Fathaaaaaaaaa.......Michael

Both Michael and I have got used to being called Obroni (white man in Twi) while in Accra and other parts of Ghana and Yevu (white man in Ewe) in the Volta Region. You will remember that Michael had mentioned in one of the previous blogs that even I get called Yevu or Obroni!

Recently, on our trip to Northern Volta Region, on our way from Nkwanta to Dambai, we kept hearing the word Fathaaaa..... called out by young children when we passed villages. It took a while to realise that they were calling Michael Fathaaa... as probably their only exposure to white men were men to do with church.

On these trips there were 7 Ghanaians, Michael and myself in the car. The children would spot Michael, ignore the rest of us and with big smiles call out Fathaaaaa.... Of course Michael made the most of the attention, he would wave at them at every opportunity and bless them. All of us got a lot of enjoyment out of this and would wait for the children in villages to spot him. On one trip we counted the number of times the children had spotted him and shouted after us. In all the villages the way they called out was in the same tune as if they had all been coached by one person. So we would be leaving villages with the ring of Fathaaaa... Michael started thinking of how he could be more entertaining and was thinking of getting a sceptre to wave the next time we go on that road.

Ghana turns “red”!

Last year Vodaphone took over Ghana Telecom. We had seen the headlines in newspapers about this takeover and local people were clearly hoping that this would mean that an improved service.
Over the months we have not seen any improvement in the service – both telephone and internet services continue to be the same - sporadically good but most of the time appalling. The only big difference noticed so far is that Ghana is turning “red”! This is not Ghana turning “red” politically and if you read on you will understand what I mean.
The takeover happened on a Friday and the next day when we went walking into town, and by the main Ghana Telecom building saw a few red umbrellas with Vodaphone logo on it. I said to Michael that although it is early days there is no sign of improvement in service but the umbrellas are here to show that the big multinational Vodaphone is here.
Within a few months we saw not only more red umbrellas appearing everywhere in Ghana but also buildings being painted red. Previously, there were numerous buildings painted yellow – MTN colours. Now this was being taken over by this bright offensive red buildings. What I could not understand was that even old colonial buildings were being painted red. One person said that it is getting your shop or house painted without any cost to you so you go for it. So for the locals it is a pragmatic approach with no thought being given to them advertising for the multinationals for free.
Another big surprise was seeing Vodaphone t-shirts and hats at funerals. One of my blog entries last year was about the importance of funerals in Ghana and that people wear red, shirts, scarves and headdress, for funerals. The pragmatic Ghanaian has again seen the freebees as benefiting them. So now instead of seeing traditional red dresses and scarves and headdresses, we see Vodaphone red everywhere on Fridays, the funeral procession day.Now, we get welcomed into towns and villages not only by Tigo (another telecom company) but also by Vodaphone within a few meters of each other

Adventures with Kofi (rust bucket really!!)

We became the proud owners of Kofi, a 20 year old Chevrolet Geotracker (known in USA as a beach buggy), a few weeks ago. We bought Kofi from an expat couple, Birgit and Raj, living in Accra who were returning home. We felt that we could rely on their word that Kofi had served them well and that it would do the same for us, so we paid a lot more than we should have.

On our way from Accra to Ho, we first of all had to find petrol as there had been no petrol for a couple of days. We were told that we should be able to buy petrol late afternoon as Obama was visiting the next day and Ghana government would not want him to witness the long queues at all the petrol stations.

I was really anxious about getting some petrol as Raj had said that as it is such an old car, we should not let the petrol tank run too low otherwise dirt might get into the engine. Michael and I decided that we should try and get petrol in Tema as we had been informed that one petrol station did have it. Luckily for us it did and we both had a sigh of relief.

Now the road to Ho has many “sleeping policemen” or rumble strips. A huge number of these are made by local people as the cars speed through communities and are a cause of lots of accidents. A huge number of people involved in accidents end up having disabilities and nobody to pay the hospital bills that they cannot afford. So I can understand why they put these up. But Kofi does not like them at all – surprise surprise because I don’t think Kofi has had any suspension for years.

By the time we got to Ho and at the penultimate rumble strip, the car started making a dreadful noise. The exhaust pipe had come undone! So our first visit was to a mechanic before we could use Kofi again. Getting Kofi in our garage was the next challenge as the door is hardly ever used and we have to use brute force to open the locks and I am useless. However, what this does provide is entertainment to the children in the neighbourhood. We usually have a crowd of boys watching and sometimes helping and looking at wonderment at Kofi. I am so tempted to take them for a ride but worry if something was to happen. They usually get to sit and pretend to drive while I wait for the garage door to be opened.

