Chelsea, Mike, Clayton and Mollie all had a long day of travel yesterday, arriving in Atlanta around 5 AM (eastern time). We had a 5 hour layover in Atlanta, but spent most of it getting through customs, talking with very helpful Delta and United representatives to get our luggage checked through to Hancock, going through security, and sampling some American food!
We had 10 hours to wait in Chicago, but we found a nice secluded spot by O'Hare's indoor herb and vegetable garden that supplies restaurants in the airport with fresh greens! There were a bunch of comfy chairs that we claimed and lots of delicious food options close by. We finally arrived in Hancock around 11 PM (eastern time), a full 30 hours after we stepped onto the plane in Accra.
Thank you all for your patience in the blog postings, they should all be up by now and I hope you all enjoy catching up with our latest adventures!
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Accra and Goodbye Ghana – August 3
We wanted to make a few last touristy stops around Accra to
see the important monuments and other miscellaneous places that we hadn’t seen,
since we had only been in the city for a few hours on the day we first arrived
in Ghana.
Our first visit was to the tomb of the first President of
Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah who declared Ghanaian independence in 1957. His tomb was a large marble enclosure, Designed
by a Ghanaian architect, constructed by the Chinese, with marble from
Italy. It was shaped like a sort
of tree trunk with all of the outside walls curving upwards. A nearby guide told us that the tree
shape had been cut off to represent works unfinished by the President, whose
government was overthrown by a military coup. Later, driving by the very large Flagstaff House estate
where the current President’s of Ghana always live, we could see that the
massive Presidential Palace was also designed similarly. In front of the tomb, pointing inland
towards Ghana, was a large statue of Nkrumah, supposedly on the exact spot
where he stood to declare the independence of Ghana. Seven other statues of horn blowers on each side, as well as
one statue playing native drums and one playing a native string instrument to
represent the North and the South cultures of Ghana flanked the statue.
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| The Tomb |
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| A horn blower |
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| The Presidential Residence |
After visiting the tomb we took a quick tour through the
Kwame Nkrumah Museum nearby, which housed many photographs of him with famous
figures like, Queen Elizabeth, Fidel Castro, Chairman Mao, and President
Kennedy. They had others artifacts
too, like pens or desks corresponding with some significant time in his life.
The next visit was to the large indoor art and Ghanaian
wares market at the Cultural Center not far away. It reminded us particularly of a less overwhelming and
smaller Central Market of Kumasi, but the whole thing had a roof over it. We had a chance to pick up any last
minute souvenirs and gifts that we had missed from the rest of our time
here. Most of the market contained
what we’d seen all over, like masks, jerseys, cloth, kente, all concentrated in
area (and for higher prices too).
Our final stop in Accra was the Mall, a place that was
eerily American. We ate in the
food court to provide a variety of options, both Ghanaian and American. Here we were also able to print off a
photo of us with Emmanuel to put into the frame that we all signed for him as a
thank you for all his work with us!
After picking up our things from the guesthouse, we headed straight to
the airport to check our bags in.
That gave us a brief time outside to say our goodbyes to our friends
Emmanuel, Govina, Cornelia, and Baba.
The international terminal in Accra is very nice and we had a good time
swapping photos as we waited at our terminal, but all too soon the time came to
say goodbye to Ghana and to say goodbye to Helena, who took a flight to visit
family in Austria before returning to the US.
Down to just four, we safely boarded our flight around 9 PM
Ghana time and started our journey home!
Written by Clayton and Mollie
Cape Coast – July 2
We had an early start to the morning, rolling out of Kumasi
at 6 AM with Emmanuel and Govina.
Emmanuel wanted us to get to see a few more points of note in Ghana
before our departure. We drove
directly to Cape Coast, Ghana and started near there at Kakum National
Park. The main attraction at Kakum
is the canopy walk through and above the rainforest. We all made it and while some held on tighter to the ropes
than others, everyone had the courage to cross the entire way!
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| A view of the rainforest |
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| Chelsea crossing |
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| Clayton documenting |
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| Mike is happy |
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| Mollie in the middle |
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| Helena hanging on for dear life - or just tree hugging |
After lunch at Kakum, we headed to the Castle in Cape
Coast. We had a very nice tour
guide who gave us an idea of how the castle operated over 300 years ago. He showed us through the slave dungeons
and captain’s quarters and everything in between, including the “door of no
return”. The castle is impressive
and the location is right on the Atlantic Ocean and spectacular, but yet the
history is so mind-bogglingly atrocious. Despite its history it was exciting and even peaceful to see
the Atlantic from Ghana, with the waves crashing into the castle walls and the
horizon spanning on, seemingly forever.
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| The group with the castle behind and the dungeons below |
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| View from the castle of the coast |
That night we traveled to Accra and stayed in a CSIR
guesthouse, which was very nice.
The complex was located in the middle of the section of town containing
all the important government buildings like the BNI (The Bureau of National
Intelligence – the Ghanaian FBI). There
were also many embassies for foreign nations. We saw the Canadian and Egyptian embassies, and caught a
little glimpse of home soil when we passed around the U.S. Embassy.
Written by Clayton and Mollie
Goodbye Sunyani, Goodbye Friends – August 1
Packing this morning was pretty hectic! We had to get every last item out of
our dorm rooms in Sunyani so we could check out and head to Kumasi for the
night. Once we had everything
packed into the cars, Mike and Clayton headed to Kumasi immediately to work on
troubleshooting the generator for the Kwame Yeboah Krom. Mollie, Chelsea, and Helena stayed with
Emmanuel in Sunyani for much of the day completing last minute errands.
