Sunny Days

 

On Saturday we organised to take our 20 Orphanage kids plus their house mother and her daughter and the 2 of us  to the beach for the day.  After a bit of football shopping, all the more relevant as the African Cups of Nations starts, we all piled into a mini-bus designed for about 12 people for the 45 minute journey.  The kids loved the beach ,  played in the water and with the sports stuff we had taken.   We had a buffet/barbeque lunch, more play and back onto the bus back at about 5.30.  We are exhausted!

On Sunday  we took most of the day off,  spending time at a more local beach until mid afternoon when we went over to the Orphanage, spending what we would call family time, teasing and joking with the kids and playing games or sporty stuff – things you would find it hard to engage a British child with, skipping ropes,  ball games, ludo.

Ok, nearly done with the weekend, only have to organise our activities for next week……………so we’ve sat up making a few demonstration finger puppets and cutting up felt into enough squares to make 60 as a starter  – never a dull moment, oh yes, just the primary school session to think about now.

From the moment that I wake til the I lay my head to rest I am blessed………..

the congregation of the Word Alive Church chanted.  Church is a Big Thing here – quite an experience – very happy clappy, service was 2 hours long and lots of gospel  type singing.

There were  at least 2 different preachers, numerous other people in the official bits, preaching, singing, telling stuff.  A variety of musicians took turns to play the drums and keyboard, girls bashed tambourines. The  drum kit and microphone system seemed more suited to a gig at the O2, certainly i’ve never seen a drum kit in a church.

The theme was walking in the super abundance of the provisions of God, namely wealth, health, peace, joy, and love.  Some iconic preaching about how we are all blessed and in the abundance of god’s provisions compared to modern technology and how, for instance having an ipad does’nt  improve god’s love for us,  notwithstanding that, there was a lot of emphasize of donating to the Cause, and that God will provide.

The Word Alive Church is the sponsor and founder of the Orphanage and Livingstone School where we are teaching.  They provide the funding for both the Orphanage  and the School.

 

Free To Do what means most to me

Days are now taking on a structure and pattern.  Ghana gets up early – around 5.30 – we laze until  a bit later at 6.30 and are ready to go by 7.30.  We go to the Orphanage, and chat with the kids whilst they are getting ready and doing chores.  When it gets to 8.45 we go over to the School for the morning’s teaching – this is with a class of 40ish 5-7 year olds and comprises the usual primary stuff of basic words and numbers, singing and actions are very popular.   The morning passes between lessons and playtime -  both are equally noisy and manic – at all times there are numerous small kids wrapped around every part of me,  as the temperature is  30-odd degrees this can be  a bit stifling!

After lunch (luckily for us, our lunch is provided by our accommodation) we leave the School and go to the Refugee Camp – this houses about 5,000 refugees from the Ivory Coast.  A bit more challenging, not least as French is the language here – we mug up on words we think we need for the afternoon’s activity on the internet the previous evening.  We spend a couple of hours here doing creative-type stuff with some of the children – we take a different class each day so as many as possible get a go.  The school comprises 23 Unicef tent classrooms, and a lot of students – there are 600 kids in the primary school alone.

There is a noticeable difference between the refugee children and the other children we are interacting with.  The refugee children are reluctant to start the activities, they want us to provide examples of exactly what they should paint or draw.  Their creativity and imagination seems much more limited than the Orphanage children who happily just take the paints or whatever and get started on something without us having to give any demonstation at all.

After this we go back to the Orphange and do the same activity, play games or chat with the kids until about 6.00 when we head back to our relative luxury.

The evening is a quick return to the real world of grown-ups  – we are staying in the management mess facilities of Adamus Mining,  a gold mining company.   Adamus offer this support to the Humanities Exchange volunteers as part of their Social Responsibility programme for the local community.  Amongst preparing for our next day, we usually find time for a drink in the bar, and the opportunity to interact with Adamus personnel interlude  -  a bit of normalcy before our next children orientated day.

The Tenth Child

Today is Tuesday and we have been here since Sunday.  The Orphanage, the School and a Nurse Training School  are all on the same site, within a few hundred metres of each other, and all run by the Word Alive Mission.  The Mission is organised by Pastor Peace who showed us round the first day, and introduced us to Maxwell, a young high flyer who does the admin for the orphanage in terms of ensuring they have food and clothes.