Our next long trip was to Cape Coast when Ananda was here. It got us there with no problems except I was caught by the police for speeding!! I was going to have to go to Court, on hearing this Michael got angry with the policeman and I used all my charm to get us out of the situation. It worked!

The 3 of us plus Gloria and Dave decided to go to Kakum National park and about 5 miles away from Kakum the car just stopped. The accelerator had no impact. Dave and Michael stayed with the car while the rest of us walked to the Monkey Sanctuary run by a Dutch couple, Denis and Annetta. They have been there for 6 years and the local people bring them rescued animals usually babies whose mothers have been killed for bush meat. They have had so many problems from the Chief in the village, lives have been threatened but they continue to stay there. They have to travel to a village further away to collect their water due to the problems. Denis knows a lot about cars and even though he was unwell with a bad bout of malaria, he spent a few hours trying to work out what was wrong. He could not fix it and so Michael went back to Cape Coast to look for the parts Denis needed and we looked around the place and met all the animals. The spare parts did not solve the problem so we ended up parking the car and Denis promising to ask his friend to come and take the car the mend it. In the meantime we got to know all the horror stories the couple have had to face and all of us kept thinking we would not have lasted this long. They seem so isolated.

Next day we were to return to Accra for a meeting so it was lucky that Denis’ friend did manage to fix it – something to do with fuel injection. Otherwise we would have had to return to Cape Coast to collect the car at another time.

Our next long trip was to visit the west Coast and the exhaust pipe decided to pack up again. We had to stop at Cape Coast so that Dave’s friend could fix it for us. Dave had kindly arranged it and when we finally managed to find the place it was to be told that he had travelled to Accra! One of his other colleagues did a holding job saying we would need a new one soon. Lo and behold the next day we had to stop over at a mechanics place and he managed to sort it out and we were able to return to Ho without any further problems.

So although we may make extensive plans about our trip, it is Kofi that dictates whether we make it or not. The journeys are made more interesting as we get to know more about Kofi and what a bad shape it is in. We also get to know the people who work on him. Through a Ghanain friend we have met a local mechanic, Wala, and we have decided to let him sort all the problems.

One would think from the photo I knew what was wrong!!

The Yanks are coming....

So the big day is finally here – Obama arrives in Accra this afternoon. There is a fair amount of excitement here (hyped up through the TV and radio media) and pride in the fact that he is coming to Ghana. There are Stars and Stripes across the city and huge “Welcome Home” signs, which is a bit strange as Obama has no connection with Ghana or West Africa whatsoever. There are a plethora of Obama songs played constantly on the airwaves – I like Black Rasta the best – and expectations are riding high as to what the saviour will do. I heard the former President on the radio today saying that if they can do it (meaning America), we can lift Africa up quickly – what?! Of course the politicians are milking this, especially the new NDC Government who wants to claim that the visit is some sort of affirmation of their election success. But what is really happening? There are some dissenting voices – why is he visiting Ghana? Would it not be more appropriate for him to visit one of the conflict zones – Congo DC perhaps or at least speak of Dafur or Somalia – what does he want here? One explanation given is the recent discovery of offshore oil – well probably not, USA will buy the oil anyway whatever. A more likely explanation I think is that Bush having failed to persuade the last government to accept an American base in the country, Obama is going to make a new pitch with the NDC – he will come bearing gifts and promises but the trade off will be an American military presence in the most stable, friendly and English speaking country in the region.

Whatever the reason Obama is not going to make a public appearance and his many fans will be disappointed. Security is hyper tight and he will be making his speech on Africa to a carefully selected audience of predominantly “Big Men” before being whisked off to visit one of the slave forts and then flying out. There are Obama Tee shirts everywhere on sale and various other knick knacks and souvenirs – after all this is a chance to cash in. I heard of a funeral casket maker who has rebranded his business as Obama and funnily enough the caskets are white. Meanwhile all the potholes on the visiting President’s route are being filled in and all the street hawkers being removed from the area – cleansing for God forbid that Obama should catch a glimpse of real Accra. There has been torrential rain the last 4 or 5 days or so and the gutters and drains are blocked in many parts of the city resulting in horrendous floods which have already caused a number of deaths. Until yesterday evening there was no fuel in the city but of course suddenly that has been resolved. Many roads were blocked by abandoned vehicles and huge queues at filling stations but do not worry the mighty one is amongst us today.

