The biggest culture shock for me here in Ghana has been the blindingly overt disparity between male and female and black and white. Racial discrimination is a trend that humanity has carried all throughout history, yet in Australia we are taught to strive for equality and to quell prejudice, even if it still exists in some form or another. In Africa blatant racism is a page that has not yet been overturned. People in the street, especially children call us Oboroni, street sellers give us higher prices, and the wrong change. Overall we are treated very differently. You have to watch where a taxi is taking you, and how much it will charge you simply for the fact that you're white, you have to sift through your chnage to ensure that you haven't been swindled simply because you are white. It is a disappointing tale because almost every non-black person in this area is volunteering. Offering up, at great monetary and personal costs their time, their effort, and their compassion and yet we are discriminated against so obviously. The worst part of it all though is that they don't understand that they are even being racist, it is just the way they have been broguht up and the way that they do things. Yet, if I was at work at Coles and decided to give a black person a higher price their would be outrage, if i called out to people in the street Black person I would be condemened by the public. Here it isn't just accepted, it's expected. (It's ironic in a way, because i'm almost finished reading To Kill a Mockingbird. It seems racism is an exponential story with no real end)
A woman's duty is the household- the cooking, the washing, the up keep- does not seem like such a funny joke anymore. At home it is merely a funny line that is not taken so seriously, but here it is a reality. I see it everyday as boys run about having fun, a girl of no older than 11 scurries about carrying the burdens of an adult. Men expect women to cook, to clean, to do dishes and raise the babies. Its such a surreal experience to witness firsthand the opression of women that I have never felt. Feminists in Australia who fight against female oppression really need to come stand in African shoes before they raise their voices about equal pay.
Homophobia is rife: it is illegal to be gay here and the persecution you suffer if you're suspected of homosexuality is brutal.
When I sit here thinking about the world, I see it differently. Because experiencing and feeling a culture so diverse from your own can really rock you identity. I have always held a cynical outlook on humanity, anybody who knows me knows that. Yet, I've always had a romanitc side that values the notion of equality, compassion, freedom and the ideal of change. Such ideals i have so readily taken for granted yet the fight for them may never actually be won. I don't expect to change the world, this country, this community or these people, but I hope one day they might look to change themselves. I've never believed that an external hand can orchestrate change, because that inevitably causes more problems than it can ever solve, but I still like to believe that people from within can change the way things are and the way things work.
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