First we dropped Chelsea off at the hospital so she could
get information from him about the medical needs of the region, as well as to
collect Mollie’s medical report from her stay at the Sunyani hospital. Then we dropped Helena off in the main
market for her to pick up a few items.
Finally, Emmanuel and Mollie visited the District Assembly to deliver
the shipment allocation to the director and to receive reimbursement for the
shipment costs. When we were all done with our errands we all went to meet the
Regional Minister (similar to Governor of a state).
We had been trying to fit our schedules to a time he could
meet with us since our arrival, and we finally got it right. After waiting about half of an hour for
his meeting to finish up, we got to finally greet the Regional Minister on
behalf of the team, and all of Pavlis.
We took a picture with him and the Sunyani MCE and then went across the
street to have lunch with them.
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| Emmanuel, Helena, the Regional Minister, Mollie, the MCE of Sunyani, and Chelsea |
During that time Mike, Clayton, Peter and Govina were
nursing the truck back to Kumasi with the generator. We switched trucks in
Kumasi, so that Govina could get his truck properly fixed and we took off into
the magazine. After fighting the usual stop and go traffic, we were directed to
another electrician within the magazine who could check the health of our
generator. After a few test the electrician told us that our problem was
actually much simpler than we thought. The generator salesman told us the wrong
neutral wire, and we had been using two live wires to check the voltage with
light bulb, giving twice the required voltage. After seeing the generator light
up a bulb using the correct wires, we knew everything was okay, and we set off
to buy Peter a voltmeter so that he can check the generator at the site with
more than a light bulb.
That night we were all in Kumasi again and as it was our
last night there, Emmanuel and his family put on a party at their house with
the whole family as well as some of Emmanuel’s students. There was a delicious array of Ghanaian
dishes including jolof rice, fufuo, goat soup, chicken soup and plain rice with
a red sauce. For dessert, Mollie
baked an apple crisp because we found out that Adjoa’s (Emmanuel’s wife’s)
favorite American food is apple pie.
It went very well with the vanilla ice cream and fresh mango slices that
were also being served!
After dinner, dancing was the theme of the night, and with
our friend Govina as DJ, it was hard to keep from tapping your toe to the
music. Luckily we had some help
form the Ghanaian youngsters in learning the newest dance style in Ghana,
Azonto. The stars of the night
were Emmanuel’s four kids though, because they were all getting in on the fun
of dancing, even Kwaku at only 13 months of age!
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| Kwaku |
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| Mike, Clayton, and Yaw eating ice cream |
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| Mike and Clayton, with their electrician friend, Peter |
Written by Mollie and Mike
Last Trip to the West – July 31
We started the day early with a 6:30 departure for Kwame
Yebohakrom in one of the FORIG trucks, with what we hoped would be the last of
the parts for the Lister engine project. With Govina at the wheel of the truck
and Peter as co-captain we made quick time to the village arriving somewhere
after 10, even with a quick stop for fufuo. The building for the engine was
still unfinished but was complete enough to hopefully finish the project. After
quickly bolting the generator up, tightening the belt in place we were ready to
test our system. The engine was fired up, running as well as ever and the
generator was spinning without vibrating out of place or throwing the belt.
Everything seemed okay until Peter went to test the generators voltage with a
standard light bulb, which was immediately popped. Concerned, we called the man
we had purchased the generator from to learn that he misspoke when we told us
the generator operating speed, and we were operating it at over twice what it
should be running.
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| A man in Duasidan next to the covered Lister engine |
Determined to finish the project, we decided after a bit of
head scratching to try the second smaller pulley on the machine that was
shipped with it to see if we could match the desired speed. After a quick run to Nkran Kwanta to
grab another belt and relocating the generator we fired the Lister engine up
again for another test. Sadly, even though the generator was spinning at what
should be the correct speed, the test light bulb was popped again. Even after
turning the generator around to spin it in the opposite direction we were
unable to get the correct voltage. Running out of time in the day, we decided
to take the generator back to Kumasi to see if it had become damaged on its way
to the project site. It was upsetting to leave the village with all our hard
work unfinished, but we knew if the generator could be revived, our friend
Peter would have no problem finishing the project after our departure.
Meanwhile the girls were dropped off at Duasidan in the
morning to have one last meeting with community members regarding the monkey
sanctuary advertisements and future work in the community. We arranged with the printer in Kumasi
for the road sign advertisements to be printed before our departure from Ghana
and arranged for the Duasidan Assemblyman, Jacob, to post them at appropriate
intersections en route to Duasidan.
The community expressed interest in forming a community center if future
Pavlis students could provide supplies for it. They even showed us which room in an old school building
they could renovate for community use.
After our formal meeting we requested that we could have a
taxi called to pick us up. It took
three hours to actually get the taxi, but we passed the time playing with the
huge crowd of kids that showed up.
Finally, the taxi arrived, driven by a nice guy called German, who
dropped us off in Babianeha.
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| Mollie and Helena with kids in Duasidan |
In Babianeha, Mollie went with Victoria, Emmanuel’s cousin
who will start University in September, to interview families in the village
about their cooking habits. It was
really interesting to see the range of cooking methods used in the village all
the way from very modern gas ranges in kitchens to open fires outside the
house. Meanwhile, Helena and
Chelsea ran a few final errands around town, including dropping off a bag of
biochar for the school garden.
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| A typical outdoor fire for cooking |
In the afternoon the girls traveled to Dormaa to speak with
the MCE there. However, because it
was the one-week celebration of the president’s death, both the MCE and the
Director were busy and so we got to meet the assistant director. He was very enthusiastic about our
efforts to advertize the Duasidan Monkey Sanctuary and he was especially
excited about the website we hope to develop. He was very optimistic about future development of the site
by the Dormaa Assembly in collaboration with Pavlis!
