My Rights My Future Event

On October 27^th, 2014, Cheerful Hearts Foundation (CHF) celebrated the completion their “My Rights, My Future” project. This five month project based in Nyanyano was aimed at promoting the importance of child education as well as informing the community about the dangers of child labour and trafficking.

The “My Rights, My Future” project trained 20 community volunteers living in the fishing village of Nyanyano. These volunteers pledged to commit at least 9 hours a week going through their community talking about the benefits of education and how it can affect their children’s futures. They share their experiences as well as their training to help create a positive view and appreciation for childhood education. They also let families know what happens when child are working instead of attending school. Many families do not see the danger that the children face when working at the shore or in Yeji and the community volunteers were always available to answer questions that parents had as well as let them know why it is harming their child’s future success.

The gathering was a huge success with over 500 people in attendance. Along with over 300 local school children all supporting their schools with pride the guest list also included many important local community leaders. The event began with a African drum and dance crew. After the dancing there were several speeches from Mr. Justice Nii Kpakpo Abrahams and Mr. George Arthur as well as the Chief Fisherman, a former Assembly Man, and a Social Welfare representative. Each speaker discussed the power of education and the impact that it can make in the community and a child’s life. It was nice to see such a great turn out from the community leaders. The community volunteers, all wearing their white project hats, were lauded and praised, creating a positive emotion associated with volunteerism. Half of the volunteers were school children themselves and took pride in the event. 

After speeches, there was a student play about the importance of education. In the play the protagonist, did not receive her school fee and was not able to attend school. She ended up pregnant (with a very unhappy mother) and her brother ended up stealing (only to be arrested by the police). Obviously very dire consequences for a lack of education. Several girls also gave very heartfelt speeches, one of which was addressed to the parents who were not sending their children to school, but most were centered on how thankful they were to be in school and how important an education is to their future.

  

It was a wonderful event and it was great to see the support that the community gives to the Cheerful Heart’s project and to their children’s education. The success of the outreach program is currently being evaluated (I am working to compile data from our school and community interviews which we have done over 300 so far), but the impact on the individuals in attendance was visible and powerful.

I have been lacking on the blog posts, partly being busy and partly due to a full week without internet (or power for that matter). More post are coming.  

The Immigration Officer

 The Immigration Officer

After successful week including trafficking interviews, teaching, and community outreach, we found out that there would be another long weekend. Even with the short notice, (it seems that national holidays are only announced the day before they occur) we still quickly made some plans for another weekend excursion. This time, we decided to head west past Cape Coast to see Busua and Nzulezo.

After a wonderful night on the beach in Cape Coast, we woke up early to head further west to Busua. When arriving at the tro-tro station, I was approached by an Immigration Officer asking to see my passport. This was not a problem and I allowed him to inspect both my passport and visa. The problems began when he asked to see the passports of the other two volunteers. Of the four of us, only two of us had our actual passports and the other two only had a photocopy. Even though this should be perfectly fine according to the Ghanaian laws, the officer was “doubtful” of the two other volunteers. After explaining our situation, (we are volunteers, we all have the same visa, a photocopy is fine, ect) he invited me to sit in the front seat of the tro-tro next to him since we were both traveling to Takoradi.

What followed was the longest tro-tro ride of my life. During the hour or more that it took for the tro-tro-tro to fill up (a tro-tro does not leave the station until all the seats are filled, which can make for a long wait if you are at a vacant station) my new friend Joseph, the immigration officer, talked with me about everything imaginable. I learned about his family, (he was traveling to visit his mother and daughter) his job, his life, everything, it seemed that we were “friends”. I believed that we had the passport situation under control, but in between the small talk, he would keep coming back to this “feeling of doubt” about the validity of my friends’ documentation. I would try to assure him that in the future we would all carry our passports and it was so good that he helped inform me about the “rules” in Ghana, still Joseph wanted to detain my friends until we could produce the actual passports.

