Always Coming Back Home

It has been a while since I’ve written anything.  I started a few times, but the words wouldn’t quite flow like they did before.  I think that’s just part of writing.  There are times when you can’t express what’s going on inside the ol’ noggin for whatever reason.  These last couple of weeks have been strange I’d say.  My thoughts have been all over the place.  I lost the focus I had.  I’ve been drifting away from Ghana slowly back to my life at home.  Whatever home means at this point.  I wonder how it will be to re-acclimate myself to everything that I used to take for granted.  All of the things that were always so constant, usually, and everyday they slipped by me completely unnoticed.  I know some of them will stand out now and I look forward to this new perspective.  Although recently my mind has been filled with thoughts of home, it hasn’t been so overwhelming as to prevent me from continuing to live here in Ghana in the now.  It’s ironic because just at the point when I am preparing to leave I finally have a decent understanding on how to navigate this culture and this place.  More than anything I feel torn.  Torn between the incredible freedom of living thousands of miles away from a life that has a past and expectations and a memory of how things were before.  In Ghana I’ve only existed for a handful of months; there is a type of freedom in that that I will never be able to obtain at home.  I’m realizing now how incredible it has been to completely remove myself from the drone of American culture; that ceaseless subliminal murmur of pure ridiculousness.  And it is so much easier to recognize just how ridiculous the popular culture is when you’ve been detoxed from it.  There are moments when I can’t imagine leaving and saying goodbye to everything that I have come to love and appreciate.  I’ve had a good run I guess…I think we all have. 

 

This afternoon I was sitting with my knees against my chest perched on the balcony of Blake’s hall looking at sun scorched lawn that was a deep green when we first arrived.  Actually, it was the lawn that a group of us tossed a Frisbee around on during the first evening of our stay at the University of Ghana campus.  We were all just getting to know each other and possibly beginning to understand ourselves in this strange environment.  Here I was now cooking pancakes with Blake and Ian and trying unsuccessfully to stop pouring sweat.  Seriously though, it was like my skin was leaking.  Anyways, it was nice to think about what amazing people I’ve met and what great and genuine friends I’ve made.  I’ve had the opportunity to saturate myself with new things, new places, new people, new challenges, new ideas, and everything else.  I think that sometimes Ghanaians are a bit confused as to why I would choose to come and live and go to school here.  A lot of times people ask, “couldn’t you just have gone to school at home?”  I hate hearing that question.  It is such a discounting question, but it is the reality of the perception.  Why would I leave a life of luxury and mindless comfort for a place that is, well, not that.  It’s a very interesting question and you have to be careful on how you choose your answer.  I can easily understand how this experience could be contested as simply another example of the Western World ‘exoticizing’ the global south.  Like any other challenge that we embark upon simply to test our own ability and resolve.  The truth is that as real as Ghana has been for me it’s is not my complete reality.  I have a plane ticket home I have my out.  That alone fundamentally sets me apart.  What does that make me then?      

The block was electric on Tuesday night.  Finals are so spread out that most people don’t have anything to do.  There’s more hanging out, more general nonsense going on.  Those of us on the fourth floor have come together at the end.  Everyone can feel the time running short and we just want to enjoy what’s left with each other.  I’m not sure why that is, but towards the end of things people seem to forgo their egos a bit and band together regardless of differences or anything along those lines.  I’ve noticed it here and been a part of it here. 

There is just a unique dynamic among all of us boys from California.  I noticed it when we first boarded the plane in San Francisco I couldn’t exactly pin it down, but there was just something different and pleasant about those of us coming to Ghana.  It’s interesting to see how that something that I noticed four months ago has developed.  It seems like people have forgone their baggage and dropped their attitudes and maybe you have to do that to survive in a situation like the one we have all found ourselves in.  It could be we all had the disposition to begin with, but I think it has been more of an adaptation than anything else.  That could be it.  That something I noticed on the plane could have been the ability to adapt and the level of maturity and self-awareness that is required to do so.  It goes without telling that all of us: Travis, Pierre, Joe, Ian, Sterling, Sandro, Nikkos, Matt, Brendan, Shane, Marlon, Alex, Eric, and Ryan have all spent our time in ways that can’t be repeated and can’t be imitated, but they can be shared and that’s the beauty of having friends.

Four parasites and bladder stones, plane rides home and plane rides back.  Falling through rusted corrugated steel roofs and traditional medicine to fix what has been broken.  Grand schemes of riding a motorcycle across exotic landscapes come crashing down in a mess of metal and concrete.  Traveling across borders into different worlds where the bullet holes remind you of the violence of men.  Missing a gear and shoving the Sergeant up a burnt red dirt road, shoving alongside of men from a different life sharing in the sweat and the laughter.  Beautiful dry landscapes dotted with dinosaur like Baobab trees and adobe style houses zooming by as the sun sets in this part of the world.  Sullen faces and bloated bellies, children asking for money and parents nowhere to be seen.  Shameless poverty against a backdrop of wealth and greed; skyscrapers rooted in slums.  A culture dedicated to the hospitality of others yet there is no trust for their own.  “You want to do business here…you need four eyes…two is not enough.” 

It’s Thanksgiving today in another part of the world…

I'm Not A Hater

I was having a conversation with Heather and she mentioned that my messages have become negative.  She was confused because she was under the impression that I was having a “good” time in Ghana and that my experiences so far have been positive, yet my blogs sound negative and a bit harsh.  I could feel myself becoming defensive, wanting to deny any bad sentiment and reassure her that I am having a great time and that I am incredibly content and thankful for my experiences.  I held back the urge and thought about what she was brought up.  It’s true actually, the last few things that I have written have been critical and they have described confrontational situations.  I think that in a way my thoughts may be perceived as cynical, but I’m not that cynical is the write word to use.  I’ve been in this country for over four months now and I’ve traveled across the majority of the landscape.  I’ve eaten dinner at expensive international restaurants in the heart of Accra and I’ve slept in bare and basic guesthouses in the most rural areas of the north.  I’ve chatted with young children, university students, businessmen, and old-timers about Ghana about America and all other sorts of things.  I’ve done my best to accept everything that Ghana has to offer and I’ve attempted to do so with out reservations, with an open mind and an open heart.  As the freshness wears off and the excitement of being in a new place subsides reality tends to sink in a bit more heavily.  When I started to have a handle on my life here and slip into a routine; to know what I liked and disliked, my messages became a bit more critical…possibly.  I’m not convinced that critical has to have a negative connotation attached to it necessarily.  What it comes down to is the fact that I have some kind of responsibility for portraying Ghana and my time here in a fair and balanced manner.  Of course I am not writing a travel guide or a published article, but the people reading my accounts are probably forming some of their own opinions about Ghana based heavily on what I have been saying.  If I raved endlessly about how great the country is and how wonderful the food and the culture are then no doubt I those of you reading would form positive opinions about Ghana.  If I complained about how hard life is and how easy it is to get sick and how impossible it is to ever fit in then I would most likely be guiding opinions in a different direction.  That is the irony of being in a place like Ghana.  Ghana is everything at once.  The people are strong and beautiful; the country reveres foreigners and prides itself on unbelievable hospitality.  The culture is rich and old yet it is dying quickly.  The streets are crowded and filthy trash overflows from open sewers and the sky is thick with pollution and smoke from burning heaps of rubbish.  The diet is simple and the culture restrains people from trying new things.  The dominant religion is Christianity roped on the back of colonialism and packaged in authority and control.  Many beaches second as public lavatories and petty crime and theft are rampant.  Corruption seems to rot through every layer of society from the top of government to the bottom of the streets.  As a student and a traveler I have more freedom I this country than I have ever felt before.  If I want to travel I just go because I’m sure that if I get lost there will be someone to help me find my way.  Random people are genuinely interested in who I am and where I come from.  Friends invite me to their home and into their places of worship.  All of these things are happening right now, its impossible to experience all of the good without the bad.  For those of you who desire order in your lives, who need everything separated and organized into its proper place Ghana is not the place for you.  I don’t think that I have become cynical at all.  If anything I have become realistic and I have been honest.  I am biased that’s a given.  My experience is unique the way that I see the world is not independent from the way that I have been raised within it.  In my own defense, although I’m not sure who is judging me maybe I am judging myself, I am not bitter and I am not cruel.  I most definitely recognize problems and I always look for solutions, but even that has changed. 

