Since I'm a horrible procrastinator, I now have the pleasure
of trying to sum up the last four months of my life. Obviously this will lack a lot of detail, but
I'll try to expand where I can.
April
The best part of April was our All-Volunteer Conference
(April 11 - April 15), but before I went to All-Vol, I visited my homestay family
in Anyinasin. It was the first time I
had seen them since I swore in August.
We were all happy to see each other except Kwaku Peter Vanney who, much
to everyone's enjoyment, was afraid of
me. My family did comment on my hair,
and they described it as "very beautiful." For those of you who don't know, I had been
growing quite a mullet (the back hadn't been cut in almost 1 full year), and
many Americans honestly said it was not too bad at all. I also had been growing a full mustache for a
while, rather it was full beside the part right in the middle which still
hasn't come in yet. They liked that too,
but said it made me look much older. It
was really fun seeing them, but getting ready for bed brought back some of the
anxiety I had during training. It wasn't
anything I couldn't handle, but it made me reflect on how far I had come as a
Peace Corps Volunteer and person. I went
straight from their house to All-Vol.
All of the Peace Corps Volunteers in Ghana come together
once a year for training conferences, administrative talks, and to relax and
meet the new volunteers. Aside from
Thanksgiving (which might not happen this year because there's a new American
Ambassador to Ghana) All-Vol is the only time when everyone gets together. During the day (8am - 5pm) everyone is
gathered together in conference halls, and we watch a lot of
presentations. But at night the fun
really starts. The evening activities
were Game Night, Date Auction, Talent Show, and Peace Corps Prom.
Game Night was kind of a dud, and most of the volunteers
(myself included) who arrived on Thursday chose to enjoy some nice, cool adult
beverages with their fellow volunteers.
This relaxed setting somehow managed to transform itself into a dance
party sometime after 11pm and lasted into the morning. (This is really late for most volunteers, and
I personally go to bed around 9 or 9:30 and wake up before 5am.)
The Date Auction was and usually is a huge success. This year all of the proceeds went to an NGO
in Kete-Krachi which rescues and then supports child slaves who work for the
fisherman along the Volta River. I don't
know how common this practice is throughout Ghana, but it is a serious problems
in some of the larger fishing and market towns.
I am pleased to announce that over 2000 Ghana Cedis were raised, but I'm
not sure of the actual figure. The
headlining date is usually "Thai Dinner for Four with CD Mike," and
this year the our new Director of Management and Operations (DMO or Money Man
for short) Mike L. decided that to add a date for four at his house to the
mix. He hinted that ribs could be
prepared, but it wasn't decided. Since I
wanted to show support for the children and I'm not afraid to look stupid for a
while, I decided to offer a date to barber my hair and mustache. My date ended up going for 51GHC (about $27),
and CD Mike even bid on it. There are
pictures on Facebook documenting the carnage, but I ended up with two different
horrible haircuts: one for Saturday and another for Sunday. The first was a zig-zag "reverse
mohawk" buzzed (no guard) off the center of my head, and the right half of
my mustache was shaved off, also. The
second was a complete buzzing of my head except for a couple of patches, and
then a circle was shaved (with a razor) into my head. On Monday morning I promptly shaved my whole
head with a razor and started clean.
The Talent Show was very enjoyable, and I'm always amazed by
the talents and variety of people we have in Peace Corps Ghana. I elected not to participate as I had already
been embarrassed enough the previous night.
Peace Corps Prom happens on the final night of All-Vol, and
this year's theme was "Wild Thing."
I hadn't really planned anything, but I hoped on a bandwagon with some
of my friends to cut down some plantain leaves and form a skirt with them using
belts. I'm not sure what we were
supposed to be exactly, but we were certainly wild. Before prom started PCV Media recorded a
Harlem Shake video, and you can see me right up front dancing with my
plantain-skirted friends. Prom was a lot
of fun, and because everyone is old enough to drink alcohol, there was a lot of
dancing. It was a nice way to wrap up
the weekend. Overall All-Vol was great: we
came, we ate, we drank, we danced, I got to meet a lot of new people, and I got two unique haircuts.
I returned to Bodada just in time for the final days of Term
2. I graded the end of term exams and
chatted with the teachers. The rains
were just starting to come, so I planted some green beans and made them a
trellis to climb. The bamboo fence I
asked some of my students to build around my garden worked great, and kept out
all of the goats and chickens. However,
nothing could be done to keep people from closing the gate after throwing trash
into the burn pile, so in the end all of my pepper plants and green bean plants
were eaten by goats. I haven't bothered
to plant anything again because I'll still have the same problem. I'm going to get some of my students to
adjust the fence so the burn pile is not fenced in. Hopefully that will keep people from
unnecessarily opening and not closing the gate.