Somehow, I had become the “leader” of the group (according to Joseph). I felt bad leaving my friends in the dark as I was the only one sitting up front, somehow attempting to determine the fate of the entire group all by myself. He decided that he needed to detain the two other volunteers until Tuesday when the offices officially opened and we could bring their actual passports for him to see. Of course, when I told him that four days in the detention center was not acceptable, he would tell me know to worry and that the more I worried the more he was doubtful of the validity of their passports. Several times during his moments of doubt, he asked me to “appease” him in some way to make him feel better. Each time I would call him out and ask him if he was requesting a bribe, which he would deny (never a bribe, only a “gift”).

 Finally, I decided to call Eric, the director of our program, to let him talk to Joseph in order to make him feel better. This is where I made my first mistake of the day. He happened to be examining my passport (for the 20^th time) when I handed him the phone. Sadly, when Eric told him that it was illegal to detain my friends and that a photocopy was an acceptable means of identification in Ghana, Joseph started his power trip. He decided to take my passport and became determined to detain my friends. He became obstinate and would not tell Eric his full name, which Eric requested in attempts to call his supervisors. Much like a middle school student, he handed me back the telephone and refused to talk any more.

To say the least, the next hour and a half ride was painful. I was able to get him talking again, but struggled to change his mind. Eric told me that I needed to get my passport back and that we should not allow him to arrest/detain us. When I demanded my passport (which was completely valid), he said that I could choose to regain my passport in exchange for handcuffing my friends. At one point, I asked the driver to stop so that I could talk with a policeman at one of the numerous traffic stops. The policeman seemed to agree that the situation was strange, but he was not “involved with immigration issues” so he could not help us. After an hour of talking with Joseph, I even resorted to “buying” back my passport for 20 cedi which he no longer wanted to accept.

Once the tro-tro finally arrived in Takoradi, it became even stranger. He still had my passport and told me that he would hold on to it until Tuesday when my friends would be released. We left the tro-tro just outside of town and he proceeded to escort us to the detention center. We entered a taxi where Joseph was going to sit on my lap, because there were only four seats. Joseph then proceeded to tell us he needed money for the cab fare. We actually laughed out loud at this idea as there was no way we were going to pay the taxi to take us to jail. Joseph was quite disappointed and told us that we would have to walk .

At this point, we destined to go to the detention center, hoping that there would be someone actually sane to listen to our story (the idea of grabbing my passport and running was also not out of the question). Conor, one of the other volunteers, decided to call the US embassy in Accra to request some assistance. Of course, as stubborn as Joseph was, he did not believe that he was speaking to the US embassy on the telephone and would not give his name and badge number (he showed me his name at badge number at the beginning of the tro-tro ride, but at that point I had no idea of the situation that was about to ensue) (Joseph Awantu or something I believe). During our walk, Joseph received several calls from his sergeant, from the embassy, and from the immigration offices. Eric had contacted the immigration department and Joseph was becoming more flustered as he talked to numerous individuals on the phone. At this point, we were stopped waiting in the middle of a random dirt road on the way to the detention center and Joseph did not know what to do. We decided to give Joseph options 1) we go and talk with his sergeant in person or 2) he return my passport. As a last ditch effort, he again asked to be appeased, obviously we were not having it and told him that he was going to give me my passport back and that we were going to leave.

You could tell that Joseph was struggling about what to do. I told him I wanted my passport and I would give him my phone number if he needed to reach me. Finally Joseph accepted the exchange. I took my passport and we quickly turned around, walking back towards the tro-tro station. Shockingly, Joseph walked back with me (Chiara and Conor were smart and decided to walk double time, but sadly Claudia and I were stuck at a slower pace). During the walk, Joseph decided to try again to make small talk (asking about how he could marry an American girl, at this point my patients was lacking). He also asked if I was still interested in giving him the 20 cedi that I had offered earlier in the trip. With my passport back in my possession, I told him that there was no way I would ever give him 20 cedi. He told Claudia who was walking with me that she needed to “talk to her husband” because I had become “hard” and unreasonable and had been so much “softer” back in the tro-tro.

We quickly found a tro-tro that was taking us anywhere so that we could leave Joseph behind and decided to continue or Saturday. Exhausted, I let Conor and Chiara do the talking to find out where we were going next as my patience and small talk was finished for the afternoon. I can’t think of a stranger tro-tro ride, but luckily everything turned out fine, only wasting our time and my patience. My first “attempted” arrest and encounter with an incompetent/corrupt officer (I think he was more of an idiot than evil) was now complete, simply adding to my international travel experiences. I have to say that the day only improved from there and we made it to Busua enjoying a relaxing day on the beach. 

