Halloween watermelons (AKA pumpkins) and other stuff

It’s been a busy few days but good busy which has culminated in a Halloween party so I’ll summarise it mostly in pictures.

One of the new vols, Janice from Zebilla is a SNO (special needs officer) and I suggested I take her to some special needs schools we have in and around Bolga as there are not any equivalents in Bawku West – her District.  So Thursday brought about a trip to St Charles special school here in Bolga.  It’s a pleasure to be able to share something working so well in the midst of lack of funding resources, support, and community understanding and so on for these children.  It goes to show it CAN be done.  Mary Magdalene (yes, actually Mary Magdalene!) the head teacher and one of her teachers, Mary Magdalene (one is called Mary and the other Magdalene to avoid confusion) are inspiring.  Such a pleasant feel about the place.  

Later after Helen had taken Janice to visit the school for the deaf we took Liz (a Kenyan volunteer) and her in-laws from Holland to Mama Laadis as they had brought some clothes over they had collected.

That day ended with me cooking coq au vin from a packet sent from the UK, successfully on the stove top as I don’t have an oven for Helen and Janice.  The following day I had organised the next TSO meeting for volunteers at my house.  Although successful as they always seem to be, it was however a public holiday in Ghana.  It was the Muslim festival of Eid which ends Ramadan and where Muslims perform salah (or prayer). Redwana had kindly said she would cater for the meeting even though she is Muslim.  That morning, whilst sorting out the final detail of food for the meeting I noticed a cow had turned up in their compound.  It was to be sacrificed for the festival and used to provide halal meat, one third of which was for the family, two thirds of which went to the local poor people.  I asked if we could observe, I was just interested and they agreed, so we all traipsed over to the compound when it was to be done.  I have never seen an animal killed for meat taking so long to die… awful. I thought it was supposed to be humane.  One saving grace was that the cow seemed very, very calm despite the throat being cut...Skip the next few photos if you’re squeamish.

Amanda kissing Helen after the event which she didn't bat an eyelid at...

The weekend finished on a high with the annual Halloween party, held at my house. Like last year it was a costumed party.  In Ghana without the sophisticated merchandising that goes with Halloween we had to get creative.  And creative we were….I was really impressed with some of the costumes...

A witch, a zombie, a half and half and the walking dead...

one inspired and well delivered hunchback

William Wlilberforce (deceased) turned up with his dyslexic weejee board!

Fabulous Ghanaian effort for a western tradition which must seem very strange when they fear witches so much

bat girl... make up by Helen!

vampire from Transylvania...

who wanted to suck the blood of every girl at the party... any excuse Ionut ; )

It's a worrying time playing dyslexic Weejee

With James mums parcel of Peter Jones Halloween paraphernalia…

water melon pumpkins…

By Helen...

In the dark...

By James (and the winner of the watermelon carving comp - knife was inspired!)...

and in the dark.

and my home made bean stew (‘red’ not ‘red red’) and rice and Heen's Halloween themed orange iced cupcakes…

It was a great party… even Alex made a half hour appearance as My Little Devil…

That was after James had dressed him up like a Halloween tree...You can see what he was happiest in!!!

‘The War Zone’

Ghana does have one.  Bawku Municipal District; placed within the Upper East Region, right up in the top right hand corner of the country and juts up against Burkina Faso and Togo on two of its borders.  It’s had tribal conflict for a number of years, not helped by the major political parties intervening for their own gain and causing more problems... so they say.  At one point the conflict was so bad that men were banned from riding moto’s in this area (due to the fact it was proving very easy to shoot someone dead and flea on the bike) and that law still stands. Women however are allowed to go about their business as they please.  As a result the once booming District capital, Bawku has diminished in to a shadow of its former self.  Many families, particularly men have moved their businesses to places like Zebilla and Bolga in order to make a living. The consequences are a very young population, (even at GES officer level – unusual for Ghana where they respect the elderly by giving them promotions whether deserved or not) but unavoidable due to the changed demographic. 

With the Regional STMIE coordinator now retired and the Girl Child Officer having to do two jobs I suggested I organise a meeting with all the STMIE (Science Technology Maths and Innovation Education) coordinators for each of the District. This was a bid to plan for the year rather than flail uncontrollably into a meeting seven months into the year and expect the coordinators to do all their work in three months (as happened last year).  When I suggested at the meeting those who needed help and support from me just needed to ask for it, the Bawku STMIE co ordinator, Memuna, a 32 year old woman with a young family and keen to do her job, took me up on the offer. Marvellous!  Work at last.  Out of the 10 Districts I was to serve in my role as Regional Science TSO Bawku was the one region I was told not to visit. 

