Imagine:
You step down from the crowned mini van and walk into the swarm of aromas, people, and colors. Urine reeks in your nostrils like an abusive hello. You turn you hips to slip through the slim open among the heap of round bodies. As you consume the new sights with your eyes your mental digestion is interrupted by a merchant with goods in both hands asking you, in a language you don’t spea,k would you like to buy. You smile shyly and keeping walking. The merchant follows you into the large, barn like construction screaming with color and sound. You hold your purse tight and enter.
So yesterday, I went to the Crafts Market in Accra. The place is a huge area with several different stalls that sell everything from paintings to clothing. Sellers have beaded jewelry, wood carvings, things made from animal skins and horns, masks of all sorts. Me being a person that LOVES African style, fashion, and art I was overwhelmed with excitement upon entering the market. I wish I would have taken my camera. My eyes are so full of sights my head aches. Immediately owners of the shops approach and begin to try to get you buy things. Before you even enter the market men and women are on the street with their goods beckoning you to their stalls. The tactic they use is first asking you to have a look. Then they attempt to pressure you to buy anything you like. Oh let me not dare forget to mention, race and nationality plays a huge role in how much you get haggled and or ripped off. I’m brown skinned but lighter than most people so I’m constantly asked where am I from and if I’m Ghanaian or not. Once I speak my cover is blown and I’m a prime victim to be sold extremely over priced goods. Also, if you are traveling with anyone white or anything non black everyone knows your ‘obruni’ (white man). For example, I asked for the price of a bag I wanted and I was told 28 of Ghanaian currency. My Ghanaian friend on the other hand was told 12. That’s how it is here. For the first time I feel like being black is a perferred in the space I live in. I’ve never not being proud of being a black woman but in certain places in the states (especially among educated people or in successful arenas) being black is not as “good as” or appreciated as other ethnicities.
So in the beginning I was crazy enjoying myself. I enjoyed looking at all the great unique crafts, bartering with people, and attempting to speak Twi (the local language). After a while you realize that every type of stall pretty much has the same exact thing and many of the sellers are business men not craftsmen. They do not make the stuff they just buy it from where ever it is mass produced. I began to have the most fun once I ran out of money, then I cold just look at stuff with no pressure because I knew I couldn’t buy anything. If you look though, you are in for a debate with the shop owner about how good of a price he will give you. I saw so many things I wanted to buy so I’m making a list of things for next time that I’ll purchase. I won’t be going back to that market until like next month though. I am a bit of a spendthrift and I want to make sure my money last me the entire trip. Also, the shop keepers here want to make you feel like this is the best deal you’ll ever get on this great thing but the reality is there is so much more where that came from. My mentor has always told me not to make rash decisions. People want you to decide things on the spot so they can rip you off. My dad has always told me not to
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Sunday, September 5, 2010
First Village Visit
Village visit 2010
4.9.2010
Just got back from the village visit to Dogobom at Ada. This is my first time ever seeing anything like it. I was so moved so amazed so wowed by what God is allowing me to see and do here. I really did enjoy the trip. What we did was build water purifiers for a community that otherwise would not have clean water to drink.
They have a pond in the village where people go to fetch water for drinking, cleaning, and bathing, and any additional domestic needs. It was really dirty water that is also shared with cattle and anything else that wants a drink or to live in the pond. Our program partnered with a local water sanitation organization to purchase the supplies to build 5 water filters in this community. The water filter consisted of a barrel, sand, rocks, a mesh net, a pipe and a water nozzle. The stones and sand act as filters for the water. The way it works is people put the dirty pond water into the filter and turn on the nozzle to obtain purified water. I suppose this is a proven science. The water certainly did change from dark brown to clear because of the filter but I’m unsure about the ability of this filter to cleanse the water of microscopic organisms that could hard the people. Nonetheless, we were able to build three of these filters. We were told that water from these filters was 98% clean. Our three water filters were donated to the school in the village for the students to have clean drinking water. Two additional filters are to be built in the actually living community in the near future.