I received a newspaper clipping from home about UC Berkeley and its recently created institute for development studies.  The article focused mainly on how the institute proved somehow that my generation, the Millenials or Generation ‘Me’, as we are popularly referred to are not completed self absorbed, narcissistic, spoiled drones.  In fact we care about starving children and poverty and the AID’s and we want to study these things and we want to solve these problems.  Generation ‘me’ wants to help and therefore we can be selfless individuals and global citizens who want to change the world.  The article was very positive and uplifting, it gave off the sense that as the world seems to be spiraling out of control there are some people who are working hard to do the right thing.  I should have felt better, I should have been proud…I mean UC Berkeley is practically in my backyard at home and here I am in Ghana, a developing country, so I should understand and appreciate what the institute for development is trying to do.  Strangely, that’s not how I felt.  Call disillusionment or cynicism or whatever you want, but the truth is the idea of rich white people sitting in fancy conference rooms and lecture halls arguing over theories and academics does not stir up those grand feelings of altruism that they should.  It reminds me of Anne Rein’s novel The Fountainhead.  Without getting into too much detail I’ll just say that she has a crazy social philosophy in which the altruists are the bloodsuckers and the selfish are the champions.  On the face of it that sounds ridiculous, but Rein is quite convincing.  The problem as I see it is that the Berkeley institute is still operating within the same system as all of the development theories and schemes have before.  It is still people and ideas from the outside being forced in.  If you send someone to clean up my house, yet I don’t see the point in keeping it clean how long do you think it will stay spotless?  I say lets stop telling people how to live especially when we have no idea why they are doing what it is they do in the first place.  We try to implement plans without even understanding the motivations behind the people we are ‘trying’ to help.  Is it really selfless because I see ambition and desire and maybe a need to justify how we live at home as motivation for the whole ordeal?  Now look what’s happened I’ve gotten so far off track.  I started all of this with the intention of explaining that in fact I am a happy person and a positive person and all I’ve done is raise more criticisms.  Well, I’m everything all at once then…I can smile and tell you what I see wrong and there is nothing false in my expression. 

 

 

Disillusionment

It's always a little tricky to decide what to put in this blog.  I suppose the audience is quite wide and fairly diverse... my parents, my friends, even my grandparents (sometimes) so I'm never absolutely sure.  To tell you the truth I'm writing this thing just as much for me as any of you.  I hope that didn't come off as too selfish, but it's the truth.  When things happen, good or bad, it's great to write them down.  I never did anything like this before coming to Ghana, but once  you start you feel driven to continue.  Sometimes I share adventures, sometimes its thoughts, subjective opinions, or everyday experiences.  I think this one covers all the bases actually... at to me.  Something to think about while reading.  Allowing yourself to become angry, I mean really pissed off in another country is an interesting feeling.  It makes you feel like you have some invested stake, at least at some level I think.  

Instant coffee brewed to perfection.  The perfect balance of white sugar cubes, Nescafe classic and Cowbell powdered milk paired with a delicious bowl of white oats, ready in seconds, equals the breakfast of champions.  Seriously though, I can make this shit taste like Starbucks.  Actually, it’s already been a fairly eventful day considering its not even 8 AM yet.  I woke up to the familiar distortion of homemade gospel music crackling from one of those megaphone/speaker systems.  Ghana is quite fond of these noise-making contraptions… sound quality is less than stellar if you want my opinion.  Anyways, today it was gospel; yesterday it was fervent, righteous croaking, and the day before that it was pretty much the same.  At some point enough is enough.  When the preaching started I got up, put on a pair of shorts and walked downstairs to have a word.  I know for a fact there are plenty of people living in this building who can’t stand these obtrusive prayer sessions.  Think about all of the Muslims living in Annex A- I’m sure they don’t appreciate it.  So I approach the self proclaimed pastor and ask her kindly, “you know we’ve been woken up every morning this week and I am really tired… do you think you could just leave us alone this morning?”  She looked at me, quite shocked that I had approached her and asked her bluntly to leave.  She replied, “No I don’t think so.”  “Well you know this is against school policy.”  “No its not.”  At this point people listening on their balconies chimed in, “let her continue”, “leave her alone.”  Tired and frustrated I lost it for a moment and shouted, “you guys are ridiculous… its 6:20 in the morning.”  “Ridiculous!” they mimicked… and now for my favorite response “go back to your country.”  Wow.  Lesson learned: don’t question the system, don’t speak your mind, don’t stand out, and don’t tell people they are being ridiculous.  I slipped for a second- so sue me. 

Random Conversation...

One thing about being in Ghana is that you can't hide from pertinent issues.  The soft fuzzy warm blanket of western security is removed from your eyes and you are confronted with shit everyday that is really not good, for lack of a better word.  On the plus side it makes you think and observe and discuss and even if you aren't fixing all the problems right now, which is impossible, you are giving them some thought.  Here are some thoughts from part of a conversation I had with some friends, Ghanaian and American, about some of the issues most people would probably rather ignore.   

Bossman (yes that is his name) asked me this question, if I feel like everyone has the same capacity for self-realization and creativity than why is it that the U.S is in the position it is in and Ghana is where it is?  That’s sort of the million-dollar question isn’t it.  Bossman feels that the education system is to blame.  In his opinion the University teaches students how to recognize all of the problems, but doesn’t show students how to approach those problems with practical solutions.  Basically theory and no application.  It’s funny because I remember having a conversation with my teaching assistant Vicken last school year about virtually the same issue.  I had been taking this upper division course about the public policy process from an almost completely theoretical standpoint.  The class focused on decision making within the policy arena and I was super engaged and interested.  And at the same time I was getting frustrated because as I learned more about how the components of the system functioned I saw things I wanted to change, but I couldn’t understand how to bridge the gap between recognition and change.  What I was feeling then is what Bossman is bringing up now and I realize that this is a universal challenge.  Digging a bit deeper in our discussion we came across something that I found to be incredibly telling and crucial.  The difference is not so much in how or what we are taught at our respective institutions, but the self-confidence and empowerment to take a risk and try something to bridge that gap.  The truth is that college can only do so much especially when you study value based, intractable issues… you know the big ones like how do we protect the environment or guarantee equality in the world.  Education can only prepare you, but there are certain things that I am beginning to realize cannot be taught in the standard sense of the word.  The point is that answers to so many issues are yet to be discovered so how can they be taught.  I said to Bossman you know I understand what you are getting at and I feel like the point of all of our schooling is to give us the tools, but it is up to the individual to decide how to use them.  To use them you must at least feel like there is some hope of success otherwise why would anybody even try.  There needs to be some support for imagination and vision from within.  People talk about development in Africa and they point their fingers at so many factors that could explain the developmental plight of this continent.  They say the legacy of colonial rule left most of Africa stripped naked and the lasting effect has been dependence on those same old colonial fathers.  I don’t think you can blame colonialism forever, at some point like Barack Obama said: Africa needs to take Africa’s problems into its own hands.  I am not trying to discount history in fact I think that the dependence that may stem from the colonial days is still very real and very apparent, but again recognizing it and overcoming it are two very different stories.  

