Devastation!

Jordan here:  So I have recently been working with a group of men I have arranged that have supposedly been caring for a tree plantation from the Forestry Department.  It’s about 10 of them and they were theoretically contracted by the Forestry Department via another supervisory company to work and care for a piece of land (10 hectares) where woodlot and fruit trees were to be planted.  They were to plow the land, measure the spacing for transplanting, weed and remove grasses to prevent fires, make a fire belt 10 meters wide around the whole farm, and send fire patrols at all times to protect the farm.  They were supposed to be paid 100 GH cedis (a respectable salary!) per month if all requirements were completed.  I was then brought up to speed hearing people’s perspectives.  They said they weren’t being paid and there was no supervisory support, and after me arranging to meet with the person who is supposed to be supervising them, he said they weren’t doing the work properly.  So I don’t know exactly who or what to believe.  But being a Peace Corps Volunteer, we are supposed to bring ideas, organization, and create connections with host country nationals, so they can help themselves out of their problems.  So essentially, I inserted myself as a 3^rd party.  This wasn’t really my project from the get-go, but I would use my skills to try to bring the workers and supervisors together to come to some agreement.  I obviously knew that when they came together, there’s usually a lot of finger-pointing, sloughing of responsibility, and name calling.  After I let them get that out of their system, I tried to look forward and generate conversation about moving forward.  A half-spirited agreement was agreed that they would finish the work like they’re supposed to and that the supervisor would make proper reports and pay them for their work like he’s supposed to.  

I went to the plantation a 2^nd time to see what work they had done.  Now I’m not trying to belittle the difficulty in doing farmwork completely by hand, but the work they’d done since the meeting was far from finished.  They seemed to think that they were deserving of pay now.  I said that the place could easily still burn and if that happens, they would have no bargaining chips with the Forestry.  I instructed them of this and that they needed fire patrols.  It sounded like they understood.  I had planned to travel to Tumu on business things, one being meeting with Forestry people at the District Office to see if something could move forward now that they’d been working.  I arranged another meeting in Tarsor (not an easy task).  Eventually we all were sitting together and the few words I could hear the workers talking about was “U bi jima re”, or “he doesn’t know”, referring to me.  So I asked what it was that I didn’t know.  Turns out the farm burned to the ground the night before I left for Tumu.  DEVASTATED!  We had nothing to hold against the supervisor now and I had no weight to throw against him to get them paid.  Talk about disappointed.  

Looking forward, since you can expect it was a meeting full of “I told you so” and “if you would have done this” and “no, if you would have done that”, we are hoping they’ll give our community another chance.  Hopefully they will buy seedlings from our garden area, and then replant in Tarsor.  Then I would have a much more administrative role in the process from the start.  Who knows, maybe its all in vain since I won’t see the end of the project, and all it takes is one day when no one’s watching the farm for it to fail.  But hey, we gotta try.  I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Schmoozin’ Ghana style

Jordan here:  So now as we get further into our service, we find fewer things that, to us, seem inspirational enough to, literally, write home about.  However as I reflect a bit about a recent experience, I thought it might be interesting to you folks reading this at home.

I was recently in Tumu for a few business reasons.  One of them happened to be me attempting to finish what a Volunteer before me (in a different village) had started.  He had really tried to push for dry season gardening as an important and profitable venture for his community.  He even arranged for a very expensive, high-tech drip irrigation system to be brought to his community.  2, were brought in fact.  After an extensive training with his leader farmers and Peace Corps staff and Volunteers, these systems were left for the community to take over.  Well, some animals were allowed into the garden area and messed up the whole unit and garden.  The equipment was still functional, but it didn’t seem the people respected it enough to be using it.  So like the majority of project equipment here in Ghana, the stuff was locked up and not used.  So I tried to rectify the attempt and move the system to my community’s garden.  That way Peace Corps’ money would not be wasted.

So I needed to get to work.  First I had to contact David’s, the previous Volunteer in this nearby community, counterpart.  This is the Ghanaian he was working most closely with on the project.  After we had a meeting and devised a plan of action, he sounded very interested in helping me acquire it.  Then I had to contact my boss, Nico, to get the go ahead to go and pursue this equipment.  Since this means sending an email, that small step was a week in the planning, since internet is an hour away from us.  After receiving the Peace Corps blessing, I met again with Abass (David’s counterpart) and devised a plan what to do next.  This required its own separate meeting.  He said it would be best to have a meeting with the opinion leader from the community.  So Abass arranged another meeting for the next day with this man.  The chief imam, who has a huge say in what happens in Kupulima, agreed to meet with us over minerals (drinks of some kind) to talk about this exchange.  We all sat and Abass thought it would be cool if I gave a spiel about this project and its potential importance to my community if they agreed to release it.  Better yet, if I could try to do it in Sissali.  I said I’d give it a shot, and it actually went over quite well.  I think I got the main gist of everything I wanted to tell him and explain.  The two of them literally clapped for me when I finished.  It’s just a huge testament of how important respectful communication is to people.  All those months of struggling to hear words and become smooth with delivery of thoughts in the language were put to use.  Not to say I haven’t used the language any other time, but this may have earned our community a valuable piece of equipment. 

Anyway, after finishing business talk, he seemed very interested in helping us out and sensitizing the community.  He would be able to go and explain what we were doing and why.  It would look bad if some white guy and a friend buzz into town, grab a bunch of equipment, and take off.  So, continuing the schmoozing, I bought his Malta (a drink made from malt extracts from brewing beer.  It tastes like liquid Raisin Bran, but most Ghanaians, especially Muslims since most don't believe in drinking alcohol, love it!) and my own drink.  Then we had to arrange for yet another meeting with Abass and me in Kupulima to talk with the community in person and see the equipment and instruct how we want it sent so it will arrive at Tarsor, our community.  

