Search for the Goat Killer

July 18th, Saboba. 5:00 pm.

We were sitting in the office, Thomas and I. The bright heat of the Sunday afternoon, coupled with a busy few days and an oncoming cold were weighing down on me, and I slid in and out of focus as Thomas talked about decentralization to Joseph, the Ghanaian university student we were meeting with. Periodically, a light breeze would dare slip through the screened windows; it felt like heaven on my sweaty face every time it happened.

Thomas’s ring tone snapped me out of it, and I sat up as he had a rapid phone conversation in Linkpapa. I shook the sleep out of my eyes, trying to hide my tiredness, and stood up to stretch. Thomas got off the phone, and calmly stated: “I must get home.. Umm, my wife says someone’s killed my goats.” My sleep vanished immediately.

“Ayh!! But why?!” Joseph started. Sensing an interesting experience coming on, I hopped on a motorbike with Joseph while Thomas got on another. We made our way through the convoluted network of small dirt paths across the vast fields of the savanna to the outskirts of town, to Thomas’s village.

We arrived at Thomas’s house to his very angry wife. Madame Comfort is heavyset, with ever-ruffled hair and a composure that resonates strength. She has a large patch of pinkish-white skin under her chin, possibly from a burn in the past. She was one of the first people I met in Saboba, who taught me my first words in Linkpapa, and was always ready to crack jokes together. That was not true today, however.

Sweating from the heat, Madame Comfort scathingly explained the situation as a crowd gathered. As she was speaking, she unloaded the large, wide metal basin balanced on her head and dropped it on the ground. I concealed my surprise, as in it were two dead goats! Necks broken, curled together, I could smell the growing stench of their flesh. I stared at the eyes of one of them, open, cold, and dead. Flies crawled across the eyeballs, and I thought “ugh, that would be so uncomfortable! If only the goat would blink…”

Meanwhile, around me, the conversation went on in Linkpapa. I looked at Joseph, waiting for a translation. Suddenly, the crowd – now grown to about 10 people – was moving. Comfort lifted the goats back on her head, and we all walked across several fields to the entrance of another compound.

The compound was unkempt, with a broken mud wall that reminded me of old ruins. Brush, garbage, and feces from various animals (hopefully only animals) was everywhere. Small fields around the compound had been farmed in haphazard lines, freshly plowed and sowed for the rainy season. Several goats were tied up here and there, to anything from logs to large pots. A man, shirtless, probably in his mid-twenties, was lounging outside the compound. He got up from his small island of shade as we approached. His mannerism was loose and uncouth.

Madame Comfort began speaking aggressively, pointing at the goats and the man alike. She was accusing someone (I think someone the man knew) of killing the goats. An exchange of ideas took place, people talked about what they had witnessed, and examined the goat carcasses offering their best guesses to the means and the time of the killing. A suspect was decided on, contrary to Comfort’s suspicions, and after calming her down we got on the motorbikes again and drove to another nearby community to visit the suspect.

“There is no reason for this! The goats were tied up, and all the crops in the area are yet to germinate!” Thomas was annoyed. Apparently if the goats had eaten someone’s crop, the killings would have been more justified.

Upon arriving at yet another compound, I caught a brief glimpse of a man bolting into a mud hut as we walked in. We greeted the women who were cooking food, and took a seat on a nearby wooden bench to be received by the landlord. We didn’t have to wait long. The man who had run into the hut walked out, looking fresh; he had just taken a bath. He was an older man, somewhere in his late-fifties or early-sixties. He grabbed a stool for himself and Thomas explained the situation in Linkpapa. In my mind, he was (in a roundabout way) asking “did you kill my goats?”

The man, calmly (by Ghanaian standards), denied the allegations and explained himself. Apparently this man owns a field beside the crime scene, where he farms. I looked into his eyes; I thought to myself “this is an honest man.” It was crystal clear he wasn’t deceiving us. I think Thomas shared my assessment, since we got up and decided to revisit the crime scene. “It must have been that shirtless man! There was something off about him…”

Back on the motorbike, this time with the old man joining us with his, our mini-cavalcade made it’s way back to the unkempt compound. The shirtless man was still there, and a brief argument ensued. Thomas and the old man went to the middle of the field, looking at the crops (that hadn’t germinated) and talking about the allegations. Joseph and I talked to the shirtless man, who said that the old man was denying making threatening comments towards animals coming close to his farm, just earlier in the day. Clearly, if he’s denying it, he must be guilty!