The thing is when you live somewhere like this and people are moving from one area to your area you get to hear a lot.  It’s the way news travels in a country like this.  Bawku, although still termed a War Zone is perfectly safe to visit, not only for a white person but a white woman… women in general in fact. On the two occasions I’ve bumped into the Bawku Municipal Education Director at the Regional Office he has been keen to share his desire for a VSO volunteer or two in his District and how safe it is to go/live there, how the ‘trouble has past’.  It’s a couple of hours drive from Bolga so I took the hour drive to Zebilla on my moto, stayed with Emma a fellow volunteer over night and then the following day drove to Bawku.  Stunning countryside, wonderful people and totally safe. Well worth the visit.  

A lovely picture if you ignore all things health and safety... typical Ghana

White Volta, a major river in Ghana which starts in Burkina Faso and floods destroying crops etc when the BF authorities open the dams up.. it devastates northern Ghana

The Director welcomed me with open arms and organised an impromptu meeting with his frontline assistant directors.  I then met separately with Memuna and the frontline AD for statistics.  I agreed to support some JHS training and went back the next day to meet with a JHS head teacher and SHS teacher to plan further. In all, a very successful few days and has meant me coming back another time to deliver the training.

It was lovely staying with Emma in Zabilla.  Not only is she so friendly and welcoming but her neighbours and friends are too.  She lives in an unusual house, there is no compound wall and there is a very open area which is semi enclosed and connects all rooms.  Effectively the whole house is a very local design and very exposed to the outside world.  As a consequence you get lots of visitors and that word I used to hear from Ali is a regular call ‘Nassara! Nassara!’.  It’s been a great few days, Emma had run out of gas and the nearest places are Bawku or Bolga to get it, it’s not something you can do on the back of a moto so Emma has to enlist the help of friends/NGO’s who have a car or truck.  So the first night I arrives Emma’s friend Fati joined us to show us how to make Red Red on a traditional charcoal fire. Red Red is a very tasty bean stew and fried plantain.   Very tasty!

traditional cooking often done outside... lighting the charcoal fire with plastic I'm pretty sure was not traditional and our cries of buring this is carcinogenic fell on deaf ears... speedy fire lighting took priority over the health aspect.  The amount of heat produced by one fire is incredible!

bean stew (one of the reds of 'red red')

Fried plantain (the other red of 'red red')

I also made use of Emma seamstress while I was there who made me two lovely skirts!

Mama Laadis part three: A surrogate mother

Mama Laddi asked me while I was feeding Alfie (and clearly very quickly becoming besotted with this adorable little boy – she’s astute!), if I would ‘send him’ for the weekend so they could rest ‘small small’.  What she meant was, would I babysit him at my house for 48 hours so they can sleep.  I said yes.  Of course I said yes!

Friday couldn’t have come sooner for me, two reasons; the court case and ‘picking’ Alfie.  The court case (unsurprisingly) was a wash out.  The Judge had travelled to Accra for a (what seems like two week) conference so court was adjourned until 19^th October.  I couldn’t care less. Electricity was off at work so I picked up Alfie early, around midday.  As soon as I got there Mama Laadi asked if she should pack the bag!  We were gone in half an hour and on the road home.  Formula, nappies, clothes etc strapped to the back of the moto and Alfie strapped to the front in a child’s sling far too big for him.  I vowed then to learn to back babies the African way.  I have to say, I turned a few heads on that journey home.  A white woman with a baby is one thing, but carrying it on the front of the body *big shock!* and what with him covered in a white cloth like a child of Michael Jacksons (to avoid the sun not the paps) I looked like one hell of a crazy white woman.

