How is the Coolness?

“How is the coolness” is the typical morning greeting in Ghana (morning being pre-8am, when it’s marginally cooler than the rest of the day).

It’s coming up on one week since our arrival in Ghana, and adjustment is proving to be a lengthy process, aided greatly by pepto chewables. Adjustment to the heat hasn’t been so bad (unfortunately it’s going to be hotter in the Upper East), and I’m finding that I’m actually quite impressed with the quality and cleanliness of the latrines. The major problem, which I did not expect, has been the food. In Canada, there are almost no foods that I will not eat, so I assumed I would easily acquire a taste for Ghanaian food. So far, that has not been the case, but I have at least found a few items that will sustain me until I work up an appetite for balls of fermented corn mush (and various other mush-ball foods) – packs of frozen chocolate milk (AKA fanchoco), fanta, rice and beans, mangoes, and bananas. I do have faith though, that I will come to like the food, it’s all just part of the adjustment.

We’ve spent the week in Tamale, doing training workshops on implementing the Agriculture as a Business (AAB) program. It’s been incredibly useful, I now know much more about the program and the specifics of the district that I’ll be working in. I met two of the Agric. Extension Agents (AEAs) from the district, Benleo and Sumaila (I’ve probably mutilated the spelling); Benleo has a bachelor’s in Agriculture from Cape Coast university, and Sumaila has a degree in Agricultural Engineering from the Polytechnic College in Tamale, so they definitely have the knowledge base to be effective extension agents. They had an intro to AAB from EWB long-term volunteers today, so they’ll be able to help me train the rest of the AEAs when I arrive in the district.

Just a bit of background on what an AEA does: AEAs work for the Ministry of Food and Agriculture in every district in Ghana, and their job is to provide support to farmers; currently, this is done on a more technical and yield-focused basis. AAB is a tool that AEAs can use to improve the support they are giving and ensure that their services actually lead to increased income for the farmer groups. My role in this is to teach the AEAs the facilitation skills required with the AAB curriculum, and attend their meetings with the farmer groups to provide feedback on their delivery of the curriculum.

Sunday I’ll travel to Builsa, and Monday to Saturday I’ll be doing my village stay somewhere outside Sandema, the capital of Builsa. During the village stay I’ll be living with a family and learning about farming (possibly helping with planting?), so that I can get a bit of a perspective into the life of a farmer and their family; even a short exposure to the lifestyle of rural Ghanaians will be so useful in understanding the challenges faced by the farmer groups I’ll be working with this summer.

This post is already longer than I’d prefer it to be, so I’ll cut it off here with some general comments: I absolutely love how friendly and helpful people are, I’m really excited to start work, and I’m excited but also a little bit scared (from a getting sick perspective) about the village stay. I have so much more that I’d like to say, so if you’re interested, email me or post a question and I’d love to share more!

Anne