“Not necessarily,” Joseph explained, since the goats looked bloated and therefore had been dead for quite a while. The shirtless man, pointing to the sky, and estimated (using the position of the sun) that the old man was tending his fields around 2 o’clock. So it mustn’t be him…

We all returned then to Thomas’s compound, behind which his wife was standing with a group of familiar faces from the community. More questioning, more deliberating, and it was decided (with conviction this time) that a man named Bisuwaa was responsible. Thomas’s wife’s original suspicions were right! We then walked to Bisuwaa’s house, to confront him; he wasn’t there, but we talked to some people who confirmed that he was the killer.

Next stop: police station. Another short ride on the motorbike. Thomas wanted to file a complaint, which resulted in us being lectured by a deluded police chief on why we didn’t come directly to the police station. He was angry because of all the investigation that had already been done. His reaction would make sense if the police were competent, but all my interactions with police here have highlighted that they are even more dysfunctional than the district government. The complaint was filed, and proceedings began. It was past 7 now, so we went home for the day.

—

Thomas came into the office today, victorious because the killer has been arrested and is behind bars till he pays the GHC 60 per goat (a total of GHC 120, about $100). Arrested?! The jail cells here are terrible!

“Goats are not that expensive,” I inquired.

“No, but they were going to reproduce! I have to factor that in…” Thomas replied. “But the ones you buy, they will also reproduce…” I thought in my mind, but let it pass as another observation of attitudes in rural Ghana.

“That man is a butcher! He kills and sells animals everyday!” Thomas exclaimed. “He’s becoming notorious-oh!” But by definition, a butcher kills animals…” I just smiled inside at my own non-understanding and continued working.

—

Just another day in Saboba! I refrained from writing up all my thoughts and analysis of everything, because I figured this is just a good story and a break from serious blog posts. Let me know what you think! Feel free to ask questions!

Rural Realities II: A Day in the Life…

A few months ago.
Toronto, ON.

“8:45 am! SHIT!” For the umpteenth day in a row I was going to miss class. “No, not this time!” rang through my mind as I slapped the snooze button one last time on my alarm that morning, jumped out of bed, and bolted to the washroom to get ready. I sprung on the tap, washed my hands and face, brushed my teeth, and got back to my room to quickly get changed. Grabbing my backpack and locking my room door, I ran down to the kitchen and threw slices of English muffin in the toaster; in the meanwhile I packed the lunch I had made for myself previously, and had stored in the fridge. My muffin popped out, I threw some jam on it, wrapped it in a kitchen towel and put it in my backpack. Out the door, on my bike, ripped down to school. I walked into my Stats class by 9:10.

Present Day.
Saboba, Ghana.

“Cuckkoo! Cuckkoo!” “Qaaannkk!! Qaaannkk!” Roosters. Crows. Laughter from the women working early in the morning. My consciousness surfaces from a light sleep. I bring my watch up to my eyes and hold down the “light” button to be informed it’s 5:15 am. My alarm, set for 5:30, has not gone off yet; I sigh. I’m drenched in sweat. My t-shirt, without which I would be devoured by insects, is soaked through in most places and sticks to my skin as I peel myself off my bed sheet. I duck out of my mosquito net, put on shorts, and walk out of my mud hut.

Everyone else in my host family is already awake. It’s market day today, and my host-mother Dana is sitting with a massive (about 1 m in diameter) metal bowl crushing and mixing powdered yam with maize. The family would sell the mix, fruits of their farming and labor, in the market all day. I seek out water in the basins of an adjacent mud hut, filling half a cup quickly before someone from the family troubles themselves to help me. The water has already been carried from the borehole, about a 10 minute walk away, to the compound by the women of the house before 5 am.

I grab my tooth brush, go out of the compound, and brush my teeth with the water in the cup. It’s already 5:30 am. I need to go to the toilet; I grab toilet paper from my room, and sleepily trudge my way past several compounds and through an acre of fallow farm land. There, in the middle of the field, there is a “toilet” in the form of a concrete slap on a hole, and a reed that surrounds part of it. I stomp on the block to scare away the lizards and salamanders, and settle in among the fleas to do my business.

