Tamale, tamale, tamale. This place has been incredible. My last 7 weeks here have flown by way faster than i could have ever imagined. I will be leaving Shekinah clinic on thursday morning, and we will travel to say good-bye to our hosts until we fly out on the 31st. Too soon! But let me share with you how Shekinah has richly blessed my life.....
During my stay here, I have been alternating between helping out in the dispensary counting pills to give out, and joining the food truck which feeds the poor in the streets of the metropolis. I have been living at the clinic in my own house (wonderful!). There is quite a bit of housing within the clinic compound and outside for patients living with mental or physical disabilites, most of whom have been abandoned by their families. This place has such a great community. The staff are all volunteers and the services are all given completely free of charge. The poorest of the poor are really being served by Shekinah. People who come here because they have nowhere else to turn are given the dignity and respect they deserve as human beings. The fact that the clinic and food program run completely on donations, and the staff do no fundrasing is only the answer to a prayer to a divine God who wants to provide for the people in northern Ghana.
Things just make sense here. A brother is hungry, so we feed him. A sister needs clothing, and so she will receive. A mother needs a loving word as she has lost her family, and the community continues to care for her in whatever way possible. Everything is shared, everyone is part of the greater purpose. Muslims, christians, catholics, all worshipping together; it is one God we all call to. The people are not divided by religion, by ability, nor by wealth, the people here are one. It reminds me of the early church, where no one was in need among them. I will be truly sad to leave this community, but I know that it has touched my life in a way that I can't explain, and it will leave a mark that cannot fade.
First and foremost, Shekinah and the people here have showed me so much about what it means to love. It's beyond this realm, and it goes so deep into the soul.
So i guess that's all. We will be leaving soon, and I likely won't blog again. So I bid you farewell. Thank you for supporting me in my journey here to Ghana. It is one that has changed my life and perspective incredibly. I really look forward to sharing more stories with you all when I return to Calgary May 12th.
All my love!
Monday, March 15, 2010
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Cocoa crazy
It has been some time now since i've updated this space, as my last few internet experiences have been comparative to the speed at which glaciers move.. ..ie fricken slow! But anyhow, I have arrived safely to Tamale (a hot, dry motorcycle haven city that is predominantly muslim) last Thursday evening. To my surprise, it actually can get hotter in Ghana, and it is ridiculously dry and windy here. I spent the weekend bed-written with some illness but have since regained strength, and have loved my time at Shekinah free medical clinic so far.
I am going to rewind however, and share about my stay in the cocoa farm a few weeks back. For 2 weeks in January I lived with a family in a town called Akoase. My time there was wonderful! My family made sure for me to learn everything possible about cocoa farming, as well as taste every possible ghanain dish, so good. I helped weeding one day, very hard work, blisters to prove it!
Let me tell you, that the Cocoa plant is the most fascinating plant I have ever known. The beans grow in pods, which grow off the trunk of the tree. The pod, once it's mature is like a small yellow football. You crack it open to find a bunmdle of white sliminess. Each cocoa bean fresh is coated in this sweet white sliminess, which is tasty too. After opening the pod, the beans get placed on the leavefs from a banana tree and are covered to ferment for 6-7 days. After fermenting, they are laid out to dry in the sun. They must be turned frequently, and once they are fully dry they are graded, packaged into big sacks, then sent to the produce buying companies where likely it will be exported to all parts of the world. Fascinating, no?
It was a really great opportunity to learn so much about something that is SO ridiculously overconsumed in Canada, yet before I knew nothing about. I am still hoping to learn more about how free trade affects the cocoa faarmers, but for now I know I will never be able to eat chocolate again without remembering the farmers here, and how much work goes into such a small yield in pay.
I want to challenge not only myself but you too, to spend more time researching where the products you are consuming are coming from. Try to buy things that have honoured the workers who produced it. If a product is super cheap, maybe somebody has been cheated along the line? Are there environmental costs? Research it! For the sake of humanity, the earth, and the majority of the economic poor. Every action can make a difference!
So that is all for now. I am going to start helping at the hot food program which cooks and sends a food truck out to poor areas in the city to serve. I will update in a couple weeks and let you all know how i'm doing. Till next time!
