where I collapse on the couch.
I have a faint recollection of my father calling me and me telling him that I'm okay. I also remember limeade.

Monday, July 21st, 11am: I wake up, and discover that I've been taking a three-day course of antimalarials, writing short nonsensical entries in my daily journal on looseleaf in unintelligible handwriting, and expelling a lot of liquids. I stand, and despite some difficulty, can actually keep my equilibrium.
I write a thank-you note to the doctor's family and walk hazily back to the compound.

As I write this, I'm only recently sure I am in the clear--malaria tends to relapse if not eradicated completely by its host, and I had to go back for another blood smear to see if the steady stream of toxins in my body got all the little bastards. Complications also might be a problem; we're not really sure at this point why I'm still so sore in the right half of my abdomen. I'll be proceeding with caution, thats for sure. It was a bad time for this to happen (is there a good time for malaria?), but considering the number of times a -year- people in Ghana tend to get malaria, I guess it's almost a necessary part of the experience. I guess.

Not that I'd reccommend it to anyone.

Photo Roundup #4: Sumniboma

Dorothy herself: mother of 4, wife 2 of 3, farmer of maize, groundnuts and millet, and an incredible example of how difficult women in Ghana work to stay afloat.

The local blacksmith, resting under a shade structure by one of the many baobabs after a day full of pumping coals and slamming heated metal with anything solid until the desired effect is reached.

The school children rise and greet me in rote english with military precision that actually makes me sad. I try to gesture that they should stop saluting me; only a few of the girls listened and understood.

The view from the neighbour's was pretty incredible--both inside the house and out. The more urban the setting, the more rare the door-painting becomes; a brutal shame, considering how beautiful and intricate it is.

I cant think of a better elder to be in charge of the youth...

Doris, walking the long road from Zambulugu to Namasim, to Sumniboma... limping, as her diseased leg pained her for the sake of my exceptionally poor Mampruli skills.

Two of the many children that would camp out in front of my compound, waiting to call me by my name, and watch me smile and wave, grateful for being more than a "Suliminga" this time. The donkey is part of a CARE International initiative aimed at assisting transport of water and goods in rural areas like East Mamprusi.

My landlord, Mr. Sumniboma himself; head IFT, next in line for Chieftancy of the community, tall, Muslim, soft-spoken and incredibly generous.

One of the community IFTs standing in his family compound--a sprawling monstrosity of domestic life, all 17 connected huts crawling with children, wives, sisters, aunts, cousins: cooking, playing, relaxing, and going to farm. He is the last born of his father's many wives; he speaks english, volunteer-teaches, and is one of three local family-planning and STD counsellors.

The stream separates Sumniboma from Sakogu, the nearest source of electricity and the site of the Area Council. It also saves women the trouble of bringing borehole water 2km to the house just to do the washing.


If I wanted any more proof that Sumniboma understood the real requirements of development work, I had it here... over the heads of children, the declaration that you can do "Nothing Without Something".

More reflections from Sumniboma, and some chat about my job, technology, and the coming crunch, next weekend!

