Thanksgiving

Currently, all twenty remaining PCVs in my group are living in the Dery Hotel in Techiman. We have air conditioning, running water, a pool, a bar, and little real responsibility. Most of our time is spent complaining, which is Peace Corps Volunteers’ unofficial hobby. We are here for our offsite technical training, which lasts for a total of two and one half weeks and currently has a little over a week remaining. The training includes a mix of lectures, on topics ranging from microfinancing for farmers to pest management, and hands on practicals, on topics such as beekeeping and GPS and tree stand management. It has been a nice mix of tedious and fascinating. Techiman has the largest open market in all of Western Africa. Yesterday was market day and we all went and shopped for supplies for the makeshift Thanksgiving we will be celebrating tonight. I will thankfully be doing none of the cooking and will hopefully manage to be productive in my own fashion.

After our offsite technical training is over we will return to our homestay town of Addo Nkwanta. We spent four of the first five weeks there and after spending two more we will be sworn in as volunteers and shipped off to our sites. We are all experiencing a combination of terror and optimistic excitement at this. The balance of terror and excitement differs but is undoubtedly consistent for us all. I am fairly certain that we will all survive but it is daunting nonetheless. This is exacerbated by the three month site restriction we will all have imposed on us. This is to promote integration of the volunteer into their communities and is definitely constructive in the scope of our whole service. However, it is reportedly very difficult as the way of life we are all about to begin is very different from any we have previously lived.

Four of us will be working with Krobodan in the Eastern Region of Ghana. They are a Danish organization that does development work among the Krobo people in parts of the Eastern region of Ghana. They focus on working with local farmers, single mothers, and increasing secondary income for these two groups. My primary assignment will be helping to facilitate the implementation of improved methods of chicken and rabbit rearing among local farmers. My site is in a community of about one hundred up the road from Sekesua.

This primary assignment is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of my plans for the next two years. I hope, and expect, to be very involved in my community and all of those surrounding it. The primary income generating industries in my communities are bead and gari making. Gari is ground, fried cassava that Ghanaians tend to love and Americans tend to hate. In addition to this, most community members are farmers as well and I plan to work extensively with them. This work should be very collaborative and will focus on introducing income-generating practices into their daily lives.  Teaching is already very likely for me and I hope to work with the local physician in introducing many grassroots health initiatives (i.e. expanded HIV awareness training, prevention of teen pregnancy, etc.). These secondary projects are often the highlights of a volunteers’ service, thus I am particularly excited for these.

           

Anticipation is high for the next couple of months as everything we have been preparing for will be put to the test. The first couple of months we are supposed to maintain a passive role in our communities as we evaluate and assess the specific needs of the community members. This translates to long days with no structure and little progress but I hope things get going relatively quickly and I can make some type of impact. 

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this post do not represent the views of the Peace Corps.  They only represent those of the author.