(1)..On Going Home.
Yup..in approx 189 hours i will be leaving Whuti and heading back to the U.S. for a couple of weeks.
I've been counting the days .. the hours even.. for quite a long time.
I've been (back) in Peace Corps now for just over a year. It has been a completely different experience for me.
Everything has been so different..climate, food, assignment, actual activities, language (duh, of course..i have yet to meet a Romanian-speaking Ghanaian), daily life and chores, living arrangments, PC staff.
And it has been hard work on all fronts...and i need a rest..and good and more food..and to get my computer fixed/replaced..and i want to see my family..and sleep in my bed, and to stock up with stuff to see me through the next year or so (till end-July 2012).
I have been fixated on coming home for a while and i can't imagine going through two years here without going home for a bit.
I leave at an OK time..i've been running the Library on my own since 01JAN and we're now up to almost 50 users per day/each averaging an hour a day. So that's 1000 'users' and 1000 'reading' hours per month where before there was NONE!!! There are NO books to read in the local schools..most children don't even have the crappy Ghana textbooks..there are NO libraries in this area and at home, no parents or grandparents read to children, no siblings read to younger children..NO-ONE has books at home and most adults here can't read. So 1000 hours/1000 users per month is a BIG advance..and i'm proud of it.
Now(as of 25MAY) i have help in the Library..an Assistant Librarian..and so i have been able to turn my attention to the Computer Centre and its max potential 20 computers (desktops/netbooks) and with outside help, we've got all bar four up and running and usable and so as of last Monday(o6JUN) i have been 'teaching' ICT classes to the local JHS students (all of them...165 of them) who come once a week in manageable size groups of 10-14 students to listen to me and watch me scribble on the blackboard(whiteboard actually). It has been fun and hard work but it will pay off..just as with books, they are 'taught' ICT in school without any access or even sight of a computer!
And it will all still be here when i come back..recharged and with a few more pounds on me..hopefully!
(2) More cultural/societal insights.
Peace Corps is big on 'cultural integration'. We report at length on our progress in 'cultural integration' in our 4-monthly Volunteer Report Form.
But 'cultural integration' is a surface thing.
How can the only white person in the community..the only white person who has ever lived in the community for any length of time..ever be culturally integrated? On the other hand it is very valid to ask ..how well do you understand your community, how well do you understand how the 'culture' affects or impacts daily life in the community..and, importantly, how it informs your work and interactions with the community.
So when i fill out my VRF i say that yes, i fell reasonably safe, and 'somewhat culturally integrated' and i pretty much leave it at that.
But how well do i understand my community? Not well, though i am constantly learning...it's like building a huge jigsaw puzzle..and i'm learning in some areas and completely dumb in others.
Obviously more than any place i could have imagined..everybody seems inter-related..part of the 'extended family'. And i begin oi have some understanding of how and why.
Families are quite large..that is to say the female and children parts of families are quite large. It is a matriarchal society. Many (most?) heads of household are the grandmothers..and there are many more females daily resident in the community than males. I was going to write that familes are large..with many children. But it isn't quite like that. In truth, most females seem to have many children by different partners..and mostly the children live with the grandmothers and many are raise by them..or 'guardians' (female) within the 'extended family'. So the nuclear family is a rarity. ...i never see young couple walking together with/without their children. Boys and girls are sexually active at a young age..probably 14-16..and since they can't afford or disdain condoms here (Aids really isn't a problem here at all) , many girls get pregnant while at school..they drop out to have the baby and then return to school..which is why we have 17-year old girls in Primary and many girls of 19 and 20 in JHS ..and the baby is raised by the family, generally the grandmother. This pattern is repeated and doesn't change if the female eventually stops going to school. Young women would appear to have many children before they are 25 but not as part of a settled union. One rarely sees couples with their children..the family unit is grandmother, one or more daughters and lots of young children. Most houses/compounds - with many 'families' living together in somewhat mingled dwellings sharing cooking facilities/fires, access to water, bathing 'facilities', toilet 'facilities' (most have none) have many 'families' living together..all possibly inter-related.
