Flood News Trickles out of Africa

I rode a beloved old hobby horse in my column this week, which was published here, and is reprinted below:

I grew up in Canada, but moved to the United States for university. Even before I relocated, I was well aware that we in Canada knew far more about what was going on south of our border than our neighbours knew of the news to their north. The U.S. media, like most world media to be honest, just don`t pay a lot of attention to what Canada is up to.

I was still shocked during my second year, though, when the American media failed to report on two issues that involved not just Canada, but the U.S. itself. My country of origin and the country I lived in were involved in a massive trade dispute over timber that dominated the Canadian airwaves, while Americans had no idea it was even taking place. They also received little notice from their press when American soldiers in Afghanistan accidentally killed four Canadian soldiers, their allies in the NATO mission there.

All this is to say that I know I shouldn’t be surprised anymore when Americans (and the rest of the world) fail to pay attention to major events happening beyond the tips of their noses. But I am.

Disturbing Disappearances

I have been perturbed by a handful of unrelated events lately. Figured I might as well lump them all into a single post.

The Trees It must be two weeks ago now, the house that backs on the property next to our compound started chopping down all of its trees. They had quite a number, and they seemed quite old as well, tall with thick trunks, making plenty of shade. This is the same property where they burnt charcoal for the first few weeks I was here, so it occurred to me that they might be planning on turning all of their beautiful trees into fuel. It just sat there for over a week though, with branches and debris piled on the lot and the covered sewer that I use as my sidewalk, forcing me to walk in the road and risk being run over by taxis who would certainly continue honking to gain my custom while they did so. Then, finally, two days ago, a truck came and carted most of it away. Who knows to where. There are still a few big unsightly stumps scattered throughout the property, and my sidewalk/sewer has an annoying covering of leaves and twigs, but beyond that, no evidence remains of the lot’s past greenery.

The President President Kufuor disappeared.

To Go To Togo

(Other titles considered for this post include: Togo A Go Go, O! Got Togo? (a palindrome!), and a bunch of lame options I’m not going to share. This is my blog. I don’t have to tell you anything I don’t want to.)

Last weekend I went to Togo with Mia, my Swedish UNHCR-intern neighbour, and Kevin, my fellow Ghana-based JHR compatriot. There are lots of good reasons to go to Togo. Ours wasn’t necessarily one of them.

FYI 3

The blog is officially up to date! Those of you who have been reading during the last month would do well to give the archives a skim, as I’ve been trying to put posts up in the order things happened, rather than in the order I got them written. That means some stories have gone straight to archive pages you wouldn’t see if you only opened my homepage. At least one has some video I took embedded in it, so it is worth the effort to go and see what you’ve missed. From now on, new posts will go to the top of the blog homepage, as they’re supposed to, so you won’t have to go on this kind of fishing mission again. Thanks for your patience. Enjoy!

Rent Adventures

I wrote another column! They foolishly published it here, and you can make the mistake of reading it below:

This week I have to pay my rent. Back home this was an easy operation. When I first moved into my apartment, I wrote a cheque every month and mailed it to the company that owned the building I lived in. After I had been there for a few months, I arranged that my bank would transfer my rent automatically to the company’s bank account at the beginning of every month. I didn’t have to think about it at all for the next two years.

In Ghana, the process of paying my rent has become significantly more involved. For one thing, I don’t pay one month at a time anymore. Before coming to Ghana, I was told I had to pay four months’ rent in advance before I even arrived in the country.

Rosh HaGhana

So yesterday and today were Rosh Hashanah, the two-day holiday also known as “Jewish New Year.” Jewish holidays are considered to begin at sunset the evening before the first day, so we typically welcome them with festive dinners. Rosh Hashanah is one of my favourite holidays, and I didn’t want to let it pass by just because I don’t know any Jews in Accra. So, I invited a few friends to join me for a holiday dinner.

I decided to do my best to cover as many traditional bases as possible in the meal, even if no one else would be familiar with the traditions. Rosh Hashanah, like all Jewish holidays, has a number of symbolic foods (or qualities of foods) associated with it. Examples most people are familiar with are the latkes we eat at Chanukah (fried in oil to evoke the oily miracle the holiday celebrates) and the matzah we eat at Passover (unleavened like the cakes baked in a hurry by the Jews as they fled Egypt during the exodus).

