Our Twi class is coming to a close soon and I’ve only really learned how to make basic sentences like the one above, meaning I eat rice every day. I can also beg for a lower price in the bargaining process, a necessary skill when going to the market to avoid the obroni surcharge that miraculously gets added to everything.
Now that I’ve been here almost two months, I have gotten into some routines, like eating rice every day, boiling water (though this has been halted temporarily since our boiler was taken after we left it in the kitchen and we haven’t gotten a replacement yet), walking half an hour to get to class, hanging out laundry, sweating constantly, power outages. Things that astounded me when I first arrived are now normal. And I don’t know if this is a good or bad thing.
I remember Peter Gess showing us the “culture shock” diagram in all our orientations and I must admit that I have reached the plateau, I feel. Things aren’t exciting anymore but I am still learning things every day.
Perhaps since I have slowed down on the traveling and am settling in at the international hostel more is why I am feeling a bit cut off from Ghanaian experiences. Hopefully I can get over this slump. Don’t get me wrong- I still absolutely love it here. It is just that being immersed in such a drastically different environment is a lot sometimes.
My last trip I took was to Kumasi, which is the second biggest city in the country. Our Twi teacher Kofi, though he might have a bit of hometown bias, claimed that you hadn’t truly seen Ghana until you had spent time there. And I have to say that I agree with him. Kumasi is the center of the Asante region, which has the rich history of the Asante Kingdom who thwarted the British several times before successful colonization. Their cultural pride is still very prevalent, especially in being the center of traditional crafts.
Kente cloth is the biggest product and it is absolutely stunning. It is so brightly colored and come in a multitude of patterns. We got to see the weavers- who were all men- in their looms, using their feet to change between threads, moving their hands at a blazing speed. Our tour guide explained that they weave in strips in either single, double, or triple weave. A single strip of triple weave could take up to a week to create. After the strips are formed, they are sewed together to make the overall fabric.
The next craft village we visited makes the cloth stamped with the adrinka symbols, which have significance to all Akan people. They showed us the process to make the ink for the stamps- involving mashing tree bark and boiling the liquid for different stages for various colors. We were then allowed to select a strip of fabric and stamp the symbols we desired. This process was a bit hectic, with various vendors harassing us for attention and money while we waited to stamp our cloth. It gets frustrating sometimes when my skin color makes me seem to be a walking bank that if provoked enough will buy anything at any price. But it was really cool once I got to actually stamp my bright blue strip with the symbols for unity, child of God, hope, call to share, and forgiveness.
After these two major stops, we also went shopping in a wood carving village, the cultural center, and the major market in town. Though it felt that we were only spending money for the vast majority of the time, we also did get to visit the Asantehene Palace Museum. The Asantehene is the chief of the Asante people and the museum had various artifacts owned or used by the last few rulers. Our tour guide was lively, explaining what we were looking at since there were no labels and suggesting at various times that we should buy his book in the gift store at the end of the tour. It was nice to learn more about this major Ghanaian historical and cultural group, though the condition some of the artifacts were kept in made me sad since they will probably not be preserved very long.
Speaking of preservation, I have finally made contact with the National Archives again. I went through a period of questioning my motives of pursuing this volunteer position. Was it simply because it is kinda expected that all the American students will volunteer somewhere while they are here and I don’t mesh well with the other options of tutoring kids? But I finally decided that the opportunity to observe how archives are managed in the third-world context would be horrible to pass up.
So three weeks ago I finally went back to the archives, after my sickness and wrong contact numbers and contemplation had kept me away for awhile. The archives director wasn’t very concerned why there had been the time gap and soon got me connected with the director of the research room. This man, my supervisor, explained to me the process researchers use when they arrive and how we attendants, which apparently is what I am now, assist them in retrieving materials in the collection. I looked at the finding aid, which is a huge book that has all the documents listed in a somewhat organized manner but still difficult to use. He then showed me the repository, which is where the collection is kept. The air conditioning has been broken for weeks now and the electricity only works in sections of the stacks. Imagine piles and piles of boxes and papers that are in various states of falling apart. There are collections of documents from the colonial administration and after independence. But there are probably hundreds of items that they have no idea what they are. I asked if I could help process something, but each collection is so large that I couldn’t even look at everything in time, let alone create and index and box. He explained to me the lack of funds and trained staff that holds up their progress. They haven’t even received new materials since 2000 because the resource center is the first location items go and get sorted, which has not passed on anything in that period.
