Ok, so it is about time you learned a little bit more about Ghanaian culture and one of the biggest influences on the culture over here, is religion. Religion is one of those topics that is just riddled with tensions and drama. Everybody has their own opinions and its one of those subjective notions that seems to render people inflexible. I have no problem with religious fanatics or stringent atheists as long as neither group tries to convert me. I'm one of those ambiguous religious people, I definitely believe in god and in the basic metaphor and message that the bible implies but on the actual bible and religious passages I remain undecided and rather dubious.
Religion over here has a different meaning, instead of complementing education and guiding values it is more of an excuse. An easy justification for bad behaviour, laziness and apathy. Christianity is the foremost religion and its sentiment can be felt absolutely everywhere. Catholic epithets are titled on shop doors, car windows and eateries. Children in classes sing if you love jesus and you know it clap your hands and other worshiping songs. I wouldn't really have a problem with this religious overload, except that I really believe that they forget the actual values associated with the faith, and simply regurgitate the same religious drivel that they've been taught to unquestioningly believe. Things like: its ok to hit women, and children because the bible says so. Gays are wrong because the bible says so. And it really makes me angry when people use God to condone the behaviour that, the very principles of Christianity deplore. And I've legitimately spoken to people who believe these things. If you ask them them, their response is a resolute 'because the bible says so'- yet I'm positive that hardly any of these people have actually bothered to read even one proverb from the bible and so merely fall back on what others preach. Yet, they seem oblivious to the truth that the Bible was written and interpreted by man and has inevitably been distorted to fit whichever truth their agenda requires. I think that is the crux of the problem over here- religion is coupled with ignorance which perpetuates the cycle of inequality and poverty because people are unwilling to change things for themselves because they believe god will do it for them, and they continue to harbour backward values and ideology because they don't question they just embrace man's words (*not god's). Because I don't believe in any god who discriminates, or condones violence. Those sentiments are a human creation, figments of human nature, and unfortunately God usually takes the blame.
I was going to write more on the subject but I find that this topic makes me restless and frustrated so I've given up. Maybe i'll delve into it again some other time.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Crazy, Crazy Travel Times
Ah so I apologise for my recent radio silence but it's because I've had no access to computers. The past week I have been traveling, and traveling is a very apt description of my time and also one that can be, in Ghana, considered synonymous with waiting.
On Monday, we left our cozy little village of Akropong to discover the wider world of Ghana. I thought, when we left, that it would be exciting and fun. I was wrong. So far out of seven days of being away I have spent three at actual places and the others on a boat, a canoe, a tro, a bus or simply waiting for one of these forms of transportation to grace us with it's presence. It has been exhausting and boring and it's perplexing to realise just how much nothingness can make you tired. So, the journey began with this ambiguous boat trip. To get to the boat we had to catch tro's and on the way there I was pretty sick and was dreading the idea of getting on this potentially seventy hour boat trip. When we got to the docks for the boat we had to wait five hours until we could but tickets and actually get on the boat, it was another hour before we left the dock. Luckily, we took mats with us because we had a choice between sleeping upstairs in the night or downstairs in a crammed space filled with too many people and too many smells. Obviously we chose upstairs. The views might have been nice but in utter blackness its hard to tell. The boat had a very titanic feel with rich Ghanaians and white tourists on the top deck- having paid for expensive air-conditioned rooms- and the lower level being packed full with the poorer people. One and a half nights later we reached Yeji at midnight. It was raining and we had gotten pretty soaked which is not the most pleasant feeling.
After that, more travel. We got on this canoe that took an hour to load itself up with as many people as any nook and cranny could hold. There were about a hundred people in this canoe and I was later told by a guy that sometimes people drown because they overload the boat so much that it starts to sink and some luggage and passengers have to be cast overboard so that the whole boat doesn't sink. TIA (this is africa) Then came the awful, and i mean awful tro rides. I catch tro's all the time and they aren't the best things i've ever ridden in but they're bearable but on these ones were pure torture. The 'roads' dirt clearings are laden with holes that ordinary cars struggle with but that tro's are overcome by. Every 10 seconds bang bang bump and you're body is thrown this way and that with the motion of the car. We did this both ways- except on the way back the tro broke down and we yet again had to wait for another to amble along.
