Tamale Pictures

Woman inside of the compound of the diviner.

Slave camp.

Slave camp. That's the big lookout rock.

Slave camp.

The rock that is no longer a rock. It is a drum!

Yep.

Baby goats are the coolest.

Diviner.

Little girl and a wonderfully cute baby in the compound of the diviner.

On the way to Tamale.

Two kids somewhere.

Some homes inside Dr. Abdulai's clinic.

Slave camp. Notice the savanna landscape.

Tamale.

Widows and orphans.

Tamale.

Tamale.

Tamale.

Dr. Abdulai... Did you know there are more Ghanaian doctors in New York than in all of Ghana? It's called the Brain Drain, and it makes Dr. Abdulai and his free clinic all the more special.

Tamale Part 2

I woke up the next morning at 6:30 and immediately dragged my body under the showerhead in the bathroom for an early morning wake-up call. I had no towel with which to dry myself, so I was forced to use one of the t-shirts I brought. We had a repeat of our breakfast from the day before - french toast, grits, and mixed fruit bowl. This morning, the french toast was just too much for me my body to handle, so when we got on the bus, I went right back to sleep. I woke up after a few hours. We were driving forther north, closer and closer to the border Ghana shares with Burkina Faso. The farther north we went, the more sparse settlements and the more the landscape felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. The trees were very small and spread out pretty far apart with nothing but grass in between them. It seemed that that landscape would just go on forever, that no matter how far out into the distance I could see, I would have this exact same view and small spread-out trees and grasslands.

We finally reached our destination of Paga around 10:30 in the morning. Paga is in the Upper Eastern Region of Ghana and is less than 20 km from the border. Paga is famous for its crocodile ponds, although unfortunately, we did not get to see one. Instead, we went to the site of a former slave camp, Nania Slave Camp, also called "Pinkworo" meaning "rocks of fear," that has now been turned into an historical site museum-like place. It makes sense that the place is called rocks of fear because the whole place is filled with rocks, and those rocks directly related to the misery of the slaves. We walked out to this one rock outcropping where slaves used to take their meals in little holes that they carved out of the rocks. It became immediately clear to me that this would not be the best place to take meals because in the mid-day sun, the rocks felt like they were on fire. I should probably mention that it was even hotter here than it was the day before at Dr. Abdulai's clinic. I seriously didn't know what I was going to do with myself, not having been so hot in so long. So I can imagine, for a slave, sitting on these rocks probably in limited clothing was not a pleasant experience.

We walked a little further up on the rocks where six men and about as many children stood around this one rock. I got the impression that the men were probably drunk because the whole time they kept arguing and just acting silly. The rock they were surrounding was actually used as a drum. This rock was unique in that you could hit it at all sorts of different points and it would make different noises. The slaves used to entertain the British slave traders by playing music on this rock. The men played a few songs for us, the first of which they told us was about finding a young virgin girl to have sex with which I'm sure made the NYU staff thrilled. Christa laughed uncomfortably and then asked them to play a song that maybe the slaves would have played. The whole time they played this one man who seemed the drunkest of all just sort of danced around, but in a very spastic way. The children found them all very delightful, and I was shocked to see that a few of the children were barefooted on the rocks. I took my foot out of my sandal and placed it on the rocks and discovered that I couldn't keep it there for more than a few seconds before my foot felt like I had just dipped my foot in a nice pot of molten lava.

After that, we went to see another important rock. This rock was perched high on top of another rock so that when you got on top of it, you could see everything for miles. This rock was used as a lookout spot to make sure no slaves escaped the camp. If a slave did try to escape, the person on the rock could easily make some sort of signal and then point to whichever direction the slave was so that the soldiers could go round him up. Like I said, the trees in the savanna are very short and spread out, so there's not much to block one's view. It's sad that most of the British's power came from their weapons. Even if people in the nearby villages tried to help the slaves escape, their bow-and-arrow's and other weapons couldn't compete with the British's guns. If you think about European invasion and settlement of the Americas, one of the main reasons it was so successful was because the natives could not combat the European diseases, and so they either died or mixed with the Europeans. Instruments of death are a powerful thing; be careful you don't use them for evil.

At this juncture, I think I should also point out how this slave camp fit into the larger picture of the slave trade. I actually just read a book on the slave trade, so I feel I can provide some quick insight into the story. Slaves were rounded up all over West Africa by various means. Sometimes vulnerable peasant villages were raided and the people were taken as slaves. Often prisoners of war were taken as slaves. Communities would give up people as slaves if that person was somehow disruptive to the social fabric of the community. Then the slaves would be taken to local slaves camps like this one in Paga for some amount of time, but eventually, they would have to make a journey by foot to the coast where they would be placed in holding cells like the one at Elmina Castle that I visited earlier in the semster. Here, the slaves could be kept for very long amounts of time. In fact, European slave traders taking slaves to the Americas took anywhere between one and six months to get enough slaves to make a trip across the Atlantic. Then, of course, the trip across the Atlantic took anywhere from one to two months depending on what part of the Americas the slaves were being shipped to (about one month for South America, more like two for North America). So, you see, the slave trade was very survival-of-the-fittest, with only the strongest and most resiliant slaves actually ending up in the Americas.

You should also realize that the Transatlantic slave trade was not the only market for slaves at the time. In fact, there was an internal market for slaves in Africa, as well as markets to the northern in northern Africa and the Mediterranean and markets to the east as well. Also, it should be noted that, while the atrocities committed against slaves in the Americas are by far the worst outcome of any of these slave trades, the rounding up of slaves for sale was not just performed by Europeans. In fact, the rounding up of slaves was primarily done by Africans for economic purposes. Europeans did not penetrate far into the African interior, mostly because for a long time there was no cure for malaria which Africans have a natural defense against because of their sickle cells. Therefore, for most of the slave trade, it was Africans who performed raids on peasant villages and took prisoners of war as slaves and outcast certain members of the community to a life of slavery. (This particular slave camp that we visited was most active during the mid-1800s, after quinine, an antimalarial drug, was invented allowing the Europeans to take a more active role in the African interior, and ultimately making it possible for Europeans to colonize Africa). So, while I am not trying to defend any European actions in relation to slave trading in Africa, you should realize that slave trading was just that, a trade. It was seen in economic terms and both Africans (well, some Africans, not the slaves, of course) and Europeans benefitted from the trade. Of course, the people who benefitted most from the slave trade were Americans who were able to use a large and extremely cheap labor supply to build up the riches of the Americas. It may seem crazy when you think about it, but it's true. Without African slave labor, the United States of America never would have been the superpower that it is today. Of course, there's much more to the slave trade that the little I've mentioned, so I encourage whoever has the time to find a credible source and read up on it as it is a major part of world history and one of the biggest factors in the inequality of wealth between certain regions of the world today.

To end our visit to the slave camp, we went to the cemetery for the slaves, not really a proper burial place for slaves, but instead a place where the British dug a large hole and threw lots of dead bodies in. Right by the cemetery was a little rock known as punishment rock. Some slaves, probably those who tried to escape, were strapped to this rock and flogged to death. There was a heavy air and an intense heat about the spot, not just because it was so hot, but because I came to that point in the day when I actually began to really think about what went on at that slave camp. It's one thing to acknowledge the history of it all, but it's another to try to put yourself inside of it and really imagine what it was like. We all shared a moment of silence for all those who have suffered because of this deep scar cut into humanity.

Our next stop was to be Bolgatanga, a little south of Paga, where we were planning on visiting this village inhabited by widows and orphans from the area. Widows are heavily stigmatized in northern Ghana. For some reason (I'm not sure what the reason is), it is believed that if a man dies, it is most likely because of his wife. So in that sense, the wife is seen as a murderer in some ways, so society outcasts her. She cannot marry again, and her family does not want to take her back. Her husband's property does not go to her, so she is left with nothing, and she is expected to live the rest of her life as a beggar. The Widows and Orphans Ministry of Northern Ghana is an organization dedicated to helping these widows, their children, and orphans find a livelihood that will support them and help end the stigmatization against widows. We visited one of these villages where the women make baskets that they can sell at the market. It's a strange setting because there's all these women, probably 50 or so, as well as three times as many children, if not more, and there are almost no men around. What men are around are people who work for the organization since these women have no husbands. Our visit to the village was a little awkward in some ways. It's just strange that this little village of outcasts in the middle of nowhere is visited by this village of white people from the other side of the globe, and we just sit there, sort of staring (not such a new thing by now) because the none of the widows really know English. They explained, through a translator, how they made baskets and how much they sold them for and so on and so on. We donated a bunch of stuff to them and then they danced for us. They pulled me into their dance circle at one point. I was somewhat reluctant, but sommetimes you just gotta ignore any awkwardness that may seem present and just have a good time. The women seemed very appreciative of our visit and our donations, and a million thank you's were exchanged on both sides.

