Wrapping up an Amazing Year

As some of you may have heard, our time living in Ghana is coming to an end sooner than expected. While we have loved our time here, it's also been very intense for every one of us and we all need a rest. For a variety of reasons, the kids and I decided that it's best to head back to the US this summer. I'll keep my job and will be "commuting" to work - a nearly 24 hour trip - about once every 4-6 weeks while I ensure the project is on track and a leadership transition is successful.

As usual with the "G" family, we're making the most of every moment. My project is ramping up for a launch of our service in the Upper East Region in about 2 weeks. Most of the Accra staff have temporarily moved to the north and I spent about 5 days there with the kids last week. It was an amazing experience for them - we attended "durbars" which are community entry celebrations where the project is introduced to the community and approved by the chief, Sophie photographed lots of our field work and made it out to 6 of the very rural clinics where we're working and Xavier spent a lot of time playing football. We even touched a crocodile at a crocodile pond just near the Burkina Faso border and toured an ancient village (check out the photos link on the right and see the one with Xavier and his "friend" who are both missing their front teeth!).

The kids finish school this week and are looking forward to getting back to their US classrooms. My good friend, Colleen, is arriving on Thursday for 2 weeks. While she's here, we'll head out to our favorite beach for a few days and then all of us are traveling up to the north so I can work and they can touch more crocodiles :) And, of course, we will be watching every Ghana World Cup Game!!!!!!

The kids leave for the US with Colleen on July 2nd. I'll stay behind in Ghana for a couple of weeks, continuing to work, wrap up the house and figure out how I am going to get the puppies back to the US with Delta/KLM having a general pet flying ban from May-Sept.due to heat. Somehow, we’ll all make it back to our favorite little island…….

Africa in Our Souls - Sophie's View

Some days we love Africa, some days we just want to go home.  Either way, there is no doubt that Africa has found its way into our hearts and souls.  Sophie, who celebrated her 11th birthday this week, wrote the following poems about her time here:

I cannot bear the poverty in the air; sifting in and out of my world.
The smell nothing to me but the world to somebody.

_________

I see Africa.
I see Ghana.
I see life at the most happy extent.
Where there are the poorest people come the biggest hearts.
That is the way of Ghana.
That is the way of Africa.

__________________

A lapless ocean;
I stare motionless;
A lapless ocean. 

Tomorrow, I am taking the kids to the Upper East Region, where we are about to implement our mobile phone work.  It is the poorest region in the country and is the "real" Africa.  We will be in Paga, a town just at the Burkina Faso border.  All week, we have a series of "durbars" which are ceremonies where representative from the project go to the village chiefs in each village where we'll be working, brings them gifts and asks for their permission and blessing to do our work there.  He presumably grants us this permission and my understanding is that dancing and music ensues.  We'll see how it goes, but I have no doubt there will be many more deep impressions and processing from this amazing experience.......

It's HOT and I'm White

  As part of my work, I frequently travel to the Upper East Region of Ghana. It’s the northernmost part of the country, just on the Burkina Faso border. It's also the poorest region and the furthest away from Accra. I like going up to the North - it's what I think of as the "real" Africa. Accra is Africa "light" - decent restaurants, generators around when electricity fails, supermarkets where Cheerios are $12 a box. But, the North is mud huts, extreme poverty, baobab trees with wise old men hanging out underneath, skinny cows, pregnant goats and donkeys straying into the road. And, extreme heat.

We are just at the beginning of the hot season. On my trip up to the North this week, it was about 110 degrees and the electricity was out much of the time. As I sat in a small, overcrowded office at 2:00 in the afternoon without electricity (no A/C, no fans), I watched as the Ghanaians in the room rigorously debated antenatal and post natal care procedures while I sat slumped in my chair, drinking a liter of water with electrolyte mix and STILL feeling like I was about to pass out from heat exhaustion, my delirium momentarily parted and something became really, really clear: I am white. Not only that, my forefathers (and mothers) were mostly from Sweden and Germany. Places where bodies have not been fine tuned by nature to easily adapt to extreme heat for long periods of time. While my Ghanaian colleagues sip a bit of water here and there, look all fresh in their beautiful head-to-toe custom tailored outfits and gracefully dab the sweat on their brows with a cloth, I am drinking as much water as I can take and am practically panting like a dog with sweat seeping through my clothes and running down my legs - from simply sitting there!

So, I've had to come to terms with the fact that for the next several months - at least until the weather drops to under 100 degrees - I will just have to get used to being the sweaty, delicate “obruni” (white person) who's just not from ‘round here.

Photo below of one of the village clinics I visited.  Yes, the man is wearing a ski cap.  Yes, it was over 100 degrees when I took this photo.