Village Stay: Sumniboma

The landscape in Sumniboma is richer than a postcard. I cant figure out why no one has built a spa resort to capitalize on the green hills, rock outcroppings, gorgeous baobabs, bubbling springs and picturesque community. Not to mention the views: from the hills surrounding it, it feels like you can see the whole country for miles on end, clear, sharp, and serene.
The Fulani cowherders sing unabashedly, waving and smiling as they direct their grazing herd. The Mamprusis and Frafras that live here are the most welcoming people I've ever met in a country renowned for its friendliness. They are hard workers, but have dedicated every scrap of their time and patience to my sunburned, wide-eyed days in their village--just like they have doggedly and staunchly put time and effort into the development of their community since 1998, I later found out. The Baptist pastor made himself my tour guide and translator. A local volunteer development worker named Doris has stayed with me in the room I am borrowing, translating, following me on my journeys, and insisting on carrying my things; she has two jobs (neither of which are paid), an infant son, an elderly mother to care for, and an injured leg, and she still followed me limping up the escarpment, spiting my concern with dogged courtesy. The man acting as my landlord, personal guard, and pack mule every time I go to lift my backpack, turns out to be the next in line for the chieftancy of Sumniboma, and one of the most important people in the hierarchy of the community.
I have intruded on and disturbed market transactions, the chief's house three times, innumerable infants terrified of strange pale faces, every class in the local mud school, people at farm and work, and virtually every house in the community. For all my irritations, I have been rewarded with groundnuts, a chicken, a hand-made fan, six eggs, a ram from the chief, and more happy visitors than I know what to do with. They called a meeting of the whole community to ask me to give them words of hope, and the opportunity to ask questions of each other. For my benefit alone, they brought out the ceremonial drums, and three dozen women raised their siren voices together, weaving traditional dances between the young men with clicking cowrie belts and traditional dancing boots. It is an honour that is rarely given, and I am certain is not deserved in this instance. Everyone I meet thanks me for coming to their community, even though I am an immense complication in their already difficult lives. They tell me that even the head of the NDC (a popular national party in the upcoming election) who was born and raised in Sumniboma and is stalwartly supported by its people despite that loyalty sometimes sacrificing their own interests, refused to stay the night in the community even for his brother's funeral. He stayed at the Chesterfield lounge, and had his meals brought in from Nalerigu; hard to believe, when the food I have eaten in Sumniboma is some of the best I have ever put in my mouth.
It is impossible that I am the first outsider to see the immense value in this small community, but all indications the people of Sumniboma give me say that is indeed the case. But I know for certain that I will not be the last; Sumniboma is a shining example of why I am here in Ghana, and why I want to do the work I am doing now, and the work I plan to do in the future. They are an entire community working with what they have to improve their futures, and they do it brightly, tirelessly, and constantly. They are an entire community of Dorothys, the central figure of the inspiration EWB draws on.
They have recharged my batteries.

Photo Roundup #3

Farming near the riverbanks has its benefits and downsides--like entire crops washing out

A woman and her son from Da-azio, who would have a modeling contract and a movie career anywhere else in the world

The crowd of children that follows me home from work every day

The statue of the founder of the BMC, with the opening of the clinic behind

A raquet and ball homemade toy, product of host brother Silas' genius

Me, deep in thought at the retreat, thin, tanned and freckled

A young village girl in Tamale, not in school, but selling water like dozens of others

Dean, resplendent in his Ghanaian zoot suit.

A woman of Da-azio standing with her infant at the field she has just sown; everyone participates in planting season

My coworker Baba facilitating the crowd at Tamboku

Steph, and her new friend at Mole park. It's about three inches wide.

Shea nut processing in Da-azio; boiling the fruit, drying the nuts, shelling and grinding into butter.

Sights and Sounds

The sun is still asleep when the call to prayer rings out, sounding Arabian and exotic in the wan light of 4:30 in the morning. It floats through the windows, and subverts the crowing of roosters and braying of goats that precedes it at 4am and continues well into the night. It is the sign that the day has begun, and everyone, Muslim or otherwise, listens. Soon, as the sun creeps slowly up over the ridge of the Gambaga escarpment and floods by small trickles into my window, the sounds of compound life begin to awaken, and amplify.
Through closed eyes, clinging hopelessly to the last vestiges of sleep and relaxation, I hear Silas release the goats. The clacking of hooves on concrete floor and the distressed clucking of the chickens running for cover as they evacuate the compound is not buffered by the thin curtains on my windows and door. I can hear the splashing of Arija fetching water from the pump embedded in the floor, and the deep pouring sound as she transfers it to the rainwater drums, from which the cooking, cleaning and bathing water comes. The cooking fire heating the leftover TZ from the evening's dinner cracks quietly, and I can smell the smoke of the young wood feeding it. I hear the shuffling of extra feet; the school kids know that breakfast is coming, and the morning is a busy time.
I open my eyes to the thin scratching of the reed brooms expertly wielded by Salima and Afia against the concrete floor. The sound moves systematically across my hearing, from one end of the compound to the door, taking dust, debris, and animal droppings with it. The mewling of the house's kitten shows he has been disturbed. Through the clucking of the chickens I can hear the scraping of the dog's nails as she meanders around the compound, looking for a place to go back to sleep. I can hear 4 voices at once, arguing, laughing and giving instruction in Mampruli in all kinds of tones.
The sun streams through my windows; my cell phone clock says 5:45. Nematu and Jen are singing a song outside in the way that only those under four can; I peek out my window with just enough time to see Afia leaving to feed the pigs, a large bowl of spent pito millet balanced on her head. Arija and Salima are bent over one cooking fire, tending to the leftovers. Joyce is standing in a yellow, blue and orange patterned cloth, full bucket in one hand, on her way to bathe. As I wrench myself from bed and wrap myself in the cloth of my own, a shrill scream erupts—the toddlers have broken their peace treaty, and someone has landed a clumsily-aimed punch at the other over a cracker, or a bag of dawadawa powder. I put my feet into my sandals amidst the booming cries of matriarchal power ringing through the compound: Doris is mediating the conflict in no uncertain terms, laying down the law in Mampruli at 80 decibels, and distributing verbal lashings as punishment for the breach of peace.
I leave my room to greet everyone, and as always am met with a chorus of “Sister Ashley, good morning!” before I can squeak out a word. The Ghanaian tempers have cooled with the swiftness in which they flared, and everyone is happy. The sun is kind and not too hot; the day is fat with possibility.
I reach for my bucket, draw some water, and wash myself into the day.