Our next stop was the Bolgatanga craft market which consisted of a bunch of stalls that sold all sorts of things from leather goods to baskets to clothing to brasswork. of course, I only looked and did not buy anything. I don't remember when I decided it, but at some point in my life, I just decided to stop buying stuff out of novelty. Of course, I will buy something if I judge that it will have some important practical purpose in my life, but in general, I just don't like to buy "stuff." It seems like an empty hobby because eventually you're just going to want more stuff, and so not amount of stuff will ever satisfy. So the easy solution is to stop buying stuff. Anyway, the market was nice, and afterwards we headed back to Tamale.

Back in Tamale, we had dinner at a restaurant called Swad. The cuisine was a mix of West African and Indian, so we got dishes like chicken curry and samasos as well as fufu. The restaurant was inside of a very basic building with a tin roof, sort of like an old church was emptied out and turned into a restaurant. It kind of reminded me of a barbeque restaurant in a small town in the Deep South, plain, spacious, and friendly. It began to downpour while we were there, so we had to scream at each other the whole time to beat out the sound of the rain pounding down on the tin roof. Afterwards, I went back to GNAT to hang out with a few of my friends. The power was out again, but the power was also out at TICCS, so it didn't really matter. We had candles now, though, so we could at least see a little. We mostly hung out on the balcony watching the most amazing lightning in the distance. I am not lying when I say that this was the brightest lighting I've ever seen in my life. These thick electric veins just filled up the sky at random moments and just added to the feeling that I was somewhere isolated from the rest of the world in a sense. Space is funny like that. I'm become so used to Accra and living here that it's somehow become very much a place in my mental map of space, but northern Ghana is still in some ways only a part of my imagination, just as Accra, and on a much larger scale, Africa used to be only a part of my imagination. Taking this trip reminded me that I was in Africa and that being in Africa was not a normal thing for me or even something that I would have considered even a year ago.

After a few hours of chatting about Ghana and the craziness of being here, it was time for bed. I lied down in the bed, and before long, sweat began to thoroughly coat my body and soak the sheets. Not only that, but the noises inside this place were instense. Everything sounded like it was right on top of you. There a man snoring in the next room, and I swear it was like he was sleeping right next to me. (I couldn't help but think how similar this trying to fall asleep experience was to camping with my dad). Whenever someone opened a door, even if it was on the next floor up, it was so loud and creaky. People would start talking in the hallway randomly, sometimes arguing quite vehemently with one another. There was some strange electronic sound that would sporadically go off every now and then, which was ironic considering that the power was out. I couldn't take it for more than an hour, so I eventually had to lather my body in bug cream and go sleep on the dirty little balcony outside. The dirt on the balcony kind of stuck to my skin because of the bug cream, but I didn't care as long as I wasn't sleeping in a pool of my own sweat.

I woke up about four hours later to board the bus for breakfast and home. On the way back, I was in my usual "I just had a tiring traveling experience and now I'm going home" state of mind, which is basically similar to the term braindead. I read a little, but I mostly just slepth and when I wasn't sleeping, I sat and stared out the window. As I looked out the window at life in action, whether in a small village or as we passed through Kumasi, I couldn't help but think about how despite whatever difference I might imagine to be present between all these people and everything I've known my whole life, people is just people. There's a woman carrying around a tray of bananas on her head all day, trying to make a few bucks. There's a man sitting on the side of the road eating his lunch in peace. A group of teenagers walk by laughing it up and teasing each other about who knows what. A shoe repair man walks around banging his big box full of repair tools. An old woman sits in the shade staring off into space. Another woman in the same shade is taking a nap on a little bench. A man crosses the street as part of his journey to whatever destination he's going to. And all this goes on, just goes on, no matter where you go. People need to eat, make money, take naps, escape the shade, and joke around with each other about all this craziness just to keep life going, and in that sense, people is just people, and we all people, whether we live in northern Ghana, south Georgia, New York, or even if you live on stilts in a lake.

Feelin' So Hot Tamale

So far, some of the most rewarding and enriching experiences I've had in Ghana have been when I've traveled. There's a quote that really captures the idea, although I don't remember it exactly. It's something like, "You can learn more by traveling five miles than by reading a thousand books." Or something like that. New places equal new people, new ways of life, and new ways of thinking about life. It's amazing how different places can be, even if they are within fairly close proximity. Accra is a big city, not the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks about Africa. Big buildings and urban life just don't fit into most people's minds when they think of Africa. One of my friends actually asked me this past weekend if I thought Africans would have ever built big buildings if they hadn't been colonized. They were impractical for so long because of the mobility of and the distance between African peoples. Now, they've made their way into some of Africa's big cities. On top of that, there's cars everywhere, banks, restaurants, business suits, and of course, Coca-Cola. I don't want to say these things aren't African or can't be African (except Coca-Cola, of course), but they are just not what one envisions when the image of Africa is evoked. No, instead images of vast dusty savannas with trees spread far apart appear. Villages with little mud huts, no electricity, probably no running water or flush toilets... that fits the image. The African sun beating down the most intense waves of heat imaginable... that also fits well. Cities like Accra just don't fit that image.

Well, this weekend, I saw that image of Africa when I traveled to the northern part of Ghana. However, don't mistake what I write. This was no more Africa than Accra is, because if there's anything I've learned from being here, it's that Africa is not a single image any more than the United States is (you know, images of fat racist white people stompin' around with ice cream cones, sittin' in front of the TV to watch American Idol and complaining about their heart medication or gossiping about Britney Spears latest pregnancy... that sort of image). So, Thursday morning, I woke up at 4:30 AM to load the bus for Tamale. Tamale is one of the largest cities in Ghana, although with a quarter of a million people, it's rather small compared to Accra and Kumasi. It's the only large city in the north part of Ghana, and it serves as the transit hub for that part of the country. It's several hundred miles away from Accra, and the journey is a long one. I slept for the first few hours of the bus ride, but I woke up as we were nearing Kumasi. I was surprised we had made it to Kumasi so quickly, considering the last time we went it took about 10 hours to get there. The bus ride was pretty uneventful. I mostly just read this fabulous book called Graceland. It's about a 16-year old boy who lives in the slums of Lagos, Nigeria, the largest city in Africa. He grew up in the villages, but after his mother dies and his father becomes a hardcore alcoholic, he moves to Lagos and makes a living by doing Elvis impersonations for rich white people at the beach. He ends up getting involved in all sorts of crazy things like cocaine dealing, organ trafficking, and traveling concert parties. I highly recommend it. But other than that, the ride was uneventful.

We arrived in Tamale around 7:00, 14 hours after our departure (of course, there were stops along the way). Our group was so large that we could not all fit in one hostel, so we occupied two. The hostel I stayed at was called the Tamale Institute of Cross-Cultural Studies (TICCS), and the other one, which I ended up staying at, was called the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT). We were all so exhausted from the ride and all the undigested food in our bellies, but nonetheless, we all ate a very large dinner of spaghetti and vegetables. I also met the owner/director of TICCS right before dinner. I was sitting with one of my friends, John, just chatting, and he came up to us and started a conversation. We found out that TICCS is a Christian institute specializing in cross-cultural ministry (they even offer a masters degree in it). So their focus is on promoting cross-cultural understanding with the intent of using that base to spread Christianity... interesting... I quickly passed out after dinner from food coma. Not the worst thing to fall asleep to, but not the best to wake up to either.

The next day, I awoke at 6:30 for a fun day full of TICCS. The itinerary was pretty packed, including a morning full of lectures. In fact, there was no free time at all for our trip, but there were lectures planned for 7:30-12:15. We were told we had to attend all lectures, but as I've learned from being here, the NYU in Ghana staff really have no leverage with which to enforce their authority, and I don't appreciate them not scheduling any free time for us. Nonetheless, I decided to give the lectures a try. After a breakfast of french toast, grits, and fruit (where's the protein?), we went to classroom where we met probably the creepiest man in the entire world who you'll be reading a lot more about. His name is... well, honestly, I don't want to tell you because I don't want to bring disgrace to his name, but we'll just say his name was Jim. Jim is a lawyer from southern California, probably in his 40s, volunteering at TICCs. He's been there since January. He wears a hat that says, "The Honest Lawyer... Can You Find One?" and his eyes seem like they are burning a hole into whatever he is looking at, like he was addicted to acid for most of his life and now he's permanently damaged. Jim introduced the director that I'd already met and the rest of the staff. A man named Frank began the first lecture entitled "Languages in Ghana." The lecture wasn't bad or anything, but it basically assumed that we just got to Ghana yesterday. From what I heard about the other lectures, they weren't any different either. C'mon, give us some credit for having been in Ghana for almost four months. The whole point of the lecture was that there are 50 native to Ghana, and some are more widely spoken than others. "No! Really? I thought people just spoke English and African."