During Rosh Hashanah we want our foods to have the qualities of sweetness (to ensure a sweet new year) and roundness (to symbolize the annual cycle that is ending/beginning). So we take sweet round apples and dip them in sweet honey, along with special round challah with added sweet raisins. We also eat a sweet vegetable dish called tzimmes, usually containing carrots, sweet potatoes, and more raisins and honey. For dessert we eat round honey cake, which I also usually bake with apple in it. And, of course, we drink wine. None of these things is particularly challenging to prepare or find in any of the previous places I have lived. In Ghana, though, Rosh Hashanah was going to take a little creativity.

Writing the Wrong?

JHR’s slogan, in English at least, is “Write the Wrong.” I’m starting to think many Ghanaians see this as the primary role of journalists, even if it’s a wrong they could right themselves. Twice now I’ve found myself working with reporters on stories where injustice was being perpetrated more as a side effect of poor communication than any kind of malice or even neglect. Our involvement in the stories ended up looking more like mediation or counseling than reportage.

Back to School

This week’s column was published here, and can be read below:

With Ghana’s students returning to school this week, I’ve been trying to educate myself about the state of education in this country. As with most subjects, the more I learn, the more I feel I have to learn. I’m starting to grasp a few of the issues though.

The biggest story this year is clearly the implementation of the new education reforms. I must confess I was shocked when a Ghanaian friend of mine told me that the whole package of reforms—adding a year each onto kindergarten and secondary school, changing the content and focus of curriculum—had been introduced this past April, and would be in place by September. How, I asked, could there possibly be enough time to implement the changes?

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

This week’s column was published here, and is posted below. Caveat: It covers a lot (but not all) of the same ground as my earlier post about my hair. (Aside: I did in fact remove my braids the night the article came out. In all I counted more than 70 braids, and wound up with a huge pile of fake hair, pictured right.) The column:

I first cut my hair when I was 14 years old. Before I cut it, it reached past my waist. For a few years it hovered between my chin and my shoulders, but eventually I let it reach its previous length. Then, four years ago, I cut off 14 inches. It was the fastest diet I’ve ever heard of: I lost five pounds in less than 30 seconds. Since that time I’ve kept my hair quite short, and have never really been able to understand how my younger self put up with such a huge weight hanging from the top of her head.

Before coming to Ghana, I had my hairdresser at home cut my hair the shortest it has ever been. It had taken me a long time to find someone who cut it the way I liked it, so I had decided not to bother doing the search all over again in Ghana. I figured by the time I found someone, it would be time to go home. Despite my addiction to short hair, I would let mine grow while in Africa.

And grow it has! I’ve heard that hair and fingernails grow faster in warmer temperatures, and that has certainly been my experience, here and in other tropical travels. A couple of weeks ago I started finding my expanding mane uncomfortable in the heat. One of my Canadian friends here had had cornrow braids put in her hair, and mentioned how nice and cool the breeze felt on her exposed scalp. I decided I would give the braids a try myself.

I am Not a Well Girl

To be fair, I am much weller than I was yesterday or the day before. (Don’t even question if “weller” is a word; I’m sick, ok?) Sitting here at my laptop (running on battery, the electricity’s off tonight), I am still coughing hard enough to disturb the candle on my desk, and probably my next door neighbour as well. No, he can’t hear me, the house next door’s generator is blasting too loud for anyone to here anything that goes on in here. Maybe I should try a primal scream or two? Or would that be a little too Sally Bowles?

Anyway, the not well thing. Saturday afternoon I had a mysterious cough, mysterious in that I wasn’t congested and didn’t feel in any way sick. I chalked it up to a reaction to inhaling mould spores from my shoes (still growing fuzz) or the ceiling in my old room. By about eleven that night, though, I had almost hawked up a lung more than once, and my neighbour Mia (with whom I was out for dinner and drinks) wisely dropped me off at home before going for another drink with someone we had met.

The next morning I was positively ill with a nasty head and chest cold: coughing, sniffling, running the occasional low-grade fever.