I am going to rewind however, and share about my stay in the cocoa farm a few weeks back. For 2 weeks in January I lived with a family in a town called Akoase. My time there was wonderful! My family made sure for me to learn everything possible about cocoa farming, as well as taste every possible ghanain dish, so good. I helped weeding one day, very hard work, blisters to prove it!
Let me tell you, that the Cocoa plant is the most fascinating plant I have ever known. The beans grow in pods, which grow off the trunk of the tree. The pod, once it's mature is like a small yellow football. You crack it open to find a bunmdle of white sliminess. Each cocoa bean fresh is coated in this sweet white sliminess, which is tasty too. After opening the pod, the beans get placed on the leavefs from a banana tree and are covered to ferment for 6-7 days. After fermenting, they are laid out to dry in the sun. They must be turned frequently, and once they are fully dry they are graded, packaged into big sacks, then sent to the produce buying companies where likely it will be exported to all parts of the world. Fascinating, no?
It was a really great opportunity to learn so much about something that is SO ridiculously overconsumed in Canada, yet before I knew nothing about. I am still hoping to learn more about how free trade affects the cocoa faarmers, but for now I know I will never be able to eat chocolate again without remembering the farmers here, and how much work goes into such a small yield in pay.
I want to challenge not only myself but you too, to spend more time researching where the products you are consuming are coming from. Try to buy things that have honoured the workers who produced it. If a product is super cheap, maybe somebody has been cheated along the line? Are there environmental costs? Research it! For the sake of humanity, the earth, and the majority of the economic poor. Every action can make a difference!
So that is all for now. I am going to start helping at the hot food program which cooks and sends a food truck out to poor areas in the city to serve. I will update in a couple weeks and let you all know how i'm doing. Till next time!
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Happy Holidays from Ghana
Merry Christmas friends and family, and almost a happy new year! I hope you are finding time this holiday to rest and reflect and enjoy the company of good friends and family. I am currently sweating buckets and somewhat jealous that you have the option (likely) to step outside for a moment and breathe in the minus degrees celcius weather. Take a deep breath for me, and if you really are up for it, you could make a snow angel for me too. We have said good-bye to our village families and are now together for 2 weeks of travelling around to see the wonderful country of Ghana. We hiked some mountains in the jungle the last two days, and now we're having a nice culture shock into one of the busiest cities in the country, Kumasi. Tomorrow we will take another long journey down to Cape Coast and spend the new years there. We are all doing very well. I got a few christmas gifts this year, some chocolate, a cd, some underwear (thanks mom), oh yeah and a low-grade of malaria. But it's okay, after spending christmas night with a fever, chills, headache, and basically wanting to crawl in a hole and die, the malarial treatment fixed me up in time to climb a mountain. I am fully recovered, and feel good to go!
Thank you to everyone who has been updating me on life at home. Please send me what you've been up to, i'd love to hear! Our next journey will be another village stay with cocoa farmers, so i will try to update then.
I love you all and miss you all!! Merry Christmas xoxoxoxoxoxox
Thank you to everyone who has been updating me on life at home. Please send me what you've been up to, i'd love to hear! Our next journey will be another village stay with cocoa farmers, so i will try to update then.
I love you all and miss you all!! Merry Christmas xoxoxoxoxoxox
Monday, November 23, 2009
Life in the village
Mo Yee, you are welcome to Alorkpem! I have been living in the Ada area here in Ghana for the last 5 weeks, and my Dangme speaking is improving. My last 3 weeks have been spent on an island on the Volta River, quite near to the ocean; the village is called Alorkpem. I want to give you all a picture of how the people I have been living with have been subsiding there for many many years. Generations have passed and still these families are there, facing many of the same challenges day after day. Life in the village is very far from home for me, in every way possible. Let me just send you through what a day may look like:
5am wake-up: sweep the dirt floors outside, sweet the dirtfloors inside, wash all the dishes (by hand of course, as there is no electricity on the island), walk for a couple miles to fetch water from the river to drink/bathe/cook with, bundle some firewood to make a fire to warm the tea for breakfast and later to stir the banku for lunch. By now it's about 7am and i'm ready to go back to bed. But instead most of the ladies go to their wooden frames where they will again weave the same mat that they made two of yesterday so they can go to the market and sell them for a dollar tomorrow. The men will take off to farm their cassava, or the sugarcan they will be able to distill alcohol with to sell also at the market. Others will go to their fishing boats, and set out to check their traps from the last day, some days prove to be in abundance of fish and crabs, but there are those days where the net is barely touched. The children will take off to school, or some will at least, those that can afford to pay for their books and uniforms. The women will continue to cook most of the day, as there is no such thing as pre-packaged food here on the island. They will sell on their heads all day, while the lady next to them is doing the same thing with the same food. By night fall, the lanterns come out and people hang out at their homes as they cannot work without light.