Notes from the Road Less Traveled

In Ghanaian english, the word “road” has many meanings.
A “road” can be a tarred, flat, maintained stretch of pavement, over which traffic of all sorts travels from one place to another. A “road” can also be the beaten dirt space between two distances only kept free of vegetation by the passage of trucks, motorbikes, and hoofed animals. A “road” could be the sole open path through country foliage, grazing land, and difficult terrain, big enough only for foot traffic and stretching for miles. The distinction of “road” means only that travel is possible, but never specifies what means are possible to cross the distance with.

For example.





















The 2 roads to Tamboku, one of our CIFS beneficiary communities, contain every kind of hazard possible on a road--2ft square rivets cut by rainwater in the road bed; a choice of wheels slipping on pea gravel, mud, clay or sand; thrilling opportunities to puncture tires or brains on large jutting rocks, bash engines on metamorphic slabs, or smother and drown motive power in the 4ft deep, 16 ft wide rivers spontaneously breaking over and through the “road”. Goats, debris, heavily laden pedestrian groups, motorists and other obstructions bar the way through the ten inches of “road” just wide enough to squeeze a moto tire into, throwing doubt and fear about the safety of continuing at speeds in excess of 70km/h. Hands quickly become raw after gripping the bike to counteract the violent cantering, bucking and tipping of the two-wheeled metal-with-momentum propelling you. After the first 45 minutes of travel, your joints and muscles are jarred enough to require serious recuperation time. After the first 60 minutes, traveling in this way stops being fun. This sort of transit is essential to work with a Community Based Organization like PARED. If development was conducted only where roads were auto-accessible, the most vulnerable populations—those who cannot access markets or health care during the rains due to washed out roads, those passed over by NGOs due to inaccessibility—would be completely overlooked.
I am told by the Regional Planning Unit that the cost to build what Canadians would call a road of minimum safety requirements is 10,000 Ghana Cedis per kilometre. For District Assemblies with tiny annual operating budgets, not only is this impossible, but it is almost laughable. Most of the community development and infrastructure—boreholes, water and sanitation projects, clinics, school feeding programmes—are all funded by NGOs. Unfortunately, it is rare for transportation infrastructure to be included as spectacular and sensationalist enough for attention from international funds. As a result road building is often contracted to Chinese companies in for-profit industry that import all their materials and labour, draining money out of Ghana without any re-investment. A difficult problem to solve, in a country where contractor quality control is unheard of.
In the meantime, we laugh as our motorbikes get shaken into components, jarred into sputtering messes, and soaked to the carburators in river water. It is certainly an adventure, speeding across East Mamprusi. And it is better than walking—what so many around us do every day.

Retreat!