After a long day of work everyone was ready to head home to
Sunyani to have dinner with a delegation of people from the Sunyani MCE’s
office as well as some other friends from Sunyani. Just as Mike and Clayton were beginning to arrive in Dormaa
to pick up the girls, their truck overheated, stalling on the road. The girls
were sent on ahead to finish the journey by bus, just before realizing that
Mike and Clayton had the only sets of keys to the dorm. Running quite a bit
behind, the truck was quickly fixed and the guys quickly rushed home to change
with the waiting girls and head to the dinner.
Despite being one hour late, we were still able to meet
everyone for a wonderful dinner. The meal was a fancy buffet with two
courses. We all looked quite
dashing in our newly tailored Ghanaian outfits if we do say so ourselves!
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| The group with our friend Govina after the dinner (note his black clothing and red scarf worn in honor of the one week celebration of the president's death) |
Written by Mollie and Mike
Waste in Sunyani and Donations – July 30
Mollie called the Minister of Environmental Health this morning to set up
a tour of the final disposal site for solid and liquid waste for Sunyani. The goal of the tour was to assess
whether the site could be the topic of a senior design project. Mollie and Helena met with Daniel, the
second in command for Environmental Health in Sunyani. He talked to us at the district
assembly first and then arranged for a truck to take us to the site.
The solid waste is currently dumped on site by a contracting
company paid for by the central government in Accra, providing a free garbage
pickup service for individuals and businesses. The liquid waste is currently being discharged into a lagoon
system for free by private companies that are paid by individuals and
businesses. Daniel indicated that
they are very interested in obtaining a truck scale so they can start charging
the private companies for use of their lagoon. He also mentioned the need for increased use of land cover
over garbage dumped on the site daily.
Right now the garbage is only covered once a month.
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| Mollie and Daniel discussing liquid waste disposal |
Despite these challenges, Daniel was justifiably proud of
Sunyani for having such an advanced waste processing system for the area. He was especially proud of Sunyani
being named the Cleanest City in Ghana 4 years in a row! He was very excited about the idea of
having Michigan Tech students design an improved system for the city and we
plan to be in contact about the details of the project.
That evening we had a lot of things to sort out in our
rooms, including preparing gifts to give to all the people that have helped us
out so far here in Ghana. We also decided
where to give our remaining educational supplies that we had in our luggage,
and our biggest task was allocating the supplies in the shipment that we sent
in May. The update on the shipment
is that it has arrived in Tema, the biggest port of Ghana, but it is still
going through a clearing process, so we will not be able to distribute it’s
contents ourselves. Fortunately,
we had already marked many of the books and supplies with which location they
were intended for, but some items were still unmarked, so we worked on writing
up clear instructions for the MCE of Sunyani as well as Emmanuel so they can
distribute the supplies in the next few weeks when they are available.
Boabeng-Fiema Monkey Sanctuary and Kintampo Falls – July 29
Today Emmanuel picked us up bright and early and we drove a
few hours north, through Techiman to the village of Kranka, a site that past
Pavlis students have visited and expressed interest in working with. There we met with the Chief, who
accompanied us for the rest of the day.
He told us about a community ICT center that had been opened within the
last year with twenty desktop computers!
We hope to allocate some of the books in our shipment of supplies to
this center.
Our first tourist stop of the day was at the Boabeng-Fiema
Monkey Sanctuary, a well-established presence in the Ghana tourism
industry. The welcome area is very
well-kept, with a guesthouse and an office where you pay for entrance and sign
the guestbook. Our guide, Brandon
was a volunteer who had just arrived a few weeks ago from Ontario, Canada. It was fun to talk with him and he was
very enthusiastic about the sanctuary!
Right at the beginning of our walk through the sanctuary we
were able to see Colobus monkeys very close up, in the lower branches of some
trees right by the path. These
monkeys are usually much harder to see and never interact directly with
humans. They are quite large and
have amazingly long tails! We also
had the chance to feed some Mona monkeys, which are the same type as we got to
see at the Duasidan sanctuary where we are doing our project.
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| A Colobus monkey |
The whole group got to climb on and in a ficus “tree”, which is actually a parasite that grows around a
tree, eventually killing it. In
this case the original tree had decayed away, leaving a huge cylinder to climb
through! We all got in on a good
group photo. Brandon was also a
very helpful guide in that he is a very good photographer! The other cool tree
we saw was a conglomeration of trees and vines and we had a cool photo shoot
there too. Before we left we had a
chance to stop at a local gift shop to buy a few carvings and masks.
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| The group in the Ficus tree |
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| Group with Emmanuel in the conglomerate tree |
Our second tourist stop of the day was Kintampo Falls, a set
of three waterfalls! The first
stage was pretty interesting, with the water surging over a huge rock
outcropping. There were a few
holes in the rock where water would also gush through. The second stage was small, but the
third stage was very spectacular!
We walked down 152 steps to the base, where there were a handful of
Ghanaians already enjoying the falls.
We didn’t waste much time getting down to our bathing suits and jumping
in too! We climbed and slid in,
around, and behind the falls for about 45 minutes, having the time of our
lives! Best. Water. Park. Ever.
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| Group with Emmanuel at Kintampo Falls |
On the drive back, we picked up the Chief again and dropped
him off close to Kranka, then made our way back to Sunyani, all tired out from
the day.