Smoke and Mirrors

I’ve always been slightly fascinated by politics.  I remember when I was in High School we had a career day.  Professionals from various disciplines, doctors, lawyers, chefs, business people, came to school and gave short presentations on what their jobs were like, how they got involved, and all of that fun stuff.  I heard a few different people speak, but the one that stands out was the politician.  I was interested in the first place because the only real sense of a politician was what I had gathered from textbooks, television, movies and that sort of thing, but I had no practical idea of what a politician was all about.  I only had this very abstract notion of the profession, if you want to call it that, whereas I could tell you exactly what being a doctor entailed, if you asked me what a politician did I probably would have fumbled with any answer at all.  Alright, so I went and heard this politician speak and I expected to walk away with a clear job description, something that I could go home with and say, “hey Mom guess what I learned at school today.”  Well, that’s not what happened.  After the presentation I think I was more confused about the idea of this politician and what she did than ever before.  Thinking back it all makes perfect sense to me now.  There is nothing concrete about a politician or politics in general.  That’s the point I think.  As soon as you try and lay a finger on it you’re lost completely.  Politicians are shifty folks in fact I’m fairly sure that they don’t actually do anything at all.  They talk a lot about doing things, but you will never find one with a hammer and nails.  It is really fascinating stuff.  Maybe I just figured it all out though.  That woman was able to talk to all of us with the explicit purpose of explaining what it means to be a politician what her function is in society and when we walked out of that room she had succeeded revealing almost nothing.  It is all becoming clear to me now the job description was there not in what she said, but in her ability to functionally say nothing.  She was damn good. 

Here I am now quickly approaching the end of my college days, undergrad at least, and what have I chosen to study… environmental policy.  It’s not politics proper, but its politics through and through.  Like I said its fascinating stuff because when it comes down to it politics is just individuals making decisions.  Obviously there are a lot of bells and whistles and smoke and mirrors that are involved, but when you boil it all down strip off the layers of bullshit you find an individual making a decision.  What I’m trying to get at, and I can see I’ve deviated a bit, is the political life on campus here at the University of Ghana.  The student government serves as a microcosm for the political culture within the culture.  Before coming to Ghana I was never interested with student government and school politics.  I’m realizing now that I have not idea what goes on at UC Davis as far as politics are concerned.  I don’t know how the system works or even if it works at all.  I have known a couple of people who have been in office or run for office, but that is about the extent of it.  The student government is there, but it’s not in your face like it is here.  As I am writing there are students downstairs casting their votes for Legon Hall JCR government officials.  Before I get into it I should probably give a quick breakdown of the University of Ghana student government as far as I understand it. 

There are four residency halls associated with the University: Legon Hall, Akuafo Hall, Mensah Sarbah Hall, and Commonwealth Hall.  Each hall is an autonomous entity, with its own government, its own reputation, culture, and style.  Its crazy, students seriously identify with the hall that they stay in.  There are all kinds of ridiculous rivalries and what not between them and I’ve experienced a bit of it since being here.  Anyways, the elections going on right now are for the hall level governing bodies.  There is a student body government as well, Student Representative Council, but those elections aren’t taking place until next semester when I’ll be long gone.  From what I gather the hall level elections are just as important if not more important than those for SRC.  Hall governments are similar to local government and it seems like student officials have more power at the ‘local’ level.  When I say more power what I really mean is more direct access to money.  I mean that’s what it all comes down to anyway, right?  Student dues are separated into two accounts, which I still don’t fully understand, where one of the accounts is controlled by the University administration, and the other is left in the hands of the hall officials.  The hall account is based on housing dues paid by the students and the money is supposed to be used to improve the condition of the dormitories and that sort of thing.  Now this is the key part so pay attention, the elected student treasurer is in charge of and has direct access to that bank account.  There is a limit on what can be extracted, but it is something absurd like 10,000 Ghana Cedis, which is like 7,000 U.S dollars.  Students, kids are given the opportunity/responsibility to control a substantial chunk of money with almost no oversight from the University.  I’m having a hard time grasping this concept and that’s why I wish I knew more about the student government at home.  Even at the University level there is obvious corruption students are embezzling funds.  Why am I rambling about all of this?  Probably because I feel like no body else is.  Maybe there are a few people who care, but there is no accountability.  There is no body to hold the corrupt responsible for their corruption and until that happens it will just continue.  At home or here it doesn’t matter the same shit is happening…its just more raw here, more flagrant because it doesn’t have to be wrapped under as many layers of lies and bullshit. 

I’m reading Fear and Loathing on The Campaign Trail ’72 by Hunter S. Thompson.  Maybe that’s why I’m rambling.  

Belief

Ok, this one is a little deep, but I guess it just comes with the territory.

What if someone asked you what you believe in?  In this case they might be referring to god and faith and religion, but it could just as well be about anything else.  How do you respond to a question like that; I mean its sounds simple enough on the face, but really, think about it.  Think about who is asking the question?  How would they answer it.  What do you believe is simple when your answer has already been written.  What happens when its not?  It is the unwritten that is the ‘unknown’ and the unknown is enlightened.  Maybe. 

        “Jesus said: If those who lead you say to you: “See, the Kingdom is in heaven”, then the birds of the heaven will precede you.  If they say to you: “It is in the sea,” then the fish will precede you.  But the Kingdom is within you and it is without you.  If you know yourselves, then you will be known and you will know that you are the sons of the Living Father.  

The Gospel According to Thomas.

 Do you even have to say anything?  

Killer Flies and Human Rights

Its 5:00 AM my eyes are bloodshot and stinging, I would describe my general appearance as tired and greasy, and my mouth tastes like stale sleep. The bus ride back from Bolga was just under 14 hours and the swelling in my feet and ankles serves as an annoying reminder of just how long I’ve been sitting on my ass. I’m tired but I have class at 8:30 AM so I think I’ll rest my eyes for about an hour and get back up again. Fortunately, I was able to sleep for the majority of the journey home thanks to a couple of Advil PM’s and a relatively comfortable seat. Seriously though that’s the way to go…pop a couple of those babies and you’ll be out for at least a few hours. Advil PM- my new long distance travel secret. Now that I’m back on campus I should probably recap the last six days or so since Ian and I covered a lot of ground.

It’s difficult (and exhausting) to describe six days of consecutive traveling so I’ll try and focus on the finer points…maybe squeeze out some significance from those. Location is a good starting point I guess: the tour covered the northeastern section of the Northern Region and a large chunk of the Upper East. Northern Ghana is a fairly stark contrast from the south in terms of the land and the people. Southern Ghana is where the action is if you’re talking about the movers and the shakers. Development is definitely unevenly distributed in this country and the north is getting the short end of the stick in some respects. I have to be careful here not to get into a deep intellectual discussion about development and education and poverty and all that fun stuff because…well because this is just not the time or place. I just want to give some background, a setting from which the rest of my story can be told. The north is dry, hot, dusty, Muslim, beautiful, expansive, poor, and worthwhile.