The rattling of the trotro shakes my hair into my face and the cap off my pen; it is clear the roads here have seen too many large trucks, too many passenger buses. It's the lush green they're driving through that they come to see: boatloads of tourists shaking and shimmying to the elephants at Mole game park, or the historic mosque at neighbouring Larabanga. However, our trotro comes to West Gonja for other reasons—although the perks of a foot safari were not ignored. The 2008 Junior Fellowship Midsummer Retreat is in Damongo, and the wildlife, greenery, and tourist-driven flush toilets are extras in the gift of reconnecting with each other.
Volunteer work for EWB is no easy task, and frustration, exhaustion and loneliness is part of the job description. Coming together gives us the necessary vent to release our anger, tension, disappointment and frustration accumulated in the first (and hardest) seven weeks, and recalibrate it into motivation, strategy, inspiration, and expectations. Even though we are on “retreat”, given an opportunity to withdraw temporarily from work, no one can stop talking shop. Conversations on government programs, how to motivate farmer groups, how to invoke behaviour change and the plights and successes of our women are continual. Every extra instant is spent on problem solving, project analysis, brainstorming and collaborating, making plans. For this one weekend, the problems of one volunteer become the projects of the others, and at the end of three days we emerge from the guesthouse each with a new initiative, a new plan, a direction, and the renewed verve to follow it.

I arrived frustrated, contorted into a mess by the difficult decisions and awkward positions of my life in Nalerigu. Now I know the best thing I could have been given was the safe time and space to cry it out, be angry, share stories of why we keep going, and decide what I'm to do about it. The motivation of the people around me is exhilirating; the passion I still feel about the work we are doing is more apparent to me when reflected in the faces of my fellow volunteers. This group of Canadians, sourced from all over the country and flung haphazardly across Ghana, has grown into quite the strong family. And after we cram our feet into dirty rubber boots, trek through Gonjaland in search of elephants, finish with our flush toilets and tourist inclinations and breathe our welcome sigh of relief, we'll rush back into the fold for seven more weeks of battling poverty--our brothers and sisters in arms in the back of our minds, and the stretch of the Northern Region in front of our eyes.

Colour, Consistency, Frequency, Volume

(photos of my precious latrine pending internet reliability)
This is for you, Stan.
You all know I do it. You do it too. You all knew it was going to be a challenge resplendent in all aspects of my life here.
For my sake and yours, lets talk about it.
Poop.
In Ghana, excrement is everywhere. I smell it in the streets, sweep it from the compound 3 times a day, witness its manufacture in fields in full view of all passing public (especially by grinning children screaming “Salaminga Hello!”), worry about it in my water. Its presence is dangerous and essential: it grows the food I eat from infertile soil, holds the walls of my compound together, gives the first danger-signs of illness, and can kill you when trifled with. Every illness in Ghana is accompanied by it. Revealing you are ill is a surefire means into a discussion of its colour, consistency, frequency, volume, pain, and anecdotes about any of the above, by your host family, your boss, random strangers at the house or in the street, and doctors of every type. After such discussion with the latter, it is often likely you'll be requested to somehow scrape together a sample for study, assumedly from somewhere in the ten foot concrete hole you last deposited into, housed in a container of your provision, not theirs. For Western volunteers, poop is such an accepted and open aspect of life that we buy an arsenal of pharmaceuticals and adult diapers to ward it from our clothes before we even leave the country—and when that fails, we have a support group to discuss and get through the, uh, fallout. The group gets its exercise, too—we often have someone new to add to the club. In West Africa, the laws of gastrointestinal logic are disbanded: there is absolutely no correlation between the volume put into the system, and the volume expelled from it.
The considerable exposure to the presence and reminders of poop require some psychological assimilation just to help volunteers get through the day. The latrine becomes the one dark, smelly, buzzing and uncomfortable point of solitude in the busy compound; even the clicking of the resident two-inch cockroaches fades away into the background noise as the call of nature is answered. Reading material is available—in the form of old school notes and waste paper, destined for what could be termed “hygienic use”. The flies become the group of friends you always knew were a bad influence, but still hung around with out of habit. Although expensive, toilet paper is available, allowing soft, holy respite from the chapping continual use of Hilroy notebooks tends to cause in the nethers. The leg-numbing squatting for what feels like hours is great for the glutes. It's not ideal, but it certainly is dealable—and I personally enjoy the knowledge that my use of the latrine prevents my personal contribution to the contamination of the local water table.
Urine is a completely different story for another day, but suffice it to say I try to calm myself with the reminder that it's largely water, ammonia, and sterile.