Household Interviews

Household Interviews

Every Tuesday I travel to Senya to conduct child trafficking interviews and today was no different. I arrived at the school around 10:00 to meet our community volunteer. After checking on the school attendance and our sponsored children, I grabbed my notebook and headed into town. It was not long before we came across a group of men playing Oware (a game similar to mancala).

No one is allowed to fish on Tuesdays which makes it a perfect time to talk to people in the village. Trying not to interrupt the game, we started talking to one of the men who was sitting on the sidelines. His name was Kwame (which means he was born on a Saturday; my name is Kwese). He was a fisherman who had lived in Senya his entire life. He had seven children of which three are still under 18 years old. Even though he had only ever completed third grade, he understood the importance of education and worked hard to pay for all of his children to go to school. He told us that he knew lots of children that were trafficked to Lake Volta and was even approached by traffickers looking to prey on his children, but was determined to keep his children in school. When asked why he did not send his children away with the trafficker, he said that he wanted them to have a better life than he had and that education was answer. He guessed that over 200 children in the village were being trafficked and he knew that poverty was the key issue.

As we were talking several of the other men began to join the conversation. Each individual had something to add. One man said that the problem was that most parents do not know what happens to the children who are trafficked to Lake Volta. Others said that it was fine for children to work, but they would not want to send their own children (although a couple of the men had children who were working).  When we asked the group of men what could be done to stop children from being trafficked, there were many good answers including scholarships, police involvement, government support, but one man was convinced it was adult education. He wanted education class on Tuesday and Sunday for the parents of the children. If the parents can learn to read and write, (which many of them cannot) they will understand the importance of education. He said that many adults cannot even read warning signs on the roads and everyone should be required to read and write. As adults become educated, they will be held in higher esteem by their peers and the entire community will begin to value education. When parents see what education can do, they will keep their children in school and out of the hands of traffickers. I was very impressed by his idea, especially because he could barely read and write. It was incredibly positive to see so many adults in the community passionate about our cause and interested in talking with us.

Unlike other weeks, (sometimes being asked to leave because parents  believe we are here to arrest them, or talking to parents who gave up their children for years only to receive less than $100) we had a second very positive interview with a mother. She had just moved to Senya from Yeji with the hope of better jobs and more work (which if you have seen the employment options in Senya, you may question her logic).  This woman had four children all of which were working in Yeji with their father before moving to Senya. They would wake up early each morning and work with their father pulling nets from 5:00-10:00. When they finished with work, they went to school from 10:00 to 2:00. Now that they are in Senya, their mother wants them to focus on their education fulltime and will try to enroll them in the local government school. It is still expensive for parents (1 cedi or $0.30), but this mother was determined to make her children finish school. When I asked what advice she would give to parents after having lived in Yeji and seen the trafficked children all around town, she said that they need to know about the conditions on the lake. She would never sell her children to the fishermen on Lake Volta. Many of the children would work on an empty stomach, not eating all day, others were bullied and beaten. She said that most of the children working came from all over Ghana, leaving their families to work from sunrise to sunset with the abusive fishermen. It was interesting listening to a parent who actually liked in Yeji and could talk about the treatment of the children first hand.

Slowly interviews are getting easier and I am better at asking the right questions to make the parents or children open up about their experiences or opinions. It is still very difficult having to work with a translator and I am sure that I only get a small amount of the full story, but slowly and surly we are building more and more information to help our report on the trafficking problem in Ghana. 

Weekend Trip to Cape Coast

Weekend Trip to Cape Coast

This weekend was my first real trip away from Kasoa. With Monday off for a national holiday, our small group of volunteers caught a tro-tro to the city of Cape Coast. Cape Coast is a tourist beach town which has relaxing beaches, historic slave trade castles, and a major national park. We arrived on Saturday afternoon after a 2.5 hour tro-tro ride. I “slept” or at least tried to sleep even with the blaring dance music you would expect at a nightclub, pot holes that could drown a full grown adult, and enough leg room that even gumby would have struggled to be comfortable, nevertheless we arrived ready and excited to explore the town.   

