Well I’d like to say that I accomplished everything I said I
would since my last post, however some things fell through the cracks. As long
as I can get at least one thing crossed off on my to-do list, I am pretty
happy. Timing is usually a reason why things don’t always happen as expected. I
was talking with my dad last night about my frustrations with Ghanaian time and
sticking to schedules. I was always the girl who showed up ten minutes early to
class in college and ditched school once in high school (and it was second
semester senior year…quite the rebel, I know). Meeting starts at 8am? Alright,
I’ll see you there around 9am. And that’s what happens. Every Sunday the Afere
Health Committee meets to discuss health and sanitation issues faced by our community.
The meeting is supposed to start at 4pm, but the first person usually shows up
around 4:45, and the meeting eventually gets going around 5:15, if we’re lucky.
This is usually how things work over here and it drives me crazy. I don’t know
why I keep expecting things to start on time, even though I know they won’t.
All part of the Peace Corps experience.
Moving on. Last week the BCS volunteers and members of Ghana
Health Service traveled down to Takoradi, the Western Region capital, for a
training event on zinc tablets and ORS. We learned about what diarrhea is, what
causes it, and how we can use zinc and ORS to prevent and treat it. There’s
never enough talk about poop for Health/WATSAN PCVs! A lot of the information
was repetitive for us PCVs but it was good for everyone else to hear. Plus we
got to spend a few days in Takoradi, which is on the beach and you can find
American food, even though it costs you an arm and leg, it is worth it.
I met with the HIV/AIDS man, Alfred, at the Juaboso hospital
again. We looked at the different HIV/AIDS educational materials I have, which
is quite a lot thankfully. He was very impressed. Peace Corps has provided us
with a pen drive loaded with goodies. There are a lot of lesson plans on
HIV/AIDS ranging from basic facts, transmission, treatment and prevention, etc.
I also have a book filled with educational games and activities to make
learning more hands-on and interesting for your audience. I’ve read through a
couple of the activities and they are pretty powerful. They definitely provide
you with a strong understanding of the virus and the emotional/physical
challenges you can face. During the VCT days (voluntary counseling and
testing), Alfred is going to pitch the idea of a support group and see how many
people are interested and we’ll go from there. I expect the process to be slow
going but I am hopefully that it will work.
On Wednesday I want to Asafo, a town about 30 minutes from
me, to observe an HIV/AIDS support group meeting – People Living Positively
with HIV/AIDS. I was very impressed with the amount of people that showed up,
which was about 40. In a culture where HIV/AIDS is so taboo, it is hard to
educate and hold meetings regarding this topic. The entire meeting was in Twi
so I didn’t understand anything, but the members were very vocal and asked a
lot of questions. There is a lot of incorrect information flying around about
HIV/AIDS so I really hope I can get this support group started and start
spreading accurate information. For example, many people believe that condoms
cause HIV/AIDS and if you are infected with HIV/AIDS and you have sex with a
virgin you will be cured. This is not just particular to Ghana; I know other
places around the world also believe this (at least the part about the condom…so
I would assume there is a version about sleeping with a virgin somewhere out
there). And people believe these things with all their heart. All the more
reason for PCVs to work hard and educate people about the truth about HIV/AIDS
and hopefully we can succeed at reducing the stigma and improving educational
opportunities for those who want to learn and protect themselves. Everyone keep
your fingers crossed for me!
We have a couple things on the docket for Afere. First, we
are trying to plan a project educating the community about hygiene and
sanitation in conjunction with building soak away pits outside of bathhouses.
Lots of households don’t have a proper place for their bath water to drain, so
it ends up pooling in the streets and running through your neighbor’s yard,
which is pretty disgusting. This dirty water can cause intestinal diseases and
bouts of diarrhea, especially in small children who are more susceptible to
illness. If we can get people to build proper soak aways, then hopefully the
instances of illness will decrease, not to mention the community will look a
lot prettier. I’m looking into writing a grant for some hygiene and sanitation
education to be done in the community before the soak away building. Hopefully
that can adequately educate community members and motivate them to improve
their hygiene/sanitation practices as well as take pride in how clean their
community will be.
Second, we are gauging interest in household latrines around
town. Unfortunately our first option for building latrines with an organization
called Ghana WASH is no longer available, so I am researching alternatives to
see how we can make this happen. Open defecation isn’t a big problem here, in
fact I’ve only seen it happen once in seven months, but not all households have
latrines and they gotta poop somewhere! Like we would do with the soak aways,
we would educate the community on what it is important to poop in a latrine and
not the bush and the health benefits that come with it. I’ll keep everyone
updated on these two projects!
So that is what has been happening over here. I’m going to
sit down with Ambrose this evening at look at some grant applications for
Afere. School has resumed again so the streets are no longer filled with screaming
children. I expect I’ll be paying a visit to the schools around town soon to
see what is going on and what I can help with, if they need/want it.
Seven months in Ghana tomorrow! CRAZY. 20 more months to go….
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