Death

Death in Ghana is inevitable, expected, often premature, unexplained for the most part, and although respected most vigorously, not a shock for it is in fact part of everyday life here for the most Ghanaians.  Pretty much every weekend they travel for a funeral through the dry season

The second night in Zebilla on my last visit we went to ‘Container’ for food.  Ali had often spoken about the infamous Z Town ‘Container’.  I have to say it was much more than I imagined for some reason.  We were escorted by Ibrahim, a nine year old neighbour of Emma’s who just came along for the ride (and probably the uneaten food!) Unfortunately there was obviously something terrible going on as we headed home as there was a fire truck in the dirt track.  The fire man told us that they had word that a child had fallen down a well.  We had to find what had happened…  One, Emma was concerned it was one of the many children she supports in the neighbourhood and two, if the child needed help we could do something practical.  After a long walk headed up by Ibrahim who knew the way to the compound the wailing from the women was a clear indication of what had happened.  Little Bashira had died in the well.  She was about two.  We were too close to the compound to turn around and run, we had to greet the family and pay our condolences.  We were told we were free to see the child… the body.  It’s what they do here… stand vigil over the body all night.  They bury bodies the next day but we couldn’t.

Funerals can follow months after the burial, years even.  They are a big and lavish affair that the family saves up for which for the immediate family can last up to one week.  A friend recently went to his Uncles funeral that had died last year in a moto accident with a truck in the early hours of the morning after leaving the local night club. The first day the funeral started around 7pm.  All the elders attend this part of the funeral where all the traditions are upheld and certain rituals are performed in the early hours of the morning, most people remain all night, drumming, drinking pito (a local alcoholic brew), not stopping until dawn.  The funeral continued for two more full days, with music, food and drink for everyone.  It will last for so many days to allow family and friends to travel to the family home and pay their respects; a consequence of this is the immediate family need to be there to receive their guests who could have travelled for miles to pay their respects…

Only recently the daughter of a woman I’ve worked with died.  She’d been sick for some time.  I’d spent some time with her.  Drank in the local spot with her, held her baby who is still under a year.  Despite travelling to Tamale hospital they still couldn’t pinpoint the problem.  This was so shocking for me, I was devastated.  Not just because I knew of her but because I know how much effort her mother had gone to trying to make her better.. but to no avail.  The more I get to know people here the more likely it is that this could happen to someone I really know well.

Death of pregnant mothers, babies and infants is far too high here... and begs the question why? The stories I’ve heard that relate to hospital negligence in these cases is shocking.  For most, if you are educated, you can push for more, question diagnosis and raise expectations of the hospital staff, but most people here in the north are illiterate and uneducated and bamboozled by the very educated doctors.  They are too frightened and unsure of how or what to ask. So they don’t , with tragic consequences.

It has upset me that death is so expected here and yet not questioned.  It’s always ‘gods will’.  Only the rich can afford autopsies.  Sometimes it is widely thought that a person died because they had been cursed or poisoned according to the traditional beliefs because of some wrong doing, or someone else wronging them. Complicated, but when I think more about it, if I lived here for longer, I believe I would start to believe it is ‘gods will’; much easier to digest than the truth, (hospital negligence being high on that list of truths) for those truths might just send you a little crazy…

“Isn’t it days like these when you’re grateful you have eyebrows?”

There were two reasons Helen was thinking of her eyebrows on the 6^th of March, Ghana Independence Day.  One; she had just spent the weekend in Burkina Faso where it seems all women (in Ouagadougou the capital at least), appear to shave off their eyebrows and repaint them on much higher with a huge arch which make the women look not only permanently surprised but also with essence of drag queen… two; it was so hot, had our eyebrows had not been there beads of sweat would have continually dripped in our eyes.  So much so it was hard to imagine how anyone could march in such conditions, but march they did.  It was great to see having missed it last year.  I was actually in Accra and in a perfect position to see the National parade but it was one of those rare occasions where despite it being a public holiday I was actually working (on the KG project) so alas, I couldn’t see it.  Helen and I chose to see the Bolga parade this year.  Helen had visited the local Tongo one last year and said it was much better organised than the Tongo one; and I was impressed.  Clearly all the marching practice at the schools which the children had been doing in the month run up to March 6^th had paid off.  