Our first stop was Larabanga. We checked into the friendly Salia Brothers Guesthouse, the only legitimate establishment in town as far as I’m concerned. The owner of the joint, Al Hasaan, is a friendly and charming man with a bright smile and a calm and steady demeanor. He comes off as an incredibly big fish in a very small pond. I’m just glad to see that he has chosen not to abandon his pond like so many other bright and talented Ghanaians and is doing his best to build up the seriously underdeveloped tourist industry in Larabanga. The town lies about 5 kilometers from the entrance to one of Ghana’s largest land reserves, Mole National Park. We rented bikes from Al Hasaan and made our way to Mole. It felt damn good to get on a bike even though the bike was way too small and required exorbitant amounts of energy to move. Our hiking tour was scheduled for 3:30 so we killed some time taking the ‘office loop’ off of the main road into the park. The heat wasn’t overbearing, yet, so we felt game for a nice 16 km ride. Things started off pleasant enough until the Tsetse flies mounted their formidable attack. Tsetse flies are terrible insects and they hurt like hell. I found they usually go for the wrists, fingers and ankles, which can be rather disturbing while trying to ride a bike and look out for wildlife. Ian and I were literally chased by these awful things for the majority of the loop. I can’t imagine what anyone watching us would have thought as we bounced down the road slapping and cursing at the onslaught of flies. We didn’t stop once for fear of being swarmed and it was only when we joined back with the main road that the flies retreated back into the forest to prey on whatever it is they prey on. All you large forest creatures… I feel your pain. We cooled down at the Mole motel, sipped on some nice cold cokes, and watched a strange new program about improper burial of bodies all over Accra. Actually, the whole situation is quite bizarre. Bodies are being buried just about anywhere people can find room and that old saying of six feet deep isn’t exactly being heeded. Appendages are popping up all over the place and the smell is rather unpleasant according to local sources. Once again I question the capacity of Accra to plan just about anything properly.

Mole could be a great national park, but like so many other things here it lacks proper funding and therefore doesn’t reach its full potential. The park is massive, but only a small percentage of it is accessible by foot and 4X4 expeditions aren’t really worth the money in my opinion. The biggest attraction is the possibility of spotting elephants in their natural habitat…apparently this is the wrong time of year and we didn’t see any. On the brighter side I did get a great picture of two baboons doin’ the nasty. It was quick and looked seriously unpleasant for the female. Interesting stuff.

That night we slept on the roof. In the morning I woke up to the sound of a blaring Arabic prayer and opened my eyes to watch the sunrise over a scorched savannah horizon. We hurried to check out what is commonly referred to as the oldest Muslim Mosque in Ghana and possibly West Africa as a whole. The first written recordings of the structure date back to around 1421 and looking at the Mosque I could believe it. I snapped some photos and Ian and I ran back to the guesthouse to grab our bags before the 7 o’clock bus came into town.

The next point of interest on our excursion of rural Ghana was the Gambaga escarpment a rocky plateau that stands roughly 1500 feet above sea level. We had heard about these supposed witch’s camps on and around the plateau and were curious to see for ourselves. The guidebook briefly mentions one in Gambaga so we went to check it out. Fortunately we met the ‘director’, an older gentlemen named Simon, of the Gambaga Outcast Home Project as we were checking into our guesthouse and arranged with him to see the camp in the morning. The camp is really just an area of traditional style homes within the town that has been designated for the containment of alleged witch’s. In order to see the village we had to pay the chief an old wrinkling, illiterate man who basically play prison warden to the ‘witch’s’. The chief’s son escorted Simon, Ian and myself into the camp where we were allowed to talk to a few of the women and take pictures of the settlement. The chief’s son is present as an intimidation factor so that the women don’t say anything to tourists that could be damaging to the chief or the communities reputation. One of the ‘witch’s’ that we talked to said she had been in the camp for over 25 years banished from her husband, her family, and her community to live out the rest of her days in this prison. The majority of the women were accused of spiritual witchcraft in the form of dreams. Simon later told us that much of the accusations stem from jealously between wives in polygamous marriages. These women bring the matter to the village chief who performs some sort of ridiculous ceremony that involves slitting the throat of two chickens and letting the drop to the ground and it is based on this evidence that women are exiled to the camp. Simon is running this humanitarian project, with virtually no funding or help, in order to ensure better conditions for the women and also attempting to change local sentiment towards the matter of ‘witchcraft’, because that is the real root of the problem. The whole experience was quite eye opening to say the least and frankly infuriating to see such a blatant violation of human rights. We talked with Simon for some time after the tour as a sort of debriefing and then caught a lorry to continue on our haphazard adventure.

All About Food

It is impossible to discuss culture with out talking about food.  We all need food to survive- it is basic to human existence.  Fortunately for us, food has become so much more than just a survival mechanism.  In fact food has a culture all of its own-from its cultivation in raw form to is preparation in the kitchen to its eventual ingestion into our bodies the specifics of these traditions reflect the environment in which they are found.  To talk about food is to talk about people and therefore insight into any society can be found by means of culinary exploration.

Like so many aspects of our daily lives the food that we eat or more specifically the decision of what to eat is taken for granted.  I find it so interesting to compare the United States with Africa in this regard.  The U.S is such a mosaic of ethnicities and cultures each with its own diet and feelings about food that making the decision of what to take for dinner can be literally overwhelming.  There is really no clear ‘American’ food culture, in my opinion, aside from cheeseburgers and apple pie, which some people would argue as a root cause in America’s perverse relationship with food.  On the other hand take a place like Ghana where you have incredibly strong social institutions built off of thousands of years of tradition it no wonder that these traditions make their way into the realm of food as well.  Ghana is not diverse at least in content of food eaten.  Even though there are nearly 50 ethnic groups each with their own ‘culture’, food is pretty uniform between them.  Actually there are only a handful of traditional dishes available in Ghana and people have been eating these with almost zero innovation for centuries.  If food has two aspects: survival and enjoyment I would have to say Ghana leans more heavily on the side of survival.  The decision of what to eat seems to be mainly based on ‘the most bang for you buck’ at least in terms of calories.  Its funny actually, most foods are barely chewed if chewed at all the point being to get calories and nutrition into your body as quickly as possible.  Starches form the base of the diet and very few ‘complex’ foods, nutritionally speaking, are consumed on a regular bases.  I’ve never craved a salad so badly before in my life.  The staple crops are yam, cassava, maize, and plantain all of which are super high in carbohydrates and not much else.  These crops are used to make about four or five different dishes that are all ridiculously similar and quite basic.  It’s basically the decision between starch and stew or starch and soup.  That’s it. 

Tradition does much more than just governing what is eaten, but guides how food is eaten as well.  Everything can be eaten with your hand just don’t make the mistake of using you left one.  I think silverware is a relatively recent western addition and it is completely acceptable to eaten everything with your fingers.  For instance, it completely normal to watch business men wearing expensive suites and ties digging into a bowl of soup with their hands or tearing the meat out of a fried piece of fish.  Water and soap are given at every table to wash before and after eating, so the practice is clean and organized.  The truth is I love eating with my hand it allows me to feel, literally, what I am eating.  Not to say that it didn’t take getting used to because it did, but once you learn and develop your own style I’ve realized that there is nothing unrefined about it.  Just like a child first uses a fork without much tact eating with your hands takes a bit of practice. 

It still blows my mind… I mean don’t people get sick of the same old food every single day?  Rice, fufu, banku, yam, kenke, beans, and that’s about it.  Of course there is small variation within each of these meals, but the basic idea is the same.  I asked my friend Omari if he ever got tired of the limited choices and he said most definitely.  I said really, well then why don’t you think people try new methods of cooking?  He said I really don’t know.  So there you have it, once again people are left wanting, but don’t seem to do anything about it.  Maybe its poverty, maybe its time, maybe its laziness, but most likely it’s a sign of the rigidity of tradition.  There are proverbs that warn against eating foods your Mother never prepared and I think they are telling examples of the mentality around food.  What ever is happening its not all-bad, obesity doesn’t seem to be a problem and Ghanaians have a very stable healthy emotional relationship with food.  Although limiting, in my opinion eating according to tradition, at least in part, is the best diet around. 

By the way, you guys should look up some of the dishes I mentioned; they’re pretty bizarre at first glance.