After the first lecture, Frank told us we could take a few minutes to stretch before the next one began. Tania and I knew this was our opportunity to ditch the program. We had actually wanted to leave before the first one even started, but there were too many people telling us, "They're waiting for you to come to start." So we just walked out. On the one hand, it was kind of rude to the people giving the lectures. On the other hand, it was kind of rude of the NYU staff to not give us any free time and then not tell us about it until after they declared we could not drop out of the trip. In fact, Tania and I, as well as four other people who decided to ditch the lectures, were the only people who even got to see Tamale at all.

So... Tamale, the city in the north. As I've already said, it's a fair-sized city with about a quarter of a million people. However, what's so interesting about Tamale is that it's essentially a rural city, something I've never really seen before. Sure, there were a few main roads, a few (very small number) of multiple-story buildings, a few restaurants and other services you'd expect in a city, but for the most part, Tamale's a bunch of villages that sort of grew into each other and became incorporated into the city. Tania and I walked down the main road of the city which had a separate pedestian and bike lane separate from the road which was very nice. There were lots of people who rode bicycles, and even a fair number who rode motorbikes. Weaving in and out of all the people and bikes was actually a challenge. I suppose that was the most city-like thing about Tamale - a high concentration of peoples in a small area. We walked around, not seeing much that was out of the ordinary, other than an abudance of mosques. The southern part of Ghana is predominantly Christian, but the north is mostly Muslim, although Christianity is definitely still a strong force. There were a few spectacular mosques in the city, most notably the Central Mosque, the only real landmark in the city that can be seen from a distance.

If you read about my trip to Kumasi, you might remember I wrote that people there didn't harass me nearly as much as in Accra. Well, this was even more true for Tamale. Many people, especially children, yelled out, "Hello!" to us, but that was pretty much all. They were satisfied with a big wave and a smile. The only real exception was a man with a shovel spear who came running up to us. His English wasn't so hot, and so Tania and I thought he was trying to sell us the shovel. He kept saying something about a farm, and we kept trying to tell him that we weren't farmers. But it turned out that he just wanted to say hello to us and he just happened to have the shovel with him. He was nice. So, the people were nice, and the furniture they were selling of the side of the road had the most wonderfully tacky designs on it, but other than that, there's not much going on in Tamale. Tania and I kept walking for a long time, just chatting and waving at people, until eventually the heat started to get to us. We took a cab back to the hostel, although we spotted the central market on the way, so we got out there to check it out.

The market was nice, a pretty typical market, very friendly, not too big, not too small. The only bad thing about it were these millet balls that Tania and I bought. The millet balls looked like fried dough dipped in sugar, but it turned out to be fermented millet with flour. It was the most repulsive thing I've ever eaten in my life. It was absolutely horrible. These millet balls should be marketed in America as a hunger-control mechanism, though, because I was starving when I took a bite out of it, and immediately afterwards, I wasn't hungry at all. We preserved the specimen of millet and showed it to Chris who told it's supposed to be eaten with some sort of milk or porridge. I suppose that would make more sense, but I'm positive it would still taste horrible.

On our way back from the market, a little boy on a bicycle came riding up to us and said, "Hello, I want to be your friend." I said, "Oh, really? What's your name?" He told me his name was Michael and we told him our names. Then he just continued to ride his bike next to us as we walked. We didn't really say much to him because we didn't really know what to say, but just went right along with us. He got off his bike after a while and started walking and pushing his bike. I suppose it is difficult to ride so slowly. The whole time he just smiled and kind of giggled, not saying anything to us but absorbing every bit of the moment. After about 10 minutes, he told us he had reached his destination, and so he was off. We walked back to TICCS drenched in sweat and snuck into the dining room where everyone was eating lunch. It was an awkward entrance since we had left earlier, but a little awkwardness never kept me away from lunch before, so why stop now?

After lunch, we all loaded the bus to go to the famous Dr. Abdulai's clinic. Some have called Dr. Abdulai the Mother Theresa of Africa, which, after meeting him, you'd realize that's an understatement at best. This man was an absolute saint. He's a trained medical doctor, did all his studies abroad, but then he returned to Ghana to open up a clinic outside Tamale for people who need operations, mentally unstable people, homeless people, and anyone else outcast from society. It doesn't matter these people have money or not. Furthermore, his clinic relies on the knowledge of Western medicine while creating a more holistic healing experience. In fact, his clinic is more like a little village, making people feel right at home. He and his volunteer staff work hard day and night, and they all, staff and patients, seem to be the happier for it. They also have a soup kitchen serving a few hundred people daily which Dr. Abdulai told us hasn't missed a meal since 1989. He's also gives small interest-free loans to people who need money to start up their own work to support themselves as well as a structured plan for how to go about starting up their own business.

However, I don't just say he's a saint because of all these wonderful things he did - I say it because of the way he talked about and interacted with the people at his clinic. Whilst he was telling us about all the amazing things his clinic provides for people, a very old woman, probably in her 80's, came up to Dr. Abdulai in a very glamorous fabric design. He immediately gave her a big smile and reached his arms out for her to come to him. She sat down next to him smiling and giggling, as giddy as a little girl. He had his arm around her and began to tell us about this woman. Apparently she showed up to Dr. Abdulai's clinic completely naked. She began walking around the place and throwing dirt into people's pots while they were cooking, telling them they needed more salt. And then she would start painting the walls of the huts with her feces and just dance around all over the place. The whole time Dr. Abdulai was telling us this, he was talking in a very "that's just what she used to do" kind of way. I wouldn't say that his words were completely impartial, though; no, they were definitely filled with love and care for what he saw as a beautiful person. Now this woman is mostly concerned with looking beautiful all the time, so Dr. Abdulai bought her several beautiful dresses, and now she just walks around feeling pretty all day.

As we walked around the clinic, I could tell that Dr. Abdulai had a similar relationship with all his patients. Whenever people would see him coming, he would just brighten up their world. Everyone seemed to just be happy around him, and he seemed to be as genuinely happy to be with them. You know, some people are just like that. They are hard to come by, but it's obvious when you find one. They just seem to make the world a sunnier place. Which could possibly explain why I was so incredibly hot at the clinic. I swear, I haven't experienced heat so intense in years, definitely not since I've been in Ghana. I mean it was ridiculous. I was completely drenched in sweat. You may think I'm joking, but I kid you not when I say that my shirt was one gigantic sweat stain. But, it really wasn't so bad. No reason to let a little heat get me down. We gave some stuff to Dr. Abdulai for him to give to his patients, things like clothes and Ibuprofen and stuff. On the way out, I noticed some of the huts had the star of David on them, others crosses, others Adinkrah symbols... just making sure people feel at home.

We came back to TICCS after leaving the clinic. The director guy gave us a little lecture about divination. Diviners are people who get information from supernatural powers. They are not really fortune tellers because they play a more ritual and social role, but basically they're supposed to be spiritual guiders for the community when a person has a problem or an impasse in their life. After the little lecture, we split up into three groups to visit a diviner. I got to be in the smallest group, just me and five others plus James, the only normal employee of TICCS I've met on the trip (although he did have a problem with chain smoking). We went to one of the little villages that had sort of grown into Tamale and walked for a while down a dirt road. On the way to the diviner, we saw the cutest baby goats in the entire world, and I decided that I want to live in a field of baby goats and kittens. That would be the life.

The diviner lived inside of a little mud hut that was part of a larger mudbrick compound. This little compound was so awesome, and from what I could tell from looking around the village, it seemed to be a typical setup for a home. In the middle of the compound, there was a huge cooking area, with fires and giant pots everywhere. There were two round hut structures, side by side, and then two longer buildings. There were about four women and sixteen children hanging out in this compound. Two of the women were cooking, probably for lots and lots of people considering the amount of food they were handling. The other women were either sitting on benches that were against one of the longer buildings, or they were moving about doing something. The children just ran around the compound all giggly and amused by the white people. There was one little girl in particular that I remember very well. She had no shirt on, a long purple skirt, a green waistlet (I don't know what to call it, but like a bracelet for your waist), and little metal coils in her hair. At first, when she walked up to us, she just looked at us and almost started crying (although most kids here are extremely excited to see white people, sometimes they start crying). She quickly ran away from us and sought the protection of one of the women. But then when all the other kids started taking an interest in us, she came back over and started being as wild as ever, rolling on the floor and running around like she was having the time of her life. The other kids were all equally amused, although they weren't quite as expressive as the other little girl. Some of the little boys tried to "keep their cool," so to speak by just sitting off to the side and talking about us. At one point, they were talking to each other and they pointed right at Jackie who was clearly looking right at them, but they just pretended like she wasn't there. Although it might seem rude, adults do it to kids all the time, so why can't kids do it too?