So my job is to sit in the research room and help find things in the repository for the searchers, hopefully something that is related to what they are looking for. When we were helping this one guy, I was with one of the other assistants (there are about 7 of us, for 3 current researchers?) and we knew which box the paper was supposed to be in. Under normal circumstances, we place the slip in the box, remove the document, let the researcher use it, replace it in the box, remove the slip, and file the paperwork. But this time the box did not hold the document, so we had to find a document similar to the one requested. A loss of the document was seen as a minor problem and no real efforts were made to find it. It was lost and that was it. Later, when I was filing documents back into the boxes, the paperwork was missing, so no trail was created to show that I had replaced the document. I am trying to not allow the disorganization to get to me but it is hard to fully accept that things can be here or there, with no care for if a researcher needs it or the necessity to preserve it. I am also passing the hours in the research room that my assistance is not needed by reading my own stuff and deciding which documents I want to look at myself, if I can find them.
For fun a few weekends ago, our group went to Champs for karaoke night. My roommate Patience and her good friend and our next door neighbor, Lucy came with us. The restaurant had “tex-mex” food, which beggars can’t be choosers. Patience tried her first burrito, and didn’t think it was that bad haha. It was funny for a cultural experience, because Ghanaians apparently take karaoke very seriously. Our group started out with the girls doing a poor rendition of No Scrubs, followed by Heather tearing down the house with Sweet Home Alabama with her natural entertaining self. Then Mitch, who is from West Virginia, led a group for Take Me Home Country Roads and then all of us ended our set with the classic Don’t Stop Believing. By this point, I think everyone thought we were crazy Americans. Because they then got up and performed like they were on American Idol. They were all really talented, except for the Lebanese men who rocked the house to a Bollywood song. It was a lot of fun, especially having Patience and Lucy along.
The next day we took advantage of actually being in Accra to see some of the sights we missed on the orientation trip. We told the taxi to take us the W.E.B. Dubois Center, which he took as the National Museum? It was OK cause we had planned to see both, but it was kinda funny that there was the mix up. The National Museum was nice, holding some artwork and a few artifacts. A lot of it was about archeological findings, but had some interesting information about traditional dances and textiles. We had the place to ourselves, which was nice, but I wish more people would be interested in the place so it can grow.
We then actually made it to the W.E.B. DuBois center. But we were confused on arrival because there was obviously a funeral being held there by the presence of about 100 people wearing black and red. Funerals are a huge deal here, especially on Saturdays, so it wasn’t weird to be occurring, but then we could only find the festivities and not the museum we came to see. We eventually got directed to the right place. We then toured the house Kwame Nkrumah gave DuBois when he moved to Ghana at the end of his life. They had a few pictures, some gifts given to him (including a signed book from Einstein), his graduation robes, a research library and his personal library he brought with him. Then we saw his final resting place. I wish there had been more at this very important site, but glad that we finally got there to see it.
Being in town also gave us the opportunity to finally attend church. Last week we went to the Legon Interdenominational Church, which is located on campus. We heard about it from one of the students who helped during our orientation. Their building is very nice, with a big balcony and projected lyrics on the screen in the front. It felt very familiar, almost like a service at home except for the bits of singing in Twi at parts. They were very friendly, even giving us pineapple juice after the service for being first time visitors.
They had a night celebration for Independence Day, which was the 6th of March. That was how I celebrated, spending most of the day resting and working on some school work. We thought they were going to be mostly showing this movie entitled Magdalena, but it ended up being a service in itself, with choir performances, poetry recitations, and the youth choreography group dancing. The actual movie Magdalena was an ordeal, with the dialogue first being much quieter than the dramatic music. Then it was first in French, so that needed to be fixed, followed by the sound mixing. When it was finally audible in a recognizable language, a large section seemed to be missing from the middle since the flashback clips at the end we hadn’t seen before… It was still a very interesting experience to spend the holiday with them.