But throughout the journey I met some new, interesting people who made the trip enjoyable. I did a safari and saw elephants at a frighteningly close distance, watched families of baboons playing in trees and held a shotgun. It's been fun but the travel has been a lot and I'm going to enjoy sleeping more than two nights in one place. Yet, I have one more week to go- hopefully to be spent lazing and luxuriating at the beach.
Over and out :)
On Monday, we left our cozy little village of Akropong to discover the wider world of Ghana. I thought, when we left, that it would be exciting and fun. I was wrong. So far out of seven days of being away I have spent three at actual places and the others on a boat, a canoe, a tro, a bus or simply waiting for one of these forms of transportation to grace us with it's presence. It has been exhausting and boring and it's perplexing to realise just how much nothingness can make you tired. So, the journey began with this ambiguous boat trip. To get to the boat we had to catch tro's and on the way there I was pretty sick and was dreading the idea of getting on this potentially seventy hour boat trip. When we got to the docks for the boat we had to wait five hours until we could but tickets and actually get on the boat, it was another hour before we left the dock. Luckily, we took mats with us because we had a choice between sleeping upstairs in the night or downstairs in a crammed space filled with too many people and too many smells. Obviously we chose upstairs. The views might have been nice but in utter blackness its hard to tell. The boat had a very titanic feel with rich Ghanaians and white tourists on the top deck- having paid for expensive air-conditioned rooms- and the lower level being packed full with the poorer people. One and a half nights later we reached Yeji at midnight. It was raining and we had gotten pretty soaked which is not the most pleasant feeling.
After that, more travel. We got on this canoe that took an hour to load itself up with as many people as any nook and cranny could hold. There were about a hundred people in this canoe and I was later told by a guy that sometimes people drown because they overload the boat so much that it starts to sink and some luggage and passengers have to be cast overboard so that the whole boat doesn't sink. TIA (this is africa) Then came the awful, and i mean awful tro rides. I catch tro's all the time and they aren't the best things i've ever ridden in but they're bearable but on these ones were pure torture. The 'roads' dirt clearings are laden with holes that ordinary cars struggle with but that tro's are overcome by. Every 10 seconds bang bang bump and you're body is thrown this way and that with the motion of the car. We did this both ways- except on the way back the tro broke down and we yet again had to wait for another to amble along.
But throughout the journey I met some new, interesting people who made the trip enjoyable. I did a safari and saw elephants at a frighteningly close distance, watched families of baboons playing in trees and held a shotgun. It's been fun but the travel has been a lot and I'm going to enjoy sleeping more than two nights in one place. Yet, I have one more week to go- hopefully to be spent lazing and luxuriating at the beach.
Over and out :)
Monday, August 2, 2010
Hygiene, Sanitation, Health: a lack thereof
Again, I can't remember what I have or haven't written on the subject so bear with me. I've developed a great appreciation for all things clean, because over here I never feel clean, and nothing is ever clean. It is no surprise that people are always sick in these conditions.
Toilets: for those who have them there are mainly long-drops if you're lucky, some people have short drops which are beyond heinous. One weekend at Adafo Beach we had short drops and you could see everything that had happened in them prior to your visit. It was confronting, disturbing and foul, but i did it. For most people though, not having toilets isn't a problem because you can go anywhere outside to relieve yourself with either fluids or solids. They even use paper to wipe themselves which i can only imagine is an unpleasant sensation. Other times proper toilets are equally as gross because you can't put paper in them you have to place it in a bucket beside it and then you have to use water from another bucket to manually flush away your business. This isn't so bad except that people who have used it before you tend to be pretty gross and the notion of flushing really seems to evade them. I swear I have never seen so much poo, that isn't my own, in my life, as I have on this trip.
Sanitation: Along the streets are deep gutters that i suppose are intended to act as some form of drainage and sometimes they are filled with human waste and the smell is an assault on the senses. But there are no pipes, no place for wastes to go so the streets, gutters, rivers become the resting place of the most disgusting things.