The Whole Group in Kumasi – July 27-28
On Friday the 27th, the group was all in
Kumasi. Clayton and Mike picked up
a few extra parts for the lister engine while Helena and Chelsea took a tour of
the biochar reactors in Kumasi at SRI and then visited with Mollie at the Opuni
house. That evening we all got to
talk to the India group by phone, which was really fun! The Opunis served us a delicious meal
of ampesi (a spicy cabbage and carrot dish, similar to coleslaw) and boiled
yams and we got to play with the four kids! The electricity went out for part of the evening, but it
came on in time for some of us to watch the second half of the Olympic opening
ceremony.
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| Chelsea with Yaw and David, two of Emmanuel's sons |
The next morning we had a leisurely start to the morning and
then Mike, Clayton, Helena, and Chelsea decided to give Kumasi’s Central Market
another go. After a bit of a wait,
we were able to catch a tro-tro to the middle of the city, where overwhelming
traffic convinced us to hop out a bit before our destination and walk the
remainder of the way (aided by Clayton’s directional knowledge). The sun was hot and the market was
busy, but that didn’t stop us from jumping right into the chaos with bargaining
and buying.
After a couple of hours and several successful finds, we
headed out to the transit station.
There we were joined by Mollie and, finally fully reunited, we loaded
onto a bus and headed back to Sunyani.
Once in Sunyani, Emmanuel (who had travelled near Sunyani for a funeral
earlier in the day) drove us back to the dorms and accompanied us to a pizza
dinner. Following our meal,
Helena, Mike, and Emmanuel partook in the live music and dancing just outside
the restaurant.
Written by Mollie and Chelsea
Kwame Yeboahkrom and the Death of a President– July 24th 2012
After another few trips into the
magazines of Kumasi, the welding and parts for the generator set-up had all
been completed and found for the lister engine project in Kwame Yeboahkrom. Our caravan started with Mike and
Chelsea returning from Kumasi along with Govina and Peter in a truck full of
everything we were bringing. Then
at Sunyani Clayton switched in with Mike and headed out towards Dormaa and the
village areas; Helena and Chelsea tro-troed their way there separately.
While
we were riding in the truck, Govina began to hear rumors from his friends that
something had happened to the President.
It turned out the President of Ghana, Atta Mills, had died in office. We were told that rumors of his death
were not uncommon since his health has been bad in recent years, but this time
the rumor was true. It’s a
particularly strange time for such an unfortunate thing to happen because he
was campaigning for reelection in the Ghanaian Presidential vote this December. Now his VP, John Mahama, has been sworn
in and will continue the elections.
Many people are wearing the red and black funeral cloth during the day,
and the newspapers tell us there is a period of national mourning that will now
extend until the late President’s funeral on August 10th.
Going back to our village trip, we
arrived at the village and we could see the small building they had constructed
to house the lister engine. They
showed us inside we could see the villagers had already poured a concrete base
and mounted the engine in position on top of it. By luck there was a man in the nearby town of Ankrankwanta who
had years of experience working with the kind of engine similar to ours, and he
was a great assistance. With a
fresh can of diesel, motor oil and a little bit of cranking, the lister engine
originally ordered by a previous Pavlis group started chugging happily away.
Most of the rest of our work was
letting Peter set up the wiring and breakers to deliver power across the yard
to the clinic, and setting up and mounting the generators itself. We spent a while trying to communicate
how we wanted the generator placed in relation to the engine, where the studs
needed to be to secure it, how to align the belt, etc. Nearly 20 members of the village
surrounded us whenever we worked around the engine, and there was a lot of
discussion in Twi we couldn’t catch over the plans we suggested. Even the local village chief, Nana
Yeboah, was into the discussion, and once we had established the spot for the
generator and they began to pour the concrete, he was right down with everyone
working and getting his hands dirty.
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| Mike working on the engine with an audience |
Unfortunately one thing that went
wrong was that the coolant system Mike had envisioned did not fit to the lister
engine, and so we will just need to find a few parts in Kumasi and then return
again for a day trip to set it up.
The concrete for the base did not dry during our stay, and so we also
need to return to actually test the generator.
Our plan was to stay two nights in
the Kwame Yeboahkrom and leave on the third day, so we stayed inside the spare
rooms of the clinic that were kindly offered to us. During the night of the President’s death we were invited into
the downtown area of the village to have dinner at the chief’s house. It was fascinating to actually be
staying in one of the more remote villages in Ghana and seeing a little bit
more of what life was like day and night.
Outside the chief’s house we waited for a while under a solar-powered
street lamp and a good number of the village residents came and gathered around
the area to take a look at us. The
children got a big kick out of our attempts at Twi and many of the older
villagers were fascinated by Helena and Chelsea’s hair. After the dinner of rice and
hard-boiled eggs with spicy tomato sauce, the village had a small funeral
celebration dance in honor of the late President Mills. Govina was still with us, and pushed us
to lead the dancing. The music was
loud and a lot of people showed up to join or just watch the obroni trying dance the popular Azonto
dance.
The following morning before we
got to work, Nana Yeboah showed us around his village. The first day he showed us a cocoa
plantation, and we learned that the majority of the people of Kwame Yeboahkrom are
cocoa farmers. We had never seen
anything like the big yellow and green pods sticking out of the cocoa tree
trunks, and later Nana invited us to try some of the dried beans from the pods
that tasted exactly like unsweetened chocolate. The next morning he showed us the palm farms, where the
trees were either cut down and tapped to harvest the sweet and tangy sap, or
left standing to produce palm fruit, then processed into palm oil, an extremely
popular cooking oil in Ghana.
