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. 

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. 

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. 

The group in the Ficus tree

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. 

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 27^th, 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.  

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 10^th. 

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.

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.

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.

Chelsea, Godwin, and Mike at the back of the tro-tro to Wenchi

Helena in the tro-tro to Wenchi

We had to take a few taxis to get to the right transit station in Sunyani from which we could take a tro-tro to the town of Wenchi, followed by another tro-tro to Nsawkaw. Tro-tro rides are always interesting- at one point, our tro-tro had overheated, so the driver just flipped up the front seats (where the engine was apparently just underneath) and poured water on the engine- filling the tro-tro with steam- until it was cooled enough. All the Ghanaians in the tro-tro turned to grin at us at that point, and said “Welcome to Africa!” At the transit stations, we were also on the lookout for Ghanaian donuts, which are a really common food sold on the streets here, and they normally consist of just a ball of deep-fried dough. At one of the stations though, Mike and Chelsea spied what looked like sugar-covered donuts, and we searched for them throughout the day after that, without success.

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.

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.

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 20^th, 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. 

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.

The West Sunyani District Supervisor of Education on the left, showing the ICT center

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

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 8^th 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.

Explaining how to set up an experiment

The teaching method in Ghana is mostly a lecture and memorization style where the answer to a question is just regurgitated, so during the classroom lesson, the students seemed to have difficulty understanding what were trying to tell them; much of the time they couldn’t answer quiz questions without looking at their notes, and our American accents didn’t do anything to help them understand either.  However once we got out to the garden and began asking them how they would plan their experimental garden, they were bursting with ideas about weeding, crop variety, planting etc.  They clearly knew a lot about growing and farming, a lot more than any of us did. 

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

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 15^th, 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)