When the diviner arrived, we all stepped into one of the little mud huts and sat on those colorful mats that Muslims pray on in a semi-circle facing the diviner. The diviner was a Muslim, but religious followings don't determine whether one can be a diviner or not. There are also Christian diviners and diviners who practice traditional beliefs. And the religion of the person coming to the diviner also does not really matter because the diviner is simply a spritual guide who is supposed to help you onto the right track when you've lost your way. The man was about 30 years old. He had learned how to divine from his father and his grandfather when he was about 9. He trained for several years and has been divining on his own ever since. He told us that people come to him with personal problems (perhaps a relationship or spiritual problem), family problems (maybe someone in the family has a problem that clearly affects the whole family), and problems that affect the whole community (such as maybe a drought or a witch). He uses little cowry shells and rocks to do his divinations, mixing them up in all different fashions to determine the path one must take. When you seek divination, you don't tell the diviner your problem directly. Instead you hold a cowry shell and a kola nut to your head (although to be honest they'd prefer you use money instead of a kola nut these days) and think about the problem, at which point the diviner will begin his work. The diviner we saw claimed that he had no failure stories, that he was always right, but judging from how he offered to give me advice on my girl troubles, I'll just assume that his divinations aren't necessarily cross-cultural.

Everyone had their own personal session with the diviner after we met as a group, everyone except for me that is. It's not that I'm perfect and have no problems or anything, but I just can't think of anything so pressing that would require me to sacrifice any animals. Indeed, after a divination, the diviner makes a sacrificial requirement for you in order to catalyze the spiritual healing. He told some people to sacrifice hens, others sheep, others still chicken. He told one girl that people didn't like her, so she had to sacrifice some sort of fowl, cook it, and then feed it to a bunch of children so that they would like her. He offered to perform some of the sacrifices for them for a fee of about $30, which makes me wonder what exactly is the purpose of sacrifice. The others told me that some of the stuff he said was dead on, but then some of it was kind of vague and not applicable to them. That's pretty much what I figured. I think diviner's probably don't have any failure if the people who come to see them believe in them as a spiritual guide and authority, but we skeptical Westerners... we just don't give in to mysticism so easily. One point I would like to make about divination is that it's a traditional practice, not a part of the Christian or Muslim beliefs. What's interesting is that although Christianity and Islam are the largest religions in Ghana, in a sense they're really just a different outlet for traditional practices. For instance, the churches here are less about preaching the gospel and more about singing and dancing your praises to the lord (which, of course, Europeans and to a lesser extent Americans are not so keen on). People here also still look to their ancestors as one of their biggest sources of spritual strength, which isn't absent from Christianity or Islam, but also isn't emphasized as much. I suppose part of that, though, at least for Americans, may have to do with a lack of connection between self and ancestoral lands. It's easier to look to one's ancestors if you can truly call their land your own as well, but for someone like me for instance, I really don't feel any special sense of connection to the European lands and peoples from which I originate, but I suppose they're a part of me nonetheless.

We left the diviner and the women and all the adorable little children behind as it was getting dark. All the little kids stuck out their hands to shake ours as we left, and the adults stuck to a simple wave and a smile. We came back to TICCS where a pizza dinner awaited us. I guess they thought we weren't too keen on Ghanaian food considering the spaghetti, french toast, and pizza they had for us. After dinner, I went with my friends Jessi and Hannah over to the GNAT hostel to hang out for a while. When we got there, all the power was out. We walked into the lobby where a man sat with a little candle finding people's keys for them. We asked if he had any extra candles, and he told us, "No, this is the only candle in the hostel." I thought that was pretty funny, but not as funny as the fact that I still don't have a flashlight after almost four months of "ko bra" electricity in Ghana. (I say "ko bra" because it's a common thing to say in Twi... it literally means "go come," but more accurately means "You're leaving now but you will be coming back at some point in the near future," such as when you're going to class or the grocery store or something). Anyway, we walked up to the second floor of the hostel where we literally could not see a single pinpoint of light except for what little light emanated from the green backlight on my cell phone, just enough to see "36" on my friend Jessi's door. This hostel was so super creepy, but since I actually stayed at the hostel the next night, I'll save the creepiest for then. Jessi and I eventually went back to the other hostel so that we could sleep with a fan, much better than sleeping in a puddle of my own sweat. And so I happily dozed off after a long day of a new Ghana...

What's interesting is that I say, "New Ghana," but really, the difference comes from the fact that these people aren't the same people as the ones in the south of Ghana. Nations in Europe and Asia were able to form around single or at least only a few ethnic groups, so that most French people are of French ethnicity, for example. But the borders for African nations were artificially drawn by Europeans when they split up the continent in the Berlin Conference of 1884 without any regard for already established nations. So, for instance, in Ghana, there are over 50 different ethnic groups (you could also call them tribes or nations), but the British didn't care. They just called the whole place "Gold Coast" and assumed Africans was just Africans. Many ethnic groups were even split up. For instance, in the Volta Region of Ghana live the Ewe people, but the Ewes also live right across the border in Togo. So all these people speak the same native language, but they are split up into two different countries. I won't go into them now, but these artificial divisions of land have created a lot of problems for Africa, including genocide in places like Darfur and Rwanda. So, anyway, back to my point, when I say "New Ghana," it's not really new Ghana, but instead just old differences in language and life.

Film, Sweat, Joseph, and Highlife

Thursday morning Hannah, Tania, and I met at the academic center at 7:00 AM to pick up film equipment for another day behind the camera. We took a cab to 37, one of the nearby medium-sized tro-tro stations. The station is mostly filled with tro-tros (go figure) and also a fair number of vendors selling mostly food, water, and novelty items. We weren't really sure how to go about filming there. All we knew was that there would definitely be trash there and there would definitely be people there, and on this day, we wanted to get some interviews with the residents of Accra. We surveyed the area, the whole while getting funny looks because we were carrying film equipment. We saw a few women sweeping up some trash and thought that they would be good for filming. We tried to ask one of the women for permission to film her, but she didn't speak English. Then some man came up to us and we explained to him what we wanted to do, so he asked the woman and she didn't seem to care. It's kind of funny that people are so willing to be filmed because we were told repeatedly when we first came to Ghana that people here don't like to be photographed. And it's sort of true; I've seen many people get made at some of my friends for taking pictures of them. I get around the problem by not having a camera, at least when I'm not making a film anyway.

After we filmed the women, this guy who we had seen on the beach the day before came up to us and started talking to us. At first we tried to shoo him away, but the day before he hadn't seemed so friendly, but then we realized maybe he'd want to give us an interview. And he did. So we found a little spot to set up the camera and a bench for him to sit on, and we asked him a few questions about waste in Accra. His answers were good, but we feared he might have just been saying things to please us. Or maybe he was sincere. We did three more interviews that day, and everyone sort of gave us the standard, "Oh, yes, the problem's bad," answer. All were unanimous that the AMA were to blame for the problem (which is probably why the WMD of the AMA is being so reluctant to give us an interview), although they all seemed to equally put blame on the citizens of Accra themselves. People are uneducated, they don't know it's bad to litter, etc, etc. They were probably being honest, though, because one woman we interviewed was a nurse, and another man was a teacher. We also got an interview with a little girl selling water so that we could ask her about people's habits of throwing water sachets on the ground after their done with them. She didn't speak English, but we got Richard (the first guy we interviewed) to translate for us. Twice during the day somebody got mad at us for filming, insisting that they had to seek their permission before we could film. The first guy we were pretty sure was legit - he was the station manager. But the other guy was just some guy who was probably upset he wasn't in the film.

After we were done filming, we went back to the academic center to drop off the film equipment. On my way home from the academic center, a man who was eating banku with some sort of meat stopped me and asked me if I wanted to join him. I had just eaten, but I was curious as to what the meat was because it didn't look like anything I had ever taken before. I asked him what the meat was, and he looked up at me and said, "Meow" while making a clawlike motion with his hand. Joseph! That's what they call cats that you eat here, Joseph. I don't know why, they just do. I'm a little surprised I was as eager to eat the cat as I was - I can't deny I was curious. Plus, I don't see why I should discriminate against eating certain animals. The cat was already dead, and if I didn't help him eat it, I didn't know who would. So I had some, not too much. The meat was dark like dark chicken meat or rabbit meat. It was very tender and sweet, although it tasted a little bit like a cat smells. Not in a bad way, though, just the way a cat smells.

*********

The next day of filming was not quite as sucessful. We met at 7:00 AM, as usual. Our plan was to go to a place called Ogbojo where Alpha had told us there was a landfill right in the middle of this community of people. We wanted to go get shots of the landfill and then interview people about how the landfill affected their lives and their community and so on and so on. Alpha was going to go with us, but he had to film somewhere, so he just gave us directions to give the cab driver. Basically we just needed to find Ogbojo and then ask where the 'bola' is. We waved down a taxi and hopped in. The driver kind of knew where Ogbojo was, but kind of didn't. He knew the general direction, so we drove for about 45 minutes and then started asking people where it was. We kept being pointed in different directions, and I felt as though we were going deeping and deeping into some sort of maze of dirt roads. We finally got to Ogjobo and asked where the 'bola' was. A man told us we were in bola, which now I realize doesn't really make sense because I think that 'bola' means trash. We drove around the area for a long time, asking people where the landfill was. Finally someone gave us a definite answer, but they told us it was this highly vegetated area where you could see some trash, but that clearly wasn't being used as a landfill. So we asked some more people and we found out that, yes, this was the landfill, but that it hadn't been used in over a year. Upon hearing this, I wanted to cry because I was working on three hours of sleep and I was so ridiculously hot it wasn't even funny, but I couldn't cry because I was losing too much water from sweating as it was (we much be practical about things), so instead, I just sweated, only with more dismay now.