It’s been a reality check looking after a baby in Africa with all its nuances; washing clothes by hand daily, bathing in a bucket twice daily (it’s the sweat!), sterilizing equipment (genius idea to bring Milton sterilizing tablets even if I do say so myself… it’s as if I knew!!), lights out with a baby, spinach surprise as opposed to chicken korma poo (that involved a quick internet search just to make sure all was well…), makeshift changing mats, avoiding mosquito’s… the list goes on. The best reality check? Knowing you are not alone. For ’this is Ghana’. One big community, friends and close neighbours willingly lending a hand, either physical or metaphorically to help the crazy white woman (now dubbed Mama Ellie) with her black baby.  Learning how to back him was an experience and provided much entertainment, wonder and surprise for my friends and local community.  Backing him is like a sedative for him; as soon as he’s in and snugly, he’s sparko.  Bloody marvellous!  It’s all gone surprisingly well really, apart from my own paranoia and internal dialogue when I wake up suddenly in the middle of the night... 'Is he still breathing?' *I hold breath and simultaneously poke Alfie*, [Alfie moves abruptly], *I breathe again* ‘oh, thank goodness…'

Two days later and some mammoth sleeps (from Alfie, not me) and I had to ‘send him’ back.  Hanana’s compound was super sad to see him go…Boris however was not.  Nose well and truly out of joint. So much so, he roamed and came back at the end of the weekend stinking like an open African drain. I backed Alfie to the home, the African way, which received even more attention than the first moto ride and managed to let go of him, just, and hand him back to his Laadi family.  Mama Laadi spoke of ‘sending him home’ with me - AKA adoption, and I left safe in the knowledge I’d already thought of that option… See you on Wednesday Alfie : ) 

Mama Laadis part two: First delivery from the UK

Baby Alfie* is the new, adorable addition to Mama Laadis.  At two months old he’s a darling, loved by all and already shoehorned deep into the family that is Laadi.  As is tradition in Ghana the older children (when not at school) take on the role of caring for him, as they do with the other small children.  It’s clear that this bond is a deep one.  I was at Mama Laadi’s one afternoon only to see the older children arriving back from school and being greeted with a running jump from one of the smaller girls, Molly*. Like a child greeting her mother…  It’s clear that even though these children are not brothers and sisters by blood, the bond runs deep.  Maybe that’s due to the sometimes very tough backgrounds they have.  Not all I have found out are entirely parentless.  All are however, unwanted.   

Molly is 3.  She was born to a mother who was considered to be a witch by her local community.  In small, rural, isolate village communities, like the one she was from, to be a witch is a terrible thing… a death sentence.  It’s exactly what her mother, and her mother’s mother got.  Both were killed by their own community.  Molly’s father disowned her and the child was threatened with death by the community she was born into, for if your mother is a witch, then so are you.  Molly is a bright, bubbly 3 year old, full of personality and a huge smile and the ability to climb on and up anything… including me… like no other child I’ve known.  I leave Mama Laadis battered and bruised, usually with Molly having spent the vast majority of her time either perched on my knee or clinging to my back.  The very first time I met her, some months ago now, my lasting memory of her was her need to be ‘backed’.  Children in Ghana, in Africa, are carried in this way by women; wrapped tightly to the woman’s back in colourful cloths, up to the age of two or so.  Some children are backed past this age, especially if walking far or sick.  For Molly, it seems like a piece missing from her childhood and a desire to be held close she cannot shake. She craves a mother’s love.

Baby Alfie’s story is different but equally sad.  His mother is ‘insane’.  Defining words like insane and retarded in Ghana are not akin to how they would be defined in the developed world. This will not be a clinical term.  The health care system here leaves much to be desired, the mental healthcare system… well, I’m not sure there is one.  Which ponders the question; if she, Alfie’s mother, were born in, say the UK, would she still have her child?  The Chief of her community took away her baby, for his safety.  No one has owed up to being Alfie’s father and one wonders if it’s because his mother was taken advantage of given her ‘insanity’… we’ll never really know.  Alfie is an alert, happy, content, well fed 2 month old with a huge surrogate family of 45 brothers and sisters who have already fallen in love with him. 

These are just two examples of these children’s sad stories… some are orphaned; others are from families who just couldn’t care for the child or children (there are siblings at Laadis).  All these children benefited from gift delivery number 1 (there was too much stuff to take all at once!).  Here are some pictures of some of your gifts reaching those children.

*names have been changed

They were all very grateful for their bags which they will use for school from Sawston Village College

Peter and his new T-shirt courtesy of Pauline Mathews

...and another

...and another.  In fact they all went to some lovely boys who had seen some of the Olympics on the TV

Any one recognise sending this adorable outfit! Josh* 

Molly fell in love with this t-shirt and put it straight on!

Even the books went down a treat thanks to my cousin Lucy and her family : )