Hygiene: Nobody washes their hands after the 'toilet', or coughing, sneezing, playing, working, petting animals or anything else that you would ordinarily wash your hands after. Then they eat with their hands. Culturally you're meant to wipe you're butt with the left and eat with the right, and I assume they believe this will be an adequate enough system of preventing the spread of germs. I sanitize my hands after the toilet and before eating and only have 2 of the five hand sanitizers left that I brought with me. Yet, still i feel dirty. People wash their clothes, and shower with buckets but there is still a sense of uncleanliness here. It might be credited to the fact that it is an ungodly temperature here and so sweat becomes a constant accompaniment during the day. Five minutes after a shower you can feel the touch of the sun melting through your skin and into your body and the sweat begin to trickle out of your pores and so an hour later there is little proof you have showered that day. The houses, shops, streets are all filthy and rundown because the concept of upkeep is obsolete. They sweep dirt from here to there, but nobody ever dusts or wipes walls and the result is layers of dust and grime that become one with the wall. When we painted the day care centre we obviously had to clean the walls before we began. It was a futile effort because the dust seemed to be impregnated within the walls and the dirt impossible to remove. In fact, after an hour of vigorous scrubbing the walls looked much the same as they had before we had started.
Health: malaria, coughs, colds, worms, stomach bugs are all rife. At the day care children are always coughing and snotting on me. Being sick is almost the norm. I have indeed, developed a cough myself, which is at least better than cholera or malaria I suppose. But the health or the people is a reflection of the lives they lead. Health only comes through cleanliness and so it is inevitable that people who live in their own excrement, would simultaneously live with disease.
Toilets: for those who have them there are mainly long-drops if you're lucky, some people have short drops which are beyond heinous. One weekend at Adafo Beach we had short drops and you could see everything that had happened in them prior to your visit. It was confronting, disturbing and foul, but i did it. For most people though, not having toilets isn't a problem because you can go anywhere outside to relieve yourself with either fluids or solids. They even use paper to wipe themselves which i can only imagine is an unpleasant sensation. Other times proper toilets are equally as gross because you can't put paper in them you have to place it in a bucket beside it and then you have to use water from another bucket to manually flush away your business. This isn't so bad except that people who have used it before you tend to be pretty gross and the notion of flushing really seems to evade them. I swear I have never seen so much poo, that isn't my own, in my life, as I have on this trip.
Sanitation: Along the streets are deep gutters that i suppose are intended to act as some form of drainage and sometimes they are filled with human waste and the smell is an assault on the senses. But there are no pipes, no place for wastes to go so the streets, gutters, rivers become the resting place of the most disgusting things.
Hygiene: Nobody washes their hands after the 'toilet', or coughing, sneezing, playing, working, petting animals or anything else that you would ordinarily wash your hands after. Then they eat with their hands. Culturally you're meant to wipe you're butt with the left and eat with the right, and I assume they believe this will be an adequate enough system of preventing the spread of germs. I sanitize my hands after the toilet and before eating and only have 2 of the five hand sanitizers left that I brought with me. Yet, still i feel dirty. People wash their clothes, and shower with buckets but there is still a sense of uncleanliness here. It might be credited to the fact that it is an ungodly temperature here and so sweat becomes a constant accompaniment during the day. Five minutes after a shower you can feel the touch of the sun melting through your skin and into your body and the sweat begin to trickle out of your pores and so an hour later there is little proof you have showered that day. The houses, shops, streets are all filthy and rundown because the concept of upkeep is obsolete. They sweep dirt from here to there, but nobody ever dusts or wipes walls and the result is layers of dust and grime that become one with the wall. When we painted the day care centre we obviously had to clean the walls before we began. It was a futile effort because the dust seemed to be impregnated within the walls and the dirt impossible to remove. In fact, after an hour of vigorous scrubbing the walls looked much the same as they had before we had started.
Health: malaria, coughs, colds, worms, stomach bugs are all rife. At the day care children are always coughing and snotting on me. Being sick is almost the norm. I have indeed, developed a cough myself, which is at least better than cholera or malaria I suppose. But the health or the people is a reflection of the lives they lead. Health only comes through cleanliness and so it is inevitable that people who live in their own excrement, would simultaneously live with disease.