I was primarily in charge of getting sand from the ground and “washing” it in order for it to be used for the filters. All of the materials used in the filter have to be extremely “clean” in order for the filter to function properly. I had to use a mesh net to sift the sand on the ground to remove large stones and grass. Then my group (about 3 other participants) filled a large bowl with sifted sand. After that we poured water from the pond onto the sand and proceeded to swirl it around. When the water was swirled enough times we dumped out the water, removed the top layer of silky sand, then added more water and repeated the process. It took about one hour to get one bowl of sand “clean.” The washing was not too difficult it was the swatting over the bowl to do the washing that put a strain on my body.
I was happy to help the people of this village though. I was constantly reminded that this is how people live here everyday but soon I would return to the bustling city of Accra and soon enough home to America. I realized that people survive under really bad conditions with little to nothing therefore I have nothing to want for or complain about. I was made to acknowledge the immense privilege that my life style has even though I’ve always thought of myself as not among the “privileged class” in America because I live in the ghetto. I felt so very blessed to be able to serve in a practical way that would really increase the welfare of people’s lives. We were told that these filters could function for up to five years.
I also considered what it meant that we built these filters in a school. This school was basically a series of cement, open rooms lined up next to one another. How can students really be educated when they are getting sick from the water in their classrooms? Furthermore, since all the food is washed in this water as well what they eat and how they bath are all contaminated. So the environmental and geographical issues of a place are imperative to the education of the people. There were a lot of kids from the village all around while we worked and it was obvious that they were happy we were there. Several people from the village came out to meet us, greet us, and thank us during this process. I could tell that they really needed and appreciated the gift of clean water. The elders of the village approved our gift, accepted it, and invited us to dance with them in celebration. They also gave everyone a coconut to drink from and eat.
It was amazing to see. The village consisted of what looked like mud huts with straw or grass roofs. From what I saw most huts were one room square buildings with not much inside them. It had no running water or electricity. The key thing I want to mention is that these people were happy and enjoying there lives. They were happy for the help but if we would have never come they would have kept living and making it. I admire their endurance. There were girls fetching bowls of water that held about five gallons of water. They carried these bowls on their heads up hill and to their homes. Three other women and I in my program (Americans) had a hard time carrying one of the same bowls together. These women (and I believe women in Ghana in general) were innovative, strong (physically, emotionally, and mentally) and self reliant.
This experience has my brain full of thoughts and questions. I realized today why the Bible says that we are our best in serving because when you give to someone else you are able to be empowered and strengthened. In serving you can see how much God has done for you and be humbled. I learned that the world is dealing with grave hardships and my being here is no mistake. I questioned how does this relate to God’s purpose for my life? What am I meant to do with the indescribable emotions I felt in those moments of cleaning sand for water? I wonder why God has chosen to be so very kind to me. All these are reoccurring thoughts that are challenging my perspective of myself, my world, the world, and my place in the greater world. I was reminded of how my mentor told me that Christ’s first order of business any place he went was to meet the needs of the people. We were meeting a need today and in that there was an inherent aspect of communal respect and community building. I’m convinced that dancing is a universal language that any “body” can speak. Speaking of languages, the people in this village spoke Ga and a few people spoke English. This trip is making me want to become a language learner because communication is so important and living in a global world mandates more than English. That is if the world is meant to be authentic and not oppressed by western culture, language, and ways. At the same time, I hope that rural Ghana can one day acquire the resources that are so readily wasted in the states.
Living is Learning,
Camea Osborn
4.9.2010
Just got back from the village visit to Dogobom at Ada. This is my first time ever seeing anything like it. I was so moved so amazed so wowed by what God is allowing me to see and do here. I really did enjoy the trip. What we did was build water purifiers for a community that otherwise would not have clean water to drink.
They have a pond in the village where people go to fetch water for drinking, cleaning, and bathing, and any additional domestic needs. It was really dirty water that is also shared with cattle and anything else that wants a drink or to live in the pond. Our program partnered with a local water sanitation organization to purchase the supplies to build 5 water filters in this community. The water filter consisted of a barrel, sand, rocks, a mesh net, a pipe and a water nozzle. The stones and sand act as filters for the water. The way it works is people put the dirty pond water into the filter and turn on the nozzle to obtain purified water. I suppose this is a proven science. The water certainly did change from dark brown to clear because of the filter but I’m unsure about the ability of this filter to cleanse the water of microscopic organisms that could hard the people. Nonetheless, we were able to build three of these filters. We were told that water from these filters was 98% clean. Our three water filters were donated to the school in the village for the students to have clean drinking water. Two additional filters are to be built in the actually living community in the near future.