We didn't really know what to do. We tried to call Alpha but he didn't answer. So we did the only thing we could do, which was make the long drive back into Accra without filming anything. When I got back, I actually didn't go to bed. Instead, I spent the next five hours finishing a 21-page paper on the dynamics of control over the environment and resources of the developing world for my Globalization and the Developing World class. I've been working on it for some time now, and I must say, this is the first time I've ever finished such a large assignment three weeks before it's due. That helped ease the pain of the miserable morning I spent inside a pool of sweat. Then later that night I went to a Highlife concert at the University of Legon. Highlife is the national music of Ghana. It's a combination of jazz, marching band music, and dance band music. It's very upbeat and somewhat swing-ish. Unfortunately, Highlife is suffering right now for a variety of reasons. Now Gospel music is the most popular music in Ghana, although Hiplife (a really bad combination of Highlife and American Hip-Hop) is starting to emerge. But one of my professors who works at Legon, John Collins, partnered with the World Bank (I know, weird right?) to sponsor this Highlife event. The concert was pretty fun, a nice night to relax and forget about papers and films and all that other jive...

Filming Adventures

Well, the chicken film is old news by now. Hannah, Tania, and I have been working on our 15-minute film a lot recently, and we'll continue to work on it until the end of the semester. As I mentioned some time ago, the film is about waste management in Accra. We're still not completely sure how it's going to turn out, but so far we've gotten some pretty good footage, although our filming was not without its complications...

Wednesday morning, Hannah and I met at the academic center at 7:00 AM to pick up the film equipment for our shoot. Our plan for the day was to go around the city and get shots of various neighborhoods and filth, shots that would mostly be filler shots or shots that would verify the fact that, indeed, Accra isn't the cleanest city around. We also needed to deliver two letters, one to the Waste Management Department of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly and the other to the Environmental Health and Sanitation Unit. We had gone to the Waste Management Department of the AMA the week before to ask for an interview. It took us forever to find the place, traffic was bad, and then we sat around some secretaries office for almost two hours just to hear the director of the WMD talk for five minutes about how we needed a letter before they could discuss being in our film. We told him we had a letter, and we showed it to him. The letter explained the film and had the signiture of the director of NYU in Ghana on it, as well as her business card, but he told us we needed a letter head. Oh, the technicalities... although I guess I can understand. If three people want to make a film about waste management in Accra, it's probably not going to be super positive, and it's definitely not going to praise the AMA for their waste management efforts. Although when stating the purpose of our film, we wrote that Our intentions were to not point any fingers and just be as objective as possible about the situation.

So Hannah and I picked up the film equipment that Alpha left for us in the conference room and headed out to the road to catch a cab to Independence Square. The first location for our shoot was the beach behind Independence Square because it's probably the dirtiest beach in Accra. We wanted to go there early in the morning so that the lighting would be good for filming. So we got down at the square and made our way across. The beach in the morning light was amazingly gorgeous, even with all the trash around. We started to set up the camera. By now we had gotten pretty used to the camera, how to set it up for good shots, adjust the lighting and sound and whatnot. We were taking our time, though, because it was early and we wanted to get the shots just right. For our first shot we wanted to just get a nice pan of the whole beach to do a nice overview. We hadn't actually started filming yet, and as I was fiddling with the camera, I hear an angry voice say something at me, but I couldn't understand the words. I still fiddled with the camera as I looked up, and what I saw was completely unexpected. Standing in front of me was a military man probably not much older than me, dressed in camoflage and holding a gigantic gun which he pointed right at us (they all carry gigantic guns here... it's a bit unsettling). He screamed again, and this time I understood him, "Get away from the camera I said!" Then he sort of lunged at us, all of this sort of happening in one instant, at which point we backed away from the camera very confused and very compliant with the man carrying the big gun.

"What are doing here?" he asked us.

"We're students. We're making a film for one of our classes and we wanted to film here," Hannah said.

"Who gave you permission to film here?"

We both looked at each other. "Our professor told us we didn't need permission. He told us it would be alright for us to just film wherever," we told him.

Then he started talking to some guy on his walkie-talkie. After he got off, we told him, "Look, we're sorry, we didn't know we couldn't film here. We'll just leave now."

"You're not going anywhere!" he told us. "I've arrested you for trying to film the castle." Hannah and I looked up at the castle. The camera did look like it was pointed at the castle, but it was actually pointed at the beach. Soon some other guy came over and didn't say anything, just stood there holding his gun. This guy was a bit older, maybe in his 40s. After he came over, the first guy completely changed his demeanor and started smiling and asking us, "Which country do you come from?"

"America," we told him.

"Ahhh, America. I really want to go there. You know, here in Ghana, I just don't have the opportunities to do what I want. How can I get over there?" he asked.

"Uhmm..." Sometimes people just have unrealistic expectations of white people. I may be from America, but that doesn't mean I know how to get you over there. "I guess the only way I know you can go is if you marry an American," I said.

He continued to make this small talk for a while, but every now and then he would just become very aggressive and angry, and he asked us again who gave us permission to film there. We gave him the same answer as before, and he told us to call our professor and get him to come down there right now. I didn't question it, and to be honest, I really wanted Alpha to be there to help us out a bit, because we really didn't know what was going on. So I called Alpha, and told him we had encountered some problems filming at the beach and that he needed to come to where we were to help us out. Alpha asked me to ask the name of the guys who were talking to us, which I didn't think was very relevant, but I did, and the guy just shouted back at us, "That's not necessary! Tell him to come here now!" So I told Alpha what he had said, and Alpha was on his way.

Then the guy came back to small talk, but it was very uncomfortable small talk. He would make comments suggesting that I should let him marry my sister (Hannah he meant) so he could get into America. Then he would come back to being angry, and every time we tried to explain what we were doing there, he wouldn't let us say anything. Hannah started to become really uncomfortable, and the guy asked her, "What's the matter? You don't like me." The whole time I couldn't help but notice that his gun was pointed at my foot, though he wasn't aiming it, it was just hanging off of him that way. I'm pretty sure this guy was just so satisfied with the fact that we were confused and afraid because he had a gun and therefore had liberty to say what he pleased. Soon more and more military men started coming to where we were. One of them who was clearly the leader of the group came up to us and started talking to us. When he came, the other guy left which was a big relief. This new guy was much more sensible and didn't find it necessary to treat us like scum. He asked what we were doing there, and we gave him the whole spiel about being students, making a film, filming trash and the beach and not the castle... He told us to put our equipment away and come with him to the castle to interact with his boss so that he can make a judgement about what we were doing. He told us not to be frightened, that it was only "a matter of national security", so they "can't take anything for granted" as he told me, and we would be fine.

As we started walking towards the castle, Alpha showed up (hallelujah!). He was very spry and talked to the guys a lot, explaining us and explaining that we had every right to film there, and of course they weren't filming the castle, they just wanted to film trash, and oh, they came to this beach because they knew there would be guards around the protect them if someone started messing with them while they were trying to film. I must say, I was pretty impressed by Alpha's fast tongue, but really it wasn't necessary. We went to the castle regardless and saw the boss for about a minute. We didn't even say anything really. The guy just explained our situation and his boss didn't seem to really care at all. He told us it was fine if we filmed the beach. Whew! That was a relief!

So Hannah, Alpha, and I walked back to the beach, trying to laugh the whole thing off, but still a little shaken up. By now the sun was starting to get really bright which was what we were trying to avoid by coming out early. Nevertheless, we got some pretty good shots at the beach of trash, some big overview shots and some close-ups. Then we got out of there because we had already spent way too much time there and now our plan looked like it might now work out as well as we had hoped. We took a cab to Kaneshie, where the WMD has its headquarters. On the way there, we got the cab driver to stop at a few different places so we could get shots. I got a shot of a wall that had painted on it, "Keep Our City Clean," a few gutters filled with trash, and most importantly, the sewage river that runs through the industrial area. There was trash everywhere in the sewage river, especially under the bridge that the cars go over. I got some really good shots of some birds playing in the trash.

When we got to the WMD, Hannah ran in to drop off our letter. I walked around the corner to see if I could find any food, particularly some red red. Red red is bean stew with fried plantains, and it's probably one of the greatest things that man has ever created. I'm pretty sure the stew just consists of palm oil, tomatoes, onions, pepper, and maybe some garlic or other spices. It's pretty amazing. Alas, I had no luck in finding red red, but I did find a little boy who happened to be sweeping up trash. As soon as Hannah came back from delivering the letter, I pointed towards the boy and we went over to ask him if we could film him sweeping up the trash. He sought approval from his mother, who just smiled and waved at us, and so we set up the camera quickly to get a shot of the boy sweeping. Well, it turned out well in one sense because we got him sweeping, but it was also kind of bad because about 10 others kids all grabbed brooms and started sweeping in front of the camera as well. They didn't look at the camera at all, which impressed me, but just the fact that 10 kids were in this small space sweeping made it look very staged, which it was (it's the fundamental contradiction of documentary-making - you want to show "reality," something objective, some unstaged, but ultimately you still have to stage everything to a degree).

