Week #13 – three month progress report

I wrote most of this on Sunday which was the first day since our arrival in Ghana that the sky was completely clear.  There was not a cloud visible all of the day!   It was exhilarating.   BLUE SKIES.  And the night was clear.  We could see Orion near the west horizon.  Today is Thursday.  The daytime overcast returned on Monday. 

We have been here three months as of this past weekend.  This week’s blog is going to be a three month progress report.

I went back and looked at my first week’s blog.  Quoting from that entry:  “We are confident that we will be able to find meaning and fulfillment in our daily lives once we can get beyond the sights/sounds/smells of our surrounding and the inconveniences of living here – having to wash every fruit and vegetable (and eggs) and all the dishes in Clorox, having internet which works sporadically, having to drive with white knuckles, and getting used to the heat – the oppressive, moist heat of the day, and night (it changes very little at night.)”

I would give us a solid B or maybe a B+ grade for getting “beyond the sights/sounds/smells of our surroundings.”   We don’t notice the dirt, the garbage, the torn up roads, and the incomplete construction as much as we did in the beginning.  If we notice anything, now, it seems that we see the people much more than the surroundings.  We often find ourselves commenting to each other about the beauty and elegance of someone that we see.  Just this morning on my drive down Independence Avenue I noticed one of the street vendors selling water bottles.  I watched her for the few moments the cars were slowing at an intersection.  She was probably in her early twenties.  She was tall and slender wearing a halter top and a ¾ length cotton skirt and sandels.  Her top was blue but her skirt was bright yellow which stood out against her black skin.   Her hair was cropped and she carried a large aluminum saucer with one liter water bottles balanced on her head.  As she approached our line of cars she smiled to each car and offered water.  Her teeth were ivory white and perfectly straight.  Her forehead was smooth, her eyebrows thin, barely visible, her nose was narrow, her lips were small.  She had no visible makeup but didn’t need anything to enhance her natural beauty.  She walked briskly, very erect, carrying the load on her head as easily as someone would wear a hat.  As she passed my car I noticed that the skin of her neck, shoulders and arms glistened in the sun due to her sweating.  It was a moist reflection, very much like the condensation that occurs on a cold water bottle placed in heat.  Yet her clothing did not appear moist.  She could have easily been a model or on the cover of a fashion magazine. 

We have noticed that most Ghanaians dress very well, despite their overall poverty, with modest, clean, clothing.  We do not see immodest dress on the women; they do not allow any midriff skin to show.  The Brittany Spears fashion line is not popular here in Ghana.  The men dress equally well, with a surprisingly large percentage who wear long sleeve shirts with French cuffs.  I have only seen one person with a tattoo (very difficult to distinguish because of the dark skin), and it was on the ankle of a young woman.  I’m not sure that she was native to Ghana.   All of the children and young men/women have short hair.  Some of the older women have beautiful hair styles, most of which are braided hair extensions put up on top of or behind their heads.  (I’ve asked the women about the hair extensions.  They have them rebraided about every three to fours weeks.  It takes 3 – 4 hours to do a complete head.)   Some of the women wear wigs.  The men are clean shaven with close cropped hair cuts.  I have seen only a few “Afro” hair styles and I suspect they are non Africans.  No one smokes, here.  Isn’t that amazing.  None of the Ghanaians, at least.  The only smokers are non Africans.

 

I would give ourselves an A in getting used to the inconveniences of living here.  It seems natural, now, to wash all the fruit/vegetables and eggs in Clorox.  Ditto for the dishes.  Out internet is not a problem.  We have a satellite modem that is always connected.  It is not fast, but at least it keeps the internet available at all times.  I don’t drive with white knuckles any more.  I do drive more defensively than at home, not taking my eyes off the road and surrounding vehicles.  But I’m not exhausted after driving to work or home.  And the heat, well, it remains hot but I (we) don’t seem to notice it as much.  We still sweat large quantities when in the heat but are not as panicky looking for airconditioning as we were three months ago.  

