TGIF!

Hola amigos,

TGIF! The end of my first week at work here, and it’s been quite interesting. Things have picked up a bit since the Monday and Tuesday all-day reading, but the real work will start next week. On Wednesday we had a long staff meeting where Kwesi and Kyei talked to all the new interns (there’s five) about the background and mandates of FoN.  He described some recent projects, including one in the Ngyeresia slum community in Takoradi implementing new latrines, and the recent purchase of 5000 mangrove trees that will be transplanted along a lagoon to help with soil erosion, water shortage, etc. Us interns will be doing the planting. I’m looking forward to this- we’ll probably start planting in the next week or two. I hear it’s very hard work, but it’ll great to be outside, get some exercise, and learn a new skill. We then all climbed into the company van to see the lagoon-, which is quite littered, by plastic and human waste. From the lagoon you can see both the fishery canoes and the oil rig. There’s a lot going on on the Takoradi shoreline, that’s for sure. We then headed to Ngyeresia, where 10 new toilets have been placed. This community is almost completely dependent of the fishing season, and has poor living conditions. We walked around and asked people living near the new toilets if they liked them, how they were being used, if they would like more, and etc. Some of the answers were shocking, and I don’t feel comfortable posting some of the private things women said on my blog, but I found the experience quite humbling. The slum has 4700 people, mostly children, living in an area 2.5 miles square. Previous to getting the new toilets (which are concrete blocks with a hole, in an outhouse sized shed), has one public bathroom, which over 4000 people use a day, is 67 years old with no repairs, and costs 10 pesewas (about 6 cents CAD) each time to use. It doesn’t sound like much, but considering family sizes are large and each family lives on less than 2 cedis a day, during a good fishing season, and much less in the off season, this is clearly unaffordable. So people use the beach, the one drain the community has, which is completely clogged with solid waste, or walk to bushes. People have dug their own drains between the homes, which have open waste. So cholera, typhoid, malaria, and therefore high infant mortality and low life expectancy are all thriving. I saw a couple of children with the large bellies, caused by vitamin deficiencies. Although it doesn’t seem that people are starving, because they have the fish, malnutrition is a huge issue. The saddest thing is that some of the toilets still aren’t being used, for various reasons.  I think this is where education is important, and I hope to get involved here. After interviewing people we headed back to the office to type reports on what the interviewees said and read more about the economics of the area.  I’m looking forward to seeing how this project will progress while I’m here.

Yesterday work was much less eventful. The power is currently not working, so Sara and I went for walks in the area with Kwesi, read newspapers (I’m so up to date with Ghana current events!), and I am currently trekking my way through a book about fiscal decentralization in Ghana, which is quite interesting, though includes a lot of legislature- never easy to read. Today we headed to one Mark’s house – Mark is a man who works here- for the monthly technical meeting. I learned a lot about the logistics and operational things about Hen Mpoano and FoN and got to know more of the staff. I also got assigned some more editing. I fell in love with Mark’s dog. I’m sure she has a name, but I named it Doe, because she looks like a deer. She’s the same colour and has white speckles on her nose. All of the dogs here, mostly street dogs, are similar in stature. They are lean and small and have pointed ears and snouts- kind of foxy- with various colour of brown and often splotchy. After the meeting, as we were driving back to the office, we passed by the waterfront where there were a bunch of men building a fishing canoe, without power tools and stuff. Don’t be mislead by “canoe”, they’re the size of a yacht. Kwesi says next week Sara and I will both be spending 3 days out of the office. Sara will be working in a maternal health clinic and myself at the fisheries working on Hen Mpoano (I think). Kwesi says he has some proposal writing for me to do. Very exciting! As for now, we have loads of plans for the weekend. The girls at work and our host siblings want to take us out in the evening, we want to explore the city, and there’s church on Sunday, so we should keep busy!

In other news, I’ve discovered a few new creatures- cockroaches and lizards. The lizards are super cool, and the cockroaches mind their own business, so I don’t mind them either. I have become friends with a kitten with two broken legs that hangs around the house. The kids have named her Chichi, and she’s quite sweet, though she must be in pain. There’s a cat at the office as well, who I have appropriately named “Orange Cat.”

Our evenings at the house are quiet. The kids are still quite shy of us, so we’ve been watching TV and hanging out with our host brothers, Emmanuel and George. TV here is more dramatic than the most dramatic American soap. It’s quite fun to watch.  Sara and I are addicted to this game on our cell phones called F1 racing. I’m currently at a high score of 84.

Keep Smiling! :)