We were just in Accra for five days, launching a major new VSO Pilot project. Kiran has been leading the first Conference on establishing learning organisations and the project involves Ghana, Cameroon and Gambia. It will be a huge challenge but we are looking forward to being part of the project across the year. One of the things that always seems to come up in these meetings, and usually on the last day, is the issue of “sitting allowance”. By this I mean that it is the expectation of most Ghanaian participants that they should be paid a daily allowance to attend conferences and workshops (despite the fact that all expenses are paid, they are put up in rather good hotels and are still actually being paid for their regular job). It is a real mountain to climb here to try and counter this. At the conference I organised a few weeks ago for a Danish NGO it manifested itself as “Give us something small to motivate us” – what!!! However at this conference it was challenged by a few Ghanaians (so it was not left entirely to the whites to take up the issue) and interestingly these were people who had left Ghana about 20 years ago and returned in the last few years. They said that this whole issue of expecting payment is something relatively new and was not there when they left the country. This week the plea was for “inconvenience cushioning” – a wonderful phrase but what the heck outrageous. When I told the participants of what these Ghanaians had said at the other conference there was total distain – one delegate said that they must have forgotten about their sitting allowance. What really gets me is that most of these people have very good jobs and are well educated. They do not want to ask the question as to where this money will come from and how this will mean less for the actual projects and beneficiaries. Where the whole concept comes from remains a mystery but some people say it was introduced by the World Bank who paid huge allowances for people to attend meetings and that it then took root in the NGO Development world – another strong argument against the way development has been managed and imposed.

So we now have a set of wheels – we collected “Kofi” yesterday – an ageing little red 4x4 jeep, a bit the worse for wear but still running (hopefully). Of course we had to pick the day when there was no fuel in Accra so it was touch and go as to whether we would make it back but fortunately we found some petrol in Tema just outside Accra and chugged back to Ho. I like the style of the car but have to say that it does make some really strange noises. Watch this space as we negotiate the police blocks, the dash, the break downs and the fun which most of all I hope we have. Next week we are off again to the Northern Volta Region for the second phase of our work with marginalised groups of people with disabilities. We are working on supporting them to form self help groups and will be in Dambai and Kpassa – so no internet again for a while and some tricky roads to negotiate.

Snapshots on the road

The bus from Bobo to Bamako leaves at first light. The bus station is shabby and run down but the bus leaves on time – seats are numbered and luggage tagged. We are even given a carton of juice each as we climb aboard. The landscape is flat and arid – villages are few and far between. In some places great mounds of newly harvested cotton line the roadside ready for collection. The bus crew have a great selection of tapes and we cruise along to a soundtrack of Salif Keita, Ali Farka Toure, Bouabacar Traore – here we are at last rattling along on our way to Mali.

Crossing the border turns out to be easy. I had expected long delays and complications but as we leave Burkina Faso and enter Mali formalities on both sides run smoothly. Officials are polite and business like – we are given chairs under the trees in the shade as we wait for our passports to be stamped – assumptions shattered! Soon we are on our way again.

At every stop the bus is surrounded by motley gangs of boys, mostly barefoot wearing an array of filthy tattered cast offs from the charity shops of the world (container loads of clothes and shoes are dumped here in West Africa and the “home use” market is a necessity for most and a bargain hunters treasure trove for the likes of me. In Ho I have bought my first ever Ralph Lauren Polo chinos and a fabulous pair of Doc Martin brogues). They carry rusty old tins and buckets for their food and are mostly from the Koran schools. They have to beg for their food in theory to teach them humility but this seems to be a far cry from the grace and dignity of Buddhist monks with their begging bowls in South East Asia. There are several hundred thousand of these children across Mali, many of them sent by their parents from rural villages, glad to have one less mouth to feed. In the NGO sector there are growing concerns that many of these children are abused and exploited in these unregulated schools.

We arrive late afternoon on the outskirts of Bamako. The bus station is chaotic and a teeming mass of travellers, hawkers and hustlers. The taxis here are even more run down and battered than in Burkina Faso and after a lot of haggling we pile into an ancient yellow Mercedes that whisks us across the mighty Niger and into the city. We stay in the Hippodrome District in Hotel Le Djenne. This proves to be a wonderfully calm and relaxing haven away from the constant clamour and hustle of the streets. It is a small place tucked away in a back street – the rooms all individually decorated by local artists – a delight.