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| Dried cocoa beans and two picked cocoa pods pictured |
Written by Clayton
Nsawkaw - July 22
Chelsea, Helena, and Mike were met in the morning by Godwin,
one of the drivers from FORIG, who would accompany us on our trip to Nsawkaw.
In Nsawkaw, we needed to visit the Tain District Hospital to discuss the needs
of the hospital with Dr. Rockson, and if still applicable, to get the necessary
information to arrange a shipment of repurposed medical equipment in the coming
year. We also planned to visit the senior high school where last year’s group
donated several netbook computers and other supplies.
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| Chelsea, Godwin, and Mike at the back of the tro-tro to Wenchi |
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| Helena in the tro-tro to Wenchi |
In Nsawkaw we were greeted by Mr. Brobi, a man who has
worked with Pavlis in the past.
Mr. Brobi facilitated our day’s meetings at both the hospital and the
school. First we went to his house, a nice place where future Pavlis students
would be welcome to stay if they needed to be in the area multiple days. Then
we visited the Tain District Hospital- a very nice place with a TV in the
waiting area (a Chelsea soccer game was on while we were there) and several
green courtyards. Most of the hallways were open-air. We were led to Dr.
Rockson’s office, where we discussed the state of the hospital’s needs,
previous obstacles to effective communication, and his (and the hospital’s)
interest in working with MedWish, an organization that repurposes medical
equipment for the hospital’s in need.
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| With Mr. Brobi (left) and Dr. Rockson (middle) |
In order to better familiarize us with the needs of his
workplace, Dr. Rockson then took us on a general tour of the hospital. We took
several pictures and listened to Dr. Rockson’s explanation of the different
areas of the hospital. Finally, we shook hands (as always) and left the
hospital to walk to the senior high school to meet with the headmaster (we
couldn’t see any students since it was a Sunday). We walked about fifteen
minutes outside of town to a school surrounded by a huge open field. The
classrooms were open-air, but the current, as well as the former, headmasters
who greeted us ushered us into an enclosed room, where we discussed how the
supplies they received last year are working for them, and what their other
needs are.
They really appreciate the ten or so computers which Pavlis
gave them last year, because they can use them to teach the students basic computer
skills, which many students in Ghana can only learn theoretically because they
don’t have the computers to try it out themselves. The books and other supplies
were given to the students, and were also appreciated. The headmasters
explained that the senior high has not only switched from being a private to a
state-run school this year, but they will also soon be moving to a new building
on the other side of town. What they would really like to have near the high
school is a community center filled with more computers and books, and they
would need whatever assistance they could get, not only with the supplies for
filling the center, but with the building materials as well. We emphasized that
although we will pass on this information to next year’s group, whether or not
they can help will depend on their resources. We wrapped up the meeting by
signing the school’s guestbook, and had the excitement of seeing the signatures
from last year’s Pavlis students who visited.
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| The guestbook at the Nsawkaw High School |
Finally, we walked back into town to make our way back to Sunyani, taxi and tro-tro style. The only hiccup was that our tro-tro in Wenchi had a broken headlight, so we had to wait a couple hours until it was ready to go. The driver was pretty fast though, so that made up for some time! ;)
Written by Helena and Chelsea
Mollie Goes from Sunyani to Kumasi - July 20-21
On the 20th, Mollie, who was feeling much better,
was released from the hospital.
She waited with Helena and Chelsea keeping company until the evening
when Emmanuel, Mike and Clayton arrived from Kumasi. That afternoon they received a visit from Lawrence from
Babianeha along with his brother Williams. It was great to see Lawrence, who helped us out a lot in
Babianeha when Mollie first got sick.
Later that evening, we got a visit from Tony and Ben, both friends from
the dorms, which was also very nice.
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| Lawrence visiting Mollie |
When Emmanuel arrived, Mollie went with him and spent the
night at Emmanuel’s mother in law’s house in Sunyani, along with Chelsea. The next day, Mollie drove to Kumasi
with Emmanuel to have some time to rest at his house, with his family. The whole family was very welcoming and
accommodating!
Kumasi Magazine - July 19-20
With list of parts and a few rough schematics Mike and Clayton
travelled to Kumasi again to meet our electrician friend Peter, and try to
acquire everything we thought we needed for the generator project in
Kumasi. The tro-tro and taxi trips
around Kumasi are always exhausting and slow, but the city is so full of
interesting sights that it’s always exciting. We were headed for the Kumasi magazine, where the largest
concentration of car repair, engine work, metal workers, and parts shops were
to be found.
The first thing on our list was the generator that Peter,
Mike and Clayton had selected on their last trip to Kumasi. After waiting for a
while at the shop the owner showed up, started the generator Ghana style to
demonstrate that it worked, and the generator was loaded into the truck.
We needed the pulley for the generator to be modified so we
took it to a machinist who Peter said could do the job. The machinist needed the pulley removed
from the shaft of the generator, so he grabbed his friend to try and use a vice
to pull it off. When that wasn’t
working, he led us down and over a few streets to another machine shop that had
a very big vice. We watched while
about 4 or 5 men grappled with the vice, twisting and pushing until finally the
pulley started coming free.
The markets in the cities are almost like large towns of their
own, crowded with concrete and wooden sheds roofed with corrugated metal. They’re usually organized by content;
house ware shops are next to each other, food stalls are in the same area, car
parts can be found all in one place, etc. so it’s not too confusing to look
around. Furthermore the shopkeepers and workers usually know the area extremely
well and can direct you or lead you to find anything you need. It’s a time consuming and tiring way to
go shopping but it can be fun too.
The next day Mike, Clayton and Peter returned to the
Magazine, only this time with tro-tro’s.