The afternoon was spent in the new hotel pool we’ve managed to use for 5 cedi per session and enabled us to cool off from standing in the sun all morning.  The whole day is best told in pictures – so here’s a few to give you a flavour…

A text message

At 11.57am this morning I received the following text message from a fellow volunteer which typifies the kind of things which delay work in Ghana but also give it it's vibrant cultured and lead us to profess  'This is Ghana'

TEXT: So  Iv'e just been told our office is closing at 12 because the local community are doing some ritual sacrifice outside our office and no one is allowed to watch especially women.  If a woman sees the animal then she is cursed never to have children! Only in Ghana hey?'

It raises a number of questions for me ... I wonder how many it raised with you and if indeed they were the same;

1. Why was my friend told only 5 minutes before the minute she was supposed to leave the office?
2. Why was the venue not chosen somewhere away from work places (of women)?
3. What animal?
4. Why a sacrificial ritual at midday on Feb 25th (which just happens to be my brothers birthday - is there a link?!)?'.
5.  Does the animal curse the woman?

Many questions raised in Ghana by us volunteers start with 'Why?' and more often than not a fellow volunteer will interrupt the sentence with a simple 'This is Ghana.' Sometimes these questions are best left unanswered.

An update on how your money is being spent; The big girls at Mama Laadis

We have a French friend  in her 20’s, Marie, who was helping out at a clinic in Bolga to make use of her nurses training while her boyfriend was working for a company linked to agriculture.  The work was frustrating for her so she left but in order to keep her hand in some volunteering work she asked if she could do some work at the orphanage.  So we took her to Mama Laadi who of course was very accepting of this help.  As Marie is an independent volunteer she comes with no funding at all.  She asked what I thought she should do.  With limited time and resources I suggested she focussed on the older girls who didn’t appear to be going to school, as they were a small group (3 at the time) and what she did with them could be manageable in the day without the small girls and boys getting in the way.  I suggested she did some informal education with them;  took them to see hats being made, weaving etc, talk about the hopes and aspirations, encourage them to write, and do some maths… generally make them realise an education is important to get them what they want.  Since she started with us back in November she’s done a fantastic job with these girls (now 4). The intensive work has clearly worked on a number of levels, a talent has been found (one is a fabulous Artist) , 3 are being tutored part time with the aim of going back into full time education and the sexual abuse of one girl has been reported to the police and she has been medically checked and counselled about it.  Also, importantly, Mama has seen the fight, spirit and ability that these girls have that was once hidden behind zero confidence, not helped by many thinking they were 'slow learners' which further encouraged them to hide with in a very thick shell they built around themselves.

Sandy (not her real name) is 14 years old, and has been at the orphanage since December.  She has spent 4 years on the street and has been raped several times.  Marie has taken her for STD tests and an HIV test; everything is negative, only that she has vaginal mycosis. We don't expect any punishment for the man but we want to show her that this situation is not acceptable and normal. However, we had to be careful about the version she gave to the police so they didn’t interpret it as prostitution as the man gave her money after he raped her.  She was begging for money at a total filling station and the watchman asked her to come, pushed her and raped her and then gave her money.  It happened a total of 6 times.  She was hungry.  Luckily, Marie said that the policewoman who dealt with the case was very kind and understanding.  Marie suspects that she is now selling her body, but if she questions her the answer is not clear and Marie doesn’t know how to let her understand that she has to stop. 

So, on the back of that Marie sent all 4 big girls including Sandy (14+ years) to the family planning clinic to get contraception.  All have been given the implant whether sexually active or not, which will protect them from pregnancy for 5 years.  They were also given a condom demonstration by the nurse, condoms were brought and it was explained to them why they were so important even if they had the implant.  With teenage pregnancies (many school masters are the cause of this) and HIV rife in this area we really felt this action would help the girls positively to stay as safe as they can given the circumstances they are in/could be in.

Marie has also arranged for 3 of these girls to be tutored by a teacher at the local teacher training college, they will receive a lesson of English and a lesson of Maths each week in the early evening, she went with the children so the teacher could assess their level, Marie came back saying [in a French accent] ‘Oh, they have found the teacher funny, nice and awesome!’. So they have agreed to continue, a positive step given their negative and limited experiences at school. Mama prefers to pay for the school at the end of the month, but the school really want to be paid before the lessons to be able to pay the teacher. So we have agreed that part of the money raised over the summer by family and friends will be used to pay for this tuition and books for these 4 girls… It’s likely to get them back into full time education, and in turn could turn their lives around…. Thank you once again for all you gave last summer.