This Sunday we went with a different orientation leader student, Shadrach, to his father’s church, which was in town. Some of those who we were going with were late, so we had to rush in some taxis to get there during the praise time. We finally get there, to find that it is simply a room in what I think is a school during the week, with about thirty very excited Ghanaians. Welcome to Victory Life Bible Church. Heather and I sat on the front row since that was where there was room, enjoying the tambourine playing and dancing matriarchs. They had testimonial time, with one of the musicians serving as translator from Twi, and most witnesses told their story and then led us in a song, leading to more dancing and shouts of amen. I probably said amen more times than I have ever said in my life combined. Shadrach’s father then got up to preach, and made a joke about how “our brethren who are joining us from Legon will be sharing a song after they have been touched by the sermon.” Except, it wasn’t a joke. He spoke on abiding in Christ and then called us to sing!! All of us didn’t really know what to do, so Heather struck up Amazing Grace. Which is a great song- but compared to their upbeat exciting tunes sounds so slow and sad!! We only made it through two verses, but they encouraged us so much. The ladies had us dance with them during the next praise songs and we shook so many hands after the service. It was just so wonderful to be among people that truly get their joy from the Lord and openly show it. We will definitely be going back, though we still want to visit some other congregations.
If you have stuck with it to the end, I severely apologize for the verboseness. My emotions are going a million directions at once, and apparently my writing style suffers there from. I will make efforts to update more often so that it doesn’t reach a point where I have so much to speak about.
I know that as the rains start soon and I start realizing that finals are just around the corner, I will be cherishing more and more things, trying to capture them all in my mind and therefore on paper.
Now that I’ve been here almost two months, I have gotten into some routines, like eating rice every day, boiling water (though this has been halted temporarily since our boiler was taken after we left it in the kitchen and we haven’t gotten a replacement yet), walking half an hour to get to class, hanging out laundry, sweating constantly, power outages. Things that astounded me when I first arrived are now normal. And I don’t know if this is a good or bad thing.
I remember Peter Gess showing us the “culture shock” diagram in all our orientations and I must admit that I have reached the plateau, I feel. Things aren’t exciting anymore but I am still learning things every day.
Perhaps since I have slowed down on the traveling and am settling in at the international hostel more is why I am feeling a bit cut off from Ghanaian experiences. Hopefully I can get over this slump. Don’t get me wrong- I still absolutely love it here. It is just that being immersed in such a drastically different environment is a lot sometimes.
My last trip I took was to Kumasi, which is the second biggest city in the country. Our Twi teacher Kofi, though he might have a bit of hometown bias, claimed that you hadn’t truly seen Ghana until you had spent time there. And I have to say that I agree with him. Kumasi is the center of the Asante region, which has the rich history of the Asante Kingdom who thwarted the British several times before successful colonization. Their cultural pride is still very prevalent, especially in being the center of traditional crafts.
Kente cloth is the biggest product and it is absolutely stunning. It is so brightly colored and come in a multitude of patterns. We got to see the weavers- who were all men- in their looms, using their feet to change between threads, moving their hands at a blazing speed. Our tour guide explained that they weave in strips in either single, double, or triple weave. A single strip of triple weave could take up to a week to create. After the strips are formed, they are sewed together to make the overall fabric.
The next craft village we visited makes the cloth stamped with the adrinka symbols, which have significance to all Akan people. They showed us the process to make the ink for the stamps- involving mashing tree bark and boiling the liquid for different stages for various colors. We were then allowed to select a strip of fabric and stamp the symbols we desired. This process was a bit hectic, with various vendors harassing us for attention and money while we waited to stamp our cloth. It gets frustrating sometimes when my skin color makes me seem to be a walking bank that if provoked enough will buy anything at any price. But it was really cool once I got to actually stamp my bright blue strip with the symbols for unity, child of God, hope, call to share, and forgiveness.
