Views around Elmina
Moringa Leaves
Friday, April 3, 2015
Pictures Day 21
Meal for Drew's Last Day
Things to know
-Spaghetti is sometimes eaten with milk powder and sugar added to it. It tastes really good.
-The president was sick with throat cancer when he went into office. He was advised against it but decided to run for the presidency anyway. That is why he has died. He had been secretly going to the US for treatment, and pretending that they were just routine check ups. None of this is public knowledge to the people of Ghana though which explains their readiness to accept the theories about voodoo being spread.
July 28, 2012- Day 23
Yesterday, I had a nice talk with my host sister Francesca. I was sitting downstairs watching her cut vegetables and make a special sauce for her tilapia. We talked about women here holding babies on their backs and cutting things in their hands rather than on a cutting board. We talked about her dreams for the future, how she wants to go to school for catering, making her own beautiful wedding cakes and pastries. However, she doesn’t have the money for it at all, so for now she makes money by selling tilapia at night. This money is needed to support the family because their father left when she was little and now is dead, so she must support the family and help her mother who is poor. For a while we also talked about the United States and how credit cards allow people to buy crazy things that they do not need and that the reason America looks so rich is not because they actually can buy these things, but because they buy things that they can not afford and often go into debt. This notion shocked her. She was also shocked to hear that we have homeless people and poor people. She thought that there were only rich people in America. It was a very good conversation to have, to even help her perspective of the world be opened up. Often, the people here are so admiring of America and any white person, thinking we have it all and are so happy and rich when that is not always the case. And even with money, are we really happy? I see more happiness here as I watch people with almost nothing appreciating everything they have, loving life, dancing and singing. They are always singing no matter what they are doing. It is beautiful.
Yesterday was Friday. Kate, Drew and I decided to go on an adventure around Elmina. We walked up to this place called the fort which is a huge castle like building. It’s awesome. From that point you can see all of Elmina encircling the fort. It was breathtaking. You can see the lagoon where all of the fishing boats are harbored. There were hundreds and hundreds of people, small from that view, all wearing vibrant fabrics. You could only tell because they were moving blobs of color. It was so cool to see all of the houses and streets and then beyond that on one side was the ocean, forever expanding, and on the other side were fields and huge hills of red earth and Cape Coast behind that. It was so amazing. As we were up by the fort, a man came and put his arm around me and asked me how I was doing. This was nothing new because everyone here is very friendly and always talking to us and asking us questions about our lives. I have even gotten a few marriage proposals right off the bat. But I just told them I had a boyfriend and then they get very happy for me that I’m not all alone and desolate. But anyway, today this man made me feel slightly uncomfortable and as I was trying to walk away he grabbed my breast. I looked at him in shock, said, “Don’t touch me” and then I walked away. I’ve felt totally okay and comfortable here up until that moment. For the rest of the day people kept being a little bit pushy and too intense. Little kids kept trying to take things from my hands, and people kept getting too close and I just felt nervous. I still feel a little nervous about things now. Not that this couldn’t happen anywhere, it is just more threatening to be away from home and feel uncomfortable like that.
After walking around, Kate and I went to Cape Coast. We picked up some more gifts for people back home and I bought fabric to make a few skirts. I also bought a French book from a used bookstore. It is my first French book. I am really excited to read it because it is also about spiritual enlightenment that is found in many different ways for many different people. I hope that it really expands my French. I may wait to read it until I get home so that as I am reading I can look up words in my French dictionary. This way I will really be learning. The reading looked more simple than any of the other French books available. There were books I wanted such as writings by Renee Descartes and Carl Jung. However, I can just barely understand their philosophies in English, so I decided to keep it simple. I also got those chocolate banana pancakes again. They are the best thing I’ve ever eaten.
As a part of this trip to Cape Coast, I had to deal with a lot with money, figuring out how much to take out in order to last me my final week here. I also had to pay my tuition bill so for the whole day and even now I have been feeling pretty anxious and stressed out. Things just seemed back to that rushed and worried pace of life, trying to fit everything into one day of running around and getting things done, and worrying about money. I didn’t like it. I don’t want this to be my life when I get back. I don’t want to return to being stressed and unhappy because there is too much to worry about. I hope that in this last week I can teach myself that even during stressful times, I can find inner peace. I have found a lot of inner strength and happiness here, which I hope to bring home with me. I feel very Zen and have a live in the moment mindset, which is easier to live in when there are not too many things to think about. But I am afraid that when I go home, so many things will consume my thoughts and time that I will go back to being just as stressed and worried about life, unable to keep this appreciation of life that I have gained through living among the people here. I also skyped with Jake last night which made me want to come home. I don’t want to feel that way. I miss home a lot but since I am here for one more week and there is nothing that can be changed, I want to accept this and enjoy myself every day until I arrive home.