After we found a hotel (a four person room for 40 cedi or $10.75), we went to explore the castle. The slave castle at Cape Coast was a very busy place several hundred years ago. Many slaves from all over West Africa were brought to the castle to be loaded onto ships headed for the United States, the Caribbean, and parts of South America. Even though we studied the slave trade in school, it was a very different experience to see the first leg of the triangle trade. We arrived at the castle late and before we knew it, the crowds were gone and we were enjoying the castle all by ourselves. From the walls, we watched the sun fade away and listened to the waves break on the rocks below.

That night, we met up with several Ghanaian volunteers near the University of Cape Coast. School is just beginning, so they had one last weekend to come hang out before getting back to their studies. For dinner and drinks, we went to a “gas station” just outside of town. This was not your typical gas station even though there were pumps and you could fill up your vehicle. On the side of the station there was a stage with a live band as well as two outdoor bars for drinks and food. Behind the station there was a DJ playing the top Ghanaian dance hits which is where we hung out for while outside enjoying the beach air.

The next day was our beach day so we decided to check into a new hotel that was right on the water (a little quieter that the previous night where a combination of roosters, street venders, horn happy taxi drivers made sleeping slightly difficult). The waves were very similar to the west coast which was a shock for the two Italian volunteers who were use to the Mediterranean. A combination of swimming, reading, and talking filled most of our day as we relaxed and enjoyed the beautiful African coast.  

We decided to use Monday to explore the National Park of Kakum. Monday is a national holiday in Ghana to celebrate the birthday of the nation’s first president Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. After visiting his memorial in Accra, I have an appreciation for the man as a leader and servant to his community. Our celebration of this man’s birthday started quite early as we caught a 45 min taxi ride to arrive at the park before it officially opened. The national park is huge (around 400 square km) and looks like how I would have pictured an African Jungle. We had unique view of the jungle as we explored the park from the canopy on a series of hanging bridges overlooking the vast forest. After paying a guide an extra 5 cedi ($1.50), we were able to enter the park early and walked the bridges free from any crowd or screaming child. After viewing it from above, we then traveled along the forest floor on a one hour hike learning about the uses of all of the trees and plants which many Ghanaians still use in the local villages. After our hike we visited a crocodile park to eat lunch before returning for one last afternoon on the beach.

It was a wonderful weekend trip and allowed me to recharge before returning to the normal schedule of teaching and community outreach. Each week becomes easier and more comfortable and now that I am beginning to explore the country more Ghana feels more and more like home.

Parent problems

Parent problems

Every teacher talks about problem with parents in some form or another and in Ghana, it is no different. My first interaction with parents was at our scheduled parent meeting with the sponsored children’s families. Our first meeting was in Nyanano on the Friday before school was set to begin. We wanted to make sure that the parents were going to support their children’s education and try to open lines of communication early so that we can work more closely with the parents during the upcoming year. We made a plan for the meeting and arrived early to prepare. After an hour and a half, not a single parent showed up. When we walked around the town to find the parents, we learned that there had been a good catch at the shore and the parents were too busy/did not remember the meeting. We decided that maybe Senya would have a better turnout on Sunday for their scheduled meeting, but similarly not a single parent showed.

It was frustrating that the children were being provided such a great opportunity to attend school for free (including clothing to wear and meals at school every day), but their parents could not take the time to attend the meeting. We rescheduled our meetings to the following weekend and this time we had more success (but not much). On Friday in Nyanyano 3/15 parents showed up, on Sunday in Fetteh 3/15 again and finally in Senya 1/30. I have to say, I was frustrated. However, there are always exceptions to the rule, and the parents that did show up were so positive and excited that their children will be attending school.  