After these two major stops, we also went shopping in a wood carving village, the cultural center, and the major market in town. Though it felt that we were only spending money for the vast majority of the time, we also did get to visit the Asantehene Palace Museum. The Asantehene is the chief of the Asante people and the museum had various artifacts owned or used by the last few rulers. Our tour guide was lively, explaining what we were looking at since there were no labels and suggesting at various times that we should buy his book in the gift store at the end of the tour. It was nice to learn more about this major Ghanaian historical and cultural group, though the condition some of the artifacts were kept in made me sad since they will probably not be preserved very long.
Speaking of preservation, I have finally made contact with the National Archives again. I went through a period of questioning my motives of pursuing this volunteer position. Was it simply because it is kinda expected that all the American students will volunteer somewhere while they are here and I don’t mesh well with the other options of tutoring kids? But I finally decided that the opportunity to observe how archives are managed in the third-world context would be horrible to pass up.
So three weeks ago I finally went back to the archives, after my sickness and wrong contact numbers and contemplation had kept me away for awhile. The archives director wasn’t very concerned why there had been the time gap and soon got me connected with the director of the research room. This man, my supervisor, explained to me the process researchers use when they arrive and how we attendants, which apparently is what I am now, assist them in retrieving materials in the collection. I looked at the finding aid, which is a huge book that has all the documents listed in a somewhat organized manner but still difficult to use. He then showed me the repository, which is where the collection is kept. The air conditioning has been broken for weeks now and the electricity only works in sections of the stacks. Imagine piles and piles of boxes and papers that are in various states of falling apart. There are collections of documents from the colonial administration and after independence. But there are probably hundreds of items that they have no idea what they are. I asked if I could help process something, but each collection is so large that I couldn’t even look at everything in time, let alone create and index and box. He explained to me the lack of funds and trained staff that holds up their progress. They haven’t even received new materials since 2000 because the resource center is the first location items go and get sorted, which has not passed on anything in that period.
So my job is to sit in the research room and help find things in the repository for the searchers, hopefully something that is related to what they are looking for. When we were helping this one guy, I was with one of the other assistants (there are about 7 of us, for 3 current researchers?) and we knew which box the paper was supposed to be in. Under normal circumstances, we place the slip in the box, remove the document, let the researcher use it, replace it in the box, remove the slip, and file the paperwork. But this time the box did not hold the document, so we had to find a document similar to the one requested. A loss of the document was seen as a minor problem and no real efforts were made to find it. It was lost and that was it. Later, when I was filing documents back into the boxes, the paperwork was missing, so no trail was created to show that I had replaced the document. I am trying to not allow the disorganization to get to me but it is hard to fully accept that things can be here or there, with no care for if a researcher needs it or the necessity to preserve it. I am also passing the hours in the research room that my assistance is not needed by reading my own stuff and deciding which documents I want to look at myself, if I can find them.
For fun a few weekends ago, our group went to Champs for karaoke night. My roommate Patience and her good friend and our next door neighbor, Lucy came with us. The restaurant had “tex-mex” food, which beggars can’t be choosers. Patience tried her first burrito, and didn’t think it was that bad haha. It was funny for a cultural experience, because Ghanaians apparently take karaoke very seriously. Our group started out with the girls doing a poor rendition of No Scrubs, followed by Heather tearing down the house with Sweet Home Alabama with her natural entertaining self. Then Mitch, who is from West Virginia, led a group for Take Me Home Country Roads and then all of us ended our set with the classic Don’t Stop Believing. By this point, I think everyone thought we were crazy Americans. Because they then got up and performed like they were on American Idol. They were all really talented, except for the Lebanese men who rocked the house to a Bollywood song. It was a lot of fun, especially having Patience and Lucy along.