When not being constantly harangued on the streets or having to haggle for just about everything, we spend a lot of time in search of music clubs, although this is no easy task. On our first night we are driven endlessly around the city by an increasingly irate Taureg in search of the legendary Hogon club (Tiamane Diabete) only to eventually discover that it shut down some months ago. Helpful locals suggest salsa instead. We end up at the Savannah Club drinking incredibly expensive drinks and would you believe it listening to a band playing Michael Jackson covers – are we really in Bamako, with its legendary music scene? The next night we fare a little better ending up at the Djembe club, a seedy smoke filled joint with a band playing mean blues. One room is full of prostitutes and there is a continuous coming and going of clients to another room out the back, but at least this place oozes atmosphere.

The road to Timbuctou is long – the landscape becomes increasingly dry and desert like and the villages more and more further apart. It takes two days to the fabled city with a stop off in Severes. We at last reach the Niger and face a long queue of 4x4s waiting for the ferry on their way to the Desert Festival. Entertainment is provided by some local herders arguing with the ferry men about transporting their cattle across the river and the ensuing chaos and comedy as they try to drive them on the ferryboat. We cross as the sun sets, watching the timeless rhythms of life on the riverbank. Perched on the edge of the desert I like Timbuctou from the very first moment we arrive.

Many people are disappointed by the fabled city – I find it charming – run down, dirty – almost forgotten as if slowly disappearing into the surrounding desert. The narrow streets of the old quarter twist and turn - a maze of disjointed streets and alleys. It is hot and dusty and life goes on very slowly here. The Djingareiber Mosque is under renovation, paid for by the Aga Khan, and closed. We wander around, visit some of the explorer houses including the legendary Heinrich Barth house and sit on rooftops drinking tea, watching the world go by on the edge of time. The place has something special about it – its wonderful history, its old universities all silently and slowly crumbling. On the edge of town is a peace memorial marking the end of the last major Taureg rebellion– The Flame of Peace. Here hundreds of AK47s have been set on fire and have moulded and fused into a lump of concrete. The monument is already falling down – abandoned and almost forgotten already and beyond, stretching out as far as the eye can see, the desert, the endless desert.

Djenne – Monday is market day and the place is bursting at the seams. The streets around the mosque are clogged with donkey carts as the traders set up their stalls before the magnificent mosque. A great heaving mass of colour and movement. This is one of the most famous sights in West Africa – the mosque – the largest mud structure in the world. It dominates the central square, standing a few meters above it. There are six steps leading up from the market to the mosque – a journey from the everyday profane and material world to the spiritual sanctity of the cosmic mothership. Well, maybe... Enterprising residents charge a small fee for climbing up to their rooftops to view the magnificent panorama – the mud brick skyline. Of course there are also the inevitable masks and bagolans for sale. Narrow ancient streets thread through the town – there is the stink of shit everywhere as we marvel at the fading beauty of the old town houses. Sunlight and shadows play upon the old walls – the magic as dusk approaches. I have this sense that it would be so easy to disappear through one of these dark doorways and never return.

Onwards to Mopti where we stay in a rather plush joint on the banks of the Niger. Women cover the riverbanks with their colourful washing. We walk down to the harbour – it is disappearing under heaps of rubbish and the banks are hidden under a thick mulchy crust of paper, plastic and cloth. Everywhere people are either disembarking or preparing to leave. The sleek, long pirogues ply their trade – passengers packed in beneath huge piles of goods. Great stashes of huge calabashes wait to be loaded together with brightly coloured mounds of plastic buckets and bowls. As evening falls we watch the pirogue builders, still working by the light of their oil lamps.

The next day we travel along the Niger by pirogue to the Inland Delta. It is a lazy and gorgeous way to travel. We stop off to visit a Peul village. Further back into time – single storey mud houses and a prickly medieval looking mosque. The children run after me – the Pied Piper – we play and play – it is intoxicating. We sing and dance – the giant toubab and them, snotty, ragged and beautiful. It still breaks my heart everytime to think of what will become of these children, what world will they inherit, what lives they will grow up to lead. Further downstream we visit a bozo fishing village – more children and more high jinks. Daydreaming as we sail slowly on, lazing regally on the roof of the pirogue with just the gentle sound of water lapping on the prow – so mellow and I think just how lucky I am.

a week in may

A snapshot of my week after 15 months in Ho.

Sunday: VOLPHIG’s AGM

Michael has a stomach bug and spends all day in bed – it turns out to be a 24 hour bug similar to something I had a few months ago. So I attend AGM on my own. An important one as the name and constitution of the organisation is changed and it got unanimous support from the members. VOLPHIG is now no more and will be called Voice of People with Disabilities in Ghana, “Voice” in short.