I walk back to the house, look for soap in my room, grab some water again, and fumble clumsily to wash my hands while pouring water from the cup. 5:50. Now I go for my run; in West Africa, nature will hurt you unless you take care of your body. Guaranteed. I run to the river – the Ghana-Togo border – and back. It’s 6:20. I take a bucket shower, I won’t describe the logistical issues around getting dressed. It’s 6:40. My host mother prepares tea for everyone and eggs for me on hot coals, a process that takes a good 20-30 mins (eggs are not what the family eats for breakfast, they are not accustomed to it; they eat left overs from dinner; but as much as I’ve argued they refuse to let me do the same). It’s now 7:00. I grab my stuff, and my bike, lock my door, and set off for town on the dirt road. The bike wheels are perpetually deflated, and it’s hot so I go slow. I stop in town several times to talk to and chill with people I know, and by the time I get to work it’s just before 8.

—

The contrast is pretty crazy eh? 20 minutes in Canada to 3 hours in Ghana? Granted, I don’t run or shower in the mornings in Canada. But I don’t fetch water or cook in Ghana either. The message is, things here take time. More importantly, they take human power. Our lives in Canada, they are so mechanized. Water is at our fingertips. Our food processing (like Dana was doing) is done in big machines in factories. We have fridges and toasters and light. Here, things wear you down. Many people rest in the middle of the day: it’s simply too hot, the work is laborious, and people work hard. They still have a blast doing it, and enjoy their lives; but it’s still taxing on the body.

—

I ate at my coworker Thomas’s house the night I arrived in Saboba. Apart from his wife and three children, his late brother’s children and other members of the family live with him too.

“In Ghana,” he says, “if your family sends you to school and you start to earn, you are obliged to take care of others in the family.” He tells me how people are quite regularly in and out of his house, and in fact at any given time there are no less than 10 people living in his house. He is also sending his kids to school, and has paid for several of his brothers to go to school as well – he comes from a family of 27 children.

“Ah! You’ve done well!” I say, reeling from the thought. Even when people are successful in making some money, it’s many-a-time spread around to benefit the entire family. This is one of the many factors that contribute to the slowness of economic improvement in Ghana; wealth is diluted. It’s a good thing, it’s an admirable thing, it’s a difficult thing.

“Hmm..” Thomas continues, “education is a risky investment here. You see, even after university the jobs are simply not there for people here. A farmer won’t send his children to school, because then who will work on the farm? And what money will school bring? So sometimes a family will send one child to school, and if he does not make money it’s seen as a wasted investment.”

Thomas explains how he strongly believes rural villagers must understand the importance of education, and send their children to school. After this conversation, though, if I was a farmer struggling to make ends meet I don’t know if I would choose to send my kids to school…

Rural Realities I: Bits and Pieces

Just a shout out to everyone who commented on my last blog post. You really got my juices flowing again, either with encouragement or with extremely valid questions. So thank you! Sorry I don’t have the ability to reply to you all, but just know that I’m pumped with energy again, ready to make things happen, and much of that is credit to all of you!

I strip down, behind a mud wall that is a bathing shelter. The cool breeze of the evening feels good on my skin after a day of sweating profusely in 35 degree heat. I kneel down to the half-filled bucket of cool borehole water, take some in my cupped hands, and splash it on myself. My head, my face, then my body. I stand up to grab soap, and in the process look up at the night sky, where every star in the universe is emerging in the darkness, dominated by the powerful shine of the full moon. It’s comfortably cool, but the wind on my wet skin causes it to erupt in goosebumps anyway. I quickly lather myself down in soap, splash water all over to get (most of) the suds off, and (kind-of) dry myself off with the 2 yards of cloth that acts as a towel.

That, my friends, is the bucket-shower experience. It’s amazing how EFFICIENT it is. I didn’t even use the entire half-bucket of water! How much water do we use to shower in Canada?

—

The mosquito net prevents a lot more than mosquitos! I’m just gonna leave it at that. Many people in the village sleep on reed or woven mats; I have opted to choose something a little more comfortable, and sleep on four pieces of foam arranged in a strip

The mud-and-cement hut I live in.

I’m living with a family of 6. My host father, Elijah, is a farmer in his late-thirties (I’m guessing). I think he looks older than he is, though. His wife’s name is Dana, and they have four kids (three girls and a baby boy). The oldest is a 14 year old daughter, who is in school and thus speaks English. The youngest is just 6 months old, and amazingly cute.