We combed the immense collection of parts store to collect everything
needed ranging from coolant hoses and hardware to the frame and mounting studs.
We even had to walk though a funeral to find a man who could sell us exhaust
parts. By the end of the day we had collected all the necessary wiring, coolant
plumbing and hardware, the belt, the pulley from the machinist, a coolant tank,
and a frame. We finished the day with the welder, handing him everything we
needed him to assemble for our trip next week.
Written by Clayton and Mike
Kwatre - July 17
We started the day with an early meeting with Obeng Kwaku,
the Sunyani Department of Education supervisor. We were then taken to the office of the West Sunyani
District (the district in which Kwatre, one of the schools we hope to support
with our shipment of school supplies), where we were formally introduced to
their supervisor. What we had
hoped would be just one more office and one more introduction to the West
Sunyani District Supervisor of Education, turned into a slightly longer
visit. We were finally able to
greet appropriate officials and were given permission so that Kwaku was able to
accompany us to the Kwatre District Assembly School.
The Kwatre District Assembly School, which was first opened
in the 1950s, houses two KG classes in addition to classes 1-6 and a Junior
High School. One of the primary
challenges the school faces is supplying its very full classrooms with adequate
materials to allow for effective and convenient learning. Government schools, like Kwatre,
are designed to facilitate classrooms of 20 to 35 students. In visiting the school, however, we
learned that almost all of Kwatre’s classes contain upwards of 45
students. Accordingly, the
government support for the school is stretched is extremely thin. Without a central library, each
classroom has a cupboard to house both books and other teaching and learning
materials.
The Kwatre District Assembly School has many ideas and hopes
for future progress. Their
interests range from improving computer literacy, to procuring a school library
and support staff, to improving their teacher accommodations (living quarters
for the teachers on campus). Their
most recent development is a computer lab (or, as they call it, an ICT center)
in which students have access to sixteen high-functioning computers). The ICT center is the direct result of
community involvement; the community pooled together to purchase four of the
desktop computers, and later petitioned parliament for a grant to provide the
additional twelve. Of course, they
continue to seek additional resources to provide for their increasing
enrollment. We were extremely
fortunate to have the opportunity to briefly visit each basic classroom,
observe the Junior High School students taking examinations, as well as tour
the ICT center during our visit.
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| The West Sunyani District Supervisor of Education on the left, showing the ICT center |
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| Students in a classroom in Kwatre |
The unfortunate news from this day was that Mollie was still
in the hospital, taking medicine for malaria, but the upside is that she got a
very nice private room at the Sunyani hospital and it even had a hot shower to
enjoy!
Written by Chelsea
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Biochar at Babianeha and Meeting Dr. Jacob -July 16
Today, Helena, Mike, and Clayton went to teach some science lessons at the school in Babianeha near Emmanuel’s family’s house. The students we were teaching were junior high-aged kids, and we had a class of about 40-50 Form 3 students (similar to 8th grade). First, we met with the headmaster, Watuza, to explain what we were interested in doing with the students. Since both we and the headmaster want to have the students carry out a biochar garden experiment (where they will measure the growth of plants with and without biochar in the soil in order to see the effects biochar should have on increasing crop yield), our plan was to start them with a lesson on the scientific method, and then we would have them discuss the different aspects of the experiment in groups in order to develop their experimental plan. After Helena gave a brief explanation on how to form a hypothesis, how to determine variables, and how to measure and observe data, Watuza divided the class into three groups (with Mike, Clayton, and Helena each leading one group) and we headed out to the garden plot that the school had fenced in for the students’ use.
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| Explaining how to set up an experiment |
We all had a lot of fun interacting with the students in our
respective groups. Clayton had a little bit of a smaller group and tried to
make a game out remembering all of their names, some of which were easy (one
kid went by the memorable nickname “Noble Rasta”) and some of which were a
little harder to say right (Adymaya). In Mike’s group, his students offered him
a red pepper to eat. It was lucky that Mike declined the offer, though, because
the students then told him that this pepper was so strong, that if he ate it,
it would make his throat swell up. Helena was amused by her group when they got
into a heated five-minute argument about whether or not it was possible to
count all the okras on an okra plant, and how some students would help her out
by keeping the rowdier ones in line.
 |
| Clayton's group |
 |
| Helena's group |
 |
| Mike's group |
At the end of the discussion session, all the students
wanted pictures with us, so we obliged. Watuza wrapped up by letting us know
that the garden would be cleared and prepared in a few weeks’ time in order to
start the garden, and that they would also like us to come back sometime so we
could be there when they make biochar in the community. We said we would do our
best, and then as a parting gift, we gave the junior high a digital camera with
which they could take pictures to further document their garden.
We then stuck around the school another hour or so to do science
demonstrations with the other classes at the junior high, and Clayton and Mike
did a great job explaining and demonstrating how molecular interactions allow a
skewer to be poked through a balloon without popping it. This demonstration was
made difficult though, by the fact that Ghanaian balloons appear to be a bit
different in material from American ones, but we were still able to get the
demonstration to work, and the students enjoyed it. Lastly, we were led into
some other classrooms just to say hi to a few groups of students who had been
displaced from their regular school building due to damage from a storm.
 |
| Clayton and Mike demonstrating some polymer science |
It was then time for us to travel back to Sunyani to meet up with Chelsea and Mollie. We waited at the taxi station in Babianeha for a while (the taxis don’t leave until there are enough people to fill them) before riding to Dormaa, where we had a pleasant journey on the bus ride to Sunyani. A group of school kids snuck up and sat by us on the bus, giggling about having had the nerve to come sit next to the obronis (white people/foreigners). We had some fun conversation with them about snow, each others’ names, and whether the trees in Michigan have leaves like they do here in Ghana.