Monday: A day trip to Accra:

I travel early in the morning to Accra to see the VSO doctor there for a regular check-up as well as attend a meeting to discuss another Volunteer’s research on Attitudes towards people with disabilities in Ghana. Both Michael and I had supported her in finalising her findings and recommendations.

It turned out to be a 6.5 hour journey for meetings lasting 2 hours!

On the way back I sat next to a Ghanian, Charlotte, who it turned out is from Kent! Well we talked non-stop all the way back and I am sure the rest of the tro tro had to put up with our discussions - we solved all the world's problems!!. Charlotte visits her sister in Ho for a few days every time she comes to Ghana. I really enjoyed her company.

Tuesday: Plan Disability Rights Fund Workshop for Voice

This time we are working on cross-disability Self-Help Groups at the workshops. I worked with Francis on what he needs to do to ensure we have a participatory workshop. He selects what tools to use – a first for him. WE will be going to Nkwanta and Brewaniase to hold the workshops next week from Monday to Friday. We had planned the dates for these workshops last year and as a result I had planned workshops over Easter!! and this time on a national holiday on Monday.
Charlotte comes to visit with her sister Ruth. Unfortunately we have power failure while they visit due to a storm. It was good to meet Ruth and we promise to keep in touch.

Wednesday: Continue planning workshop and develop a shortlisting procedure for a new post of ABILIS Programme Facilitator. Voice is partnering ABILIS in Ghana. This time round Voice advertised a new post in a national paper and I had supported Francis in developing an application form (with help from some of my friends in UK who sent me thier forms). Now he was learning how the applicants can be shortlisted. In the past they accepted letters of applications and there was no proper process set out for shortlisting. Another first for Francis and he really enjoyed the process.

Thursday: Attend a “Global Giving” information giving session

Time well spent? In theory the idea is great that we can get people across the glob to donate to Voice’s projects. The drawback is that Voice has to get $3,000.00 in 3 weeks before it gets a place on the website. Worse still, they take 12.5% of the donations for their administrative costs. Which I can understand but a high price to pay! I started this debate about why Ghanains should look to the west for donations when there are so many rich Ghanians. The conclusion, the rich Ghanains do not want to donate to their fellow country-folk as they do not trust that the money would be used properly!?!

Met a potential “friend” for Voice and it is great that she is Ghanian. She said that she has been discussing this “tapping local resources” issue at a national level. Maybe something will come from it.

Friday: Actual shortlisting

Francis surprised that we were able to shortlist 8 applicants out of the 28 applications received. He had worked on what he felt was essential for the job and we had shortlisted accordingly.
Final preparations for our trip to North Volta (Nkwanta and Brewaniase) from Monday to Friday next week.

So you can see a varied week and meeting interesting people.

Teaching Grace to make Samosas

Who would have thought I would be teaching a Voltarian to make samosas?

I met Grace awhile back when I found out that she makes the brown bread that we buy in Ho. The bread most sold here is very white and bulky and to the people’s taste here and it is rare to find brown bread. So finding her was wonderful. My purpose was to ask her where she bought her brown wheat flour from as that seems to be like gold dust in Ghana. I asked if I could buy some wheat flour and she wanted to know what it was for so I said for rotli. She said she would like to try some so I made some with a bean curry. I found out that this was for her husband’s benefit as he was placed, while in the army, in India and Pakistan and loves food from that part of the world. This is not something you hear from many Ghanains as I have said before.

Grace was frank – she did not like the rotli but she enjoyed the beans as it is similar to what Ghanains make with beans. However, she said she would like to learn how to make them and so last weekend she came home with her daughter. Surprise, surprise she also wanted to learn how to make samosas and she had brought ingredients for it – of course I would not use the mince meat she had brought, so replaced it with soya. That is something else most people here cannot understand. If you have money why would you not eat meat? Whenever we have been to small communities the caterers have always managed to make us great Ghanain vegetarian food but after a lot of explanations about why we are vegetarians.

Yesterday, Grace told me that the samosas and rotli was their dinner that day – which really surprised me but I guess it is a matter of exposure to different cuisine and willingness to try something different. Grace said she was practicing making samosas so that she can get good at it.

I really enjoyed teaching them both. I should really ask to be shown how to make fufu and banku but doubt I will have the strength to make either as both need a lot of elbow grease.