John's Next Step

Training This past week I went down to Kumasi to attend an In Service Training (IST) and to reconnect with the volunteers in my group. Kumasi is about 550 kilometers or about 12 hours travel from my site – not counting waiting for the bus (hours) – but I've already written about travel and besides being long there is nothing else to report.  (Oh - sad note - I lost my dorky looking 20 year old cloth hat, don't know maybe a happy note considering it was sort of dorky looking.) The major purpose of the training is to see how we are doing after about 3 months at site and to give us ideas about coping with problems. Traditionally this is a time when a lot of volunteers are getting down about service and things. Yes, the Peace Corps tracks the typical high and low points in the two year service period. Lows are common at six months (3 months training plus 3 months a site) and after the first full year at site (some wonder about accomplishments half way through service an

After many weeks on site the Peace Corps pulls everyone in my group left in country for "In-Service Training" and reconnecting the volunteers as a group again.  Two people terminated their service and one person is under medical care in Washington D.C. (Peace Corps does take care of the volunteers) So I'm back at Samaritan Village in Kumasi.  I got to the bus station in Nandom at 12:30 am on Friday November 21 - and got to my destination at 2:30 pm same day.  The place is 549 kilometers (341 miles) away from Nandom. I'll be celebrating "our" (family and friends and my) harvest festival (Thanksgiving) with hopefully something resembling an American meal.  No hope for Turkey - not in the budget - but I'm sure it will be nice.  I'll post about the training and Thanksgiving Ghana style to keep everyone informed when I can - but maybe not for a couple of weeks depending on how busy I am with the training. I'll be here until Friday November 28th.

On Friday, I went to my first funeral of someone I knew. I had seen and talked with the old man at church services under the tree in the community several times. His name was John and he was always in good spirits and seemed healthy. So I was a bit of a surprise to hear that he had died. This was not my first funeral. I attend on average between one and two funerals a week. I attended two on Friday as well as sat in the background for the first sitting (family meeting) to set the date and location of the funeral for a lady who had just died. So I thought I would take this week to write about funerals in the Upper West of Ghana. Setting the date and preparations Upon the death the family will get together to determine the date and location of funeral. Like most decisions made here the people get together to sit and talk things out to reach a consensus decision. If the person was living far away or there are relatives that will need to travel then the date may be moved ou

Corn, rice, and millet are the common grains grown in my region of Ghana. All three are used food, but millet is also used to produce the local brew – pito, or daa in the local language. “N nyu daa” - in Dagaree means “I drink pito.” There are several varieties of millet grown here – a red and white varieties have loose heads. These are used for pito and other foods. There is also a smaller seed variety with a tight head of seeds that is mainly used for porridge. (Don't have a picture of that variety yet.) In all varieties millet grows on a stalk with the grain head at the top of the stalk. White and red millet in the field Two bundles of while millet to be used for seed next season Converting a grain to alcohol is a common practice in various cultures. It provides a way to capture and digest the nutritional value of the grain. In some places, like Germany and the beer brewing monks, the making a beer was a way to preserve the harvest. In Ghana the millet is

Well, I made it to the end of October with 12.50 cedis remaining out of the 325 monthly living allowance. So I lived within the budget given to me by Peace Corps! It was close.  I needed to save 4 cedis each way for the trip to Lawra on October 31 and have a little buffer for problems so I did not buy fruit or vegetables in the last week to make sure I was stayed within budget. Actually, the trip to and from Lawra was kind of interesting. As you may know from previous posts I need to go to Lawra, about 20 miles away, to get money from my bank. I planned to go on Friday because I did not have classes to teach (I'm teaching during the strike that is still on) and because it was a Lawra market day. The theory was that on market day I would not have a problem getting a tro there or back. I was going to ride my bike down, but I had a teacher's staff meeting and funeral in the afternoon so I needed to leave Nandom early and get back as soon as possible. This was a little bi