We decided to walk towards Kaneshie Market to film there because we figured it would be pretty dirty. On the way Hannah got some pineapple and I finally found my red red. of course, the woman didn't understand that I didn't want to get it to go, so she put the piping hot beans and plantains in a plastic bag. I didn't know what to do, so Hannah and I just walked until we found a place where we could sit down and rest. The heat was getting to us, and we wanted to eat in some comfort. From now until I die I'll always associate profuse amounts of sweat with filming... there's just no escape from the heat. It took me about 10 minutes to find someone who would let us borrow a bowl and a spoon. But I did find those items essential to eating hot beans (which are actually black-eyed peas, mind you, they just call them beans here), and I enjoyed the red red very much. We proceeded to the market, which was discovered was way too crowded to film in. It was just cause too much of a commotion. Plus, there was really no place where lots of trash was concentrated in one area, it just spread out all about. Then I started thinking about how it was kind of silly to try to proove Accra is a dirty city by showing a market because even in a clean city, the market is likely to be a little dirty. So we left, a bit dejected but still fairly satisfied that we had gotten a few shots.

We went to the Environmental Health and Sanitation Unit, which is actually now the AMA Public Health Department. We met a man named Wisdom whom we gave the letter to. Wisdom is the information man at the Public Health Department. He was very kind to us and told us he would be happy to do an interview for our film. He even said we could do the interview then, but we both had classes to go to, so we made an appointment to do the interview on Monday morning. This made Hannah and me very happy. The ease with which we secured that interview (we were uncertain how easy it would be because of the way the director of the WMD had sort of shrugged us off) made Hannah and I forget all about the unfortunate incidence that morning. Then I went home and had a nice shower before class, washing away the sweat from my labor (and by my labor, I mean the equatorial sun).

Habitat for Humanity Build

Saturday morning, I awoke at 6:30 and immediately headed to the kitchen to make myself a cup of coffee, excited about the day that lay ahead. This was the day we would finally go do a build for Habitat-for-Humanity. Habitat is an international non-profit organization that helps build affordable housing for families. The houses are built by communities, volunteers, and hired work for more technical jobs such as plumbing and wiring. The money comes from donations as well as the people who pay for their houses. Habitat helps the family budget over a time period to pay for the house. I had never worked with the organization before, but I do care about affordable housing, so the opportunity seemed exciting. Plus, I love doing physical work in the outdoors if it's for some larger cause. It's strange because it's so difficult for me to get myself to exercise on a regular basis, but I don't mind spending a day schleppin' around mudbricks, or spending two months walking through forests, or spending a day hauling furniture up stairs. Actually, that last one I did mind a bit, but that's another story.

The van was set to leave at 7:00 AM, but of course, as usual, we ended up leaving late even though everyone was ready to go on time. We spent the first two hours of our ride getting out of Accra, and then the next two getting to the town of Kibi. I spent my ride reading Senator Barack Obama's memoirs Dreams from my Father, eating crackers, and drinking pineapple juice and soymilk. I also napped for a little while when it became clear that the estimated two hour journey wasn't going to end anytime soon. As we got closer to the town, I noticed the terrain becoming like that of the Volta Region, very green and hilly, alive with life. We got to Kibi, then drove a little bit outside of town to a little community. At the entrance to the community was a sign that said, "Habitat for Humanity."

I suspect that the whole community, perhaps 100 houses, was built by Habitat. The houses all looked very nice - plain mudbrick with the same rectangular shapes, but painted a wide variety of colors. Each house had a cute little yard with different plants and flowers. A simple dirt path went in different directions around the community. The whole place looked very planned and very clean; I could tell people took pride in their surroundings. The NYU staff and a woman who worked for Habitat led all 24 of us to a shaded area to sign liability forms, get gloves, and get lectured on drinking lots of fluids and not overworking ourselves.

There were three different stations set up for working. At one station, there were two wheelbarrows and three shovels. With these tools, the workers move dirt from one place to another. Simple enough. Then there was the brickmaking station. The brickmaker was a huge hunk of metal into which you put lots of earth and compress it. It hardens, you let it dry, and you have yourself a brick. I wanted to work with the brickmaker, but there was only one, so I didn't really get a chance, especially since most people weren't too psyched about the third job. This job was carrying bricks from the brickmaking area far into the community to another pile of bricks which I assume will be used for building in that spot.

If you're good at counting and you realize that it only take two, three at most, people to operate a brickmaker, then you know that there were jobs for four people and the dirt shoveling station (one for wheelbarrow), two or three at the brickmaking station, and then 17 or 18 people carrying bricks. Apparently there was a big mix up and they just hadn't planned for the amount of people that were coming. All day, there were rumors afly about getting more shovels and wheelbarrows, but I never saw them. So I did the only thing I could do. I carried bricks. I picked up a brick and followed a man down a dirt path into the village. He told us to make a pile where a building site was planned. And that was that. There were hundreds of made bricks, but they had to be carried a good three or four minute walk away. The bricks were pretty heavy, so many of the girls tried carrying the bricks on their heads, as the locals would do, but it just hurts your head instead of hurting your arms.

After we realized how much of a pain carrying the bricks individually was, we searched for other options. We found a little pull cart with flat tires. About ten little boys worked to move that pullcart back and forth. (I joked at the time that the little kids were doing the hardest job of all because there was no good path for the cart and the tires were crap. I treid to help them, but the kids were too intent on doing the jobs themselves). I wanted to use the wheelbarrows, but they were being used for shoveling. People stopped working very soon. We had arrived at the hottest time of the day after a long van ride and people weren't entertained by the idea of carrying bricks that far. I kept on carrying, and soon some of us organized an assembly line to get the bricks to the building site. But not long after we started the assembly line, they told us it was lunchtime, so we stopped working.

For lunch, we had rice, stew, chicken, vegetables, and plantains, a very typical and very tasty lunch. We also brought food for many people in the community. They seemed to appreciate it. After lunch, a bunch of people left, which really surprised me. I thought people wanted to come to work for more than an hour. I guess I expected the whole experience to be more productive. Even I was working, but I just couldn't get much done because there was no quick and effective way to get the bricks from one place to another. After lunch, I used the wheelbarrow, which did work well. However, after four loads of four bricks, I was kind of tired, and no one else seemed to keen on the idea. We started the assembly line again and moved many bricks, but all said and done, we probably only got about 120 or so bricks to the site. I guess it's better than none.

After I was done working, I sat down and heard a few people were going to the river. This sounded exciting. I was dirty and sweaty, ready for a nice dip in some water. Well, once we had mobilized everyone, we went to the river which really turned out to just be a little stream. We still played in the stream, of course. The kids from the village followed us and watched us as we sat around in a semi-deep part, our shoulders just coming above the water, and played with the most amazing mud I've ever felt. I thought it was funny that we were playing the stream while the little kids just watched us. I've been thinking about it, and I guess kids just stare. I think parents in the US just tell their kids not to stare at people, and here, they definitely don't because almost every little kid that sees me ends up staring at me or yelling out at me and smiling or holding out his or her hand for me to take it or asking for money or doing any other number of things. I don't mind it; I suppose it's only natural to see something or someone different for the first time and try to examine it as closely as possible.

After getting out of the water, day was nearing its end. I sat around and ate some cashews I had bought at a gas station on the way to the town, staring up and admiring the blanket of clouds that completely covered half of the sky as the sun set behind them. We went into town which wasn't really a whole lot. We went to a place called Decent Spot (dealers in drinkable goods) and played cards until dinner. We had dinner back at the village, banku with chicken soup and vegetables, all of us sitting around a large bonfire. After dinner, I went home. Most people stayed overnight in the town, but I didn't want to get back late the next day because I had to help edit the five-minute film I'm working on with Tania and Hannah. The ride back only took two hours, and I think it was probably the greatest van ride of my life. I had a whole seat to myself (there were only three of us), and I just laid down looking out the window at the full moon, spacing out to the gentle hum of the night.

These Days

These days I seem to think a lot...

