Ghana 2012 - Week 6

So 1st July was a bank holiday in Ghana and as a result we had a free day. Our team decided not to waste it and see something. This time we went to different places. Patrick along with Piet (Dutch volunteer) and Ganew (son of Ibrahim) went to Gambaga to visit the witch camp. The camp itself is like a village and has around 200 women living in it who are believed to be witches. Guys told us that they had quite a nice look around, but the trip to the place took most of their time (about 3-4 hours to one side). Because Margarita was still feeling sick because of Malaria, she decided not to go and rest that day. Meanwhile, I and Caroline went to Tongo hills. Tongo is a village about 15km from Bolga, so it was supposed to be a short trip. And it was, but the problem was in the departure, which was around 3 hours later than we expected. The driver does not want to leave with a half empty trotro, so he waits until it is full. Apparently, Tongo is not the most popular destination so it took a while for a trotro to fill up. The journey itself was cheap and quick and in few minutes time we were 5km away from the hills. At that point we had to leave trotro and walk. Because we were feeling adventurous and full of energy it took us no time to reach Tongo Hills. We were met by a guy, who later on told us was a son of a chief. After familiarising with all the rules and destinations within Tongo we started our hike. We started with the palace of the chief, which looked more like a whole village. The chief had 17 wifes and many kids and grandkids, possibly a hundred or over. The family was massive so everywhere we went we met members of the same family. We were taken to few places. First one we visited was a donkey cave. We were told that if someone had a problem that could not be solved, they could have told the problem to the cave and then it would take care of it. If the problem was solved in the end, a person should have sacrificed a donkey. The cave itself had a lot of skulls of donkeys and looked pretty interesting. Next stop was the shrine. The interesting bit about it was that one can only enter it topless and without shoes and socks. The second one was not that complicated, but the first one seemed to be a bit of a trouble for any girl. Boys decided to go first and have a look. It was not much to see there, just piles of feathers of dead birds and bows and bags. It was not very clear for me what was the purpose of the shrine, because we were only told that if a woman could not give birth, the family should have sacrificed an animal and then they could have children. The purpose of the bows and bags was not clarified very well though.

After that our guide decided that we have seen enough and started going back towards the office. When we asked to show us more and that there were many more things in the list he unhappily showed us some other places. Later on we found out that guy was hurrying to get his lunch, because he was hungry. Oh well. The next stop was the hyena cave. When there we many trees in the area, hyenas used to gather there to rest in the shade, but since the place was cut out they do not live there anymore. The cave is now used for gatherings of village elders. Our last stop was the hiding cave. We were told that when British attacked the village, locals used to hide in the cave and if necessary defend themselves from being taken. By that time we were also hungry, so we decided to let the poor guy go and get his lunch.






On Tuesday we started realising that it was only few days of teaching left and that we are leaving Bolga very soon. We also tried our new cars for the first time. The second design worked so much better, so our lessons (hopefully) were easier to understand and challenges were much more exciting, because the cars actually worked well. However, the kids found it extremely difficult to grasp the bit that energy can be stored in the elastic band by winding up the wheels and released when you let them go. This usually took most of the time and there were not too much time left for the race and the fun bits. Anyway, kids seemed to enjoy their workshops so we were happy as well. 

As Wednesday was a market day we have seen so many things that were very funny. Everyone was taking animals to the market, but the funniest thing ever is how people get them there. The trip from our host family to schools started with me noticing a pig tied on the back of the bicycle. The other thing we saw was sheep and goats on the roof of the trotro, but the highlight of the day was definitely a cow on the roof of a car and another two cows in the same car along with two guys. I found that hilarious. I suppose that is quite normal here, but for westerners it is not. I will try to upload a picture or two from that day.

Another thing we did was the interview with a science teacher in a local school. She told us some quite interesting things and emphasised our mistakes and gave us useful feedback. We are glad we met this teacher. She seemed to be the most interested in our classes and came to assist us every time we taught in that school.

On Thursday we had another case of malaria in our camp. This time it was Patrick. It was a shame, because Friday was the last day and we all wanted to be there and take some pictures for memory. Anyway, we were really surprised when on Friday morning I started feeling very sick. I decided to miss the school and go to see the doctor instead. After long hours of waiting in the hospital I was diagnosed severe malaria. I was not feeling good at all. Hopefully I managed to reach home somehow with the help of the father of our family. The last bit I could not cycle at all, so I was just slowly walking towards home when I met the father. He helped me back and put me into bed. We were so disappointed that although we all took these super expensive medicines to prevent malaria all four of us had it. Another thing is that I missed the last day in school and I could not attend the picture taking and gift exchanging part.