I would like to comment on two items that I’ve been thinking about a lot.  The first relates to malaria.  Having never been in a malaria endemic area Marsha and I arrived with a mental image of needing to take exorbitant precautions daily against the disease: DEET all over our bodies, mosquito repellent clothing, not going out at night, etc. and worrying incessantly about the enemy – the anopheles mosquito.  We both laugh, now, as we recall our first night here.  We were staying in temporary housing and had prepared for bed.  As we were turning the lights off we noticed a small flying insect in the room (the anopheles mosquito is very small, almost not visible, quite unlike the large mosquitoes of the American West).  We tried to kill it but could only catch fleeting views of it.  We were not able to eliminate it.  So, we prepared for bed both of us convinced that it was a malaria bearing mosquito and we were its next victims.  We covered ourselves with DEET and slept very restlessly, awakening to check to see if we had been bitten.   Now, three months later, we don’t worry very much about malaria.  We use DEET occasionally, but for the most part don’t take the onerous precautions we did in the beginning.  We are not as fearful of malaria.  We have become Malaria Russian Roulette players.  We carry our malaria medication, Artrin, with us all the time.

Having dealt with malaria on a daily basis for three months I want to offer a medical observation.  The incubation for malaria is about 10 – 14 days.   When malaria becomes clinically apparent it does so with the onset of a sensation of being “ice cold” – the cold phase --  characterized by shaking chills usually accompanied by headache/bodyache, fever, and gastrointestinal disturbance.  This lasts up to six hours then passes into the hot phase when the infected patient describes a “burning up” sensation accompanied by profuse sweating.  If the current medication for malaria (the Artrin, a combination of artesunate and lumefantrin) is given during the cold phase the patient is usually better within four hours of taking medication.  If started later than four hours after the onset it takes longer to work.  I am amazed that this combination medication is so effective for such a dramatic disease.   In reality, the medication makes it easier, and more successful, to treat acute malaria than a viral URI.   

My second comment relates to the changes I’ve experienced in my concerns about being white in a black society.  It is hard to describe the evolution of this change in attitude, but I have become much less aware of my whiteness in the past three months.  I remember being in ShopRite the first weekend here and noticing three white women near the fruit section.  By reflex I started to push my cart toward them, I guess wanting an unconscious sensation of being among my own.  I don’t do it anymore.   In fact, I hardly pay attention to the presence of white people at all.  I obviously don’t feel as self conscious of being white as I did on arrival. 

Along this same line I have also come to appreciate that the Ghanaians have very little awareness of skin color.    Let me tell you why I can say this.  (This happened to me about a month ago and I’ve thought about it quite a lot since then.)  Marsha was looking at fabric at a vendor’s shack and I was standing in the background watching her look at the different patterns.  The owner and I started chatting about trivial items and he offered to show me some men’s shirts made of Ghanaian fabric.  He brought me a number of them and held them up to me and commented each time how good I would look in the shirt.  He then said that if I were wearing a Ghanaian shirt I would “look Ghanaian.”  I looked at him and laughed and said, incredulously, “there is no way I would look Ghanaian wearing this shirt.”   He kept insisting I would.  I thought he was just trying to make a sale.  But I don’t think so.  I started thinking there, and have rethought about it a lot since then, that this man was serious in his assertion that if I would wear a Ghanaian shirt I would  “look Ghanaian.”  He didn’t see my whiteness as the determining factor in whether I looked like the locals or not.  Think about that for a moment.

By the way, I bought the shirt.  And I’ve worn it several times.  A couple of the native Africans have commented that I have looked very “Ghanaian.”  It amazes me!  To think that a shirt of African fabric is all that’s required to make me look like a native of Ghana.

I can’t think of anything funny this past week.  I guess I’ll close with a shopping experience.  This is to serve as an example of the Greatness to whom I am married. 