A Brief Summary of Ghana Care
This is my last week in Akropong doing Care and to be honest it's a bit disappointing. Not because its over, but because in my last week I am forced to hop between two schools and an orphanage along with all the other care and teaching volunteers because the others have closed for a six week holiday. A fact that Projects Abroad kindly omitted telling us before we arrived. On Wednesday I embark upon some more traveling and its going to be quite the adventure. I'm going to Cape Coast until Saturday, and then I'll come home and leave on Monday for the other side of Ghana. On Monday we will, hopefully, get on a boat that will take us on a potentially seventy hour boat trip. I say potentially because all the guides say that there is no definitive answer and it depends on the day and the whims of the crew. I say hopefully, because the guide books have told us that we may go there and buy a ticket but that is not a guarantee that we'll get a spot on the boat. The one boat trip that i've had here which was really a canoe ride was only 40 minutes and the whole time i was grasping the sides of the boat and wrestling with the fear of falling into the Volta lake that I was told was filled with barracudas. Also, there was the very high chance of sinking with five of us girls perched precariously in in a canoe that was leaking water so rapidly that one guy instead of rowing devoted his time to bucketing the water out of the boat and back into the ocean. We also had to maneuver it so that us and our bags were in a balanced position so as to avoid the boat capsizing. I can only hope that this boat trip wont be quite so adventurous but with all the indefinite variables and the fact that the boat may very well not have toilets, or space for us I'm sure it will be infinitely more challenging.
Ok, back to the actual content of this blog. Sorry I can't help going off on tangents and I really cannot remember what i have and haven't written in past blogs so forgive me if I repeat myself too much. As I have mentioned in length volunteering over here in care hasn't been what I expected. It hasn't been a bad experience merely an enlightening and somewhat disheartening one. I've spoken about a lot of things to do with care- and the children have been a big focus. But, today as i think about the children that have made this experience worth it, my heart breaks a because i think of the lives that lay ahead of them and it is beyond bleak. These futures aren't dictated purely by the constraints of poverty or inequality but because of the appallingly substandard system of education over here. Many children are left behind because education is not compulsory and if you can't afford it then so be it. Even for those in school the hopes are not much better because they are forced to memorise things rather than learn. I never really thought about it before but one of the most valuable things i've been taught within my entire existence as a person is the ability to learn. The differentiation between having knowledge and using knowledge. These children are being forced to memorise the alphabet, numbers, colours. But if you give them a number out of sequence they seem perplexed. They learn to say yes to everything even if they have no idea what you are saying. They can't do simple things like colour, or put building blocks together because they've never been given that opportunity. They are missing out on so much development because the value of play and exploration is ignored. This is why I'm not so angry at the teachers when they insist upon colouring in, or joining the activities that I've arranged for the children. They too have suffered through the severely lacking education system of Ghana, and activities like colouring, beading, bubbles or balloons is as exciting for them as it is for the children. Which is really a morbid reality.
Children miss their childhoods because they are are so afraid to make noise, play or have fun because of the threat of the cane. The issue of smacking or hitting children remains one of contention everywhere. Some people are for it and others are against it. I have always been adamantly against the use of it but coming over here has only exacerbated my original opinions on the matter. Seeing children, who are sitting rigid, quiet and blank in a classroom because they are paralysed by the idea of being hit makes me utterly infuriated. One little girl, Princessa, is possibly the most gorgeous little girl I've ever met. She is vivacious, and as most children are, a little bit naughty. But when she smiles, or plays there is a twinkle in her eyes that shows the immensity of her joy and the infinite innocence of childhood. A lot of the other children have already lost that twinkle, especially the eldest children in a family who bear the brunt of responsibility and sadly the beatings. Princessa, however, often greets me in the morning with eyes sparkling with happiness and mischievousness, and i enjoy that right up until he point that the teachers bellow her name and she shuts down. Her entire body changes, she sits blankly, her eyes go dull and her smile fades and seeing this is one of the hardest things i've had to struggle with. So, while beating might be a very successful means of discipline it steals a lot more than it could ever be worth. It steals the light and happiness from children and that is one of the saddest things that can happen to children.