I was not feeling well for the following 4 days and this is why the blog slowed down and I don’t really have many pictured either, so I will try to do my best and put something up from someone else. About malaria, it is a hell of a disease. I heard someone saying that it is not too bad, but if you have the more severe case it really is. I could barely move for 4-5 days and could not look at food at all. Malaria drains all the energy out of your body so it is so difficult to fight with it. Luckily, I managed to fight it and now I am feeling completely fine.

This was the end of Project Ghana 2012. We spent 6 nice weeks teaching in 2 different regions of Ghana. We approximated that about 500 kids received our 6 hand on workshop course and most of them told us that they thoroughly enjoyed it. We definitely enjoyed our stay in Kasoa and Bolga and most importantly established good relationships with locals so our project can continue. We also want to thank everyone who contributed to the project, helped us and read this blog. I will put some updates on how our travelling is going later on, so please do not forget it for now. :]

Ghana 2012 - Week 5

This week started in a standard way with all the classes going as expected until Ibrahim showed up in one of the schools with another volunteer. We only said hi to him at that time, because we were teaching, but we met him later on when we were having lunch. Piet is from Netherlands as most of the volunteers who come to Bolgatanga, because Meet Africa is a Dutch organisation and there main office is there as well. Piet told us that he is going to be teaching PE in schools. It was rather nice to meet another white person, because there are not many white people in Bolgatanga.

As a rule, our bikes kept breaking and we had something like a sixth tyre replaced in last two weeks. The guy who repairs our bikes was getting annoyed by the fact that we come to him so often and lady who is supposed to pay him does not do that so we were also feeling a bit confused by the whole situation. Anyway, these kind of misunderstandings are quite common in Ghana, so I guess we should just get used to it.

We only had one lesson on Wednesday, but there was another thing waiting for us that day. Youth Harvest foundation recently started a project called step-up and Wednesday was the day of the launching event of the project. This project is for young girls that are not very rich and have no work. The idea is to train and provide these young women with the possibility to buy the sewing machines (and pay, as they say here, small small every month) so that they could learn how to sew and sell their works. As we have been told, the project was quite successful and there was also some interest from Netherlands, so some clothes were exported and girls started making money. This proved that there are initiative people coming up with these kind of projects in Ghana. We were pleased to help run this event and assist organisers, because we had the chairman of Youth Harvest Foundation and even the Municipal Chief Executive attending it.

Thursday started with an extremely heavy rain in the morning. Because of the metal roofs of the schools, the rain was making so much noise that we could not run our lessons. The kids simply could not hear anything because of the rain. We also noticed that other teachers stopped their lessons as well. The interesting thing here in Ghana is that nothing happens when it is raining. All the activities are stopped no matter how important they might be. The streets become completely empty and nothing starts happening again until the rain stops. The most surprising thing was when we went to run our second lesson and found the school empty. Apparently teachers let kids go home when it rains heavily. We thought that nothing would ever happen in Scotland if teachers or lecturers behaved like that.

Because we only had one class in the morning on Friday, we decided to visit Bongo village, which is not too far from Bolga. There was already an update on that so I am not going to go into details again (I finally uploaded some decent quality pictures to facebook, so you can check on that).

On Sunday we decided to have a bit of rest. Patrick went to the church with our host family and I relaxed at home (I thought 4 hours in the church would be a bit too much for me). After that and having some lunch, we went to the lake which is not too far away. We had a very nice swim with Ganew (Ibrahims son), Fabien and Bright (from girls family) in the lake. Because it seemed that it was about to start raining we decided not to waste any time and headed back to the town. Another reason why we were in a hurry was Euro 2012 (as we all know Patrick is Italian and Italy played Spain in the final). It was a really nice weekend for us and although we have been here for only 2 weeks we started feeling quite local, because some local friends of ours were always around.

That was our week 5 in Ghana. Week 6 is our last week in Bolgatanga and the last week of teaching as well. There is still quite a few things that we have to finish, but hopefully we will make it all in time.

PS. Sorry for such a delay, malaria got me quite hard. Now all four of us had malaria.