I'm going to try sweet corn as soon as the fence is fixed.
Just before May, I got a horrible phone call saying that a
PCV named Dani Dunlap had died. We
haven't gotten the autopsy reports yet, but all signs point to severe
dehydration from cerebral malaria. She
was taken from her site to Accra by Peace Corps vehicle, and she passed away
shortly after arriving in Accra. I
didn't know Dani very well, but I talked to her a couple times. She was very loved by everyone who knew her,
and she was described by many people as a Super Volunteer. Super Volunteer is a term that we joke about
here as a way to describe someone who goes above and beyond all expectations,
but no one was joking when they described Dani that way.
May
Dani's memorial service was held in Accra on May 3 at CD
Mike's house. It was a large event, and
almost every PCV in Ghana was there to show their support. Dani's homestay family from Anyinasin came,
and a car full of Ghanaians came from her site in Central Region. Also in attendance was Dani's mother who held
up better than anyone else in the audience.
She thanked everyone for the love and support they showed Dani during
her time here, and she urged everyone to take malaria medication. The next day she flew back to Atlanta with
Dani. Seeing and talking to Dani's mom
was the hardest part for everyone because it was impossible to not imagine
one's own mother. I haven't missed a
dosage of my malaria prophylaxis, and I don't know how I could forget after
what happened to Dani.
I turned 24 the day after Dani's memorial, and I had
originally planned to have a birthday party at the beach in Keta. My party turned into a small group of people
going to Keta and relaxing there. It was
a nice change of pace from the grief we had all experienced. It was highlighted by one of my non-Peace
Corps, American friends in Ghana, Pat who works with a tilapia farming group on
the Volta River, when he brought all of the fixings for s'mores. Ghanaian chocolate doesn't melt as easily as
American chocolate (because if it did it would permanently be melted) but we
managed to stuff ourselves full of s'mores anyway.
The next big event for me was Training of Trainers (TOT). I applied to be a trainer for the 2013-2015
education volunteers, and at All-Vol it was announced that I had been selected as
a trainer. I applied because I enjoyed
training more than most, and I thought that my perspective and advice would be
very useful to someone who is training to be a PCV teacher in Ghana. On my application, I said I would be a good
trainer because "I
am a unique blend of friendly, Iowa farm boy and informative, experienced Ghanaian
PCV." I elaborated more in
the rest of my application, but I thought that was a pretty good line.
Back to the point, TOT was a weeklong event where we tried
to plan all 10 weeks of training. I was
brought on with three other volunteers to be PCVTs (the T stands for trainer),
and the PCVTs' jobs are to provide technical and cultural training to the PCTs
(this T stands for trainee) and support PCTs in their times of distress. Essentially we teach the newbies how to teach
effectively in Ghanaian classrooms, mind cultural differences, and give them a
shoulder to cry on. The role of PCVTs in
training is crucial as we link the Ghanaian training staff to the new trainees,
and the trainees often see us as the most credible people around (because we
are American and we have done what they are doing). During TOT we planned as many of our sessions
as possible and laid out the CALENDAR OF TRAINING EVENTS. I thought there was a lot of potential in
TOT, but there was simply not enough time to execute the plan to its full
extent. Two weeks would have been much
more effective than one week, but the staff was worried about the amount of
school we would be missing as teachers.
Third term started during TOT, and being a trainer means
that you miss 7+ weeks of a 12 week term (for JHS, the SHS term is
longer). I was worried about this too,
but since my district shuffled all of the teachers last year, my school has a
surplus of teachers. The form three
students write the BECE in June, so they are not in school after the first two
weeks of the term. After the form three
students left to write their exams, the teacher to student ratio was 1:7
(without me). I got my counterpart and
good friend Godwin to teach my classes while I was away.
Also, I got a package from my Aunt Tammy and her daughter's
family (the Berrys). It had all kinds of
wonderful foods inside like summer sausage, real maple syrup, parmesan cheese,
and canned roast beef. I know what
you're thinking, "Canned roast beef? Gross." WRONG.
It's delicious. Before I left for
training, I went to Mount Afadjato and cooked a taco dinner with Kate and
Cara. I haven't had any Mexican food
beside guacamole and salsa since I arrived in Ghana, and oh my, was it
good. We rolled and grilled our own
tortillas (with the help of Cara's small girl), cooked rice with lime and
cilantro, made refried beans, fried the roast beef with taco seasoning and lots
of cumin, and we had giant bowls of pico de gallo and guacamole. I can't even begin to describe how amazing
this tasted, except that it was so good I didn't even mind the lack of cheese
and sour cream. So a big thank you to my
family in Washington state. I love you
all, and so do Kate and Cara.