Similarly to absent parents, the school attendance has also been off to a very slow start. Finally in the second week of official school we are beginning to have children in the classrooms. It is a struggle getting the children to come to school and hopefully we will have most of the kids consistently in the classroom by week three. When I am not teaching, I am often walking around the town to check on the sponsored children that are not in school. One mother we encountered was adamantly against her child going to school.  She began to make up excuses about uniforms and shoes and then about her child being beaten by teachers. Eventually, I was in the middle of a shouting match (all in Twi of course) as the school director, the mother, and about five female family members (aunt, grandma, ect) were all yelling at each other. When you do not speak the language, you get better and better at reading body language (which is also slightly different in a different culture). I learned later that the family members wanted the child to go to school and were upset at the mother (the child and family members denied any physical abuse at school and disagreed with the other excuses the mother was making to keep the kid at home). Eventually, the child followed us to school, but the mother is not very happy. Many parents do not understand the importance of education and would rather the child sit at home instead of attend an institution that they either do not understand, believe in, or trust. Many of the parents have never been to school and need help understanding the importance of education for their child.

There have been other stubborn parents, but slowly the children start to show up back at the school. We currently have about 70 children in school and are eventually expecting about twice that number. This week’s major parent issue however occurred when we were doing child trafficking interviews. Each Tuesday, the school director and I go around the town conducting interviews about the problem of child labour and trafficking. This week we interviewed a boy who was 16 years old and had just returned to Senya after working in Yeji for 8 years. That same day, we attempted to interview several parents which we have done in the past, but the parent who we wanted to talk with was convinced that we were there to arrest her for selling her children. The door was quite literally slammed in our face and all of the families on the street wanted us to leave. It is obviously very important to be delicate when using the words labour or even trafficking when trying to starting a family interview.

Even if there can be push back from the parents, the children have been simply wonderful. They are very happy to be back in school and their smiling faces and excitement in the classroom makes the difficult parents much easier to manage.

Food Blog

Food Blog

I have had a lot of questions about Ghanaian food, so I decided that I needed to do a food blog post. My food situation is pretty ideal. I will start in the morning. Normally, I wake up and eat some bread with peanut butter along with my malaria pill. The peanut butter here is very similar to what we have in the states and spreads fairly easy on bread. Some morning, I wake up to the director’s wife cooking eggs and take an egg sandwich for breakfast. I am generally not a big breakfast person, and I have been scolded for not eating enough on several occasions. Days when I skip breakfast, I generally buy a “fried dough ball” which is similar to a hushpuppy or non-sweet donut which I eat on the walk to work.

For lunch, I am either at the office or in one of the fishing communities. For a quick bite to eat, there are lots of snack possibilities that are sold by vendors carrying the foods on their heads. I am always impressed by the balance of the sellers as I have yet to see anything fall off, even when they are running after a tro-tro or taxi trying to make change (whenever your vehicle stops, you have the opportunity to buy almost any snack imaginable). There are also many streetside venders that fry plantains, sweet potatoes, or other various items. Because I am not much of a snack person, I generally go to a “Chop Bar” which is like a street stall with a couple benches off the main road. Freeman, my coworker, showed me two chop bars that are generally clean and safe to eat at. I am normally very wary of cold dishes and don’t often go to random places without a recommendation from a Ghanaian first. Also long as the food is hot, it is generally safe to eat, but some places are better than others.

 

Eating out, my first choice is Waakye. Waakye is blackeyed peas and rice. I normally order it with plantain and one egg. Most of the dishes in Ghana also have some spice with a red sauce (when eating yam, I prefer the green sauce). It is similar to the spiciness of many Central American dishes, but I don’t necessarily considerate very hot. When eating, I always ask for a spoon, but many Ghanaians prefer to eat with their hands. There are tubs of water along with soap to wash your right hand before eating and to clean it off after you are done. Normally, I see about 50% of Ghanaians eating with a spoon and the other half using their hands. I will use my hand for fish but I am not officially Ghanaian yet (Hand is singular, it is important to use the right hand for eating or for greetings).

Another common dish is Jollof rice, which is normally cooked with spices and fish. Different places will have more or less fish in the rice. Especially near the coast, fish is pretty common in most all dishes. Even when buying sweet potatoes or yams (a good lunch replacement if you don’t leave the office), a fish head or tail is often included to add some protein to your snack. Talapia is very common, but there are other fish as well that are caught at the shore.  Most of the time when I eat lunch it cost around 3 cedi which is about $0.75 USD.