Marsha and I were at the Accra Mall on Thursday of last week grocery shopping.  I knew that I had only a little money with me.  As we were going through the store, adding more to the grocery cart, I kept asking Marsha if we were going to have enough money for checkout.  She would look at me and calmly say “yes.”  As we added more and more to the cart I kept asking about our amount of cash on hand.  She seemed confident we were not beyond our means.  I need to interject here that I dread the day when I have a check out confrontation – the checkers are not friendly at all and customer service here in Ghana is not a principle taught, let alone understood.  I fear having to disagree with an unfriendly checker.  And I fear worse having to explain why I don’t have enough cash, and begging her to take a credit card, which, by the way, is not safe to use here.   As we approached the check out stand with a full cart and an unknown amount of cash in our wallets I envisioned us having to ask the checker if she could take back some of our items for credit to get us within the amount of our cash on hand.  As we started through the check out Marsha calmly asked me how much money I had.  I told her Ghc 16  (sixteen cedes).  She was watching the running total and doing some mental calculations.  She asked for my Ghc 16.  As the grand total came up she handed all of our cash to the checker.  We received  Ghp 68 (68 pesowas,  about 50cents) as change.  As we loaded the items into our cart she looked at me with the look of “you are such a skeptic, did you really doubt me?”    I bow to her shopping Greatness!

Talk to you next week.   (This is papaya cut cross wise instead of length wise.) 

   
 

11 April 2010 weeks # 11 and 12

I thought I’d start with this photo.  It made me think of sailing. 

Last weekend I was traveling to and from the states and was unable to post a blog.  I had the unfortunate responsibility of having to accompany two missionaries home.  Both had developed mental health problems that prevented them from continuing their service here in Africa.  One had to be sedated to travel safely.  We left on Thursday night and flew through the night to Frankfurt, Germany.  We had an eight hour layover in Frankfurt and then flew to Denver where I delivered the sedated missionary to his family.  I then traveled with the second missionary to Salt Lake City where his family met us.  It was a difficult experience for all three of us, especially the two missionaries.  Both were tearful and very upset about returning home.   I sat between them on both flights and had a lot of time to talk to them.  There was nothing I could say, and I did try, to convince them that they had no control over the development of their mental health issues.  They were not failures.  I am hoping with appropriate medication and counseling they can get on with their lives. 

I made it to the hotel late Friday night.  I spent Saturday catching up on sleep and shopping for items that we need and can’t get in Accra.  I spent Sunday with Christopher and left Monday morning to return to Africa.  The Salt Lake to New York City (JFK) flight was OK, but the JFK to Accra flight had an incident that deserves an entry on my “Funnier Now Than When It Happened” list.  It was about one hour into the ten hour flight.  I was seated in the back, left side section, in the aisle seat.  Next to me in the window seat was a large man, not fat, just very big and muscular.  A shoe horn could have helped him squeeze into his seat.  He was so big that he couldn’t put down his serving tray because it rested on his legs.  (He really should have been in business or first class.  On second thought, I should have been in business or first class.)   In front of me (aisle seat) was a woman in traditional Ghanaian dress, with the matching fabric dress and headwrap.  The head wrap was very colorful and VERY TALL.   Behind me (aisle seat) was another big man.  I didn’t look at him while boarding, and after this incident really didn’t want to look at him the remainder of the flight.  The two aisle televisions that I could see were right above me and eight rows ahead. 

The following all happened in the space of about ten minutes.  The flight attendants were serving drinks at the same time the in flight movie started.  They served me and the man next to me.   Out of the corner of my eye I saw this man take his Coke and balance it on his serving tray, the serving tray that was resting on his legs.  The flight attendants moved on to the row behind.  This man tried to reach for something beside his tray and he spilled his Coke over the side of his tray onto the left leg of my suit pants and into my shoe.   I don’t think he got any of it on himself.  He mumbled an apology but offered no help other than picking up his overturned plastic cup.  I got the attention of the flight attendants and had them hand me paper towels which I used to clean up some of the spilled Coke.  The towels did little for the wet pant leg and sock.  I patted them as dry as I could.  I took a deep breath and tried to remember what I had learned about forgiving others.  I also tried to mentally calculate how long it would take my sock to dry out and how difficult it would be to get a wool suit dry cleaned in Africa.