The Orphanage has 20 children.   Maxwell explained that quite a few of the children there are not orphans at all, but are tenth children.  In Ghana it is thought that the tenth child is a curse on the family and therefore they are rejected from the family.  Some families will keep the tenth child and bring them up with the other children (as Maxwell himself was), the luckier tenth children end up in the Orphanage, the fate of the others is unknown.  There is no curse associated with the subsequent children, so the 11^th, 12^th and so on are all ok, and raised within the family.  Family sizes range from about 8 to 18 children!!

The Orphanage is not a harrowing experience, the children are remarkedly self contained and self sufficient.  They are reasonable well nourished, albeit on a rather monotonous diet of rice.  Lunch was a cartoon of orange juice and a individual packet of crackers.  The children have a house mother who organises them to do the chores, and so on.  There are the bare essentials, a bunk bed each, (seemingly no covers), some clothes, a shower – definitely not clear if it actually works – washing is more likely to be done outside under a hose pipe.  But like those who do not have much, the children are happy and play outside amusing themselves as there are  no toys or anything for them to use.  They are also polite and considerate – each of them greet us with a good morning or whatever is appropriate to the time of our visit.

Ready to go!

And guess what?  It’s Friday 13^th – yes, we have insanely decided to fly on this date! Although with all the excitement (and stress) of getting ready to go on a journey abroad, and in particular one that is going to be a new experience, this has faded into insignificance. 

 We are all ready to go.  Yesterday the house resembled a children’s arts and crafts warehouse.  Oodles of goodies have been donated by very generous colleagues and friends, including descriptions of songs and games that we can use to teach with.  A discount school supplies website has been a cheap source of other resources.  All of this has been crammed into 3 suitcases – thank goodness for the additional baggage allowance!  We are taking a very, very meagre amount of clothes and personal stuff.

The Humanity Exchange has provided lots of pre-information, organized our internal flights, and someone to meet us at Accra Airport.  Communication has been by email and very easy, with quick replies.  We have a list of contacts for use once in Ghana, and a local company provides support in terms of a driver and contacts if we need local help.   Our accommodation is in the accommodation facility of a mining company, Adamus Resources, and we will also get our meals there.   All very re-assuring to the novice volunteer, particularly one who may miss sausage and mash!

 Of course, it’s not only about ensuring the basic needs of transport, accommodation, food, and safety and concerns about this.    I am expecting that meeting the children and seeing how they live and what their support networks are, will be emotional and poignant.  Aspects may be disturbing, equally  others may be uplifting.  I am intending to go with an open mind, to respond to the kids in a honest and affectionate way – I hope I am up to the challenge.

Excited, Daunting and Scary

Well , the festive season is almost over, the turkey finished, the chaos of the sales over. Yippee!

Right – on then with my New Year project, which I’m very excited about, and not a lot of time until it starts on 13^th January (a Friday, should anyone want to cross their fingers for me).

Firstly I’m Sheila,  full time job in supply logistics (no, I don’t drive a truck, I organize transport of fuel).  Going to go to Ghana with my daughter to work in an orphanage and a refugee camp.  I’ve not done anything like this before, although I like working with children, and have volunteered in a local school both to help in the classroom and as a school governor.  I’m doing this as I would rather use some of my holiday time to  do something that is giving back to the community.

Work is always pretty manic for me, but I’ve done the admin of the trip, booked flights, got VISA – well on 2^nd attempt – scary amount of  process and registered envelopes.  Vaccinations and malaria tablets also sorted out.

Now for the more fun bit.  I’ve contacted the airline for increased baggage allowance so we can take supplies, pencils, crayons, painting, arty stuff, out to the children.  Virgin Altantic have generously doubled our baggage allowance for this.

I have chatted to my friends about what sort of activities and elements might be helpful.  And I’ve emailed my colleagues for contributions to our supplies cache.

Everyone I know is also really excited and generous with ideas and money for this trip.  All are looking forward to reading the blogs, viewing the photos and following us on our journey physically and emotionally.

I, on the other hand, whilst really excited, also find the scheme a bit daunting and scary – the unknown is always a challenge!  So watch this space.