When I return home from work, the director’s wife has dinner prepared. Each night it is a different traditional Ghanaian food. Along with Waakye and Jollof, it is very common to make a stew often with fish or lamb that is eaten with a rice ball. The rice has been pounded the consistency of mashed potatoes (only stickier) and you will eat it with the soup. Fufu and banku are also eaten with soup and are very similar to the rice balls. If you ask for it, banku is often added to the meal (kind of like bread in the states) to soak up any extra sauce and fill up your stomach. You can also see that some nights, there is also a noodle dish that has some chopped vegetables and some spice which is always exciting as well.

To drink there are several options. For non-alcoholic beverages, my favorite choice is Alvaro. It is somewhat similar to Sprite but with pear or passion fruit flavor. For beer, there are several options (I generally go with whichever one is cold). The top two choices are Star or Club. There is much debate about which is better, but both taste like a light wheat beer. My coworkers will often mix their beer with Sprite and I have realized that in general, Ghanaians are not very heavy drinkers. Most drinking is reserved for social events and ordering a beer at dinner seems uncommon. When they have it, I enjoy Castle and Stone which are two other types that are available and are slightly darker. Guinness is also very popular and they even have a non-alcoholic Guinness “energy drink” which is heavily advertised. Most beers come in 0.5 L glass bottles which you must return to where you bought it, but most water is drank in small bags (you actually buy whiskey or vodka in bags as well).

For dessert, there is ice cream, but dessert in general seems uncommon. I don’t think I have tried any dessert other than one “ice cream bar” in the entire month that I have been here (although, that is not exactly uncommon for me).

Overall, I have enjoyed Ghanaian cuisine so far, lots of rice, a little bit of spice, and always the option of fish (or egg). It is nice however to find exotic specialties in Accra like a turkey sandwich or pasta just to mix it up a bit.

Child Labour Talks

Child Labour Talks

Now that school has officially started, each Thursday I will be doing Child Labour education talks in local schools. This week Freeman, who is the child trafficking project director, and I went to Ebenezer Memorial School in Nyanyano to give the presentation. The class takes about one hour and we presented to the 5^th and 6^th graders first and the 3^rd and 4^th graders second.

We start with introductions and asking what people wanted to be when they grow up. It is interesting hearing their answers. Almost all of the girls said they wanted to be nurses. For the boys, answers varied between, doctor, bank manager, soldier, and footballer. We stressed the importance of education in their quest to achieve their future jobs, but most of the children already seemed very motivated to finish their education. Some talked about even wanting a Master’s degree after university. The fact that there are many things that can stand in the way of a child’s education, lead us into the topic of child labour. We started with an activity where we passed each child a card that had a picture of a child working. The students were told to look at their picture and decide if this was “good work” or “bad work”. These talks reminded me a lot of the child sexual abuse talks that I gave in Costa Rica, but instead of good touching and bad touching it was good work and bad work. We talked about how “light work” such as cleaning the house, fetching water, helping your father untangle his nets after school was fine for a child to do as long as it did not stop them from going to school. “Heavy work” or dangerous work such as quarry work, selling water on the roadside, agricultural work, was very different from the “light work” that children are meant to do. If work is considered dangerous or if it would stop a child from going to school, we said that this was not ok and is not acceptable for a child to do.

The kids were very responsive and were good at choosing if the work was appropriate or not for a child. Afterwards we split the children into groups to analyze short scenarios and determine if the work was appropriate. I was very proud of the kids and they did a great job absorbing and analyzing the material. During the talk we also discuss some of the rights that every child has such as food, medical attention, education and so on. We made sure to tell the children that there were people that wanted to help them or their friends if they felt that their rights were being violated. Luckily, our head community volunteer in Nyanyano is a teacher at the school and is a wonderful person for children to go to with problems. It is exciting to know that there are so many good people in the community that understand the value of education and want to protect their children from exploitation.

Even though school has officially begun, not every school is running as smoothly as the one we visited in Nyanyano. The school that I will be teaching at also officially began on Monday, but only about nine students showed up. By Wednesday there were around 25 and hopefully next week we can start following the actually class schedule. While one of us was teaching all the various grades, the other teachers and director walked around the town reminding parents about school and asking why their children are not attending. It was a much different start than the past four years at Montgomery Bell Academy in Nashville.