Tuesday July 10, 2012 Africa:  Day 30

            We got on the bus this morning with our backpacks full of clothes, sleep sacks, and treats to give to the people tonight at the camp.  We had no idea what to expect as we set off on this new adventure. 

            We gave another presentation on domestic abuse, stress, and coping to the women's vocational school. The presentation was fine.  My own lack of concentration was also due to the fact that we were all slowly baking in the oven.  They cooking school was making meat pies (this time with just a half of a hotdog inside) in the corner of the cement building.  The coal-burning oven was not only cooking the pies, but also providing plenty of heat to cook the crowded room. After I gave my part on the physical and psychological effects of abuse, I was happy to volunteer to stand outside to hold one of the women’s babies so she could listen to the rest of the presentation.

            Following the presentation and are little lunch of hot dog pies, we had the van drop us off at K.'s house before it took our counterparts back to Accra.  It was then we realized that we were going to be staying in K.’s house.  I think we were all feeling a little uncomfortable that we were taking up one of the two bedrooms in his house, which meant that his family of seven would all be sharing the other room.  K. and his wife S. were so excited to have us that they insisted that it was no problem at all. 

            K. then took us around to meet some of his friends.  We talked for a while with a pastor who was sitting outside a bar at the front of the camp.  This man immediately launched into his tragic story of how he ended up a refugee widower in Ghana.  Then we went to the mortician's house.  We sat around in his little “bachelor pad” waiting for him to get dressed or something while random guys came in and out.  There was something about the scene that reminded me so much of many times visiting families by the school in Vegas. 

            The two guys borrowed a friend’s station wagon and took us down the road to an outdoor restaurant called XXX.  I laughed when I saw signs for ice cream and hamburgers being displayed instead of other kinds of images I would have expected for a place with such a name.  A couple other friends of K. and his friend came and joined us and we sat around talking, drinking, and playing pool.

            One of K.s friends seemed to take a quick liking to me.  He insisted on sitting next to me.  Every time this man in his late forties  talked to me, he would put his hand on my thigh.  As I was sipping my soda, he looked at me at said, “pour me my beer”.  I managed to control my first reaction with my feminist/Vegas hood side wanting to tell him, “boy, don’t talk to me like that.  Do it yourself!”  However, I quickly found a slightly nicer approach and made him at least say “please”.  I then still tried to get out of it by telling him that I don’t drink and I’ve never poured beer before.  He still insisted (this time by adding a mocking “please” at the end of the demand), and I managed to fill his glass with more foam than liquid.  Everyone thought that was hilarious and he muttered something about how he didn’t blame me because it was my first time.  Sometimes the African male chauvinism makes it very difficult for me to maintain an appropriate level of cultural sensitivity.

            We all got in a heated debate when K.'s friend tried to say that child soldiers were less of a social problem than the school shootings that happen in the Western part of the world.  He argued that it was because kids in America are allowed to talk back to their parents, their parents don’t discipline them correctly because they are not allowed to hit their kids, and gun control is completely ineffective because kids are taught they can do whatever they want.  It was clear that the men at the table that also agreed with Patrick were getting most of their information from television shows and sensational news reports.  I don’t think we ever successfully convinced them that most parents in America expect their kids to use manners and respect adults and that school shooting don’t happen every other day.

            At one point my beer friend  somehow turned the conversation to eating hearts.  I was aware of the cultural significance in Ghana of eating human heart after you kill an enemy, but I could tell K. was kind of uncomfortable with this, and made some comment about how this friend was a rebel fighter in Liberia.  

            This guy later started telling me some of his story, too.  He mentioned that one time he was sitting down having a drink when a guy he knew came up and said, “hey, sorry I beheaded your dad”.  He told me he had no idea that this was the man that had killed his father, and also explained that since there wasn’t anything he could do about it now, he just told they guy, “it’s fine”, and then they finished their drinks together.  It was another reminder of how blessed I am and how strong and resilient so many people are in this world who have to experience unimaginable atrocities and then carry on with their lives.

            All eight of us piled into the station wagon for the short ride back to the camp.  I again was asking myself “what are the chances that you would be smashed in the back of a station wagon with three other Americans, a pastor’s arm around your shoulder, a mortician, and a Liberian rebel fighter?”.  We managed to get back to K.’s house with only scraping the undercarriage of the car a few times from all the weight going over the rutted “roads” through the camp.  K. then took us girls to “the gap”.  This is the ‘hood of the camp that is known for the drugs, violence, and crime that is rampant in the area.  While walking to K.'s friend’s house earlier today, we passed a crowd of young men pulling a bloodied guy along with them.  They all started yelling that this was a Ghanaian thief.  K. explained that they were probably coming from the gap, and that’s the typical justice system. You beat the guy up first to teach him a lesson, and then you take him to the police, which is apparently where the group was headed.  . really wanted us to go, though, because he feels so strongly in the work that he does.  He feels that other people ignore this population because it’s too dangerous, but they are still just people that have also experienced trauma and need just as much (if not more) help as anyone else.  It sounded a bit like my rationale of why I worked in the Vegas ‘hood for as long as I did when everyone else would tell me I should leave.

            Within a minute of getting out of the car, people were streaming up to us.  Someone led us over to a little bench, and we spent about thirty minutes just meeting people.  I listened to young guy after young guy come up, introduce himself, and then launch into his story about how he doesn’t have the UN-issued refugee card so no one is helping him figure out where to go next.  Many of them have lost their families long ago, have had little to no schooling, and are obviously very afraid of what their prospects are now that they are illegally living in Ghana since the refugee status cessation.  It got exhausting having to tell each one that I am truly concerned about their circumstances and I sincerely wish there was something more I could do. I think in some small way the little help I did offer was listening to their stories and letting them know that there are people who do care about them and their situation.  One guy kept telling me how honored he was to meet me because I was the first American he had ever met.  What he didn’t realize is that I was the one feeling so honored that I got to be there meeting so many strong people like these young adults who have had to figure out life on their own.

            We got back from the gap and played with K.'s five kids .  Then we joined K., his wife, and , their 3-year-old daughter, and the guys we were hanging out with this afternoon to go find some dinner.  We walked through the camp and ended up at a small little shack that served delicious plates of chicken and fried rice.  The dining room had two small tables, so they took us around the back and set up some plastic chairs and a couple of little plastic tables right next to the outdoor kitchen.  It was fun to be able to watch them cook the food before they brought it out to us.

            His friend then insisted that he treat us to another round of drinks.  We were all so full, but he doesn’t take no for an answer.  I sipped away on my Malta (a Ghanaian soda that tastes a lot like molasses) to be polite, but I was so full from dinner and don’t even like carbonation that I was relieved when I finally got to the end of the bottle.  We started dancing on the patio and were soon joined by some other drunk guys.  One kept trying to talk to me, but the music was so loud and the alcohol was not helping his speech, that I kept finding reasons to need to talk to one of the girls.

            Finally  we went back to the house and we all got settled in the little bedroom just off the livingroom.  The four of shared the two mattresses that filled one half of the room and slept under two big mosquito nets.  The kitchen was just a small sink and a few cupboards at one end of the hallway, the two bedrooms in between, and a small bathroom with a toilet and shower on the other end. I kept hearing the sounds of little animals running around on the roof and woke up many times afraid that rats were going to start nibbling on my toes.