Trip to Bongo 29-30/06/2012

Our destination for Friday afternoon was Bongo village. It is located in the North of Ghana, only 15km away from Bolgatanga. The village itself is like a capital of the very north part of the country and is a place where the chief lives. We were told that there are 32 villages in the area (all of them have their own sub-chiefs) and the population of it is about 100,000. However, this only includes people who are 18 or older, so the chief estimated that there might be 150,000 people in total. He is responsible for all the other chiefs and sub-chiefs who live in the area and in the Ghanaian hierarchy is only bellow the king. Apart from that, we heard that this place had nice landscapes so we decided to give it a try.

The transport was easier this time compared to our trip to Paga, because there was a trotro going directly to Bongo and was quite cheap (1GC = 30p). The road to Bongo was not fully paved so we had a quite a bumpy ride. Once we arrived it was already afternoon, so we decided to get some lunch. Just next to the trotro/taxi station we found a nice place to eat, so we sat there for a while. When we finished we started talking with some people outside and found out that one of the men was an uncle of the chief. We were told that if we waited for a bit, we could meet the chief, because he was out doing sacrifices for the gods. After a while we were invited to come inside.

The chief greeted us and told us some things about the area and the Bongo rocks that we wanted to visit. We were told that there is a male rock and a female rock in the area. Although, male rock is bigger, female rock is the one where they sacrifice for the gods. They sacrifice in order to please the gods and have a good year. Depending on the situation they might sacrifice a cow, a goat or just some flour or something else. We were also asked to sign in to a guest book and were surprised to find the names of two people from the University of Edinburgh, School of Engineering, who visited the place last year.

Once we left with the son of the chief to see the rocks we were told that when climbing the female rock, there is a place where there is a gap between two rocks. Before passing the place, the person has to say ‘I am sorry, I want to pass’ and step on to another rock. If you forgot to say these words, by the time you want to step on another rock, it would move further so you could not reach it and you would fall down. Unfortunately, some of us were wearing slippers so we were not allowed to climb neither male nor female mountains. However, we had a nice walk around the area and enjoyed the landscape very much. Some places looked as if they were taken out from the painting. There was a place where water comes out from the rocks even though there is no lake anywhere around. The place where we stayed for longest was the huge rock, which was sitting on just two small rocks. Although it did not look very stable, we took some nice pictures there. By that time it was already quite late, so we had to come back to Bongo. After saying bye to the chief and for the boys who showed us the way we left the village.

We enjoyed the place so much that once we got back to the office we decided to come back the next day. We really wanted to climb the male or the female mountains. Next morning, instead of taking a trotro we took our bikes and took off to Bongo again. Once we were at about half way, Patrick noticed that he had a flat tyre. The curse of the breaking bikes kept following us everywhere we went. Luckily, on our way we found a man who repaired bikes so Patrick’s bike was repaired in no time and we continued our journey. Once we reached Bongo we met the son of the chief again and with a few of his friends left to the rocks again.

At first we were told that we can climb both male and female rocks, but we had to start with the male one. The climbing appeared to be more challenging than we expected and we also realised why they did not let us climb with the slippers last day. There were some big gaps between the rocks so we had to be careful not to fall down. On our way we noticed some crosses. The guys told us that some people come here and pray for the gods, so this is why these crosses are left there. After some time we reached the top of the male rock. The views were amazing and we could see very far from the top. We relaxed on the top for a while before going down. We were also told that it is not possible to climb the female rock, because no one goes there on the weekend, because at this time gods are there. We were a bit disappointed, because no one told us that before.

On our way down, we came across some huge baobab trees and interesting plants. Once we reached the bottom we decided to try some sibisibi. These are tiny fruits that grow on the trees in the area. We had some nice rest in the shade, because it was already noon and was quite hot and sunny. It was time to go back to the village and have something to eat, because we were all quite hungry.

Once we got back, we noticed the chief sitting in the shade on his nice red carpet with all the pillows around. We were invited to sit down for a while and rest. We were a bit confused, when the chief said that he never heard the story about the moving rocks, but he told us another one. He said that on the female rock there is a cave where some items were kept. These were musical instruments that no one is allowed to take away from the cave. If someone tried to take one, he could not see the way out of the cave and would be trapped there. We were a bit disappointed by the fact that we could not go to the female rock because it sounded quite interesting.

Once we got up to get some lunch, the mother of the chief started complaining that we did not give any money for the boys who went with us. For a few times we were told that these are not compulsory and we already left something last day. However, our intention was to give them as they call a ‘token’ after lunch and we did not need to be insisted for that. As a result I felt that the token is not as optional as we were told and if you do not leave anything people would complain.

