Last Day in Tamale

The View from the Bus: the busy streets of Tamale

Walking through the crowded streets of early market day, Tamale seems dirty and crazy, but really pretty friendly. People want to talk to you, and you find you want to talk to people. Running errands becomes easier the braver you become: you will have to dart across the crowded street between large busses, packed taxis, screeching motorbikes, goats, sheep and other terrified pedestrians; you will have to coax and barter with men in your Ghanaian accent, telling them that your friend only paid half of his asking price for a cheap chinese-imported plastic mirror; you will have to refuse beggars and children, looking to profit from the wealth that comes tattooed on you with your white skin. But amongst all this, the thick clouds of leaded gasoline smoke, the yelling voices and the old-Kensington-market smell of meat butchered on a street with a machete, there are friends hiding everywhere.

The MetroMass bus station: as many people as Tokyo, in one eighth the space.

Today I accidentally drew a crowd of 20-- refusing a marriage proposal with the fact that I am "married" led me to bring out my photo book, and answer four-dozen impassioned questions about snow, busses, the homeless, and whether they could marry my sister (thats you, Steph! Want a Ghanaian husband?). An offhand mention of how a new acquaintance had the same name as my godfather led to an invitation for dinner, and an offer of a free TV. Many of them, upon learning that I work for an NGO, had some questions that I ask myself: what am I doing for the Ghanaian people? What will I tell Canada about them? What will I do to help Ghanaians free themselves from poverty? I send the questions back at them--ask -them- what I should do. Most of them laugh in the good-natured way so common here, and say they do not know.
Tomorrow I embark on my first combined bus-trotro ride on my way back to Nalerigu. With luck, the place I am staying (hopefully for the summer) will be ready for my arrival--but Cat warns that I am in West Africa, where things rarely go right. We will see how it goes, whether I get the chance to start putting down roots immediately, or if it needs to be deferred a little longer.

When I get to Nalerigu, I have quite the task in front of me. Along with getting myself set up in my place (with a post with pictures to follow, of course), I have to meet the King of the Mamprusus, the Chief of Nalerigu, the District Assembly office, and the Ministry of Food and Agriculture outpost. Plus, we have to start on our work for the CIFs project--food security initiatives in East Mamprusi villages, including training, field facilitation, and proposal writing.

We'll see how this goes! Wish me luck!

-Ash

New Baptism

I wish I brought a video camera, if only to help explain what it's like here when the strong sun gets pushed aside, and the rains finally roll in.

It's Sunday, and I'm in Tamale again, relaxing temporarily at the EWB compound house before the beginning of the week-long CIFS training tomorrow, and I feel as though I have been given another start at this experience. Through the course of the last two days I've had the opportunity to relate some of my difficulties with the other volunteers, be in a social environment again, talk to my whole family, meet some incredible Ghanaians, and stomach a whole meal. It feels as though I'm getting my physical and emotional strength back a bit, and this means I can finally take the small steps I need to build my foundations in this organization, in PARED, and in Nalerigu. After a day of roaming the streets trying for supplies on a non-market day, having my first real (and shaking) encounter with some Ghanaian men's penchants for Canadian girls, and being denied my favourite internet cafe due to religious practice, the clouds flowed into the sky at an alarming and amazing speed, and all the water that the world has been holding for us fell heavy like cool, clear lead. Ryan, Courtney and I rushed outside to collect the runoff in an attempt to offset the brutal shortages in the area from the dry season, and as it soaked me through (and for the first time since I got here I actually felt -cold-), I felt like Ghana was washing the week off me and giving me another go. I only get to do this once; I am a Canadian in Ghana, trying to understand, which is a gargantuan challenge—but these are kind people, and I am a capable person, and while I'm here, I'll see what I can do. Confidence restored, at least temporarily. Lets do this!

Two nights ago, the rains ripped through Nalerigu. The concrete walls of the guesthouse were wailing at the wind, and the rolling, rolling thunder and lightning bass-pounded and strobe-lit my room after it thoroughly took out all our power. Clinging to my coworker on the back of his motorcycle, I saw zinc roofs lying twisted, walls collapsed. I didn't take pictures; I'd have felt like a disaster pornographer. Nalerigu has 1,000 proud and capable people, but certainly not unlimited means, materials or time. I worry about what they will do, where they will stay, whether it will be their farms or their families that suffer first. I worry about how strong this storm we just passed through will be when it hits them.

Subsistence farming makes it necessary to have a strange relationship with the rains; they're your respite from the Harmattan winds, your only irrigation, and the keystone of feeding your family, and they breed diseased mosquitoes, sweep away your soil and sterilize your land, rip your home to pieces, and flood your towns and cities. Too little rain will disarm a community in their fight to survive; too much will make survival impossible. Communities that we volunteer in today are still suffering the effects of last year's flood, and farmers who have experienced bumper crops in the past are importing these same foods from Korea to still be able to eat. Through the course of this season, my job could fluctuate, intensify, or even disappear, and it all depends on the rains.