When we arrived in Sunyani, Clayton, Helena, and Mike joined
Chelsea to meet with Dr. Jacob Abrebese, the Medical Director of Sunyani
Regional Hospital as well as an assemblyman for the village of Nsawkaw. Dr. Jacob, or Jacob, as he insists on
being called, has been extremely instrumental to groups in the past and his
ideas and interest in the Pavlis program are as strong as ever. Some of the first words out of his
mouth upon introduction to our group were an emphatic, “When will you come to
our village?” Chelsea explained to him the efforts we made to collect
information in order to ship re-purposed medical equipment to the Tain
(pronounced Tine) District Hospital throughout the past fall and spring
semesters. However, due to an
inability to sustain adequate communication with our medical contact there,
efforts were put on hold until further communication could be achieved.
In discussing the proposed project with Jacob, however, it
became very clear that the Nsawkaw community would be perhaps more interested
in a joint shipment of supplies involving collaboration between their education
and health boards. That is, while
they think medical equipment may serve good purpose, books and educational
(especially related to Information, Communication, and Technology—or ICT, as
they commonly refer to it) support are of equal or greater need. Jacob insisted that the time to act
should be soon, as upcoming political elections may drive politician financial
support in shipping items.
Further, he was especially intent on Pavlis having more direct
interaction (i.e. doing lessons in schools, etc) with the community. While we were unsure to what end we
would be able to facilitate Jacob’s high hopes (as from here on out, our
schedule was filling up pretty quickly), we did already have plans to visit
Nsawkaw on the upcoming weekend to get a better idea of how future Pavlis
cohorts can have a positive impact there.
*Note: This post was written by Clayton, Helena, and Chelsea
Monday, July 30, 2012
Duasidan with a bit of Babianeha - July 14 and 15
When the girls’ second morning in Babianeha dawned, the
Opuni household had once again prepared us a generous breakfast. Mollie wasn’t
feeling too well that morning though, so to be safe, Chelsea and Helena (as
well as our friend Lawrence from the Opuni house) accompanied her to the
hospital in Dormaa in the afternoon. They just missed Clayton and Mike, who
arrived in Babianeha shortly after the girls left, so unfortunately we weren’t
able to be reunited that day.
On Sunday the 15th, Mollie was doing fine, but Chelsea
and Emmanuel went with her to the hospital in Sunyani where she could be more
comfortable. Meanwhile, Helena, Mike, and Clayton went to the village of
Duasidan to talk to the community about the monkey sanctuary. Kwadwo, one of
Emmanuel’s brothers and the assembly man for Babianeha, had contacted Jacob
Obiri, the assembly man at Duasidan, to set up this meeting for us. We had
actually been expecting to just meet with a handful of people, but when we
arrived, we were ushered into a courtyard where about thirty community members
sat all the way around the square. Formalities in Ghana are all about
hand-shaking, so we shook all their hands, and vice versa. Then we (along with
Kwadwo, who translated for us) sat on the elevated side of the courtyard, and
our discussion with the community could begin.
First, we explained our purpose for being in Duasidan: to
help further the mission of the monkey sanctuary, that is, to promote the
protection of this habitat for the monkeys and the biodiversity of both the
plants and animals in the area. We would like to help by providing the
community with resources for advertisement, but we need the community’s
opinions and input. We showed the community members the
draft of the brochure for the sanctuary, which had been designed by the
marketing department at FORIG. Everyone around the room was nodding in
satisfaction as they saw the design, and seemed to agree with our idea of
distributing the brochures to hotels and other locations in Sunyani, as well as
keeping copies at the visitor’s office. We also explained that we planned to
design a poster for the visitor’s office, as well as a few road signs to be
posted at convenient intersections near Duasidan. The community gave us a few
suggestions for places where the signs should be located.
We then established that Jacob, the Duasidan assembly man,
would be the English-speaking phone contact for the sanctuary, and the community
also decided on which days of the week and during what hours the sanctuary
would be open for tours. Our entire interaction with the community was very
interesting for us, because we would start by telling Kwadwo what we wanted to
ask, then Kwadwo would approximately translate our question for the community,
and then the community members would debate heatedly, back and forth, for up to
ten minutes, and then Kwadwo would again translate the verdict for us. People
were especially passionate about the question of what the open hours for the
sanctuary would be, since they are a farming community, so it is important to
work around the schedule of the sanctuary guides who farm to earn a living. The
discussions were interesting in that people would always say times and numbers
in English, but the rest would be in Twi. So we would hear “somethingsomething
10am somethingsomething” and so on. Needless to say, it was a great experience
to be able to sit in on this community meeting which was so different from how
these things work in our hometowns.
Eventually, the community was hesitant to discuss more, due
to the fact that the Duasidan chief (who actually resides in Dormaa) was not
yet aware of our presence, so we said we would make plans to contact the chief and
come back another day in the coming weeks to wrap up our questions for the
community. We also needed to get information from the chief about the history
of the monkeys in Duasidan, because the chief has a document, which details a
study done by the Ghana Forestry Commission about ten years ago, which has the
monkeys’ history in written form (so far we have only heard it orally, so we
want to make sure we have a consistent story before it is printed in the brochures).