I finally got the pair of pants that I had made for me last week. They are extremely epic. I also found out about this wonderful plant called Moringa. It is the super food of all super foods. There are so many amazing things in Ghana. Cool pants, cool plants?! It grows here in Ghana and is used to cure any kind of sickness. It contains Iron, Vitamin A, C, Protein, and many other things. When the plant grows you cut the branches off, then taking the leaves and drying them. Once they are dry you grind them into powder and boil the powder in water. Then you have tea! So of course, I bought some of the seeds to bring home and grow at school. I am so excited to make my own tea that has extreme health benefits. Mama Teiko has been giving us Moringa tea every morning and night for the past few days. She even let me help her take the leaves off of the branches and taught me how to make the tea.
Last night was Kate’s last night. We talked and ate a really nice meal of jollof rice, homemade coleslaw, and chicken. It was good. Mama Teiko even gave us Sprite. Kate left this morning though. We went to the station with her so she could get to the airport from there, and I almost cried because I was sad to have her leave. I loved meeting her and spending this time with her. But we live so close to each other back home and I hope we will stay in touch.
Thoughts: I met a woman who was volunteering for ProWorld this month. She just graduated from college and looks fairly young. She told us that she has an 11 year old son. So many people have such different lives and such varying experiences. It never fails to astound me when I hear stories like this. She couldn’t have had her baby at any older than 12. I was reading over her shoulder as she read a book called The Stolen Life about a girl who was kidnapped and used as a sex slave for this man at the age of 13. I feel that I can not even reflect on this because no matter how much suffering I see, I still can not get used to it. It still hurts me to know that people everywhere are dealing with issues of such magnitude.
Thursday, April 2, 2015
July 26, 2012- Day 21
When I write out the days on here I can not believe I have been here for so long of a time. Day 3 feels like it was a few days ago. It could be day 7 at most in my mind. Time is going so quickly.
For the record, there are many things that go through my mind in the day, many topics that I want to discuss with all of you when I get back but to journal about them all would be so overwhelming. If you would like to talk about anything when I get back, please let me know. I have had a lot of discussions with people that I can not even begin to scratch the surface about in a few pages of a journal.
Today started off with bad bathroom issues. And some yoga. Always a good morning in Ghana. I went downstairs to go to work and Mama Teiko made me sit and wait, telling me that she had sent someone to get me rockies. I didn’t know what rockies were. When they arrived it turned out that they are muffins! Rockies, muffins, both words that make no sense. But these were the best muffins. They were buttery and resembled corn bread. I love rockies! So I walked to the taxi station to meet Drew and we finally had success getting a taxi. The past few days have been rough. You always encounter days where taxi drivers try to make you pay 10 cedis to get to where you're going just because you are American and they hope that you don’t know the real price. Its only 1.50 cedis to get to work. Once the way toward Dwenase, there were three men standing in the road with a big log across, blocking the way. They made the taxi driver pay them in order to get by. Apparently these men were working on the roads, fixing the endless amount of potholes here, and these workers often believe that they deserve money from those driving on the roads. This happens with police men here as well. The police system seems to be very corrupt, my knowledge of which comes from observing them stand on the sides of the roads, pulling taxis over in order to get money from the driver. If you give the police about 5 cedis which is about $2.50, they will let you go. This does not seem like the job of a defender of citizens, or an upholder of the law. Just some more information to digest along with the rockies I had for breakfast.
At work we laid more beds for the plants and raked the sticks out of the field. Then Aya took us on an adventure to find coconuts. I tried to balance one on my head but it is really not easy. Then she chopped open our coconuts with a machete and we drank out of them and ate the coconut residue from the inside. It was so cool! She also showed us a very strange fruit with spikes on the outside. This is called the apple of Ghana. They have other apples here but they call those foreign apples. It is not ripe to eat yet, but in a few days it will be and I am excited to try it. There are many points in the day where we stop working and just spend time sitting around talking and not doing a whole lot, but trying new things, and finding out new things about life in Ghana. I like that they try to expose us to as many random things as possible. Finally Pastor Sam showed up with a feast. It was Drew’s last day so the Reverend bought us each a large piece of chicken (which is really rare and expensive here) and a bunch of jolof rice (rice with spices and peppers in it, usually red) as well as sweet corn in a can. It was so good and filling.