Another thing that we understood is that it is always better to visit the place of the chief before going to see the rocks. Without chiefs or someone else’s permission it might be considered rude to enter the land. Also, if people noticed tourists walking around without a local person, they might simply ask you to leave the place, because it is strictly forbidden to take pictures of the female mountain.

By the time we finished our lunch it was already quite late, so we decided to get on our bikes and start heading back. On our way to Bongo and when we were leaving we could hear kids shouting ‘Solmia welcome’ (Solmia – white person). It looked as if they were told to do so when they see a white person, because everyone was shouting the same thing. Also, when the white people were going it looked like the time stopped. Once locals (especially kids) notice a white man they stop doing whatever they are supposed to and just watch you passing or wave. It was quite an experience to visit Bongo. At the end of the day we all felt that we had a very good time and were very tired as well. I think so far this was one of the best daytrips we had in Ghana.

PS. Sorry for the extra super poor quality pictures, but as I have already mentioned the internet speed is very limited here. I will upload the good quality ones to facebook soon.

 Chief.

 Bongo landscape

 Water coming out of the rocks

 The male mountain.

 Nearly at the top of the male mountain.

 View from the top.

 ....

 On our way down.

 Sibisibi.

Chief.

Ghana 2012 - Week 4

Week number 4 is our first week in Bolgatanga, which is a city in the very north of Ghana. The place seemed not to be as densely populated as Kasoa and people here were a bit more relaxed. The schools appeared a bit more organised and classes scheduled more carefully though. As a result, from the first day in schools we were presented with a timetable and we had a discussion with teachers about when we are going to teach. After meeting teachers in both schools we ended up having either 1 or 2 classes a day. Because both of the schools are government run and are both mostly attended by Muslim students, we were also informed that one day a week they finish school early so they can go and pray.

The first school we taught in was TI Atimadija. This school is very close to the Youth Harvest Foundation centre, so it is convenient for us. As in most of the schools kids have to wear uniforms. Kids wear red uniforms here so it is easy to distinguish which kid belongs to which school in case we meet someone in town. Because we have our timetable, we do not need that many assistance or coordination as in Kasoa. The teachers are generally very helpful and friendly and during our first class we even had the principle of the school observing our lesson. Although he seemed not to be extremely impressed, we appreciated that. In TI Atimadija we were impressed that kids are quite smart and behave very well. Hopefully, we can maintain this until the end of our stay.

The second school we taught in was Aswaj. Again, this is a government run school, mostly attended by Muslim students (purple with brown uniforms). We felt very welcome at this school. Science teacher Gloria showed great interest in our project and our classes from the beginning. She always comes in and helps us with the class, which is very much appreciated. We hope to get some feedback from her as well. The classes are a bit smaller in this school, so it is slightly easier to teach. However, there is a great interest from smaller kids from primary school, so towards the end of the class we are usually surrounded by curious and sometimes a bit noisy crowd.

For the workshops we decided to run towers and levers again, because we think that these two are slightly easier so they help kids to get confidence from the beginning. The big change we made is that every time we start our class with a short test. These tests are made so that we could see if kids are actually improving.  In addition to this we are asking kids if they could find the materials we use at their homes. This is mainly because teachers in schools say that they would like to have experiments and practical works in classes, but they do not have the money to buy the equipment. By doing this we expect to find out if kids could bring the equipment themselves for workshops.

Another interesting aspect of our stay is that our bikes keep breaking down. During the last week we already had 5 flat tires, 3 of which just popped. Others had punctures or were in such a bad condition that we had to change them. So far the guy who repairs our bikes does that for free (we do not pay, but the owner of the bikes does) but we do not know for how long this is going to last. It looks like our bikes are just falling apart. However, there are not many options in this case, because taxis are not that popular here and are generally expensive and we live too far away from the schools to walk. Hopefully, these break downs are going to stop, because we are already a bit annoyed by them and it takes time to get bikes repaired.

Over the weekend we decided to let our bikes rest for a bit. Our plan was to go to Paga, which is very close to the border of Burkina Faso. It is famous because of the crocodiles that live in these ponds in Paga. Unfortunately, when it was time to leave it started raining very heavily, so we had to wait for a few hours until it stopped. After visiting the place and taking some exciting photos of crocodiles we went to the border. We were surprised that we were allowed to cross the border without our passports or bags checked. Everyone seemed to be chilled about us walking around and taking photos. We event went to Burkina Faso and no one was actually worried. It seems like it is enough to be white and you can go wherever you want. Although it sounds a bit weird, this is how it is here.

That is it for week 4. I hope the internet connection is quick enough today so I can upload some photos as well.