The next day we took advantage of actually being in Accra to see some of the sights we missed on the orientation trip. We told the taxi to take us the W.E.B. Dubois Center, which he took as the National Museum? It was OK cause we had planned to see both, but it was kinda funny that there was the mix up. The National Museum was nice, holding some artwork and a few artifacts. A lot of it was about archeological findings, but had some interesting information about traditional dances and textiles. We had the place to ourselves, which was nice, but I wish more people would be interested in the place so it can grow.
We then actually made it to the W.E.B. DuBois center. But we were confused on arrival because there was obviously a funeral being held there by the presence of about 100 people wearing black and red. Funerals are a huge deal here, especially on Saturdays, so it wasn’t weird to be occurring, but then we could only find the festivities and not the museum we came to see. We eventually got directed to the right place. We then toured the house Kwame Nkrumah gave DuBois when he moved to Ghana at the end of his life. They had a few pictures, some gifts given to him (including a signed book from Einstein), his graduation robes, a research library and his personal library he brought with him. Then we saw his final resting place. I wish there had been more at this very important site, but glad that we finally got there to see it.
Being in town also gave us the opportunity to finally attend church. Last week we went to the Legon Interdenominational Church, which is located on campus. We heard about it from one of the students who helped during our orientation. Their building is very nice, with a big balcony and projected lyrics on the screen in the front. It felt very familiar, almost like a service at home except for the bits of singing in Twi at parts. They were very friendly, even giving us pineapple juice after the service for being first time visitors.
They had a night celebration for Independence Day, which was the 6th of March. That was how I celebrated, spending most of the day resting and working on some school work. We thought they were going to be mostly showing this movie entitled Magdalena, but it ended up being a service in itself, with choir performances, poetry recitations, and the youth choreography group dancing. The actual movie Magdalena was an ordeal, with the dialogue first being much quieter than the dramatic music. Then it was first in French, so that needed to be fixed, followed by the sound mixing. When it was finally audible in a recognizable language, a large section seemed to be missing from the middle since the flashback clips at the end we hadn’t seen before… It was still a very interesting experience to spend the holiday with them.
This Sunday we went with a different orientation leader student, Shadrach, to his father’s church, which was in town. Some of those who we were going with were late, so we had to rush in some taxis to get there during the praise time. We finally get there, to find that it is simply a room in what I think is a school during the week, with about thirty very excited Ghanaians. Welcome to Victory Life Bible Church. Heather and I sat on the front row since that was where there was room, enjoying the tambourine playing and dancing matriarchs. They had testimonial time, with one of the musicians serving as translator from Twi, and most witnesses told their story and then led us in a song, leading to more dancing and shouts of amen. I probably said amen more times than I have ever said in my life combined. Shadrach’s father then got up to preach, and made a joke about how “our brethren who are joining us from Legon will be sharing a song after they have been touched by the sermon.” Except, it wasn’t a joke. He spoke on abiding in Christ and then called us to sing!! All of us didn’t really know what to do, so Heather struck up Amazing Grace. Which is a great song- but compared to their upbeat exciting tunes sounds so slow and sad!! We only made it through two verses, but they encouraged us so much. The ladies had us dance with them during the next praise songs and we shook so many hands after the service. It was just so wonderful to be among people that truly get their joy from the Lord and openly show it. We will definitely be going back, though we still want to visit some other congregations.
If you have stuck with it to the end, I severely apologize for the verboseness. My emotions are going a million directions at once, and apparently my writing style suffers there from. I will make efforts to update more often so that it doesn’t reach a point where I have so much to speak about.
I know that as the rains start soon and I start realizing that finals are just around the corner, I will be cherishing more and more things, trying to capture them all in my mind and therefore on paper.
Well hello miss attendant.
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad that your roommate can be friends with Heather (burritos...haha). Your adventures sound so fun and thrilling! I'm so glad that you get to work in the archives, even though it might drive you crazy. Oh, and church sounds SUPER baller! I wish I could have seen this rendition of Amazing Grace. Overall, I love you and I'm glad you're having a good time. I'm also incredibly glad that I got to talk to you the other day. Seeing your face was amazing. Maybe I'll leave you a video comment so that you can see mine.
All my love, honey. Always, Laur