We had a very long talk with Pastor Sam today. I asked him about the belief in voodoo, etc. He told me a lot of things that really opened my eyes to a new view of culture. Culture should be judged sometimes. Not to say that we should look down on the people. However, progress is an important part of life if you want to survive and thrive. Believing in things such as voodoo and spirits merely places a limit on your life. Rather than becoming literate, educating themselves, and finding real answers to their problems, and thus dealing with and solving the problems at hand, culture will often give them an excuse or an answer. This answer has been passed down for generations and continues to limit that culture. If people are dying of a sickness and you blame that sickness on evil spirits, then how will anyone ever learn and find the cure to that sickness and help the people within that society to stay alive? Culture is incredible and very important. So are beliefs, traditions, family stories, etc. However, when these things are getting in the way of you living life to your fullest potential, when is enough enough? Now I understand why people have problems with religions. There is nothing wrong with believing in something. But if your belief gets in the way of your health, or is hindering you, then it is not good. Pastor Sam was telling us that these excuses and cultural explanations are holding back Africa from developing. It’s a tough thing to think about because there is so much history, life, and value behind many of the aspects of these cultures. Culture is the definition of everything that people are. Kate and I talked about this a lot later too. It’s so difficult to decide if you are for or against things like this because you can’t just cut something like culture out. People would not survive without culture. But you also need to progress beyond what you think is best, and find out what actually is best. A lot of things that I have encountered here feel on a similar level of conflict in my mind. There are always so many positives and negatives. For example, the idea of comparing America to Africa. There are so many positives and negatives to both sides. Thinking about the concept of how well people are doing here in Ghana, you see a lot of negativity: children with protruding belly buttons, open sewage running on the sides of the streets, people dying of malaria. But at the same time there is so much that is going on here to make things better. Especially in comparison to a lot of places in Africa, Ghana is doing so well. I can’t stick with one emotion because I go back and forth on both sides for all of these topics. I hope to engage you all in conversations of this kind when I return.
I would like to say that this trip is making me really focus on how amazing the rest of my life is going to be. This is the first step I have taken toward my happiness and success since coming to college. It’s really the big first of things that I have done on my list of things to do in my life. I have so many dreams and aspirations and it has always felt like I had to put everything off for later. Later is NOW! I feel that doing this is making me so motivated and inspired to succeed in all areas and explore all of the interests that I have had for so long. Now I can finally go out and do everything that I only ever used to talk about. I haven’t been this excited to learn French, do yoga, study Buddhist philosophy, paint, go home and learn and read and watch documentaries on every place on earth, learn all about every culture, work with professors on research projects, do my senior thesis, everything sounds amazing at this point. I just want to throw myself head on into so much work and so much involvement. I can’t wait to help in the soup kitchen back in Plattsburgh. I can’t wait to travel to Montreal in the fall on the weekends. Tomorrow I am going to a bookstore in Cape Coast and buying my first French book to read on the flight home! One of my professors at school asked me and a few other students to work along side him in creating an honors seminar about Herbert Marcuse’s philosophies. I emailed him a few days ago and hope that this opportunity really happens. I also want to tutor French in the fall and work in order to start saving money. I’m so happy that this is my mindset because all of last year I felt like I wasn’t doing anything except taking classes and I couldn’t find the inspiration that I need to live. But now its back and it’s in full force. Yesterday I learned the word for pocket in French. It’s “poche.” I didn’t know and now I do. Even this seems exciting to me. Qu’est-ce que tu as dans ta poche? J’ai le monde entier dans ma poche.
Tuesday, March 31, 2015
July 25, 2012- Day 20
Today at the farm we went on an adventure through the woods. We found a little wooden gate attached to a tree in order to swing open and shut. Behind the door was a very secluded little pathway, all covered in trees with big leaves and overgrowth of plants everywhere. It was almost like I discovered "The Secret Garden" in real life. We continued on the path and suddenly found ourselves up on the top of a hill. Suddenly, the whole world opened up in front of us. There were hills and valleys and mountains surrounding us, yet from a distance. It was breathtaking. I’m in love with nature, and Africa is a whole new world full of it!