And all this continues day after day. For a very little reward in pay. In fact, most of the people are on the island because once they finish primary and middle school, they would have to move to the mainland for senior school, which costs a lot of money. Generally if you live on the island, your family will not have enough money to send you there, but instead you will stay at home and learn the family business so you can grow up and take over, and make your own family. And so it goes on.
This life is reality for many individuals. My host family lives in it, I participate in it there. But there is a difference, because I have a choice to be there. I have the option to leave whenever i'd like. I don't have to use the bush as my washroom everyday for the rest of my life. I don't have to carry all the water I will use on my head. I am not expected to take on cooking and raising children for the rest of my life. No, instead I am overwhelmed with the options open to me. I have a hard time choosing what I want to do in my lifetime, because there is so much out there. Choice should be available to everyone, it should be available to my family here. They should be able to leave the island to go to school if they like. They should have the choice to go to Trade school to learn a skill that can generate a decent income. While I am here I will see more of their country than they even know exists.
All of these and more have given me a new perspective on travelling. A new perspective on the education I have received. A different attitude towards food. A grave concern for the future generations who must continue this cycle of poverty. A frustration that while I am here, I can do not much to change anything. An anger towards how the lifestyle of countries like Canada contribute to what I see my family trying to fight against.
For goodness sake, I beg you all to think today about what you will buy, where you will go, and what you will see. I most of all ask you to appreciate what you have, and not take advantage of it. I ask you to think twice next time you go to buy chicken breast from the grocery store, because the excess parts of dark meat that we don't like were sent here to Ghana to be sold for extremely cheap in the market, putting many chicken farmers out of business.
We are a global community, and my brothers and sisters here want you to know that your choices DO matter and they DO affect people around the world. And you DO have the choice to act or not, to educate yourself on the products you buy or not, to consume less, to give more, and to live in community with people and not things. I share this with you all because I know you care, life in Canada gets busy at times, but I ask you take this day and think of the choices you can make, and know that it's a right that everyone should have, but is instead only available to a select few.
Think of us as we head to Nkawkaw for a retreat, then in a week we will travel back to the village for another 3 weeks. I will update you then!
5am wake-up: sweep the dirt floors outside, sweet the dirtfloors inside, wash all the dishes (by hand of course, as there is no electricity on the island), walk for a couple miles to fetch water from the river to drink/bathe/cook with, bundle some firewood to make a fire to warm the tea for breakfast and later to stir the banku for lunch. By now it's about 7am and i'm ready to go back to bed. But instead most of the ladies go to their wooden frames where they will again weave the same mat that they made two of yesterday so they can go to the market and sell them for a dollar tomorrow. The men will take off to farm their cassava, or the sugarcan they will be able to distill alcohol with to sell also at the market. Others will go to their fishing boats, and set out to check their traps from the last day, some days prove to be in abundance of fish and crabs, but there are those days where the net is barely touched. The children will take off to school, or some will at least, those that can afford to pay for their books and uniforms. The women will continue to cook most of the day, as there is no such thing as pre-packaged food here on the island. They will sell on their heads all day, while the lady next to them is doing the same thing with the same food. By night fall, the lanterns come out and people hang out at their homes as they cannot work without light.
And all this continues day after day. For a very little reward in pay. In fact, most of the people are on the island because once they finish primary and middle school, they would have to move to the mainland for senior school, which costs a lot of money. Generally if you live on the island, your family will not have enough money to send you there, but instead you will stay at home and learn the family business so you can grow up and take over, and make your own family. And so it goes on.
This life is reality for many individuals. My host family lives in it, I participate in it there. But there is a difference, because I have a choice to be there. I have the option to leave whenever i'd like. I don't have to use the bush as my washroom everyday for the rest of my life. I don't have to carry all the water I will use on my head. I am not expected to take on cooking and raising children for the rest of my life. No, instead I am overwhelmed with the options open to me. I have a hard time choosing what I want to do in my lifetime, because there is so much out there. Choice should be available to everyone, it should be available to my family here. They should be able to leave the island to go to school if they like. They should have the choice to go to Trade school to learn a skill that can generate a decent income. While I am here I will see more of their country than they even know exists.
