Sunday, May 31

Wintanga a yaya

Thanks so much for the wonderful comments on my last post, I'm glad you enjoyed. I'm not sure I'll be able to continue to impress you, but I feel as though I have to try.

Writing them on paper might be a good idea, but with the help of Moses at the office I've discovered that I can just use one of the monitors in the office and use my laptop as if everything was normal! Although I still can't use it outside the office. At the same time I didn't discover that early enough to prepare a post in advance, so this one will a be "on the fly".
I'm trying to arrange one-on-one discussions as we speak. I've made up a basic structure with some key questions that I'd like answered. And hopefully through that interaction I can get a clearer idea of the environment they find themselves, with more specifics.
As well, I wasn't in Accra, so I apologize if I said that somewhere, it was a mistake. The internet cafe that I'm using is in Tamale, about a 25 minute drive from Pong-Tamale. I will be spending most of my time in Pong-Tamale, only coming into Tamale on weekends. I hope to elaborate a bit more on my attempts to find a permanent residence later in the post. As for the compounds that you likely saw from Google Earth, each of those would generally house a family. I'm not 100% sure about the functions of the larger buildings and smaller huts, because I believe it varies from family to family. Generally, though, I think the larger rectangular buildings will house the head of the household and in many cases has other rooms for other members. The other huts can serve many functions it seems, usually as a room for sleeping but some are the entryway to the compounds. Once I find a compound of my very own I'll provide the layout.

So this week was a bit different than my previous ones, it presented me with my first truly tangible pangs of home-sickness, a drop in motivation and general frustration with the difficulty I've had communicating with those around me. It was a bit up and down. I would have a day of feeling more or less useless and then start to feel better the next day, and then the next day I'd be down again.

I'm feeling fine now, and today in fact was quite fun, but I'll save that for the end. This week was difficult for a number of reasons, many little things compounded together to appear much more frustrating than they should have been. First of all, I was thinking that things at work were moving to slow, and that I wasn't pushing myself enough to keep up momentum. I was banking on my interactions with the students this week to act as my springboard to jump into the coming week, but on both Wednesday and Thursday, the students failed to arrive. It turns out that there was a scheduling mistake and they had been asked to meet with me on the two days leading to a deadline to fill out some important paperwork in Tamale. But even given this, it still didn't feel good to think that I had wasted two afternoons waiting for them, and that I was unable to make the preparations I was hoping to make for the following week.

This let-down was added to my inability to make any progress in finding a home in the community, so that I could begin the process of attempting to understand the local people and their livelihoods in earnest. I hadn't felt that I was properly communicating my need to live in the community to the Principle of the College, with whom I was staying. And in truth I had no idea where to begin, I was simply going to have to stroll into the village and start asking.

A stroke of luck came with the intervention of an extremely helpful individual by the name of Rahman. Thanks to a call from Sarah my coach to the Vice-Principle, as well as the subsequent conversation that he and I had, the Vice-Principle had asked Rahman, a young man of 25 who lived in the community to give me a hand. Rahman and I had met before, he had helped get my bicycle ready for use. Rahman had immediately spread the word that I was looking for somewhere to stay and the following days were spent meeting all the individuals who had a room to spare. Rahman had presented me with more options than I could handle.

So the prospects of finding a suitable place to stay in the community are now much better than they were at the beginning of the week, and I've been able to give myself the extra push to realize that I can and should just pursue the things I'm hoping to accomplish at work, such as interviewing teachers, rather than waiting for something to just happen on its own. The important thing was to get past the fear of feeling annoying!

And now on to today! Adam and I had arranged earlier in the week to go farming with his host family. So this morning I woke up bright and early and caught the first tro-tro (a large bus-like van) for Tamale. After a breakfast of egg-and-bread (literaly fried egg squished between a bun) and a mug of Milo (hot chocolate) I joined Adam and his friends Yussif and Ibbrahim outside their compound and we jumped onto bicycles to make the journey to the farm. It wasn't exactly a comfortable one since I was riding on the rear rack of the bicycle and could feel every bump and rock! After one small tumble caused by mud, we recovered and arrived at the large rectangle of earth that we would transform into a maize field by spreading seed.

Yussif and two others traversed the field back and forth poking holes in the group for the seed with large sticks, than Adam, the rest of the boys and I walked behind them tossing seeds into each hole and covering them in soil with our feet.

It wasn't that tiring but the sun began to take its toll, calling for lots of water! Eventually we were joined by the women of the family, and they joined us in the sowing of the seeds. It took surprisingly little time to cover quite a bit of ground. The family laughed at Adam and I as we sweated and applied and re-applied sunscreen. This prompted the phrase "Wintanga a yaya"

The sun turned out to be too much for the entire operation by the time 2:00 rolled around, because it had dried out the soil, and it was no longer productive to continue sowing. And thus ended my first farming experience in Ghana.