After this, we went back to the farm and picked up sticks from out of the garden for a while. Then we dug up about seven beds for plants to grow in. This work was getting frustrating because often things on the farm are done the quick way and not the long term most efficient way. And the people who own the farm won't let us fix that. They tell us to stop and just do it quickly and messily. But we can’t change the world in 4 weeks so we just do what we are told.
At the farm, Drew is the favorite. There is a dance here called the Azonto dance. It is very popular right now and he can do this dance. One day he did it for them and they all clapped and laughed and now call him Azonto man every day. I feel kind of left out because they never really talk to me specifically. Then today I realized that they don’t know my name. So I told them my name but they couldn’t really say it (many people have not heard the name Rachel and think that you are saying Richard) so they asked me my Fante name. Fante names are determined by what day of the week you were born on. I was born on a Sunday, making my Fante name Esi. I told them this and Aya got so excited because she was named after a woman who’s name was Esi. So her name is also Esi even though it is also Aya and her real name is Comfort. So now we have a special bond and the rest of the day she kept shouting at me “Sister Esi!” and laughing and smiling. It was so nice to feel like I was a part of the family.
After a few hours of working we took a break to eat lunch. While we were eating, Cynthia began to prepare a common dish here known as Red Red. To start off you have black eyed peas. Then you separate the good ones from the bad. You boil those in a pot for one hour. Then you fry plantains. Fried plantains are always eaten with Red Red. When the black eyed peas are done you mix them with a tomato paste and onion tomato sauce. You stir that all together with coconut oil and let it simmer for a while. They use coconut oil to cook everything, even frying the plantains which is cool because we got to make coconut oil with a processor the first week that we were here. I loved watching this whole Red Red process because there was a little fire place that Cynthia was cooking over as I was watching and asking questions, Aya was nursing Monica and they were both chatting in Fante. It just felt really wonderful and normal to be sitting around in Africa making Red Red with the women. I love learning from the women here. They make up such a huge portion of life here in so many ways. Often households here don’t even have a father because he has gone away to live somewhere else for example to make money in the city. So every day I have the opportunity to watch and learn about how wonderful these women are and see what they do each day.
Later in the evening when I got home, I spent the night in Kates room just talking about everything in the world. She has malaria so I was keeping her company because it can be really terrible to be sick and have absolutely nothing to take your mind off of it. It was really nice to spend time together. I hope that when I get home we will stay in touch because she is such a good friend and is so similar to me.
Something tragic has happened here in the past couple of days. The president of Ghana has died. He died suddenly after having a strong headache. He was only 68 years old. In the cab ride home today we saw many people running and dancing and walking down the road in a big parade. They were wearing red cloth around their heads and wearing red and black clothing. There was a brass band and people waving flags. My sister Francesca told me that this was them mourning his loss and putting their sadness out there. This is their way of dealing with his death. Later that night there was a party in the square outside of my house, for the same reason. There were so many people wearing red and there was very loud music playing.
So here is the inside story on the presidents death, according to Francesca. The president was a member of the NDC, the National Democratic Congress. The other political party is the NPP, the New Patriotic Party. Apparently some weeks ago, a large sum of money had gone missing from the government. The president was angry and wanted it to be that whoever stole the money could not spend it. So he was going to do an entire process of changing the serial numbers on the money in order to make the stolen money have no value. Now, just a few weeks later, he is dead. Therefore the members of the NDC believe that the members of the NPP killed the president. The NPP must have stolen the money and now were mad that the president would do something to stop them from being able to spend it, so they killed him. However, they did not kill him physically. They killed him by calling on evil spirits to harm him; they killed him using voodoo. This is the generally held belief of the NDC members along with my sister Francesca.
She said that voodoo exists in the world but it is most strong and dangerous in Africa. The only way to stop voodoo is through a lot of prayer because through prayer God will protect you from the evil spirits. In order to do voodoo you can use any object such as a piece of paper or even a doll and call that persons name, bringing bad spirits into the object in order to harm them. There is no real way to judge this belief. Of course it was shocking to me at first to hear that this was the real belief of many well educated political activists as well as maybe half of the nation. However, this is what you have to expect when you go to other places and want to study their culture. Regardless, I love studying things like this. And even if no one killed the president, the people of Ghana are mourning the loss of a wonderful leader who had a great and caring personality. Many people I have talked to said that they did not eat after hearing of his death. It is all anyone is talking about right now. Re-election happens in December but for now the VP takes over office.