The Library, where i work, is set back from the main(only) road and the space between the Library and the road is a thoroughfare so as i sit and wait for a computer to respond i began to observe how teenagers interact...and it took some illuminating conversations with some teenagers who frequented the Library to understand what i was seeing. I began to recognise that there was a struggle going one between teenage boys and girls wherein ..trying to persuade someone of something...the boys would physically grab the girls and try (and often succeed) to drag them off. This jibes with what i was told ...that boys put a lot of pressure on girls to have sex with them ..and that then sets a pattern for the rest of their lives...for both!!
It is illuminating..because of what it says about respect for the family while also explaining how everyone is inter-related. I'm guessing that this would not go down well with the Tea Party
It isn't a comfortable or comforting society to observe, to live in, to try to help.
But i clearly have to accept it..because there is absolutely nothing i can do about it!
So, for me, there isn't much in this 'culture" to love, to admire, to respect.
All the worst imaginable -isms are at work..and more besides...sexism, nepotism, cronyism, even racism as it applies to people from othr regions of Ghana..and local corruption as well.
So that's the community understanding part..and the more i learn the less i respect this culture ..value and honour its differences? Nope..not me..it all smacks of ignorance.
But i'm not here to make judgements, just to help, and that isn't impacted by this growing 'understanding'.
The growing understanding does help me to navigate better ..and that is important.
I'm this 'sore thumb' around here.
But how people interact with me depends on where they sit within the community and its structure and the extent, if any, to which they have an interest in my being here or in the Library and its NGO sponsor.
To the vast majority of Whuti's population..of 3k to 5k/6K, depending on whether you count the males who leave the area to try to find some work and the children who are sent out of the area for schooling...i am just the 'yevu' (the white person) . They see me a lot, they've been seeing me for months, they see me interact with the children and they're fine with all of that, they wave, they slap hands, etc but basically they have no idea why i'm in Whuti, how long i'll stay, and they have no expectations of me.
There are a set of people, mostly women- market traders, who are conditioned to want something (money-a loan ) from me..because i'm a white man.
I'm committed to helping them - through my work with Lumana (http://www.lumana.org/) - but it has been a slow process with many ups and downs. There are many women..of all ages - in this category.
Sadly, many of them are conditioned to want and expect a hand-out from 'yevus' and so they're angry? and disappointed when i won't (and can't) give them money..they think i'm holding out on them.
The next layer are those who do make money on a regular basis and who want me to help
the community in general i.e. non-specifically, but who haven't the faintest idea how any of this can be performed ..they have no ideas for development projects and no development funds to contribute.
The final and most difficult group/layer are those who have been involved in the PCV (me) coming to Whuti and who have, mostly unannounced, angles or private agendas in interacting with me and PC.
The Library is a long time coming..now in its fifth year since the foundations were being prepared......and some people's energies have lagged.
There isn't really much community spirit here ..and yet this set of people are the chiefs, elders, those with some 'position' in the community. They all have private and personal expectations of me and the 'status' of these expectations this summer, etc is not so good..because i don't directly bring money!
These are the people to whom, I, as the de facto Librarian report, but most of them don't actually give a shit about the Library or the education of the community's youngsters. They are associated with the Library because of the prestige within the community that it brings to them...and because they have their own private interests in making some money out of the work being done on the Library.
And to the extent that I don't go along with all of that and cling to my idealistic goals for the Library, the Computer Centr, and the greater good of the community, they will bad-mouth me.
But I'm not a quitter..and i am learning!
(3) Friends Leaving!
It is a somewhat unexpected but unow understandable 'experience' to say good bye to friends that i've made here! Apparently not everyone signs up for two years!!!
I've met and occasionaly interact with and hang out with the people..B-School students and new grads and interns from other schools in the Seattle area who come here to work with/for Lumana, my favourite microfinance operation. And Lumana also atracts other young people from different countries floating around Ghana looking for supported volunteer work. They've rented a big house in Anloga, next (bigger) community up, and they even have someone who comes in and cleans and cooks for them! Lucky them.
Given the difficulty in actually making friends with Ghanaians here (i have three and i'm not sure we're that close) AND the relief that one (me certainly) finds when one can socially or professinally interact with Brits, Americans, Canadians, Europeans ..and NOT be the yevu under inspection all the time, it is not surprising that i feel a sense of loss when these other vols return to their various homelands to go back to school, etc! I don't suppose that they see it that way but i do! They're probably just happy to get out in one piece.
Fortunately, Lumana and other NGO's that i interact with keep sending in new blood for me to befriend. Long may they continue.