Kwahu Ridge

Its Sunday night again and I’m back on campus, back at home from a great weekend.  It amazes me how fast time moves especially here in Ghana.  With every passing day I feel like the clock is wound tighter and tighter until the hour hand becomes a minute and the minute a second.  Right now my body is tired and soar from a rough and dusty trip home, but I feel content with the passing of another fulfilling weekend.  Blake and I traveled about three hours north of Accra to a mountainous region known as Kwahu Plateau.  Neither of us had serious expectations for the trip beyond getting out of the campus bubble for a while.  We heard the landscape was beautiful and there were plenty of opportunities for hiking around, which sounded perfect to me.  There is something refreshing about getting into the mountains I’m not sure exactly what it is, but I like it and need it at times.  Something about relief in the topography of the landscape allowing me to gaze into the distance and really see my surroundings.  No matter where you are the mountain air is fresher, which is most definitely welcome after spending any time in the choked and congested cityscape of Accra.  In reality the Kwahu plateau only stand about 750 meters above sea level, but relative to the whole of Ghana that’s pretty high. 

We took a long and curving taxi ride up following switchback after switchback until we level off on the plateau top.  The plan was to stay the first night in Tafu and check out the area from there.  Apparently we came at the peak of the funeral season and all of the lodging in town was completely occupied.  An older man took us to ask the chief if he could provide any housing for us, but unfortunately he was away, so we hopped back in a taxi and drove to decent sized township called Obo. 

The community rests in the center of a circular ridgeline with large (unoccupied) mansions on the mountainsides.  Dropping down into the bowl there was a sharp contrast between the rusted red corrugated steal roofs of the old colonial buildings and the lush deep green mountains surrounding the town.  We drove through the center of town and up the opposite ridge to a quasi resort that was mentioned in our guidebook.  I want to pause to say a few words about the infamous guidebook.  Guidebooks can be tremendously helpful and terrible restricting at the same time.  You really need to be careful when following the advice of a self-proclaimed guide who is willing to write down for you everything you need to know.  I think if you follow the recommendations too closely they have the potential of limiting what you see of any particular place and how you experience it as well.  It’s important to be prepared, but if you form expectations based on some else’s experiences your time won’t be original and unique.  Fortunate for us the resort place was way too expensive and so we walked back into the town proper and followed a sign to the central hotel.  It dusk by the time we found the hotel, which was nothing more than a large gray exposed concrete building that looked as if remodeling had begun some time ago and very minimal progress had been made.  Inside the place was bare, but clean and we were offered a room with a single bed for about 5 dollars a night.  We tossed our bags in the room and walked out to the sleepy streets of Obo to find some chop.  Blake wasn’t hungry so I settled for a fried egg sandwich.  The entire town was watching the Ghana Brazil soccer match we walked around stopping at various spots and provision stores to join everyone else in watching the game.  When Ghana won the small quiet town exploded for an instant with kids and adults rushing onto the streets yelling and singing and dancing like mad.  I stood there in the street watching and smiling and thinking about the pride of Ghana and how great this simple expression of unity is. 

The next morning we strolled around town again looking for something to eat and then set off to find a bush path that we could hike for a while.  We walked to the next town, which was quite a bit smaller, but still made up of slightly decaying old colonial buildings a few extravagant vacation homes.  At the far end of the town the paved road ended and a well used dirt path continued into the forest.  We passed by a good amount of people apparently on there way to a funeral from some remote village some few kilometers away.  Being Ghanaian, everyone asked us what we were doing and where we were going.  It was slightly odd to respond, just taking a walk, but I guess that’s what we were doing.  The forest was thick and lush here and we could see only a small distance into it.  There was virtually no wildlife beyond some crazy spiders and butterflies and other various insects.  It’s not surprising though, in the southern portion of Ghana most of the wildlife has been eradicated.  Farther along the path there were occasional glimpses of the massive sandstone cliffs that make up the edge of the plateau and are quite impressive.  We followed a side path down to what we thought was a waterfall or river, but turned out to be a small stream.  Banana trees were planted along the stream banks and they made for a welcome refuge.  We sat underneath their massive leaves and relaxed for a while before returning to Obo.

That night Blake went back to the room and I went out of the hotel to make a phone call home.  As I was walking onto the street I passed by a group of people about my age sitting around a table eating dinner.  They called for me to come over and join them.  Not wanting to be rude I walked over and they made room for me to sit down.  They told me to wash my hands and dig into the Banku and Okro stew.  Ghanaians find it so hilarious and shocking when white boys like myself enjoy their traditional dishes.  The food was good and we sat and chatted and got to know each other.  Most of the group were just visiting for the weekend and would be attending the funeral, the deceased was 110 years old by the way, and then returning to Accra.  The crazy mother of one of the guys came out to say hello and talk to me since we had met the day before on my initial arrival to Obo.  Her name is Matilda and she is quiet eccentric.  In fact the first time Blake and I met her we thought she was pretty tossed.  She insisted on only speaking Twi to me even though I’m sure she spoke decent English as well.  The interaction was hilarious and everyone was laughing as I did my best to understand what she was saying and respond with my very limited repitoire of Twi phrases.  The guys were going out to drink and party so I was left with Matilda and her crazy neighbor.  Don’t ask me how, but she saw that I had a dead black and blue toenail and she insisted on getting some unlabeled cream and rubbing it all over my foot.  Her large neighbor friend came over to see what was going on, grabbed my foot and started yanking on my toe wiggling it back and forth and laughing at me when I was obviously in some kind of discomfort.  Two other girls started laughing at me and I thought this lady was going to for sure pull my toe right out of the socket.  Matilda gave me the cream and told me to put it on everyday and my toe would be better in no time.  I’m still confused as to what exactly they thought was wrong with my foot.  That’s traditional medicine for you I guess.  

Sunday morning we woke up to a misty and drizzling morning a welcome change of climate from the scorching dry heat of the Harmattan.  We sucked down some pourage and took a taxi down to the banks of lake Volta to have a look around.  Dropping down from the plateau the lake comes into view as this expansive shimmering sheet of water that doesn’t quite belong where it is.  The lake really doesn’t have much of a basin making it seem that much more artificial.  We crossed via boat taxi at a narrow section of the lake and stepped onto Afram plains to try and find of place to swim.  The town was impoverished and sun was scorching hot, we didn’t feel welcome so about as quickly as we came, we left.  Back to Adowoso back to Accra.  

 

Stalemate

This entry is less specific to Ghana than to life in general and what has occupied my thoughts for some time now.  Maybe writing it out, sharing it with those of you who have taken the time to read the snapshots of my experiences will help me to figure things out in some way. 

 I’ve come to this point in my life where the decisions that have been carrying me forward are no longer being made for me.  The track that has bound me, kept me stable, and guided me this far is slowly ending and where has it brought me?  It’s brought me to a void, a deep abyss and I’m standing frozen at the edge peering into the nothingness reluctant to take a step forward.  I am confronted with this empty space and it’s my responsibility to do something with it.  I have been given the tools to build a bridge and I have to strike the first nail.  Initiative is the word I’m searching for, not ambition as I once thought.  Initiative to take that first step into the unknown, initiative to construct the plans of my future.  It sounds so simple then why do my feet refuse to move forward like I’m paralyzed in a dream my body unwilling to cooperate with my conscious mind.  I am standing in wet concrete and if I shake it off now I’ll escape, but the longer I hesitate the more immobile I will become until my legs are bound forever in this cast of doubt and anxiety. 