Saturday, May 23

Life at the College

Hey folks,

First and foremost, I would like all of us to mourn the death of my laptop. Well it's likely salvageable but probably not until I return to Canada. The screen has been rendered useless. And so can only write updates while actually at the Internet Cafe instead of writing them ahead of time and then uploading as I had hoped. This will result unfortunately in unedited updates, likely of a lesser quality than the ideal. So please bear with me. The other more tragic is result is that I see absolutely no way to upload pictures!!

So I have started work at the college, as my last post explained, but I'd like to give you a glimpse into one morning at the college.

I am waiting in a classroom with about thirty-five desks scattered around and two small whiteboards fastened to an old blackboard to make one usable whiteboard. As I wait, sweating in the heat young men and women slowly start to filter in to the classroom. As they do they begin re-arranging the desks into neat rows and they wipe down the desks to remove the dust that covers everything in this dry climate. While my back is turned looking out one of the doors to see if more students are coming, one of the students who was first to arrive has arranged one of the desks at the front of the class for my bookbag and has placed a whiteboard marker and eraser there for me to use. Surprised I thank him and he smiles and returns to his desk.

All the students are in uniforms. White shirts and brown slacks for the boys and blue dresses with white trim for the girls. There are about twenty-two boys present and three girls. The students are already joking and teasing each other as they settle in and I can tell this is a friendly environment where almost everyone is comfortable with everyone else. They are all paying extremely close attention as I introduce myself and explain my purpose for being there. I ask if they are having trouble understanding me, because being from where I am, I may have a tendency to mumble or speak too fast. They say they understand just fine, and this turns out to be true as we get deeper and deeper into discussion as I rarely have to stop and explain something I've said. I however have a somewhat harder time understanding what a few of them are saying, especially the shyer ones who speak quietly.

I write the word "entrepreneur" on the board. I ask what does it mean to be an entrepreneur. My goals for this discussion are twofold, EWB wants to know what the student's existing attitudes and understandings about entrepreneurship, and the college wants the students to spend some time thinking and learning about entrepreneurship. While I'm absolutely certain that I have absolutely nothing to teach the students about entrepreneurship, I do feel confident that a group discussion about it can provide the first steps for both the aforementioned goals. I will be able to learn what they think when they think entrepreneurship, and the students will share and debate with each other about the topic.

It quickly becomes clear that these students know a quite a bit about entrepreneurship and have a great deal to say on the topic. I write on the board all the different qualities that they say an entrepreneur has and all the things they say that an entrepreneur does. It was an entertaining and illuminating discussion. The students were eager to participate and share and I quicly became aware of some interesting class dynamics.

We then moved the conversation to the topic of "obstacles". I wanted to get a picture of what the students saw as standing in the way of starting up small businesses. If I thought they had a lot to share with the first topic than they were overflowing with input on this topic. The number of things they were able to identify was astounding. We discussed everything from an unstable economy and political instability to a scarcity of resources, disaster, conflict among partners and the perception of risk.

It was clear that these students had all the ideas and attitudes that I felt it would take to be successful entrepreneurs, but they simply do not find themselves in an enabling environment. Fortunately more entrepreneurship makes room for more entrepreneurship. So maybe as more young people take that risk and are successful, it will contribute to creating an environment in wich it is less dangerous for others to attempt. Unfortunately, however, that sort of risktaking alone will not ensure success, nor will it work in every environment. For real success governments like that of Ghana need help to invest in the necessary infrastructure and services that business require to be successful. That sort of help needs to come from the international community, and it will only happen as a result of pressure of citizens. So, get to work!

Thursday, May 14

Hitting the Ground Running

I know, I know. It's been far too long since my last update.

Some of you may have been disappointed, some of you may have even been worried. But I assure there is nothing to worry about, and I do apologize for failing to keep you up to date.

Things here in Ghana have been hectic since landing in Accra.

We arrived just in time to get a night's sleep, and were up early the next day to grab a bus to Tamale. That bus then broke down on the way, and we had to wait four hours for another bus. We arrived in Tamale late in the night, and slept a little before getting up to start meeting the Overseas team. We spent the day talking about culture, health and safety, and then we were sent on a scavenger hunt to get some extra things we will need. The next day was an intensive day of learning with our sector teams, so my group learned all about our strategy with MOFA (Ministry of Food and Agriculture) and our Agriculture As A Business (AAB) program.

Most JF's left the next morning for their various placements, but a few of us had to wait because our partners were not yet ready to meet. Two other MOFA JFs (Junior Fellows) and I were invited to a Regional MOPA meeting. That was quite an interesting experience. It was valuable to witness these Government employees discuss the various issues that affect them and their work.

Then, since I would not be travelling to Pong-Tamale yet, Sarah, my coach, arranged for me to go to the field with some extension agents to observe their use of the AAB curriculum. It was quite a learning experience! I learned quite a bit about chilli pepper farming, raising guinuea fowls, and fishing from my three visits. I also learned quite a bit about the three extension agents' different approaches to working with farmer groups.

So despite the fact that I haven't yet even started my placement, it has been non-stop since arriving!

I hope I can keep you up-to-date more regularly in the future.

Until next time.

Evan