Kind of wish we had a weatherman.

I'll write more during the week, and post again on the weekend. I may as well take advantage of Tamale while I can!

Keep me in your thoughts,
-Ash

This isn't just shock. It's an earthquake.

This is, by far, the most difficult thing I have ever had to do.

The climate, the culture, the people, the distance, the difficult lines of communication, and intense feelings of loneliness conspire to make this, my third day in Nalerigu, very hard. Culture shock hit me like a wave, at the same time that illness from food poisoning left me embarrassed, dirty, crying and dehydrated on a crowded public bus to a place I have never been. Being in Ghana now is like being on another planet; the strange people speak strange languages, and are afraid of you (somewhat understandably) for your differences; the food is strange and difficult to eat, and the water comes in astronaut-sealed plastic bags. It is difficult, expensive, and somewhat unreliable to communicate with your loved ones. The similarities you see between your home and this new place are facades—the differences emerge at simple scratching of the surface.

I have never experienced anything like this.

In-country learning was a positive experience, despite sunburn, and being with fellow Canadians helped stave off culture shock excessively well. However, going from spending every day with them, to spending no time at all, has certainly taken its toll on me. I may have some feedback for the EWB manual and operations next year.

At the time of writing this, I am able to maintain the confidence that things will get better. I'm hoping that this mindset will be the one that is correct. I already have a few best-practices, from the inevitable falling on my face:

Don’t let them leave you alone when you first get to your community; find a family or a home to stay in, have regular social interaction, get involved and stay distracted.

Don’t get sick the first night. Any sickness throws you headlong into culture shock and turns a bad emotional situation even worse.

Don’t think it’s not normal, expected, and dealable. This one’s a toughie, I can tell you.

From the 17th til the 24th I'm in Tamale, at a CIFS training, and staying at the EWB house. And after that, I move in with my host family! I'll have better things to report soon!

Missing Canada, and all of you,

-Ash

In Transit

As I write this, I'm sitting in the Amsterdam airport, feeling hazy, but still excited. It is 3am Toronto time, but here at 9am, everyone around me scrambles to write and post in these few hours of free time between the craziness of Pre-departure training and the reeling of culture shock and our inevitable exhausted collapse in Accra. The last week has been quite the experience: twelve hours a day of critical thinking, information retention, and thrilling but sometimes harsh truths. In the last few days, I have had to reconcile the notion of some of the friendliest people in a continent of friendly people using immolation as government punishment for petty theft. I have contended with the truth that I know nothing, and worse, habitually make assumptions that stand in the way of me learning. I have accepted the responsibility that every one of my actions has risks, negative consequences, and a need to be questioned. I have wrestled with the inevitability that I will have to make choices that runs the risk of damage in the short term, to maintain my ability to make positive change that is sustainable. I have wrestled with the inevitability that I will not only make mistakes, but that my responsibility to battle them from being repeated, misinterpreted, and internalized -must- be constant. This job is among the most difficult in the world, tackling one of the most difficult problems in the history of the human race. The climate is challenging, the terrain unforgiving, and the infrastructural supports so integral to Canadian society either fledgling, struggling, or absent. The culture is not only alien, but incredibly diverse, with more languages, traditions, ways of doing and reasons for doing than we could absorb in a lifetime, forget about four months. And yet, despite all of this, I have been forced to confront the difficult fact that incredible change as a result of my work is viable, possible. This opportunity provides me with a responsibility: to ensure, regardless of my professional project, my orders from above, or my shivering from culture shock, that I pioneer my own chances to make change. Our first and foremost indicator of success in past JF's has been the ability to own our placements. I am preparing to arrive, stabilize, and make this process mine.

Looking at the time-zone shifts and trying to anticipate the direction and severity of our jet lag, someone mentioned we lose time in Ghana that we will regain when we travel back to our families in August. I like that--we dedicate our days, nights and thoughts while we're here to the people at the bottom, but when we come back, those extra handful of precious hours are returned to us, to spend with those without whom we could not develop.

As a sidenote, I'd like to ask people to dedicate some of their thoughts, hopes, or research time to those in Myanmar/Burma. The damage the brutal military regime inflicted by closing borders, shooting students, monks, and minorities, barring the media from exposing them, and exploitative policy has been brought to a fever pitch by refusing aid organizations after the worst disaster in Asia since the tsunami. The effects of this meteorological and political storm will be felt around the world, especially because of the devastated rice producers affected in a time of soaring food prices, riots, and starvation. If you can help by time, resource or cash donation, or by talking: these are people with less of a voice than most, even among the most voiceless countries in the world.

Tomorrow at 8pm (or 4pm, in the Toronto area), I arrive in Accra, sleep, and board the twelve-hour pulic bus to Tamale for in-country training. Let the challenge begin!

-Ash