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
July 24. 2012- Day 19
At work we walked all the way out to the fields and planted plantain trees. We had to dig holes in the ground and then place the base of a cut off tree back into the ground. I spent most of the time just realizing that I am in Africa and really enjoying just being in that moment. I feel that I don’t live in the present moment enough. Some of my days here I have been waiting for work to be over or thinking about going home or always on to the next thing. This is the same thing at home. We all live our lives in a perpetual state of waiting for the future or looking to the past. We are never truly just living here and now. It produces a lot of anxiety and makes life very negative because you aren’t really enjoying life, you are just comparing it to what it could be or what it used to be. I want to make this better. The books I have been reading cover this topic extensively. I am reading a lot on Buddhist philosophies and about what I just explained above. So at the farm that day I just kept stopping my mind and really focusing on what I was doing and where I was. I listened to birds cooing in the distance, felt a slight breeze, looked around at the hills and valleys surrounding me, all covered in trees, green everywhere. I bent down close to the ground to replant the plantains. As I was doing this I smelled the soil and really focused on how I was pushing it around the plantain root. I realized that I was adding to the life in Africa. I just planted a field full of plantain trees that will grow tall and produce food that will be picked and then eaten in Africa. I am leaving in a week but these trees will be here for a long time. This experience was really amazing to me because I was so focused on it. I was such a part of the earth and the plants and the world in those few hours.
Later on we all had to go to the ProWorld house for Fante lessons because we do that every Tuesday night. I actually learned a bunch of things: how to say how are you, I am good, good morning, good evening, and good afternoon. These three greetings are very important. You always say them to everyone you meet. If someone gets into the taxi and it is afternoon you must say good afternoon to them. It’s really cool. I like learning the rules of how to exist here and what social norms and expectations exist. Basically, CULTURE. It was really awesome to be learning Fante in Ghana. This whole day was just good. After Fante lessons, ProWorld takes all of the volunteers out to eat at various restaurants each week. That night we went to a place called One Africa which was a nice place because we got to eat outdoors. Now that I think of it, most places that we eat are at least slightly outdoors, just with a roof over our heads. I love it. Why stay inside when it’s so nice out? I got Mac and Cheese with vegetables which was delicious. Tuesdays are always a nice way to get a small taste of home, eating fake American food and talking to American people.
Overall I’d say that day 19 was one of the good days. It’s like that here. Good days, good days, and then one bad day, and then some more good.
My roommate Kate has malaria. I feel really bad for her. She only has a few days left here and has to lay in bed sick the whole time. I think back home we assume that malaria will kill you if you get it but here it’s kind of like having the flu. It is definitely dangerous, but if you get the medication, you’ll be better soon. You just spend a few days vomiting and having diarrhea and feeling terrible. Then you recover. A lot of volunteers have gotten it, but mostly those that have stayed longer than 4 weeks. However, locals do die of malaria for many different reasons. Often they aren’t cautious enough and just let it slide, not really getting checked for it and not taking the pills. Or they can’t afford the medication. It is fairly cheap but some people barely have enough to eat, not to mention extra money for medication.
It’s getting hard to find time to journal anymore. I am always doing something and when I’m not I want to enjoy the culture here as much as possible. I want to get as many experiences as I can, not just write about experiences. I feel like there are so many little things that I want to mention here though that by the end of the day so much has happened that I can’t even remember them all. Like the fact that on the morning of day 19 we tried to get a taxi for such a long time and the drivers were trying to screw us over cause we are white and they think they can take advantage of us. It’s really frustrating. They lie to us sometimes and raise the prices just to see what they can get away with because we’re just dumb tourists. It can be stressful because you have to argue with them and tell them that you're not just a stupid Obruni (white person). Then when we finally got a taxi, we stopped on the side of the road to pick some people up. We ended up putting 12 people in one taxi: the driver, 2 in the front seat, 4 in the back, and 5 in the trunk. It was seriously just a car trunk, so they were just sitting in it and standing on the back of the car, holding on for a good 5 miles. It was so funny and ridiculous and crazy. These are normal things you experience in Ghana. It’s a good time.
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