I’m staying in a village called Boagbaln. It’s about 1.5 km from Saboba town, so just over 2 km from where I work. This gives me the opportunity to really get a feel for rural life while experiencing the town as well. Engineers Without Borders volunteers are encouraged to integrate into the communities as much as possible, to really get down to the nitty-gritty of life in villages. I’ve chosen to spend most, if not all of my time here living in this community, and trying as much as possible to live like people here do. I bike to work every morning.

The family compound. That's my host father, Elijah, standing in the center. Unfortunately he turned away from the camera, but more photos will come!

“I’m making a yam farm this year,” Elijah says, “It’s in Togo.” The Ghana-Togo border – marked by River Oti – is just a 30-or-so minute walk away from Boagbaln. I go to the border and back for my morning run everyday (people find this running thing hilarious, by the way).

Other than yam, Elijah grows 1 acre of groundnut and 2 acres of something that I’ve never heard of.

The entire family has been absolutely amazing to me, and we’ve become close despite the thick language barrier. They are doing so much for me despite my insistence otherwise, that I don’t even know how to repay them. That’s a longer story for another blog post, though.

—

A Borehole. This is not the regular model, but you get the idea. The large lever has to be pumped up and down, and ground water comes out from the tap.

I joined my friend Phillip in fetching water yesterday. This was the second time I’ve been to the borehole. I’m lucky that the village I’m living with has a borehole, and even luckier that the compound I’m in is just a 10 minute walk from it. A borehole is a narrow shaft drilled fairly deep into the ground. A hand pump is mounted on the top so groundwater can be pumped up for use. I’m not sure if there is a filter in the pump (I hazard a guess there is), but the water comes out remarkably clear. I have been drinking it for nearly a week, and so far so good!

When we got to the borehole, women were pumping the water vigorously, with full-body motion as it gushed out of the pipe. I pumped some as well, attracting amazing amounts of laughter from everyone around.

In the morning, and really throughout the day, women are carrying unimaginable amounts of water on their heads from the borehole (and some, unsafely, from the river) to their homes. Some walk for 100 m, some for 10 km. It really depends. A large amount of time and energy is spent fetching water each day.

Road heading to town. I took this while on my bike, to sneakily capture the women carrying water. I did not want to appear tourist-y!

Just to give you an idea.. a water canister that women and children carry on their heads holds about 12 L of water (6-8 year olds are commonly doing this). That is 12 kg of weight! I can’t even carry it in my arms for long!

—

RANDOM DISCOVERY: Did you know how ugly sheep sound? It’s not the cute “mehh” in cartoons; really, it’s an obnoxious “BAAHHRRR”. I nearly choked on the water I was drinking when I first heard one, because it’s such a hilariously ugly sound!
Sheep, goats, some cows, roosters, roosters, chickens, fowls, and roosters. They are everywhere. Roaming on the roads (which are really dirt paths), roaming in out of the compound at home, sneaking into the food-stores mud-hut to be chased out by 3-5 yr old children with sticks.

—

That’s it for now; there is WAAYYY too much to talk about in terms of rural living, so stay tuned for more! Hope you enjoy the pictures. I know they’ve been long overdue.

Saboba 1

Saboba 2

Saboba 3

Thats my village in the distance. This road leads to River Oti, and then to Togo.

Nuts and Bolts: Governance in Ghana

Sorry for the lengthy post, but I thought it was important. They won’t be this long again I promise!

This is a complete LOW-DOWN on the work I’m doing. I really wanted to communicate it to all of you in some detail, because I know you’re curious. That said, if something is unclear let me know! I’ve tried to be detailed enough to paint a good picture, without going overboard.

I mentioned before that over the last couple of decades the government in Ghana has been in the process of decentralization. This means that decisions should theoretically be taken at the district and community level, where problems are known best. These could be water supply issues, schools and teachers, agricultural services for farmers, medical services (doctors, hospitals), among others. Below is the government of Ghana in theory:

At all levels, the decentralized departments (food, health... there are 11 major ones in total) should be working together. Services and infrastructure should be planned and implemented at the district level, monitored by the regional level, and overseen by the national level.

In reality, though, the system is broken; shot to pieces. Donors (World Vision, UNICEF, CIDA, World Bank, and hundreds of others) fund projects with a preset purpose in mind. This undermines the government system that is supposed to identify what the people NEED and implement projects accordingly. The picture really looks like this:

There is a lot of influence (donors, politics) that skew the power. The departments don't communicate with eachother, and report to their national level counterparts directly. There is no procedure or system in place to say otherwise.