All of these and more have given me a new perspective on travelling. A new perspective on the education I have received. A different attitude towards food. A grave concern for the future generations who must continue this cycle of poverty. A frustration that while I am here, I can do not much to change anything. An anger towards how the lifestyle of countries like Canada contribute to what I see my family trying to fight against.
For goodness sake, I beg you all to think today about what you will buy, where you will go, and what you will see. I most of all ask you to appreciate what you have, and not take advantage of it. I ask you to think twice next time you go to buy chicken breast from the grocery store, because the excess parts of dark meat that we don't like were sent here to Ghana to be sold for extremely cheap in the market, putting many chicken farmers out of business.
We are a global community, and my brothers and sisters here want you to know that your choices DO matter and they DO affect people around the world. And you DO have the choice to act or not, to educate yourself on the products you buy or not, to consume less, to give more, and to live in community with people and not things. I share this with you all because I know you care, life in Canada gets busy at times, but I ask you take this day and think of the choices you can make, and know that it's a right that everyone should have, but is instead only available to a select few.
Think of us as we head to Nkawkaw for a retreat, then in a week we will travel back to the village for another 3 weeks. I will update you then!
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Fly fly away
So here i am going to keep a blog. I have never done this before, so I am going to try try try to update you all as often as possible. I know it is semi-impersonal, but reality is I won't have enough computer time to update everyone individually. SO if you have more questions, or want to comment, do so! Or send me an email and i'd love to hear from you all.
I guess since i'm leaving tomorrow, I thought I should update you all on how I am going into this journey to Ghana. Prep month has in itself challenged me beyond belief. Everything I have learned, shared, and seen has really sunk into me. The whole month was dedicated to learning about Ghana and ourselves. Economics, history, the hard things, the good things, the government, stories of past participants, all this and more has placed in me an incredible passion to spend the rest of my life seeking out justice. That is with the earth, with people, with all living beings.
Me and my two group members are flying out to become part of a people. We . We are committed to living simply and in solidarity with the people we meet. Here is a rough itinerary: We will fly into the Capital Accra for orientation, then a few days later head to Bedeku village for 2 weeks of language lessons. We will then split up and each be in a different village, living with a host family. We are with our families for 6 weeks. Then we have an amazing opportunity to live with cocoa plantation workers and meet with the fair trade co-op in Ghana. The last half of my time there I will be in the Northern city of Tamale, volunteering at the Shekinah Free Medical Clinic.
So I guess what i'm trying to say is that, i'm pretty damn stoked to go! Because while we can't think ourselves into new ways of living, we can live ourselves into new ways of thinking (a quote by Richard Rohr). I am taking the leap to let go of what I know, and be in a place where I will be converted, despite myself. So............. let the fun begin!
I guess since i'm leaving tomorrow, I thought I should update you all on how I am going into this journey to Ghana. Prep month has in itself challenged me beyond belief. Everything I have learned, shared, and seen has really sunk into me. The whole month was dedicated to learning about Ghana and ourselves. Economics, history, the hard things, the good things, the government, stories of past participants, all this and more has placed in me an incredible passion to spend the rest of my life seeking out justice. That is with the earth, with people, with all living beings.
Me and my two group members are flying out to become part of a people. We . We are committed to living simply and in solidarity with the people we meet. Here is a rough itinerary: We will fly into the Capital Accra for orientation, then a few days later head to Bedeku village for 2 weeks of language lessons. We will then split up and each be in a different village, living with a host family. We are with our families for 6 weeks. Then we have an amazing opportunity to live with cocoa plantation workers and meet with the fair trade co-op in Ghana. The last half of my time there I will be in the Northern city of Tamale, volunteering at the Shekinah Free Medical Clinic.
So I guess what i'm trying to say is that, i'm pretty damn stoked to go! Because while we can't think ourselves into new ways of living, we can live ourselves into new ways of thinking (a quote by Richard Rohr). I am taking the leap to let go of what I know, and be in a place where I will be converted, despite myself. So............. let the fun begin!
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