I was primarily in charge of getting sand from the ground and “washing” it in order for it to be used for the filters. All of the materials used in the filter have to be extremely “clean” in order for the filter to function properly. I had to use a mesh net to sift the sand on the ground to remove large stones and grass. Then my group (about 3 other participants) filled a large bowl with sifted sand. After that we poured water from the pond onto the sand and proceeded to swirl it around. When the water was swirled enough times we dumped out the water, removed the top layer of silky sand, then added more water and repeated the process. It took about one hour to get one bowl of sand “clean.” The washing was not too difficult it was the swatting over the bowl to do the washing that put a strain on my body.
I was happy to help the people of this village though. I was constantly reminded that this is how people live here everyday but soon I would return to the bustling city of Accra and soon enough home to America. I realized that people survive under really bad conditions with little to nothing therefore I have nothing to want for or complain about. I was made to acknowledge the immense privilege that my life style has even though I’ve always thought of myself as not among the “privileged class” in America because I live in the ghetto. I felt so very blessed to be able to serve in a practical way that would really increase the welfare of people’s lives. We were told that these filters could function for up to five years.
I also considered what it meant that we built these filters in a school. This school was basically a series of cement, open rooms lined up next to one another. How can students really be educated when they are getting sick from the water in their classrooms? Furthermore, since all the food is washed in this water as well what they eat and how they bath are all contaminated. So the environmental and geographical issues of a place are imperative to the education of the people. There were a lot of kids from the village all around while we worked and it was obvious that they were happy we were there. Several people from the village came out to meet us, greet us, and thank us during this process. I could tell that they really needed and appreciated the gift of clean water. The elders of the village approved our gift, accepted it, and invited us to dance with them in celebration. They also gave everyone a coconut to drink from and eat.
It was amazing to see. The village consisted of what looked like mud huts with straw or grass roofs. From what I saw most huts were one room square buildings with not much inside them. It had no running water or electricity. The key thing I want to mention is that these people were happy and enjoying there lives. They were happy for the help but if we would have never come they would have kept living and making it. I admire their endurance. There were girls fetching bowls of water that held about five gallons of water. They carried these bowls on their heads up hill and to their homes. Three other women and I in my program (Americans) had a hard time carrying one of the same bowls together. These women (and I believe women in Ghana in general) were innovative, strong (physically, emotionally, and mentally) and self reliant.
This experience has my brain full of thoughts and questions. I realized today why the Bible says that we are our best in serving because when you give to someone else you are able to be empowered and strengthened. In serving you can see how much God has done for you and be humbled. I learned that the world is dealing with grave hardships and my being here is no mistake. I questioned how does this relate to God’s purpose for my life? What am I meant to do with the indescribable emotions I felt in those moments of cleaning sand for water? I wonder why God has chosen to be so very kind to me. All these are reoccurring thoughts that are challenging my perspective of myself, my world, the world, and my place in the greater world. I was reminded of how my mentor told me that Christ’s first order of business any place he went was to meet the needs of the people. We were meeting a need today and in that there was an inherent aspect of communal respect and community building. I’m convinced that dancing is a universal language that any “body” can speak. Speaking of languages, the people in this village spoke Ga and a few people spoke English. This trip is making me want to become a language learner because communication is so important and living in a global world mandates more than English. That is if the world is meant to be authentic and not oppressed by western culture, language, and ways. At the same time, I hope that rural Ghana can one day acquire the resources that are so readily wasted in the states.
