Good News and Staying On

There are a few different things to write about about life in Ghana. Where to begin?

I met a German woman Meike yesterday who had found online the NGO where I will be and agreed by email to come volunteer in Ghana for 3 months with them. She took time off school to come live in Africa. When I met her, her eyes were full of tears and she had just finished changing her plane ticket to go back to Germany today. She had come with her fiance about a month ago and they had spent two weeks going around together. He went back after two weeks (as they had planned) and she was to then start her position in the slums. She said she ended up getting malaria almost as soon as he left but it seemed to me that she had a serious case of home sickness. She just wanted to go home.

As I listened to Meike I wanted to say, "I know! I felt the same way but it gets better. It really does. You just gotta keep trying." But it was too late. Her ticket was already changed and she was relieved to be going home today.

So what would I say to her if I were to say something?

I would say that although it's not obvious on first glance, there's so much good here. You can find a corner restaurant, a little internet cafe, a place to live, favourite waitresses and water vendors and newspaper vendors... When most big cities in the world are criticized for being so anonymous, this is not one of them. Here you can meet people and start to carve out a small space for yourself in no time.

I would tell her that the NGO she's partnered with is actually amazing. That Farouk, the director, is an incredible man. A passionate, smiley eyed genius. He's busy but he's busy because he's committed and working hard to make a difference in the lives of people who are in a bad situation. He believes in his own country and his own people and while so many Ghanaians with education and money are running to the North, he has stayed here to make change.

The way the organization runs and the model they work with, approaching their work as empowerment is incredible. How they have found leaders from within the slum community, how the microcredit program is actually working and getting more money into people's pockets, the way so many women are taking on leadership roles in a place where women are rarely given positions of power... I would want to help her see all this.

On Tuesday nights Chris and I play basketball with a group of foreigners to Ghana, mostly Americans and Canadians though many Europeans too. It's the one time of the week where I really have anything to do with white people aside from Chris. I realize this when I realize how different it is and how, bit by bit, I become more accultured to Ghanaians and find encountering the Northeners hard - competitive, individualistic, brash. None of the easy smiles and warm handshakes like the Ghanaians. If I were to go into a group of Ghanaians, I would shake everyone's hands and we would all introduce ourselves and we would ask of each other how we were. Among the basketball crowd, it's nothing like that and when I try to talk to people, they stare at me like I'm breaking some unspoken rules.

I am learning through experience.

But still, I like playing basketball and I like the running, the game, the sweating.

On Wednesday nights is a spoken word poetry reading at a local bar. Art too happens.

In the slums, at the community meeting, the moderator shouted, "Information!" and the people responded, "Power!" Then he shouted, "Homeless!" and the people answered, "But not hopeless!" Though it's me who has money, education, access to resources, their togetherness makes them so powerful. This too I like.

After basketball we go to a little restaurant called Chicken Lickin and indulge in a rare treat - cheese. People here don't eat cheese really so a vegetarian pizza on Tuesdays is a beautiful thing.

At the bookstore at the university, they have an extensive collection of fiction and nonfiction by Ghanaian authors. Chris and I bought a ton (maybe our single largest expense since we got here) and have been eating up the books. Even though I tried hard before leaving Canada to find books about Ghana and by Ghanaians, it was a near impossibility. But how good to read the words of Ghanaians reflecting life, studies, and stories!

I had a meeting this morning with a social work professor at the University of Ghana in Legon. It looks like I'll be teaching three courses beginning in January at the undergraduate level in the Department of Social Work. The prof I met with is great and though we only spent a little time together, he too struck me as brilliant and we had an excellent conversation. I'm looking forward to the chance to learn more from him, to teach, to meet more Ghanaians through the university, and even just to learn so much about social work in Ghana. Things keep happening when you network and meet people, talk to them, learn from them.

I would tell Meike not to give up; there are so many opportunities for so many things here.

I've been very diligent in not taking taxis even though they are cheap by Canadian standards. I make my way around town by minibus with the 12-20 other Ghanaian passengers with me, throwing myself into life here while learning the layout of the city. When we went to basketball, I met an expat woman who hasn't used a bus yet - just taxis and rides in private cars. Funny, I thought. I don't think I would even have the heart for that because although the minibuses are hot and can take a long time, are sometimes inconvenient and sometimes rough, they are also part of the transport of the people and if I want to learn about the people, then I should live among them, no?

But still, it can be hard here too. The pollution depresses me. It's so filthy and the waters hideous. The poverty depresses me, especially those who seem in such a bad way, sleeping on the roads, the kids begging, the people with disabilities grabbing at my ankles as I walk by. Chris was pickpocketed the other day and I had some random guy just grab my crotch as we were walking past. I hate that I can never just relax and my guard is always up. Three young girls stopped me yesterday as I was walking and talking to Chris on my cell phone to warn me that there are thieves about and I should be careful to watch my phone. Thoughtful girls.

The countryside too has many problems and as I think about all the people who ask us to take them to Canada, it's hard to really get excited about a place when people here aren't so excited about it either. The worst is when a mother holds up her baby, maybe a year old or even less, and says, "Take my baby to Canada." My heart breaks.

These are funny these so-called developing countries. So much poverty, frustration, problems. Yet at the same time such brilliant light and so many causes for hope and celebration. So much for me to learn.