Hello from Ghana

Written by Brighid Sammon - GapBreak Ghana 2009

I have been in Ghana for just over two weeks now and have experienced many things different to home including going to an antelope sacrifice festival {however much to our own stupidity we missed the actual sacrifice} and hundreds of other bizarre things. For our first week we stayed in the capital, Accra and just got to know Ghana.

The night of my birthday was spent at another volunteers birthday party where the local people put on a dance for her which was incredible, the way the people dance over here would put any Australian dancers to shame.

The heat here is probably the hardest thing that everyone has trouble dealing with as the humidity is at about 80% and you spend half the day drinking the water that you are constantly sweating out. The city of Accra was very much like Bali or Thailand or any developing country I imagine, it was good being there for the week. However, when we moved into our host families in Swedru, was when we began to see the real difference in our lifestyle.

Before we begin teaching we volunteer in the orphanage for two weeks which has been rewarding but very confronting and at times extremely hard to deal with; it is making us all question the way we live in Australia and the opportunities we have had and will continue to have. The children are absolutely beautiful and most of the time just want to be held, especially the babies, as they are missing that affection most of us get from our mum or dad. Our days usually consist of playing with the kids in the morning, then either washing the clothes, dishes or cleaning the beds. The most challenging thing above everything in the orphanage has been the hygiene. Most of us have been peed on by now, as the kids even the 3 or 4 year olds are not toilet trained meaning they will be sitting on your lap and just wee on you. Luckily no one has experienced a poopy accident yet but they do just go right in front of you. It is slightly concerning as we all are wondering at what age they will be toilet trained {although it is not uncommon to see people peeing on the side of the road} But however challenging, working in the orphanage has given me a very detailed insight into the poverty and the lack of opportunities the children have here. The family I am living with is more middle-class so the orphanage has defiantly been an eye-opener and so far something that I will probably never experience again.

The food here has been a slight disappointment however as I am writing this I just had the best dinner I have had so far which was this tomato fish thing with rice which was amazing. But everything is really fishy and apparently the fish is the equivalent to what
Australians use as bait so not really appetising but we are slowly getting used to it. However I must confess on out first weekend travels we spent most of it pigging out on western food and also sadly many of our conversations around the dinner table revolve around the food we eat at home.

I need to go and check the news as there is no way of knowing what is going on in world which at the start was slightly liberating and refreshing however I am now missing the newspaper and of course the football news. I have been trying to teach the boys that live out the back of my house to play AFL with a soccer ball very hard but i think i have found some very good recruits for Geelong!!