 I have been given so many options in which to move and yet they render me more confused than ever.  When there is only darkness how do you decide to step forward.  How do you feel the path when you can’t see it?  I must have a flashlight in my bag somewhere, but I only seem to fumble around in it without being able to pull it out.  Society gives us the blueprints to design our futures, but what if you reject them in preference for your own.  Have I learned creativity or has my education killed my imagination replacing it with formulas, definitions, and concepts that fit a predetermined system in which I’m even sure if I belong.  How do I know the right direction to travel when I’m not even sure what my destination looks like.  We all want to end up happy I guess, but what an abstract destination.  It has no location that I can think of in terms of space and time so I guess I’ll have to look further I guess we have to look further.

 The mortar is soft for now.  There is still hope.  We are still young.

Now Im Starting To Ramble...

There is something that I have been trying to put my finger on for a while now.  I don’t think it is unique to Ghana, but I have felt it more here than anywhere else.  I think I’ve been noticing a level of narrow mindedness and a lack of objectivity.  I would equate these characteristics with conservatism more than anything else.  It’s a situation where peoples minds seem so filled with rhetoric that they can’t even begin to imagine anything different.  I see it most in reference to things, lifestyles, habits that are not part of the widely accepted mainstream culture.  People view alternative lifestyles or choices with dismay, hatred, fear, or even disgust.  Two things in particular stand out in my mind marijuana and homosexuality.  When you ask someone what they think of smoking pot, why they don’t smoke and have never tried it they will tell you it makes you mad, violent, and crazy.  There are a lot of words that I would use to describe what marijuana does to you, but violent is most definitely not one of them.  I’m not trying to advocate the virtues of smoking weed I’m just trying to make a point about perception.  When you lack any personal experience with something it is hard to understand or believe anything that is contrary to what you have been taught.  Especially when you are not in the habit of asking questions.  When something is taboo the easiest way to prevent people from experiencing it is to teach them to be afraid.  It is fear that narrows the mind and fear that keeps people quiet fear of weed smokers and homosexuals, fear of a lifestyle that is different.  The people in positions of power, the ones who dictate the terms of culture focus on the negatives, draw out the darkest parts of whatever it is they feel threatens society and feed that evil to their disciples.  No wonder people are scared and threatened by homosexuality.  When gay people are portrayed as sex crazed maniacs who go about praying on innocent straight young men the concept of homosexuality does not look so friendly and acceptable.  It’s interesting to me how warped people’s perceptions can be when they lack objective information or the desire to get it.  I think about the gay people I know in the U.S and the healthy functioning relationships they are able to have and I imagine how mind blowing that might be for someone in Ghana.  

Benin Was A Flop

The plan seemed simple enough, yet I should have expected the complications that would soon render it impossible.  We were to board the bus at twelve o’clock midnight and drive to Benin for the Ghana vs. Benin soccer match.  A student group on campus organized the trip, and the person in charge fittingly referred to himself as Obama.  Ironic right. It’s not easy to round up sixty or so odd people and transport them across two borders, especially when you’re talking about West Africa.  Frankly, I was impressed.

 The first sign of trouble came when we received a text message informing us that we wouldn’t be leaving until 3:00 AM.  Ok fine.  I’ll just stay up until then and sleep on the ride to the game.  We show up at the central cafeteria, it’s about 3:15 and the majority of people already there are white.  Not surprised in the slightest.  Only one bus is there and I know there are supposed to be at least two.  About a half hour passes while we wait outside in the dark no sign of Obama or any of his representatives.  Eventually they load us onto the bus now it’s about 3:45 or so.  I sit down and pass out in my seat.  When I wake up the sun is beginning to rise and we haven’t moved an inch.  The second bus hasn’t arrived yet and people are still waiting outside, although I think a few have given up and gone back to their comfortable and welcoming beds.  At this point I am beginning to seriously doubt whether or not we are even going to leave the university.  By about 5:30 AM the bus is fully loaded and the driver starts up the big diesel engine and we leave, two and half hours behind schedule and leaving about half the group behind still waiting for the second bus.  I’m frustrated and slightly angry, but way too tired and incoherent to do much of anything so I just continue to get some kind of sleep while the bus bounces down the pothole strewn highways of Ghana.  The funny thing is that I still don’t even know for sure what time the game is starting.  I’ve heard 2:30, 3:00, and 4:30 from a number of different people.  Oh Ghana. 

 After driving for about three hours we reached Aflao, a border town between Ghana and Togo.  The driver pulls into the main station and we unload without every actually being told what is going on.  I get off, stretch my legs, exchange some money (cedis for cifa), and find a place to piss.  Everyone is just kind of walking around looking slightly confused or just sitting on the bus waiting to leave or hear any bit of information.  Finally, we pull out of the station and I beginning to think we might just make it.  Not five minutes later we are stopped again, this time at the actual border and I am told we are dealing with immigration services.  Uh oh.  All I was told to bring was my student ID card because the immigration details were all being taken care of for us.  I brought a copy of my passport and birth certificate just in case (my real passport is with immigration in Ghana, which is a whole different story).  Someone collects our identification and returns with immigration forms, which I am told to fill out.  Ok, I wasn’t expecting to have to deal with this and I can feel things beginning to fall apart.  Oh by the way, the other bus of people still hasn’t arrived in Aflao and we’ve been there for close to two hours.  Before the forms are collected one of the event organizers makes an announcement which I gather to say something like, we had a ministry escort to take us across the border who has left because we are too late and now if you want to go to Benin you will have to purchase single entry visas across both borders.  The cost will be close to one hundred cedi in total.  Deep breathe.  Should have been expected.  Seemed too good to be true.  Fuck. 

For the first time I take a look around me and realize we are parked about two hundred feet from the beach.  I look out the window and see white sand and turquoise blue water.  It’s a beautiful day and I am in the midst of a place worlds apart from anything I could have ever imagined three months ago.  Some people want to go check out the beach swim and hang out so I get down from the bus to join them.  We start to walk over, but even these plans are soon foiled.  Everyone keeps warning us the beach is unsafe, Aflao is a border town riddled with crime and theft.  You should just stay on the bus. Don’t go to the beach.  I think of Tijuana.  Well, I’m going to at least have a look.  It’s fairly crowded with people swimming, pulling in massive fishing nets, sleeping, hustling, or just looking sketchy.  The sweet smell of urine is floating in the breeze and I decide to leave my sandals on.  We are quickly ushered back to the bus and told we are leaving to go back to campus.  About 30 minutes out we meet the second bus and segregate ourselves.  Obrunis on one and Obibinis on the other, and off we go once again bouncing down the broken road music blasting the entire way.  

Empowerment

How do you empower people who have been rendered helpless? That is the question that I keep coming back to. Over the last two months I have had countless conversations all with the central theme of development. That is to say development in general: economic, social, and political because my sense of development cannot stand unless it is supported by all aspects of society. Conversation after conversation we always come back to the idea of empowerment. That is, individuals, communities must have the ability to fight for the changes they see necessary and their voices need an outlet, they need to be heard. It’s not enough for the government to make empty promise in the form of policy initiatives, average citizens need to be at the heart of any kind of movement towards national development. I always come back to the America during the 1960’s. I know it’s a bit cliché at this point, but it really was such a powerful time in our history. It was a time when ordinary citizens took responsibility for their country and their future into their own hands and changed the system, created a new status quo. It was a perfect example of empowerment. What were the conditions that fostered the civil rights movement, the women’s rights movement, and the environmental movement? How does a country like Ghana replicate such a revolution under its own terms?