I decided to see if the in flight movie would be appropriate for watching.  I started to lean back to watch the screen over my head.   I got my seat part way back and the man seated behind me immediately pushed my seat forward.  I guess he figured I was infringing on his space.  I waited a minute and tried it again.  He pushed me forward a second time.  I tried it a third time with the same result.  I thought, again, about what I’ve learned about forgiveness.

Being resilient as I am (laugh, laugh) I decided to watch the screen eight rows ahead of me.  As I started to view the screen and to adjust the headphones to the proper audio channel the woman in front of me put her seat forward and sat upright, obviously interested in watching the same screen.  Her VERY TALL fabric head wrap came upright and blocked my view completely.  No matter how far I moved to the right toward the aisle I could not get a view of the entire screen due to this beautiful Ghanaian fabric head wrap in my line of sight.  I was not about to move left toward my Coke spilling neighbor.   

Fortunately, the movie was not worth watching.  I decided that there would not be any benefit gained from further pondering forgivenss so I decided on the next option:  drugs.  I searched for an ambien but discovered that I had packed them in my checked through luggage.  Aargh!  It was a very long flight to Accra.

I am going to insert some pictures taken two days ago at the Orthopedic Training Center in Nsawam (a two hour drive from Accra.) 

Marsha and I took Rebecca Tetteh, her mother, and her brother to the OTC.  Ike Ferguson was there with a team from SLC fitting wheel chairs.  Two physical therapists were part of the team.  I wrote about Rebecca in my week #5 blog.  She has just turned eleven years old.  She was born with congenital bilateral hip dsyplasia and bilateral club feet.  Through the assistance of a number of people she has had her feet repaired and now walks with crutches.  We brought her to the OTC to see the physical therapists.   We also wanted to have her orthopedic shoes and crutches examined – a 10,000 mile check up on the hardware.  She spent an hour with two therapists who instructed Rebecca and her mother, Roseline, on exercises at home to strengthen hip/pelvic musculature and to prevent hip contractures.  We then took her to the fabrication building and had her shoes and crutches examined.  The technicians took the crutches and repaired parts that were wearing.  They took her shoes and completely resoled and reheeled them.  The shoes have special platform positioning to prevent the body’s tendency to scar back into a club foot position.  The crutch repair and shoe renewal took about three hours.   The charge was Ghc 10.00, about $7.00.  

The Orthopedic Training Center is Ghana’s resource for individuals with extremity disabilities such as amputations, paralysis, polio, congenital disorders, etc.  It is a service provided by Catholic Charities.  Sister Elizabeth Newman is the director.  She has been at the OTC for about 35 years.  The OTC has an outpatient service, a mobile unit, and an inpatient service.  They have over 6,000 patient encounters a year.  The inpatient service has about 100 – 125 patients at all times. (The picture above is Sister Elizabeth talking to the mother of one of the inpatients.)  Most of these are children with congenital deformities, primarily club feet, and patients with new amputations.  We saw one girl about 10 years old with bilateral below the knee amputations, a left mid forearm amputation, and a severely deformed right hand (fingers absent,) all the consequences of injuries secondary to a fire earlier in childhood.  She was an inpatient at the clinic while the technicians refit her three prostheses, having outgrown her previous ones.  She was animated and excited to see us.  I did not glimpse in her eyes any of the despair I would have expected in someone with such devastating deformities.

As we were walking with Rebecca toward the fabrication shop a young man about 12 years of age with a right leg amputation, ambulating with hand crutches, approached us.  He and Rebecca had a brief encounter, pausing for a moment and glancing at each other, and then passed.   The encounter was very touching for us adults as we observed in these two individual’s eyes and body language a recognition for each that there is another person in this world with similar disabilities and that life does not need to be limited because of physical handicaps.  It was a precious moment.

Marsha and I have been in Ghana three months this week.  Each day is a new adventure.  Each person is a new story.  Each experience is endearing.