So where to start... How about Thursday? It was early afternoon, and I was on my way to my class titled, "Topics in Pan-Africanism: Workshop in Pan-African and Diasporic Jazz Improvization." (What a long and drawn out name. The class is supposed to be about improvization, but really it's just a class where we play the same four beats on a big cowbell every week. So anyway, I was on my way to this class, hoping that today we would do more than play bells, and I decided on a whim to take the short cut to class. It's not really a whole lot shorter - more of an alternate path that seems more direct. I didn't start using it at all until maybe a month ago when it occured to me that I wanted to spice my life up a bit, take a different path for a change. This alternate path goes right by one of those large sewage streams that violate my nostrils. Well, this particular day there were several men in the ditch shoveling out trash and mud so that the sewage could flow more easily. I put no blame on anyone for what happened when I walked by that sewage stream, because, I suppose I should've let them know I was passing by. How could that nice man working to clean out that ditch have intentionally shoveled sewage on me? No, no one was to blame. This was what we call an unfortunate experience. I had gross, smelly sewage mud all over my shorts, my arm, and my water bottle. I instantly froze and tried to assess the reality of the situation.

The men instantly realized what had just happened, and they felt pretty bad. One guy got out of the ditch and started trying to clean me off, which was nice, but I just wanted to get out of there. Now, if you know me, then you know that I don't let foul smells stop me from my daily activity. I walked to the academic center and washed my right hand and arm thoroughly (and they say it's the left hand that's dirty) thoroughly. I washed my shorts as best as I could, and then went into class with one of my dad and my sister's new fragrances... "Sewage Shovel... by Ralph Lauren." Luckily, we had class outside. In class, we actually did something than play bells! We got litte bamboo reed flutes, which are pretty cool. The tone quality is not so hot, but it's fun to play, and it's pretty much impossible to make it sound bad. As long as you can breathe properly and move your fingers a bit, you're in business (meaning I'm in business).

I'm still worried about the fate of the class... we're supposed to have some sort of little concert as our final, but it seems that we've done so little in the way of actually improvising or playing instruments other than bells and bamboo flutes. Actually, I have been playing Henry's drum for a little while now. He got a beautiful drum made, and it sounds AMAZING! I'm actually going to the Arts Center tomorrow to get one made. I'm going to the same guy who made Henry's drum, so I know I will be getting quality. I've also begun to pick up Dipesh's guitar recently and strum a few bum-diddlies. I haven't been singing quite as much as a result of all these other things, but hey, sometimes you gotta try out new things - or revisit past loves.

Speaking of new things, we are starting to make films in my "Documenting the African City" course. During the first half of the semester, we learned a few things about how to use the cameras - lighting, focus, setting time codes, hooking up microphones, etc., etc. In another class we took a field trip to Jamestown and Nima. We've also had some pretty cool guest lecture filmmakers. We've watched some movies. It's a pretty good class. Two classes, one before Spring Break and then one the day after Spring Break ended, we made short little films in the compound just to let us get some practice using the cameras. Seeing as how the academic center isn't very big, there wasn't a whole lot to film, but we all came up with some pretty creative ideas. Some worked, some failed. As films do.

But now we're actually off making two films. The main one we're making is a 15-minute documentary about the waste management situation in Accra. In many parts of the city, there is no infrastructure for waste management. There are no trashcans around, no public authority enforcing proper waste disposal, and so people just throw their plastic water bags on the ground like it's the most normal thing in the world. We're going to perform an experiment where we set up five trash cans 50 meters apart along a busy stretch of road. On each trashcan, we're going to attach a sign that says, "Please put your trash here." We've chosen two locations: Ring Road near Labone Junction and Jamestown, both very busy areas where there are no trashcans. We're going to monitor the amount of trash that goes into the trashcans and onto the ground, one for the purpose of just seeing if people would use trashcans if they were around, and two to interview both people that use the trashcans and don't to find out their motives. Then we're going to interview a few students at La Yahoushua Primary and Junior Secondary School to find out if they are taught anything about waste management in school. We also want to look at the institutional side of the equation as well, both government and private waste management services. It's a pretty ambitious project, and I look forward to starting.

But we haven't started filming that yet. Right now we're working on a five-minute documentary to give us practice for the longer one. Hannah, Tania, and I (my fellow filmmakers on both projects) sat around and thought about what a person could possibly make a five-minute documentary on. We knew we should try to focus on one simple thing, a process. "What about the chicken thing, killing and eating a chicken?" Hannah so brilliantly suggested. So this past Sunday, we went to Apapa, a nearby neighborhood, and purchased two chickens, just like last time. Only Hannah and Tania weren't present last time (in fact neither of them have seen this been done, and they were both reluctant at first, even Hannah who had the idea in the first place). So the three of us and Rasheed went and got us some chickens.

We got out the camera and set it up on the tripod, white balanced the camera, adjusted for the current lighting, and action after action after action. This is when I discovered that making films isn't quite so easy. It seems like you could just point the camera and shoot, but oh no, there's so much more to it. The difficulty isn't just in the technical aspects of adjusting the camera and the lens' setting, but also in framing a nice shot and having it look like it's just happening - there's not actually a camera pointed at those two people, and a boom mike hovering above them. Yes, documentary filmmaking, where fact and fiction intermingle ever so intricately.

However, there was no fiction to be found in the fate of those chickens. We captured some shots of Rasheed and Hannah entering the chicken place (well, I'm sure it's someone's house or something, but to me it's the chicken place), a few shots of the chickens in the cage, some shots of the chicken man (same logic as above) getting the chickens for Hannah and Rasheed, and then finally a few shots of Rahsheed cleaning chicken poo off of his shirt. Oh Rahsheed. You're such a great sport. After that, we cabbed it over to Rasheed's house for the slaughter. We were in a hurry because we didn't want to run out of the daylight. The whole lighting thing makes filming so much more inconvenient. Unless it's overcast outside, you can't film from maybe 10AM to 3PM because it's too bright outside. But once it hits 6PM, the light's almost out.

We did not run out of light that night, and luckily, no one ran out of patience, although Rahsheed almost lost it once. We wanted to get lots of different shots of the chicken and the people watching the slaughter, the de-feathering, cleaning, de-gutting, etc, and so we had to stop him in the process many times and ask him to wait for us to set up a new shot. He was fine, though, and we were all happy with the shoot, our first filmmaking. Today we filmed another scene at the Top-in-Town supermarket in Osu. We had Hannah browsing the freezer aisle and picking up a packet of pre-cut packaged chicken, and then proceeding to the checkout to purchase the chicken. We're also going to film a short little interview with her about where she gets her chicken and whatnot, and then tomorrow night we're going to cook the chicken which is currently sitting in my freezer. We'll get shots of putting the chicken in the oven, and then shots of Rahsheed and Hannah chomping down on some tasty chicken. Hopefully it won't be too chewy this time. This weekend, we edit, which I'm sure will be a whole new adventure.

So I've got a lot ahead of me just with those films. It kind of sucks, though, because all my classes seemed to have saved all the work for the end of the semester. The first half of this semester, I didn't even feel like I was in school. We hardly did anything in my classes, had practically no work at all, and the week of independence I only had 1 out of my 4 classes, and then the week after that was Spring Break. And now I've got these films to work on, this concert to think about which I still have no idea how we're going to pull off, and two big research projects to do, one for my African Popular Music class, and the other for my Globlization and the Developing World. I'm actually excited about working on all of these projects, but it sucks that I have to do them all in about a month.

One thing I realized recently is that, in terms of the pace of life here, I actually kind of feel like I'm in Douglas for the summer. Every day I wake up, it's really hot. And every day I wake up, I wonder, "What am I going to do today?" Of course, I always find something, it just seems like nothing happens here. Don't get me wrong - I didn't say that nothing happens here, just that sometimes it seems that way. Maybe the heat has something to do with it. I also think the weather in general here might be to blame. I was talking to Meagan the other day and I said to her, "Don't you think it's weird that the weather just doesn't really change here? It's just always hot, all year long. Half the year it doesn't rain at all, and half the year it rains some, but that's about the only change." Then she said to me, "I think it's weirder that in New York it can be 100 degrees outside but then a few months later it snows." She's probably right. That is strange now that I think about it. But nevertheless, I'm used to seasons changing. Normally I would be witnessing the emergence of spring this time of year, but instead, it's still just really hot. On top of that, when I finally do get back home (I'm speaking of Douglas home, not New York home), the South Georgia weather will pretty much pick up where Ghana left off.

We in Accra did receive a pleasant surprise this past Monday, though, when we received our first rain of the year. I'm sure some sort of precipitation has fallen somewhere in Accra before this happened. Perhaps there was an invisible drizzle one night as I lay in my unconscious. But this was the first for real rain. It started pouring when I was in my "Documenting" class, and I immediately knew that I needed to be in that rain as soon as possible. I stepped outside after class and became nice and wet, but most surprising, COOL! I never thought this would happen in Accra, but I was actually kind of cool walking around outside. I expected that the rain would be hot (I love hot rain, warming up my foot in a nice puddle by the road), but this rain was actually kind of cold. Of course I didn't complain. I need some cool weather after endless days of heat. It stayed pretty cool for the rest of the day and night. It was incredible. In fact, we actually had a power-out night (the water level in the Volta Lake Dam is low again) that same night, and I had no trouble sleeping at all because it was so nice and cool. (In all reality, it was probably more like lukewarm, although those sorts of words are usually saved to describe water).