Sometimes, the more you think about it the more impossible it seems especially because development is a nonlinear and multifaceted concept. My contemplation has led me to believe a few things on this subject and first and foremost corruption must not be tolerated. There is a serious problem when the president of a third world country is given two houses, four cars, exemption from taxes, and whatever else he wants, while a good number of his people cannot read or write. The corruption is not centralized in the highest reaches of government it is diffused among bureaucrats and police at every level. The police salaries in Ghana are so low that bribes are not only tolerated but expected to make up where legitimate pay falls short. Yet people simply say, well that’s just the way things are. Shit, get angry! Demand change. Stop relying on God to solve all of your problems while those in power continue to squander money and fail to stick behind policy. If a democratic government is what you are working with then institutions are key in my opinion. Institutions set the stage for behavior, and when institutions are strong and correct they have the ability to direct a government and its people in an appropriate and positive way. In my opinion that was central to the revolutionary movements of the 1960’s in America. The necessary institutions were in place to direct behavior and allow for change. The issue becomes complicated when you realize that maybe a government doesn’t want to get the institutions right; doesn’t want to expel corruption when that corruption is stuffing the pockets of the elite. When you think about it like that the question of development becomes even more grim and farther out of reach.

I’m not trying to be cynical or negative. I’m just trying to open a discussion and face reality.

Starting To Feel At Home

When I first came to Ghana I was blinded by the overwhelming “newness” of it. All I could see were the macroscopic differences between here and home. At that point there really was a drastic distinction between Ghana and my home. I was only able to see things skin deep so to speak and I was incapable of picking up on the subtleties of life. It’s been about two months now and I am feeling settled. Sometimes without thinking I refer to my room and campus as home. Then I catch myself and realize this is my home for now. I care about people here; I hope people care about me. I have a routine, I have responsibilities, and I have a life. What is it that defines “home”? It has to be more than the house I grew up in because I haven’t lived there permanently for more than three years. I think home is where you choose to invest your time in people and they are invested in you as well. Home doesn’t have to be such a concrete entity. Sometimes it is more of a feeling, an emotion, a sense, a vibe, or whatever you want to call; just something more abstract, something that can exist virtually anywhere. Ghana will never be my home in the same way that California is, my roots aren’t here, but on a different level I feel grounded here and I feel welcome here. I’m beginning to know the ins and outs, I have people to call on and I’m sure that if I were ever to come back I would have a place to stay. I am in the process of developing myself and part of my life and Ghana is the setting in which that is happening. I am functioning within this environment I am not just visiting and holding my breath until I return back to my proper home. No, I am here and I have had to learn how to survive, or do more than just survive, while breathing this humid air everyday. Although I have a ticket back, there is an end date to my stay, a definite moment when I will be leaving this place I think it will remain my home at some level. In that sense I am happy to admit that I have multiple homes and they don’t cease to exist in the absence of my presence.

 Now, back to my thought on observation, which ties into my understanding of one’s home. The “newness” has worn off a bit and I have begun to dig a bit deeper into this place. I have been able to develop a few relationships with Ghanaian friends that have moved beyond the superficial level. It is at this point that I have started to feel comfortable and settled in my life abroad. There is something about sharing personal thoughts and opinions with the people around you that draws you in to a place. I am learning that there are certain basic emotions that are universal and the issues around expressing or explaining those emotions are global as well. It’s interesting to me that half way around the world, in West Africa of all places, I would have a friend confide in me his suppression of jealousy, anger, and insecurity, and he was unsure if I would understand his position. I realize now that the incapacity to face our deepest fears, which usually lie within ourselves, does not discriminate, I am starting to believe that it is part of human nature. We tell ourselves that we have control we plan our lives so that we have some security, but the world can be random, unfair, and unpredictable. There is no control only a false sense of it. Maybe, suppressing insecurity is just another attempt at proving to ourselves that we have control and admitting it would just be too dangerous. In a place like Ghana where many people are merely surviving strength comes from the strength to manage poverty and I am not sure if that entails acceptance or denial, but I think the line is very thin. My friend is not living in poverty, but much of his culture is marked by it, so his inability to express himself does not surprise me at all. It is these kind of relationships that make a place feel like home to me and I feel lucky to have many.

The Trouble With Our Big Brains

Human beings sure are an odd bunch.  I was lying in bed last night thinking about all the strange things we do and all the crazy ideas we stir up.  I don’t think there is anyone who can express the bizarre and ridiculous nature of humanity with more insight and sarcasm than Kurt Vonnegut.  In his brilliant novel, Galapagos, he attributes all of the unnecessary problems in the world and the eventual fall of mankind to our over-sized brains. 

 

According to Vonnegut it is our big brains and all of the humming and drumming that they do that gets us into trouble.  If we were fortunate enough to have a less developed mind that narrowed the playing field of the human drama, life could be a wonderful place.  The ability to think, to rationalize, to ponder, to weigh options, to manipulate, and to tell our bodies to one thing when they want to do the other (with all there instinctive might) is nothing but a damn shame.  If only we were more basic, less imaginative, less ‘in our heads’, order could be restored and natured would be balanced.  To all of these thoughts, sometimes, I agree.  Why should one person believe one thing while the other is stuck on something else?  Why are we constantly searching to define truth in the world when all we have to do is live in it?  I mean c’mon, really, what good does it all do?  Doesn’t it just divide us; pit us against one another and for what use; to satisfy the weird curiosities of our oversized brains? 

 

I found myself engaged in a familiar conversation last night, but I have to say it is one that never gets old.  Lets just go ahead and jump right into it.  My friend Gabby said to me, “the bible is the truth, it is fact…how could all of the millions and billions of people who have and do believe in it be wrong?”  I don’t know Gabby, I just don’t know.  Matt commented, “you’ve heard of the holocaust right?  You agree that it was wrong, but all of those Nazis, the thousands or millions of them believed that killing Jews was their duty in life.  We all agree that was wrong, Nazism was not the truth.”  So then how could all of those Nazis be wrong?  Gabby says, “ I don’t like to even think about Hitler…they were all indoctrinated that is why they believed what they were doing was right and justified.”  Thank you Gabby.  I wonder, “Is Christianity or the bible or religion not a doctrine?”  Is truth simply the aggregation of the same belief over a large enough population?  If so, how many does it take before an idea becomes a fact of life?  Now we come back to the main culprit, that grey matter in our skulls always cooking up the craziest of schemes…if only we could be satisfied with food, sex, and shelter.  

Cape Coast Festival (Oguaa Fetu Afahye)

Once again they rounded all 50 or so of us EAP students up, put us on a bus, drove us to Cape Coast for the weekend. Cape Coast is a moderately sized fishing village in the Central Region once infamous for its critical role in the transatlantic slave trade, and now famous for playing host to United States President Barack Obama. We were there for the Oguaa Fetu Afahye or Cape Coast Festival; one of the most outrageous festivals in Ghana (in my opinion at least). Here's a brief background on the significance of the festival:

Harvest festival to pay homage and respect to local dieties responsible for the continued abundance of important resources (i.e. fish).

Time to give thanks for everything that happen during the last year and celebrate the beginning of the new year (September-September).

Common to witness men dressed as women, people wearing animal costumes, masks, and young people dressed as chiefs and kings- in order to show that during the festival time all normal traditions and social norms/rules are forgotten for a while and people are free to act as they please

Generally, like most public celebrations it is a time for the community to come together celebrate life and forget about the troubles of everyday existence

My personal note and a universal one at that: A time for young males to get ridiculously drunk (sauced if you will) and act like complete idiots with zero inhibitions... sound familiar to anyone?

Anyways, we arrived at the Savoy Hotel on Thursday night and walked around town for a bit eating dinner and checking out the beginning of the festivities. Celebrations wouldn't get into full swing until saturday morning. About six of us stayed in a lodge/house with three rooms and one key to the main door. Unfortunately, we had an unwanted visitor in the middle of the night who decided to take Travis's digital slr camera and about 50 Ghana cidi from Joe. It was partially our fault because the last person home failed to lock the main door. It was a pretty terrible way to start the weekend. It's too bad that a festival that is supposed to be a time to celebrate the common good of people is also a time when dishonest people take advantage of the influx of people, especially foreigners.