Looking back at this relatively exhausting process of getting business done for this equipment for our dry season garden project, I’m sure it’s the proper process.  Personality, integration, and persistence will (hopefully) pay off. 

Nowadays...

Jordan here:  Sorry to keep all of you in the dark for a while, we haven’t had much chance to get to internet lately.  We have been busy lately.  At the same time, we haven’t been busy.  But that’s kinda the way it rolls in Peace Corps.  Sarah has been keeping quite busy planning the big Girls’ Camp that we will hold in a few weeks.  Everything seems so simple if you’re not the one organizing it.  But then as you’re playing phone tag over shotty phone service, running out of credit, and all sorts of other logistical frustrations, you get a new respect for those who are “behind the scenes”.  Although, for this camp, Sarah and I will also be in front of the scenes.  Sarah will be presenting a session about changing gender roles (a potentially touchy subject).  I’ll be leading some sessions about Food Security basics, benefits of moringa in daily lives, and a hands-on demonstration of how to make moringa/shea butter soap.  For some, this camp is a chance to get out of the village and see a new place and meet some new friends.  For several others, we hope, this could be a chance to develop a mindset of leadership and action in their lives that will outlive our service here.  Maybe pie-in-the-sky mentality, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.  The impacts likely won’t even be noticed for years.  I’m sure some of you reading were generous enough to donate and after the camp, we’ll be sure to post lots of pictures to show you some of how your donation was put to good work.

I have been continuing work on my dry-season garden/tree nursery/ rabbit rearing etc projects.  We’ve now purchased the bulk of the equipment.  We are now left with buying or cutting poles to use when we extend the chain link fence to protect our grafted mango orchard.  We’ll also still need to extend our shade area for the thousands of tree seedlings we will plant.  As the garden has progressed, Issah and I have learned a lot about how best to set it up and use the equipment.  A new water pump has enabled us to avoid certain “politics” with using the 1 pump that is used by many other gardeners on their own areas.  It has been really frustrating getting more people to join our community garden, however.  The sense of taking care of your own first is a strong behaviour to change.  We still believe that after a year or two of spreading the word and flaunting the benefits, people will want to take advantage of the opportunity.  We’re about to start filling the thousands of plastic water bags that were trash and will now hold tree seedlings instead.  We’ll be carting in cow manure to promote growth and germination and natural fertilizers.  

I also have been working with the few people we have helped get rabbit rearing started at their homes.  We’re now at the stage of expansion and we’re experimenting with local material housing units for the rabbits.  Hopefully it will be more natural and realistic for the community to understand.  One man, Mohammed, started with 2 females and one male and now has 12 full grown rabbits, and last night one gave birth to another 3 bunnies.  We’re very proud of him!  

Today, Sunday, Sarah and I are teaching some extra classes to students who are preparing for their entrance exam to attend senior high school.  And of course, every day we’re thankful for being here in Ghana and remind ourselves that we need to make the most of every day.  Sometimes that’s just sitting with the neighbours and putting together puzzles, or eating fufu, or watching a harmattan sunset.  Our days are numbered and we are looking forward to coming home.  But we’re not done yet, so I suppose I should go prepare my computer class :)

Back in the Swing Again

Jordan here:  Well, we arrived at our site again, welcomed by many smiling faces, excited children, and the interior of our house covered with a thin film of harmatan dust.  The mammoth trip from Accra to the boonies of the Upper West Region was and will always be exhausting.  It wasn’t helped by the 3 huge bags of stuff we were dragging along with us.  Don’t get us wrong, it was worth it, since inside was enough food from home to outfit a bona fide Cold War bomb shelter.  Unpacking that is always one of my favourite parts of coming back.  We also printed out over 100 4X6 pictures to hand out to a number of people .  To see their faces light up was priceless.  They seldom get to see pictures of themselves.  Interestingly, they didn’t like the ones where they were actually smiling genuinely.  Of course those are our favourites, but they like the stone-faced, expressionless faces.  Oh well.  And of course as we walked around seeing people for the first time in over a month, we used our scripted-sounding responses to all the same questions: How is your mother, how is your father, the chief (assuming our home town has a chief of course),your family, your travel, etc.  By the way, they greet everyone who is reading this.  

We spent a couple days of good thorough harmattan season cleaning and got our language chops back in shape.  Now its Monday and we’re back to the grindstone.  Sarah went back to some of the same frustrations that come with a new school term.  I had planned a big trip with Issah to buy some large materials we need for the dry season garden.  That means we had to go on a market day to Wa, where some specific materials could be purchased.  Well since  the village we go to to board a bus or car travelling to Wa is along the road, and tons of students were heading back to Wa from Tumu (where the cars start), they filled every single chance of Issah and me getting to Wa.  So we sat for 6 hours watching overloaded cars pass by before biking home.  By now Sarah and I have adopted the “well, that’s Ghana” mindset and just moved on from it.  We’ve learned that whining about run-of-the-mill troubles is pointless.  People here don’t let it bother them too much, so why should we?  

Anyway, I guess this isn’t the most interesting update, but we’ll try to post some pictures as well.  We hope all is well with you and your life is being lived and you think it should be.  Until next time! 

January 2013

LOVE the sunsets

Clay pot beehive seems to be on its way to success

The view on the road into the village

Dry season leaves lots of time for loafing around. This is our friend Sanni

Common sitting place in the afternoon

Alijah and her kids Hafida & Hikama

She is one who makes moringa products and supports her family with the proceeds. 

Mango nursery is looking good! We hope to expand.

One fly was particularly annoying, so I grabbed him out of thin air!

Issah & Alija with the moringa leaf drier we made.

Sarah making shea butter

Even the students love Connect 4