Also, the way the government functions is really reactive. The national government says: “do a survey!” and a survey is done, data is collected. The government says: “make a plan!” and a plan is made. The government says: “report on projects!” and projects are implemented and reported on. But the link between these activities does not exist. Data is not used to plan. Plans are not used to implement projects. And the projects are not used to collect data and see what has changed as a result.

There is a HUGE push right now from both the Ghanaian government and a Danish development project to fix this system. It involves pooling all the money Ghana is getting from donors, and using that to provide the districts with grants. The grants are awarded based on the districts’ leadership, planning, and data management systems, among other factors evaluated in assessments called the FOAT (Functional Organization Assessment Tool). This grant creates incentive for the district to do well. Eventually, as districts improve their process, the plan is to (over the next decade) make FOAT based on changes in the actual indicators of district development (illness rate, water access, test scores, school enrollment). The hope is that as their communication, planning, and data processes improve, we will start seeing improvement in the quality of life in impoverished communities.

MY JOB:

This gets a little complicated. I am part of a team of 9 Engineers Without Borders volunteers in the Northern Region. 6 of us are short-term, like me, and are embedded at the district level of government in 6 different districts (out of a total of 20 in the region). Out of the 3 long-term volunteers, 1 is working with a huge development initiative that spans the whole region; 1 is embedded at the regional level of government; 1 is working to engage stakeholders, and funnel all the knowledge and lessons from our work to donors, government agencies, and the Danish development initiative I mentioned.

The 6 of us embedded in districts are trying to develop and implement 3 different systems; the regional government will then potentially use these systems for all 20 districts in the region. The systems are:

1. An database that tracks the key issues in across all the communities in the district, and across all the departments (health, water/sanitation, roads, education, agriculture)
2. A process for using this data (making it visual, developing easy ways to see which communities are priorities for certain resources such as water) to inform the planning process.
3. A monitoring system: a database for information relating to projects in the district, and process for interfacing with the regional level who will monitor plans and projects. There is already a database in place at the regional level, as a result of this Danish initiative.

For these systems to work, they must be developed with the district, for the district. I can’t just draw up a plan and implement it. I have to work with everyone: the planning officer, people from every decentralized department, the engineering department, data people, etc.

Right now, there are broken links in the planning process for infrastructure and services. My job is to attempt to strengthen the links.

Key challenges:

• In Ghana, things move sssllloooowwww. People don’t appreciate directness like in Canada, but take it easy. ALL THE TIME. It gets frustrating, but it’s not something I can change. It’s cultural, and something that I have to adapt to and work with. In a way it’s nice, but the fact that I’m only here for three more months is constantly on my mind; there is SO much to do, my brain is going at light speed all the time but I’m paralyzed by the system. All the knowledge I’m accumulating from all over the place feeds into other interactions, and leads to connections with people and future possibilities; but there isn’t enough time!
• Authority is ridiculous. No one will do anything without the director’s permission. I mean anything. Initiative is culturally not appreciated. Again, frustrating as hell. I’ve been (slowly) trying to push people to take action, and constantly communicating with the leaders myself. It’s really difficult though, and really slow.
• The different departments (who should be working together) are up to 1 km apart in different buildings! Also, all of the workers who are supposed to work in a TEAM have separate offices with doors shut; how the hell does this make sense?!
• People are underpaid. There is no motivation to work, to do things well or to do them right.
• Computer skills are extremely poor. The communication barrier adds another level of craziness in trying to tutor someone.

Here is what I’m trying to do right now:

• Pushing the creation of a Medium-Term (4 year) Development Plan for Saboba district. The district does not even have a planning officer (yeah, crazy, I know) so they are behind schedule. The good thing is that the previous volunteer at this district really worked hard to ensure issues were identified based on data. I’m working with an awesomely determined (but unfortunately by-the-book) man named Thomas to improve his computer skills through writing the plan.
• Making connections with people in the different departments, and will hopefully work with them to identify issues for their sections in the database. I am also going to try and bring them together for anything from computer training, lunch, or a meeting in hopes of opening up communication channels.
• Working with both Thomas and a sharp woman named Patience to develop the database. This way, they can improve their excel skills while actually applying them to something practical. The first challenge is getting Patience assigned to work with me! (she’s been assigned to another department, and management has to deal with it)
• Working with the Engineering department to develop the monitoring system, while developing their excel skills. I haven’t given much thought to this yet, but it’s only my 4th day at the office.
• Going to project sites (I went to 2 yesterday) to ask questions, and understand the process for project implementation and monitoring that is used at the district.