The religious ceremony takes place miday on Friday and culminates in the slaughtering of a bull. Once the bull is sacrificed it is dragged through the streets for everyone to witness. Once ther ritualistic part is taken care of its time to party. Saturday marks the social aspect of the festival. It starts with a overflowing procession of the various companies (neighborhoods) that make up Cape Coast and their respected Chiefs and Queen Mothers. The procession is absolutely insane, people dancing, waving flags, banging drums, and men carrying the Chiefs on top of their heads in sled-like contraptions. We watched for a few hours and then made our way past the parade to get lunch and meet up with it once again at the fair grounds, where the procession culminates in a massive Durbar. I didn't know it, but the President of Ghana John Atta Mills was present as well. I didn't stay to watch each of the Chiefs and the President give his address, but I later found out it was entirely in local language so I guess I didn't miss much.

All in all, the experience was incredibly fun, exhausting, overstimulating, and helped to bring me one step closer to understanding Ghanaian culture. It was impossible to observe and take every aspect of the festival in...it was really just too much. There is a proverb that says something along the lines of, ' foreigners are like children who have very big eyes, but cannot see.' I think that really sums up my experience at the festival and my experience in Ghana as a whole.

Environmentalism?

Things have begun to normalize on campus. Everyone is moved into there rooms, lectures have started and moved past the syllabus, and I am starting to develop some kind of routine. I am attempting to mix courses between the Faculty of Humanities and the Faculty of Sciences, which may prove to be a risky move. Unlike universities at home that allow students to pick and choose courses from just about every discipline, the registration process is much more rigid here. I would say that the main cause of the inflexibility is the disorganized and poorly connected nature of the University of Ghana. Not to say that the level of instruction is inferior to colleges in the U.S just that the school is incredibly underfunded and staffed making a streamlined scheduling system nearly impossible.

For now I am offering (that is the Ghanaian terminology) courses in both the Department of Geography and Resource Development and the Department of Oceanography and Fisheries. The University does not have a department dedicated to the study of environmental science or policy, so I am doing my best to mix and match classes that have some environmental relevance. In my honest opinion, after roughly two weeks of class, I'm undecided about the quality of the instruction and material of my lectures. Keep in mind that the United States has had over 40 years of experience dealing with environmental legislation. In contrast, Ghana has been a democratic country for just over 50 years. Therefore, the country is in the earliest stages of drafting environmental policies and the ability of the government to plan and implement large scale projects is limited. Not to mention that the country has an illiteracy rate of nearly 60 percent and almost 30 percent of the population is currently living underneath the poverty line. As my friend Kina said so poignantly, "environmentalism comes after breakfast." I think there is a lot of truth in that statement. I've often heard my instructors at UC Davis say that environmental policies are a luxury of the wealthy class and the more developed world. How can you really expect people to care where and how they dispose of their waste if they are surviving from meal to meal. It's a difficult question to answer, but I feel like Ghana is at least beginning to take the necessary steps to approach the problem head on.

The internet cafe is shutting down so I'll have to revisit this topic next time. Just remember it is a privilage to have the capacity to recycle your newspaper and drive low emission vehicles...use it wisely.

A Question of Faith

I came to Ghana with as few expectations as possible in order to be open and objective towards the new culture I would be emersed in. It's important to leave your baggage at the door so to speak, in order to experience life from various perspectives. I feel that I have been successful in doing so, but the one thing I constantly get hung up on is the question of religion. Before leaving, I knew that Ghana was a deeply religious country, with the majority of the population involved in the Christian faith. Like I said, I knew Ghanaians were religious people, but in fact I had no idea of the level of their piety. Along with everything else, being here has me seriously questioning my own beliefs about the legitimacy of the supernatural world, of god, and the creation of mankind.

Religion is practiced in a different manner here. Ghanaians are not Sunday Christians by any means. They recognize god and the occult realm in every moment of every aspect of daily life. Unlike academia at home where there is a stark seperation between education and religion or science and religion, the two coexist in Ghana. It may be subtle, but it is there. A professor might say something like, "God willing we will discuss the topic of biodiversity next lecture." Therefore God, religion, whatever is evident everywhere and always. Being surrounded by religiousness is one thing, but being inundated and indoctrinated by it is something completely different.

My first serious and unwarrented account of an attempted conversion was last Sunday. While the rest of the country was in church or on their way I decided to sleep in until about 9:00 a.m. On my way down to get some breakfast when a fellow student said to me, "why weren't you in church this morning." LIke he knew me or something. To which I responded, "because I'm not a Christian." He asked, "well then what faith are you?" "Actually I don't have a faith" "Well haven't you heard of Jesus Christ?" "Yes of course I have." "I want you to believe in him." Tired of being quasi-attacked about my lack of faith I said the first thing that came to mind, "Oh well that's nice." The conversation ended at that point, but I continued to replay the encounter for the rest of the day.

I guess the thing that is hard for me is answering the question, "why don't you believe in Jesus Christ as your lord and savior?" How do I put that in words? How do I explain my belief in non-belief to someone whos beliefs are backed by an ancient and easily understood book. They have chosen sides and never looked back. I am realizing how important it is to be able to explain your opinions, values, beliefs, whatever you want to call them. Even if you believe in nothing you should have a valid argument and a clear understanding of nothingness. I won't figure out the answer to the question stated above any time soon. For me there is no rush, but I will continue to go over it and discuss it because I do believe that with self-realization comes great insight and empowerment. For now I'm going to do some thinking and when I come back hopefully I'll have a few more things to say on the subject of religion

The bucket shower

It has been exactly one month since I first set arrived in West Africa, Ghana to be precise. writing that now makes me realize how strange and unfamiliar time feels here. I feel like I have been away from home for an eternity, completely cut off from my old life and at the same time like I just left. I have had that sensation before, but it feels more extreme here, probably a byproduct of being in such an unfamiliar environment. I would like to apologize for waiting until now to account for my experiences in this foreign land. I guess I am partially apologizing to myself and then to all of my friends and family who would love to know what life in Ghana is all about. Actually I have no idea what life in Ghana is all about, but I can tell you what I have seen, heard, and felt so far.

It's probably better to start with the present and then slowly fill in the gaps as we go along. So lets see... Sunday, August 23, 2009 was a great day, not overly exciting, in fact it was quite similar to any other day back in California. The only exception being that everything I did took place here in Ghana not in California which gives even the most ordinary events a unique twist. Lets take for example the act of washing your body; a common occurrence that usually takes place without much thought or effort...that is to say if we are in the California context. Here in Ghana something so mundane is actually quite different. First of all my dorm building has not had running water since last Monday making the showering process a bit more involved. Instead of simply turning on a knob I (and everyone else) had to walk down four flights of stairs to the reserve tank outside, fill up my three gallon bucket and carry back upstairs to the bathroom. Then using a makeshift device constructed by cutting a water bottle in half I proceeded to shower via bucket and water bottle scooper. Don't take this account as a complaint because its not, bucket showers come with the territory and there is nothing wrong that. In fact its yet another great exercise in patience. I realized today that coming to Ghana is like stepping back a few years and in some cases many more than that to a time when everything wasn't available instantly and the most basic luxuries were not guaranteed. I have heard time and time again that I am part of the "now" generation, a generation of impatient twenty something year-olds that expect everything at the touch of a button. In my opinion instant gratification is a dangerous addiction that breeds a false sense of the world. Therefore, my lesson for today would go something like this: its o.k. if you have to fetch water for a bathe at least you have water to fetch.

Until we meet again.