June
The trainees flew into Accra on June 5, and they arrived at
the Training Center in Kukurantumi in the Eastern Region on June 9. My fellow PCVTs (April - Biology/Integrated
Science, Kate - Deaf Art, and Jim - Physics/Chemistry) and I (JHS
Math/Science/ICT) met them at Kuku, and the next day we started sessions. The first week of training was mostly
technical training: teaching them about Ghanaian schools, students, and what is
expected of them as teachers. This week
went pretty well, but we were all tired from the long work days of
presentations during the day and preparation in the evening.
The second and third weeks of training were practicum. The JHS teachers were split into pairs and
sent to four different schools in the Kukurantumi/New Tafo area. Most of them taught 10 different lessons each
week, and only a handful had any teaching experience. They all had plenty of room for improvement,
and by the end of practicum everyone was so much better at teaching that I
could hardly believe it. I'm sure I went
through the same transformation, but it is hard for me to imagine how awful I
must have been trying to teach Ghanaian students for the first time. It's easy to think that you can just show
examples and that is teaching, but it's not.
You need to guide the class from the foundation and work step-by-step until
you reach your goal. Then once you reach
your goal, you can give examples, and you should give lots of examples. I digress, but I was impressed by the
improvements I saw, and I can say without reservation that all of the JHS PCTs
are more than capable of teaching in a Ghanaian classroom.
July
The fourth week of training was filled with more technical
training, but as we were already finished with practicum, there was less
interest in our sessions. We tried to
make them as engaging as possible, but there's only so much you can do with government
mandated sessions. Kate and April both
left to attend to matters at site, so Jim and I had lots of good bro time. It's unfortunate that Jim is already back in
the USA and that we didn't meet sooner because we got along really well. He'll definitely be one of the friends that I
keep after Peace Corps, and I hope we'll get a chance to hang out in the
future. We also celebrated the Fourth of
July with the trainees, and Jim and I brought hotdogs to the party. They are actually quite easy to find in
Ghana, but very few Ghanaians eat them except as a luxury item for breakfast
(think English sausage). The Fourth of
July party was a hit, and we sang (if you can call me shouting lyrics out of
key singing) lots of patriotic songs. I
think the trainees really enjoyed it too, and it was good to show them what you
can do when you get together and eat with other PCVs.
After the fourth week of training, Jim and I rode to Accra
in a Peace Corps vehicle; all I can say is that traveling by private car is
about 100 times better than traveling by trotro. I was going to Accra for my midservice
medical checkup and dental exam, and Jim was going to stay in Accra one night
before going back to his site in Central Region to wrap things up. Going into Accra, Jim told me about the
proper way to travel to the PC Office (ie. where to alight, where the taxis
are, which ones to take, etc.), and I was determined to have a good time in
Accra after not really enjoying it in the past.
It has always been okay, but I never really relaxed and figured things
out. This time I enjoyed everything and
learned about where you can go for cheap but good food in Accra (the Metro TV
canteen is a goldmine).
After we dropped off our things, we ventured into Osu with
Nihal for pizza, burgers, and beer. Jim
read this book that the trainees were given called African Friends and Money Matters, so we all three discussed
it. The book compares and contrasts the
differences in money and savings between Europe/America and Africa. The gist of it is that social value and
giving is more important in Africa and that system works well as a means of
surviving, but in our globalized world where so much wealth and power is in
Europe and America, the system fails.
Americans are brought up to value savings and personal work, but most
Africans are brought up to value sharing wealth and giving to those in need
(because there will probably be a time when you are also in need).
I only skimmed it during training, but it's an excellent
book, and I will pick up a copy next time I am in Accra. Nihal offered an interesting perspective on
the whole situation, and he has a pretty amazing story. He was born in South Sudan, and lived there
for 11 years before moving to Houston to live with his uncle. He's a great person and I don't know his
story well enough to tell it now, but there was an article written about him
fairly recently. I'll try to find the
link after writing this.
I passed my midservice medical exam, but I did learn that I
had a fungus living on my skin. It
wasn't doing anything bad to me, but it was causing my skin to break out in a
rash. I thought it was heat rash for a
long time, but the PCMO told me it was fungal.
I've been battling with it since then, and I think I've finally beaten
it.
After my time in Accra I finally traveled back to Bodada,
but I had an unfortunate surprise waiting for my arrival. I was expecting an overjoyed dog named Bobby
to be waiting for me at my house, but when he wasn't there on the first night I
thought maybe someone else was looking after him. Jean-Paul (the pastor whom I live with) had
traveled, so I assumed Bobby was spending the night somewhere else. The next morning, I asked my neighbor where
Bobby was, and she told me that the pastor sold Bobby to some people in a
village to be used as a hunting dog. As
you can imagine, I wasn't too happy about this, so I called the pastor to ask
him about it. He confirmed that Bobby
had been sold for 50GHC to some people in Patricia's (the school girl who
boarded at the house and cooked for us) village. Truthfully, Bobby was not my dog, but when
the pastor brought him here one year ago, he told me that the dog was to keep
me company because he heard that Americans like dogs. I was still annoyed by this, but I understood
why he sold him: he didn't know who would take care of him when we were both
traveling? Well, the answer is that I
would have found someone to feed him while I was away. And the pastor also considered Bobby to be
his property because he paid for him.