Living is Learning,
Camea Osborn
Friday, September 3, 2010
to fill you in
3 am GMT Sept. 1, 2010
So I’m having a hard time sleeping in Ghana and a hard time posting pictures to this blog. I don’t what exactly is the difficulty. I know it has something to do with the sounds (frogs, wild dogs, howling birds…) the dampness is also a factor (I sort of feel like I’m sleeping in wet rags some nights). I don’t mean to be negative Nancy but today this is where I am. I thought I would share my classroom experiences at the university of Ghana. So far I’ve encounter too many students crammed into small classrooms. Ghanaians tend to ram into and over anyone in their path to the lone desk. That gets really annoying. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m past being friendly and respond with the same rude aggression with which I am approached. Today in my lecture of 100 plus students in a room designed to seat maybe 50 the lecturer proceeded to make us watch a VHS on a 30 inch tv screen that about 10 people in the very front row could see and hear. I was not one of those people. It is an extremely difficult environment to attempt to “learn” in. I have learned very quickly that the standard of “quality education” is very different than elite universities in the states. With that in mind, I spent much of my time today contemplating enter the teaching field as I previously thought I would. Primarily, I would do it to help bring quality education to urban youth in America. I have ideas about how to transform education and spaces in which people are meant to learn. I feel like the quality of a nation’s education is directly relational to the “quality” of it’s people. By that I mean what type of people a society produces in terms of their goals, contributions to the world, views, etc. Not that one person is better than another per say but perhaps education
is a vehicle by which people can be equipped to do and give more. I’m still developing these ideas and working them out in my head.
I’m blessed enough to have regular internet access in my room and I have the audacity to be frustrated that it’s inconsistent. (Privilege is an addiction)
I also wanted to mention some alarming things I’ve seen on this campus: (in no particular order)
• A monkey named Joe tied to a tree
• Massive terminate/ ant mounds everywhere that stand taller than me !! scary!!!
• Many lizards both large and small
• Wild dogs that roam around, most of them are starving
• Starving horses (I was not an eye witness but the pics were alarming)
• Men and women indiscreetly urinating in public places (this is unfortunately really common)
• I guess I could say people carrying things on there heads but it gets typical
With that said, I guess I’ll return to my bed and continue reading until the sun rises and I find something else to do.
Good morning good world!
-Camea Osborn
So I’m having a hard time sleeping in Ghana and a hard time posting pictures to this blog. I don’t what exactly is the difficulty. I know it has something to do with the sounds (frogs, wild dogs, howling birds…) the dampness is also a factor (I sort of feel like I’m sleeping in wet rags some nights). I don’t mean to be negative Nancy but today this is where I am. I thought I would share my classroom experiences at the university of Ghana. So far I’ve encounter too many students crammed into small classrooms. Ghanaians tend to ram into and over anyone in their path to the lone desk. That gets really annoying. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m past being friendly and respond with the same rude aggression with which I am approached. Today in my lecture of 100 plus students in a room designed to seat maybe 50 the lecturer proceeded to make us watch a VHS on a 30 inch tv screen that about 10 people in the very front row could see and hear. I was not one of those people. It is an extremely difficult environment to attempt to “learn” in. I have learned very quickly that the standard of “quality education” is very different than elite universities in the states. With that in mind, I spent much of my time today contemplating enter the teaching field as I previously thought I would. Primarily, I would do it to help bring quality education to urban youth in America. I have ideas about how to transform education and spaces in which people are meant to learn. I feel like the quality of a nation’s education is directly relational to the “quality” of it’s people. By that I mean what type of people a society produces in terms of their goals, contributions to the world, views, etc. Not that one person is better than another per say but perhaps education
is a vehicle by which people can be equipped to do and give more. I’m still developing these ideas and working them out in my head.
I’m blessed enough to have regular internet access in my room and I have the audacity to be frustrated that it’s inconsistent. (Privilege is an addiction)
I also wanted to mention some alarming things I’ve seen on this campus: (in no particular order)
• A monkey named Joe tied to a tree
• Massive terminate/ ant mounds everywhere that stand taller than me !! scary!!!
• Many lizards both large and small
• Wild dogs that roam around, most of them are starving
• Starving horses (I was not an eye witness but the pics were alarming)
• Men and women indiscreetly urinating in public places (this is unfortunately really common)
• I guess I could say people carrying things on there heads but it gets typical
With that said, I guess I’ll return to my bed and continue reading until the sun rises and I find something else to do.
Good morning good world!
-Camea Osborn
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