As the meeting wrapped up, we asked the community if they
had any other needs they wanted to address. The main issue which came up
centered around education. Like many rural communities, Duasidan schools lack books,
computers, and other resources for students as well as the greater community. The
community members expressed interest in next year’s Pavlis students working
with Duasidan to bring in supplies for a community center, similar to how
Pavlis worked with the community in Babianeha two years ago. At the very end of
the discussion, the lone woman in the room stood up to say that if possible, we
should return to Duasidan before school lets out on July 26, so that we can
visit the school and meet the students. We said we would certainly try, and
with that, the meeting ended with us going around and shaking hands with
everyone twice (again), and then we rode back to Babianeha. The driver who
drove us and Kwadwo was a very assertive driver who sure got going pretty fast
down those dirt roads!
When Helena, Mike, and Clayton got back to the Opuni house,
dinner was waiting for us, and we happily dug in. We were also able to check in
(over the phone) with Mollie and Chelsea (who were in Sunyani by evening)
before turning in for the night.
(Written by Helena)
(Written by Helena)
Friday, July 27, 2012
Generators and Funerals (Not Ours!) – July 13
This morning Chelsea, Helena and Mollie woke up early and
enjoyed a wonderful breakfast of scrambled eggs and veggies with toast prepared
for us by Emmanuel’s family, specifically Lawrence, a very nice and helpful guy
around our age. After breakfast we
went to visit the junior high school, where they were in the middle of their
normal Friday worship.
The students were joyfully singing and dancing in the
classroom when we went to greet them.
The teacher asked us to say a few words to the class, so Helena told the
students how happy we were to hear their beautiful singing this morning, and
how we are looking forward to starting the biochar garden with them. The
students, however, just looked blankly at us, so the teacher repeated
everything that Helena had just said, because he realized that the students
simply hadn’t understood the American accent. We found out that we wouldn’t be
able to teach at the school that day, so we would have to come back on Monday
to do our biochar garden lesson.
The headmaster took us to see the bounteous garden that the
school maintains, full of onions, maize (corn), cabbage, okra, ripe hot
peppers, cowpeas, cocoyams, and more!
He plans to use the garden next year to teach about crop rotation and we
hope to also incorporate a section of the garden using biochar, to increase
yield. There is a sawmill next
door to the school where they can source sawdust to make into biochar.
Next, we visited the community center established by past
cohorts and assessed the state of the computers in use there. From there, we were accompanied by
Lawrence, Reagan, and Adinkra (all guys around our age) to the Cote d’Ivoire
border, where we walked along it for a ways, comparing the differences between each
country. Badukrum is the village
that is between the Ghana customs border and the Cote d’Ivoire customs border,
where the citizens have dual citizenship, share languages and currencies. We changed about 50 cents into sefa
coins, used in Cote d’Ivoire, as souvenirs. The Ghanaian street lights are poles with four cables strung
from each while the Ivorian lights are on cement posts with one cable on
each. There is a path past the
village that follows the border all the way north and south. We walked along it a ways and came
across some grave sites, sorted by religion.
After a mid-day nap we returned to the community center
where we met some kids and played a couple jumping games, including jump rope
with ropes donated by a previous Pavlis group, as well as a local jumping and
clapping game called ampe (pronounced ahm-pee). There we met Adinkra again and he led us to the one week
celebration of a man who had passed away in the village. In Ghana, funerals are quite
celebratory, but this was not the same as a proper funeral, for which they set
the date today for August 2.
At this ceremony, there was traditional drumming and
singing, accompanied by a couple traditional dancers at a time. When we arrived, we greeted everyone (including
all the chiefs and elders) in the first row of chairs then sat down to observe
the proceedings. After a short
time we were asked to dance, and with varying degrees of apprehension, we did
do our best imitation of the crouched, small steps of the other women we had
seen dancing. We were comforted by
the fact that we seemed to be well received and the gesture was appreciated. As we danced, three women gave us their
red and black shawls to wear, as these are the traditional colors of death in
Ghana and we were not dressed accordingly (as we had not known we would be
going to a funeral).
 |
| Traditional musicians and dancing |
When we finished dancing, we returned the shawls and sat
down again to soak in the call and response singing, the different percussion
instruments and the more expert dancing of the local women. After a time we were invited into the
neighboring house for a drink and were offered some pop, which we accepted, as
well as traditional palm wine, which we all tasted. The palm wine was sweet and served traditionally in dried
gourds. The men that drank the
wine poured the top off of the very top of the wine onto the ground to share
with the ancestors. Adinkra told
us that a practical reason for this is to avoid the impurities that float to
the top. After finishing our
drinks we returned and continued watching the celebrations until the ceremony
ended.
Upon returning to our hosts’ (the Opunis) house, we were
greeted with a dinner of rice, cocoyam leaves, chicken and spicy fish
sauce. After dinner, we rested and
watched some kids playing football (soccer).
---
Meanwhile, Mike and Clayton started the day early and met
Peter at 8am to grab a tro-tro into town (Kumasi) where he knew some places that had
generators. We went from place to
place, covering a good portion of the city and a greater portion of the day
without having any luck finding what we needed. It turned out that while “all-in-one unit” gas generators
are extremely common in Ghana, many people were often at a loss when we
explained we were looking for only the generator/alternator part. We kept traveling and finally found
(kind of) what we were looking for at a smaller engineering bay on a street
corner. They had a generator there
that would make a decent match for our engine, though it was bolted into a
frame with an engine already. The
man said that he would remove the engine for us if we didn’t want it.
After a long day of marching here and there we finally came
back to FORIG to say goodbye, and Govina took us across the city once again to
catch his own bus and help us catch one back to Sunyani. It was dark by the time we got there
(although, it’s only around 6:00 pm when it gets dark here) and finished the
night with spaghetti and a rousing two hours of laundry. The next morning we planned to head off
to Babianeha ourselves. We also
called the girls to see how they were doing and how their trip had been.
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