That's pretty much what's been going on with me. On Saturday and Sunday, I'm going to a small village outside of Accra to participate in a Habitat-for-Humanity build. I'm looking forward to it. If you are not familiar with Habitat for Humanity, go look it up. Peace.

If America was a bit more like Ghana...

*You address a person by the color of his or her skin. "How are you, black man?" "I am fine white man." You could say something like that. Or perhaps, "Indian woman, pass the butter." Something like that.

*When you're walking down the streets of New York and you've got to pee really badly, you don't look for a store that has a bathroom. You just go right there on the sidewalk, as long as there's no sign telling you not to. If you have to poo, just go to Coney Island.

*Advertising isn't such a lucrative business, except for Coca-Cola (because no one can escape the presence of Coca-Cola). Instead of reading billboards and seeing commericals all day, you just walk down the street and people will yell what you want right at you. "Pure water!"

*It takes 8-10 hours to get from Douglas to Atlanta, or DC to New York, depending on the quality of the road that day and how many police barriers you encounter.

*However, even if you live in Douglas, you can simply walk out to the highway and within a half hour, flag down a crowded, half broken-down van that should've been recalled in the 50's, hop in the back, and be on your way. The journey only costs you about $6 or $7.

*Whenever you are surprised, shocked, disgusted, or having a revelation, you let out a nice emphatic "Ooh!" sound.

*All chain stores decide to make a reference to God in the name of their stores. Some of the changes include, "The Lord Lives Wal-Mart," "Bethlehem Fried Chicken," "ChurCheese" (oh wait! That's actually in Ghana!), "Hail Mary Radio Shack," and of course, "Victoria's Secret Immaculate Conception."

*Instead of drinking water from bottles, you drink them from plastic bags, and when you're done with that bag, you just throw it on the ground. Someone will gather and burn it later.

*You approach foreigners and immediately try to be their friends. Within a minute, you have their phone number, or a big, "Up yours, buddy."

*You go through the drive-through at "God's Will Burger King," and instead of ordering a hamburger, frech fries, and Coca-Cola, you order fufu with goat meat and peanut soup and a Coca-Cola (because no one can escape the Coca-Cola empire).

*You have just gotten your master's degree, but you can't get any job other than selling plantain chips and pineapple on the side of the road. To add to your pains, your oldest son has an English teacher who hasn't showed up in over two months. But on the bright side, you don't have to hire anyone to watch baby Jim for the day. You just strap him on your back and take him with you to work.

*Your electricity goes out quite often. (Okay, that one isn't funny. It's just true).

*When you turn six, you start school and the teachers try to teach you everything in Russian. And they actually expect you to learn! (Oh wait...)

*You ask someone on the street if they have the time, and they say, "Yes, please."

*You go to "The Lord Giveth Walgreens" and bring a tube of chapstick to the check out. When the cashier rings it up and tells you, "That'll be $1.19," you say, "Oh no, that's too much. I'll give you 70 cents."

*"The Lord Gives Wal-Mart" has decided to make all their stores outdoors and just have independent sellers for all of their products. They are now "The Lord Gives Wal-Market."

*There are men on bicycles with horns selling bags of frozen chocolate milk and frozen strawberry yogurt. You cannot wait for them to come your way again.

*You wake up every day and it's hot as balls outside.

Spring Break, Day 7

Saturday, March 17

In the middle of the night, I awoke with quite a disturbance. I had no idea how long I had been sleeping. The fan was off - the electricity must have gone off. I was hot and sweaty and extremely dehydrated. I laid there in the bed not really knowing what to do, just feeling completely bizarre. After a few minutes, it became clear that I couldn't just keep laying there. I got up out of the bed and stood up. In that instant my mind and my stomach felt like they had just been twisted up like a little kid on a swing and then just released to go back and forth, back and forth. Rachel woke up and asked if I was alright (it's always Rachel and me in the middle of the night... Tania just sleeps through it all). I told her I needed some fresh air. I walked outside to a little concrete area in front of our room. I then proceeded to the front door of the hotel which was locked shut. I felt very weak, so I immediately sat down on the concrete. Right after sitting down, I knew I was going to hurl everywhere. As much I didn't want to move, I didn't want to throw up all over the concrete for someonoe to clean up the next day.

I stumbled to the bathroom, unable to see a thing (remember, electricity off), so I just felt for the toilet, clutched it, and then let everything go. I threw up a lot. It was pretty intense. The whole while I was throwing up and gagging and drooling, I could taste that meat from the sandwich I ate earlier. It was hot and nasty. Some of it clearly hadn't digested so well. Tania and Rachel immediately got up and asked if I was going to be alright, horrified by my spewing but also kind of laughing at the situation. I told them I'd be ok. They went outside. They were having a hard time sleeping anyway. We all were considering the heat with no air conditioner or fan.

After my long hurl session (Tania would later tell me it was the most she's ever seen or heard anyone throw up), it became clear that I had another problem on my hands. Well, on my hands, in my intestines actually. It was the most intense diarrhea attack I've ever experienced. I told Tania and Rachel and once again they were horrified but laughing, not only at me, but just at our whole trip in general, all these crazy things happening, and here's what Drew gets for it. I finally finished releasing all the various wastes from my body, and I stood up. I felt okay. Clearly whatever was inside me that had made me sick was gone now.

Unfortunately, the toilet wouldn't flush, and the fan still didn't work, so now the room was hot AND it smelled like crap. So I went outside with Rachel and Tania, and we all sat around on the concrete, just laughing in disbelief at how little life made sense. Finally we all layed down on the concrete, no pillows or blankets, me only in my boxers. It wasn't cool outside or anything, but compared to being in the room, outside was a blessing, and we all fell asleep there on the concrete.

I woke up again when the sun was up. I was still outside on the concrete in my boxers. I didn't see Tania or Rachel outside, so I turned my head and I saw them laying on the bed in the room, the door wide open. I got up as if I had just done the most normal thing in the world and went back to the bed. The fan was working now, so it would not be such torture. I woke up again at 8 in the morning, once again feeling pretty dehydrated. I quickly got dressed and left the hotel. I still had the taste of regurgitated meat in my mouth. I found a little store and bought a bottle of water which I drank very happily. I then went back to the hotel and took a much-needed shower. I had only showered twice on the whole trip, and I just felt disgusting.

When Rachel and Tania got up, they showered and we chatted once again about how little sense life made. We also decided at this point not to stay in Ouidah Saturday night, which we had been thinking about doing. We went to get breakfast. We couldn't find any coffee and omelettes, but we did find a later selling rice, spaghetti, and beans with different sauces. So I ate some which made me feel a lot better. It also made me realize how tired I still was, though, so I told Tania and Rachel that I didn't think I could do anything in Ouidah. I said it was fine if they wanted to do some stuff, but I was just too tired to enjoy anything. So I went to the cultural center in town which was really more like a nice park that can't be seen from the street. I went to a little bench where we all sat down our bags. Tania and Rachel bid me farewell for a few hours, I laid down on the ground, and then I went to sleep. There were only a few people there, but they didn't seem to mind. A teenage boy came over to me and asked me if I was okay. I explained as best I could to him that I did not feel well but that I was alright and my friends were coming back.

They did come back quite soon after I got up. That was a relief to me because I didn't want to sit around this place all day. They did a few things - went to a market, met some Spanish lady, saw a few temples - things like that. We took zemidjans back to the main road where we could get a taxi to the Benin-Togo border. That's when we met the lady whose daughter lives in Atlanta. She was really nice. She shared a taxi with us to the border, and she also helped us get a good price for the taxi (which we needed desperately because we had almost no money). Luckily, at the border, people were exchanging cedis and CFAs. We had cedis, so we got some CFAs so we could get a cab ride to Ghana. It turned out that one of the guys we shared a cab with to the border (it was a 6-person operation) was a taxi driver, so he took all five of us who had ridden with him to the border. Amazingly, it only takes about 45 minutes to drive from the Benin border to the Ghana border. The country's that skinny!

I was so happy to cross the border and get back into Ghana where life at least kind of makes sense. I could tell the second I crossed the border that the people had changed. It brought a smile to my face. We found the tro-tro to Accra, and I eagerly got in the back, excited to be going back to Accra. Well, the ride back was horrible. I mean, horrible. There were twelve, I repeat twelve (12) police barriers between Aflao and Accra. The whole trip is only about 220Km, so that's more than one police barrier every 18km. It got to be pretty aggravating. A few of them only took a few minutes to take care of, but some of them took 10 or 15 minutes. One time we got stopped immigration officers, and we all had to get off the tro-tro and show the officers our passports and IDs. What should have been a three-hour drive ended up being a five-hour drive. Not the ideal ending to a long trip, but most certainly a fitting ending to the craziness that was my Spring Break. As soon as I got back to my place, I made a big bowl of oatmeal and sat around the rest of the night doing nothing but enjoying the knowledge that the next day, I didn't have to go anywhere.

The End.