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The Past Few Days...

I had high hopes for Thursday; Alisa, a fellow PCV, and I were asked to teach a family planning and contraception session at the local clinic in Juaboso. The first and second Thursday of every month is Child Welfare Day. Pregnant women and women with babies up to five years old come to clinic to weigh their children and get them the necessary vaccines. Last Thursday we arrived around 9am along with other mothers and their children. Many more came after we arrived. Yet, and this still astonishes me, we were scolded for being late. Did I mention we are in Africa? In all the meetings and events I have attended, never once has a Ghanaian been on time. I guess everyone but Ghanaians must adhere to “American Time.” So this Thursday, we made sure to arrive on time, at 8am, like the nurses had asked this time. So we arrive…8:30am rolls past and still no nurses…weird. They finally arrive around 8:45-9am. There was no mention of being late or making us wait. Life goes on.

We started off with a story about contraceptives. BCS has given us several materials, including the Trigger Sketch Manual, which has different stories about health and family planning. I read the story, which was in English, and one of the nurses translated. The women seemed to be really interested in what we were saying, but the nurse didn’t always translate back to English, so I’m pretty sure we missed out on a lot of what was being said. After our talk, I sat with the nurse in charge of logging the babies’ weights. Every mother is given a booklet for their baby when they are born. The booklet records the baby’s weight over a period of 5 years, as well as all the vaccines it receives. After the babies were weighed, I was handed the booklet to chart their weight and to verify that their vaccines were up to date. If they needed a vaccine or a Vitamin A booster, I put the booklet to one side. Most children actually needed their Vitamin A supplement, and I got to administer it! There were two types of Vitamin A tablets…a red one and a blue one, kind of like the matrix. Children under 6 months received the blue one, and everyone else was given the red one. The tablets were little squishy things with liquid inside. I was given a small lancet to prick the ends of the tablets, which I then got to squirt into many unhappy mouths. As soon as they saw me coming, most of them started screaming bloody murder. Through a combined effort, the mothers and I held the babies and opened their mouths. I’m sure they loved me. If they weren’t already afraid of white people, I’m sure I pushed half those babies across that line. Luckily we went to market afterwards and were able to feel better about ourselves over a semi-cold beer and meat-on-a-stick.

On Friday I finally got Pineapple vaccinated. You don’t need to worry any longer, Mom. I won’t be getting rabies anytime soon. Apparently Pineapple and I made history in Juaboso; Pineapple is the first cat to be vaccinated against rabies in the Juaboso area. Not really sure how I feel about that, but at least she won’t be getting rabies. Pineapple is a trendsetter I guess. The vets all laughed when I told them Pineapples full name, which is Akosua Abrobe Pineapple. Pineapple came to me on a Sunday and the Sunday name for a Ghanaian girl is Akosua. Pineapple in Twi is abrobe.

This morning, Saturday, I went with some members of BCS and my LNGO (local NGO) to Kwafukaa, Alisa’s town. They are starting a Community Health Committee and wanted to discuss their plans to the chief and elders. Alisa and I were both under the impression that we would be going to a durbar, otherwise known as a community meeting. Instead we went to the chief’s palace and sat through a two and half hour meeting, all in Sefwi. Luckily the man sitting next to me translated every 10^th word, so I’m pretty sure I almost got the gist of the meeting. At least Alisa was sitting across from me so we could make “Is this seriously happening right now?” faces at each other. I did get to ride in a real air-conditioned Ford Explorer though. At the end of the meeting Alisa and I took some pictures of us “teaching” to make it look like we did real work, look for the tagged pictures of me on Facebook. There was a board with health issues labeled so we posed in front of it, pointing at various pictures, pretending like we were talking to a crowd.

This evening I walked around town with one of my JHS teachers, Frimpong. We went to visit several girls in my girls club at their respective houses. Basically we wanted to ask the parents about the girls’ habits and life at home. I think we visited eight girls in total. Most of the conversations were positive, but we found a few girls to be troublesome at home. Some parents were saying that their daughters are disrespectful and won’t do their duties when they are at home. What on earth could they be talking about? I was obviously never like this…just ask my parents! In all seriousness though, I think most of the girls are at the age of teenage rebellion and their parents are just frustrated, but there are definitely some deeper seeded issues in some of the households. Hopefully my girls club will be an outlet for some of them.

Tomorrow a colleague is coming to register the cocoa farmers in my village, so I hope it goes smoothly. We’re also going to show a documentary called “Emmanuel’s Gift.” It’s about a Ghanaian man who is handicapped but bikes from Accra to Kumasi to raise awareness about his disability. It’s in Twi and English so I think my town will enjoy it! It should be a good event…Insha’Allah. 