My hopes are that through a parallel efforts of creating the databases, using them while writing the plan, and connecting key people from different departments to each other, information flow will become better, and the planning process will improve.

New Realities

Tamale, Northern Region, Ghana
May 16^th. 2:00 pm.
~35 degrees Celsius (I had to throw this in)

“Salaminga! How are you!?”*
“Hellooo!! How is it?!”
Cars honking. Kids screaming. People haggling. People talking enthusiastically, loudly.

The smell of food. The smell of sweat. The smell of dirt. The smell of sewage.

Fields close to the EWB house in Tamale. Note the mud huts and compounds in the distance; this is where people usually live.

The heat. The afternoon sun beating down on you just intensifies the always-present, intrinsic heat. Your skin never dries. You drink up to 5 L of water a day, and it gushes out through every pore in your body, failing to keep you cool. You bathe only to get the dirt off; don’t bother with the sweat.

Children are everywhere. Kids playing on the streets. Kids helping their mothers sell goods from roadside stalls. 1-to-2-year olds chilling responsibly next to the open sewer, wearing clothes many sizes too big for them, while their parents work.

Foods of every kind, slippers, sandals, phone credit, technology, cloth, clothes, toiletries, water, pop (or “minerals,” as they say here in Ghana)… Everything under the sun is available, well, under the sun. By the roadside, or in the open market.

The market… that is just something else. It’s roadside stalls, hundreds of them, packed so close together that there are places that are completely covered. Men are chopping meat at every corner, there are tailors by the dozen, and you have to swim your way through people; there are more people in the narrow spaces between the stalls than you’d think physically possible.

There is one thing you see everywhere, though: smiles. People are always laughing, always greeting, always friendly. It takes double the time to get anywhere walking, because of the random conversations you have on the way. Through the crazy climate, through the unreliable water and electricity, through the gaps between peoples’ wealth, through the images of poverty… the smiles shine through like a beam of energy, a power that radiates through not only Tamale, but Ghana.

It’s a stark contrast to Toronto, where people don’t even say “hi” when getting into a cab or ordering at a café. We may have all the wealth, the cleanliness, the services… but our social capital in Canada leaves a lot to be desired.

—

A major street in Tamale. Not only are their no lanes on the road, but really there is no differentiation between where cars, bikes, motos (motorbikes), pedestrians, or vendors should be.

I’ve spent the last six days in Tamale, the main “metropolis” or big city in the Northern Region of Ghana. We (the 16 volunteers who’ll be in Ghana) landed in Accra last Sunday night, got a bit of sleep, headed to the bus station at 6 am and took a 12-hr bus ride to Tamale. One of the volunteers is working in the southern part of the country, so she stayed behind with a long-term EWB volunteer in Accra.

Check out this earlier post for background and a map: Destination: Saboba, Northern Region, Ghana

Over the last six days, the 15 of us have spent time:

• Getting acclimatized
• Making sure we have everything we need (money!) before heading to our districts, which will be much more rural.
• Understanding the culture a little, language a little.
• Started work: not at the office, but worked with the long-term EWB volunteers on what we’ll be doing for the next four months.
• 1 person got malaria, 7 have gotten sick. I’m doing good for now… Don’t worry, though, it’s common and all part of the experience!

The governance team (6 short-terms including me, and 3 long-terms) is going to be in a meeting tomorrow with all the District Directors and Planners from all the government offices we’ll be working in. By tomorrow evening, if all goes well, I’ll be in Saboba and ready to start work on Tuesday.

I want to write about all the actual “work” stuff, but that’ll make this an enormously long post… so stay tuned for the goodies on governance in Ghana coming up in the next post. In the meanwhile (through commenting) please let me know what you’d like me to write more about! It could be anything from details on the things listed above, to food, to culture, to language (Ghanaian-English is amazing, by the way). Holler back!

*“Salaminga” roughly means “traveler,” and is associated with a “white person” in Degbani (the major language in Tamale).