One of things that makes me saddest about these schools and Ghana's education: is that in Africa Ghana is supposed to be one of the more developed and better educated countries. Think of the children in the world who suffer these indignities and worse. Think about what you can actually do about it. Diddly Squat! That's what. The government has an obligation to it's people to do better, but the people bear the most responsibility because it's up to them to demand more. Unfortunately though, over here parenthood isn't as much about love as an obligation to have chidlren. So some parents- not all- but some are more pathetic than the teachers. Nobody wants to change, they seem content to live like this and that is their decision. I came here thinking that people would want to live better but lacked the opportunities to have those better lifestyles. Yet, over here it is more a matter of apathy: people don't want to change.
Ok, back to the actual content of this blog. Sorry I can't help going off on tangents and I really cannot remember what i have and haven't written in past blogs so forgive me if I repeat myself too much. As I have mentioned in length volunteering over here in care hasn't been what I expected. It hasn't been a bad experience merely an enlightening and somewhat disheartening one. I've spoken about a lot of things to do with care- and the children have been a big focus. But, today as i think about the children that have made this experience worth it, my heart breaks a because i think of the lives that lay ahead of them and it is beyond bleak. These futures aren't dictated purely by the constraints of poverty or inequality but because of the appallingly substandard system of education over here. Many children are left behind because education is not compulsory and if you can't afford it then so be it. Even for those in school the hopes are not much better because they are forced to memorise things rather than learn. I never really thought about it before but one of the most valuable things i've been taught within my entire existence as a person is the ability to learn. The differentiation between having knowledge and using knowledge. These children are being forced to memorise the alphabet, numbers, colours. But if you give them a number out of sequence they seem perplexed. They learn to say yes to everything even if they have no idea what you are saying. They can't do simple things like colour, or put building blocks together because they've never been given that opportunity. They are missing out on so much development because the value of play and exploration is ignored. This is why I'm not so angry at the teachers when they insist upon colouring in, or joining the activities that I've arranged for the children. They too have suffered through the severely lacking education system of Ghana, and activities like colouring, beading, bubbles or balloons is as exciting for them as it is for the children. Which is really a morbid reality.
Children miss their childhoods because they are are so afraid to make noise, play or have fun because of the threat of the cane. The issue of smacking or hitting children remains one of contention everywhere. Some people are for it and others are against it. I have always been adamantly against the use of it but coming over here has only exacerbated my original opinions on the matter. Seeing children, who are sitting rigid, quiet and blank in a classroom because they are paralysed by the idea of being hit makes me utterly infuriated. One little girl, Princessa, is possibly the most gorgeous little girl I've ever met. She is vivacious, and as most children are, a little bit naughty. But when she smiles, or plays there is a twinkle in her eyes that shows the immensity of her joy and the infinite innocence of childhood. A lot of the other children have already lost that twinkle, especially the eldest children in a family who bear the brunt of responsibility and sadly the beatings. Princessa, however, often greets me in the morning with eyes sparkling with happiness and mischievousness, and i enjoy that right up until he point that the teachers bellow her name and she shuts down. Her entire body changes, she sits blankly, her eyes go dull and her smile fades and seeing this is one of the hardest things i've had to struggle with. So, while beating might be a very successful means of discipline it steals a lot more than it could ever be worth. It steals the light and happiness from children and that is one of the saddest things that can happen to children.
One of things that makes me saddest about these schools and Ghana's education: is that in Africa Ghana is supposed to be one of the more developed and better educated countries. Think of the children in the world who suffer these indignities and worse. Think about what you can actually do about it. Diddly Squat! That's what. The government has an obligation to it's people to do better, but the people bear the most responsibility because it's up to them to demand more. Unfortunately though, over here parenthood isn't as much about love as an obligation to have chidlren. So some parents- not all- but some are more pathetic than the teachers. Nobody wants to change, they seem content to live like this and that is their decision. I came here thinking that people would want to live better but lacked the opportunities to have those better lifestyles. Yet, over here it is more a matter of apathy: people don't want to change.
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