Let the Good Times Roll

Lately I’ve really been loving my job. This past week I’ve had a lot of great conversations with people in my town, which is refreshing and also quite enlightening. You can only stand hearing, “Obruni, what is your name?” or “Hey, I love you. I will marry you,” so many times a day. It definitely makes you want to pull your hair out sometimes. Another infamous saying is “Ma me sika,” or “give me money.” Depending on the day you can have fun with it but on others you just want to chase those little kids away. But all the great experiences I’ve been having so far definitely make up for the ones that get under you skin. I figure you can complain and be miserable during your two years of service or you can enjoy it and realize you have the best job in the world. I mean who doesn’t get frustrated at work? So take it for what it is and make the best of your situation. You’ll be a better volunteer and you’ll have a lot more fun. It also helps that I have made some really great people in my area. There are a handful of PCVs within 20 minutes to two hours of me, and I get to see them at least once a week for our epic market days. I have to say PCVs are pretty great people. It definitely makes my job and my life much more enjoyable. 

On Friday I met with two girls from my girls group at the JHS. Three of them have volunteered to by translators so I wanted to talk with them about my plan and show them some of my materials. They seemed to understand everything I was saying and looked pretty excited, especially one of the girls, Emelia. I think she is going to be my new favorite student. There is a program through Peace Corps called STARS (Students Taking Action Reaching for Success) and there is an annual conference at the KNUST (Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology) in Kumasi. Basically STARS is there to promote and teach leadership skills for SHS students. PCVs from all over Ghana bring two students from their local SHS to the meeting, which lasts for a week. A couple of the PCVs in my area just recently returned and I’ve heard nothing but great things, so I’m really excited to get involved with this. I would really like Emelia to be one of my students but I don’t think she will be in SHS by the time I leave.

Sunday is always one of my favorite days because everyone is at church. It’s so quite in my compound, except for the incessant noises from goats, sheep, and chickens. A neighboring Natural Resources Management (NRM) PCV is working on a project to register cocoa farmers in this area, so after church I held a meeting with my local cocoa farmers. My meeting was scheduled for 2pm, but being that we’re in Africa and all, the first person didn’t show up until 2:30 and the rest came around 3:15 – African punctuality. Ghana’s time zone is West African International Time aka WAIT. So we finally kicked things off around 3:30. My counterpart and I explained the idea behind the project and how it would benefit them. The farmers can sign up to receive text messages each week that will give them cocoa farming tips and techniques. All in effort to help them improve their farms and earn more money. I think this a great idea and I’m glad to help another PCV with his project. Well, after explain all this and reiterating that it’s completely voluntary and FREE, one man in the group decided to give a little speech. Basically he told me he thought it was a terrible idea and would be no benefit to the farmers here. Instead, taking them to America and conducting a cocoa farming class would be better. My counterpart and I both said, again, that this service is not required and is only here to help those interested. So even if only one farmer is interested, that’s still someone we can help. It was a very frustrating meeting. This man succeed in making me feel terrible and at one point I was almost in tears. However, I kept my cool and kept smiling. I ended up getting 30 names, including the man who was against this. So on Sunday my friend will be coming to register the farmers, and hopefully more show up. It feels good to accomplish things!

That evening I met up with one of the teachers from the JHS. We went to one of the local hangouts to relax and watch everyone dancing Azonto. I suggest you YouTube this phenomenon. I like talking with the teachers because they speak English better than most people and are fairly educated. This teacher is involved with the JHS hygiene club and has been helping me with my girls club, so we were talking about both clubs for a while. He seems really interested and wants to stay involved, so that makes things easier for me. We both agree that working with the students is a good way to implement my projects. I’m working with behavior change, so we figure that is easier to instill new thoughts and behaviors in younger people who haven’t developed their lifelong habits. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. I plan to change that though! I’m planning on visiting the primary and kindergarten schools to teach them a hand-washing game. Hopefully that will get them thinking about health and hygiene. On Saturday, the teacher and I are planning to do some home visits. Sometimes he’ll walk around town and visit with his students to see how thing are going at home and just do a general check in. I was glad to hear this because it seems like he really cares about his students and is invested in their education. I also want to get to know the students better and make them feel more comfortable around me. Hopefully this helps!

On a completely separate but equally important issue…Euro Cup 2012 has started! I’m a little frustrated that England-France ended in a draw, but it’s better than a loss! Go England! My television doesn’t show the games so I have to go into town to watch them, but it definitely entertaining to watch football with Ghanaians. Today is Denmark vs. Portugal and then Netherlands vs. Germany. Should be some great football happening there! 

I hope all is well in America! I miss you guys...but I'm having a blast so don't worry. Happy early birthday to my wonderful Grandma Gladys Addy on June 14 all the way in England! And of course I didn't forget Rocky! Our little pooper dog turns 12 on June 15! I'm sure my mom will be giving him a right nice dinner. 