When I got to school I asked Patricia if this was all
true. She said that it was mostly true,
but that Bobby was dead now. The people
who bought him said that he wouldn't eat their food, so they killed him and ate
him. I thought she was lying at first,
but she was telling the truth. Now it's
true that I did eat dog once in Ghana, and I've eaten cat on multiple
occasions, but I've never eaten one of my pets.
More than anything I was just shocked by this information. I raised that dog since he was a puppy and
someone else sold him off to be slaughtered.
It's kind of a big deal. Every
Ghanaian that I talked to was shocked that the pastor didn't even consult me or
anything. And when I told the other
teachers at EP about it, they told me that they were wondering where he had
gone. Apparently, Bobby had been going
to school every day looking for me while I was in Eastern Region. That pretty much broke my heart. I don't think I'll be getting any more pets
in Ghana.
I did get back to school in time to proctor and grade the
end of year exams. I was highly
disappointed in the performance of my students, and grading the exams was a big
reality check for me. I had spent the
last 5 weeks surrounded by Americans, and I had romanticized Bodada EP JHS, my
teaching ability, and my students' abilities.
This was a reminder that I still have a lot of work to do.
During this time one of the trainees, Emily, came to Bodada
for a job shadow. She had a great time,
and really enjoyed my site. I have a
pretty awesome site in the rainforest surrounded by mountains, and I have a
pretty cushy living situation (running water outdoors, a shower, electricity,
decent internet via cellphone provider, and a good group of friends). We went hiking, played basketball, ate bugs,
and talked about life in Peace Corps Ghana a lot. It was fun to have a visitor at my site, and
everyone in town wanted to know if I had brought my wife. When she left I traveled back to Eastern
Region with her because there was still one more week of technical training.
Training was fine, and nothing too interesting
happened. I visited my homestay family
again, and they were disappointed that I didn't have my beautiful hair, but
they told me I was beautiful anyway.
After the week of training, I went to Kumasi for a meeting of the Gender
and Youth Development committee. That
was enjoyable, and it was fun to relax at the KSO. I wish I were a little closer to a non-Accra
office, but at the same time, I already feel like I've been away from site too
much and I would probably want to visit those places more if I were closer.
Before I left Bodada, the pastor also told me that he has
been accepted into a master's program at the University of Ghana - Legon in
Accra. He and I discussed this before,
and we talked for a long time about littering and other environmental issues
facing Ghana before his interview. I
think he'll get a MA in African Studies with a specialization in environmental policies. I'm happy for him, but he was my closest
friend here and I'll be sad to see him go.
I hope whoever replaces him is half as welcoming and open with me as he
was. This is my next biggest hurdle:
living alone in my compound and then meeting the new pastor and hoping I can
stay here.
August
4000 words and a couple hours later I'm getting burned out from
writing. I got back to Bodada on July
30, and I haven't done too much since then.
Since I'm the only one living here I'm mostly just trying to clean and
get the house in order. The pastor left
me the kitchen key, and I can use the full size refrigerator in there (I think
the church owns it). I've been cooking a
lot of rice for myself and some pasta too.
I'll be leaving this weekend to go back to Kukurantumi for the new teachers'
swearing-in ceremony, so it seems silly to fully stock my pantry and fridge
when I'll be leaving so soon. I've been
reading and watching a lot of TV shows lately.
I recently finished "Entourage," and I'm watching "Downton
Abbey" now. I've been reading classics
lately: I'm currently reading One Hundred
Years of Solitude, and I recently finished Animal Farm, On the Road, some Hemingway, Vonnegut, and David Sedaris
to round things out.
Last week I biked to Jasikan to play basketball at the senior
high a few times. It was a lot of fun, and
I'll be able to teach those kids (some of them are my age...) a lot of things about
basketball. In rural areas no one plays basketball,
so they don't learn how to shoot, or dribble, or even pass until they get to high
school. One of the tall kids can dunk, but
that's all he can do. It's pretty fun being
the best player on the court. On average
I think Ghanaians are the same height as Americans. I'm taller than almost everyone, and I haven't
found anyone to bring back to the NBA (cough* sorry Nay).
That's all I have for now. I'll write again sometime. No promises or guarantees about when though. I've learned my lesson with that. As usual, let me know if there's anything in particular
you want to hear more about.