Goodlife All Stars

My Project

Here's a link to who I'm working for/with and what we do! Behavior Change Support Project with Johns Hopkins University.

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A Little Background on Peace Corps Ghana

http://ghana.peacecorps.gov/

Books and Babies

Well nothing too exciting has happened over that past couple of days. I finished a book that I started several months ago – go me. My friend Gayle recommended a book she is reading called “Africa” by Richard Dowden. I thought it would be appropriate to read this book, since I’m in Africa and all. Dowden is a British journalist that has lived and traveled extensively in Africa and he’s met and interviewed people like Mugabe. Each chapter is about a different country in Africa; the political history, development, foreign aid, etc. I am quite fascinated so far and haven’t been able to stop reading. I can relate to a lot of what he writes because I have actually witnessed and experienced some of the things he discusses. It makes the book even more interesting. One excerpt really resonated with me and is one of my reasons for joining Peace Corps. I’ll share it with the class; “I wanted to do something real about poverty and suffering. I believed that to change the world you had to go there, live with the poorest and change their lives. But after three years of learning about European history, what did I know that could possibly be of use to Africa?” (Dowden, Africa). Ask my mom and she’ll tell you I’ve always wanted to go to Africa and save the world. I completely agree with what Dowden is saying here; I personally feel that the only way I can make a difference, or attempt to make a difference, is if I witness and experience poverty, hunger, sickness etc first hand. I would really like to work in the field of international development or public health, but I can’t imagine doing that without seeing it for myself. How can I presume to know what’s best for a certain group of people or country if I haven’t talked with them or visited that country? How effective can you be behind a desk with no frame of reference? You can only learn so much in a classroom. Feel free to disagree. I have some other quotes from the book that jumped out at me so I’ll include them at the end for everyone’s (mostly for my own) enjoyment.

On Wednesday June 6^th, the first Wednesday of the month it was baby weighing day in Afere! I went to the first one in May and came back for the one today. Three nurses from Juaboso (my market town) came to Afere to conduct a small health talk, weigh babies, and vaccinate. The nurse in charge of vaccines, Jennifer, was telling me that they have added two new vaccines, giving them six in total. They already administer Yellow Fever, Polio, Measles, and I didn’t catch the fourth. The two new vaccines are Rotavirus and another one that began with a “B” but I forget what it was for.

Today I went to the baby weighing in Juaboso, at the local hospital. Alisa and I helped the nurses log baby weights and vaccines. The nurses were really nice and were really enthusiastic about us being there. Immediately they asked us to observe what they were doing and eventually we were able to assist them with their duties. At one point I looked over at Alisa and she was giving children doses of Vitamin A. My nurse even let me give one baby a Rotavirus vaccine. There were no needles involved…it was just a few drops in the mouth. But I did make the baby cry as I tried to get it to open its mouth so I felt a little bad. Still it was pretty fun to actually help. A couple people from a certain organization were actually filming a documentary during the baby weighing. They panned the camera around the room and zoomed in on Alisa and me. We kept hearing theam say “abrofoe” which means white people in Twi, so I’m assuming Alisa and I were guest stars. At one point they even interviewed Alisa to ask her opinion of the day so far. We are going back next Thursday to give a small health talk on Family Planning and Nutrition…things like that. We have some materials, like flipcharts and picture cards, so we can use those to show the mothers at the clinic. I’m hoping it goes well. It was a pretty good day and I look forward to next week!

TOMORROW IS MY 4 MONTH MARK IN AFRICA! 23 months to go! Officially shorter than 2 years. The new group is on their way now. They are Education volunteers. It's nice to know that there is someone who has a longer time to go than we do!

Quotes as promised…from Richard Dowden’s Africa

“Like most outsiders arriving in Africa for the first time I was confused by the way people referred to their families. When a pupil wrote about his mothers and fathers, I corrected him. He promptly corrected me, pointing out that he lived in a house with three fathers and two mothers. ‘Yes, but you have only one father and one mother,’ I told him. ‘No, I have three fathers and two mothers at our house,’ he replied. ‘One of my mothers is my mother’s sister and one of the fathers is her brother.’ In Africa any relative who looks after you as a child is a mother or a father. Even cousins several times removed are called brothers and sisters.”

“Other cultural gulfs tormented me. One was the lack of personal privacy. Like most (Western) people, I like to be on my own some times. In Africa to be on your own means you are sick or upset.” (This is so true!!)

“Another aspect that outsiders find difficult is the responsibility that comes with being a wealthy outsider. I received a constant stream of requests from people coming to my house asking for money and sometimes for work.”

“Instead I found myself loved for the very reasons I despised. I was loved because I was white and rich, and from the rich world. I had come to bring its benefits to Africa, had I not?”