Greetings from Ghana!

Hello, all. Unfortunately, I am in the middle of being evacuated due to the COVID- 19 pandemic. This not only affects Ghana, but every country where Peace Corps volunteers are deployed -- a first in Peace Corps history. The last few days have been crazy with trying to wrap up loose ends/unfinished projects, getting rid of everything, packing, and saying goodbye to everyone I have come to know as my friends in the past few months. Before I left Wa, I was able to take a yellow yellow and take one last ride around town to show you what my beautiful city looked like. Sadly, I haven't had the time to do that with Tamale, but I wanted to give you all a glimpse of the beautiful landscape I have been walking and biking. As a result, I am choosing to upload some videos that I think accurately depict what I would have chosen to film. Some notes on what you are seeing are included below the videos. Please enjoy a little bit of Tamale, just as I did for the ten months I called it ...

 

Over the past two weeks, I have been obsessed with watching Teen Vogue's "Playlist of My Life" videos (since I have had access to Wifi and don't have to waste data waiting for things to buffer). It is so fun to hear what songs mean a lot to famous actors and musicians and the memories they elicit. Inspired by these videos, I have made a playlist of my Ghana life full of songs that, ten, twenty, and even fifty years from now, will make me think of my time here. Note- I obviously do not own any of these songs. I am only adding these videos to make the listening experience easier for any friends and family reading this post. 1. AKWAABA - GuiltyBeatz (ft. Mr Eazi, Pappy Kojo and Patapaa) As soon as you arrive on Ghana soil, you see all sorts of signs with "Akwaaba!!" emblazoned on them. It takes only a few minutes to realize this means "welcome" in Twi, the language most widely spoken in southern Ghana. When I started training in Eastern Regi...

Being in Peace Corps is all about sharing information, whether it be recipes, dance steps, or language. I am sure many of you have seen pictures of me stirring banku, wearing an oversized kente smock, and attending baby naming ceremonies. However, this exchange is not one way. A big portion of my service has been me explaining the United States and its culture to the people I meet here in Ghana. Explaining, you might ask? Doesn’t the world already know about the U.S. from TV, movies, and the news? After all, we are one of the most powerful countries in the world (and express that in many ways, from military “might” to cultural hegemony to unequal trade laws). While it is true that Ghana has received a lot of information about the United States from TV, movies, and the news, it is easy to see just how limited in scope that glimpse into American culture is. For one, whenever I have a conversation about my home country with a Ghanaian, they always think that everyone there is w...

Image credit In honor of National Coming Out Day, I want to take some time to take a look at the experience of LGBTQ+ PCVs and Ghanaians. Many who fall outside of the "straight" norm are often forced to hide their identity to avoid persecution and, in some cases, death. But why should these folks hide a major part of their identities? For one, being queer is seen as going against religion, which is a major part of the Ghanaian way of life. Ghanaians are very religious and believe that everything in the Bible and the hadith (sayings attributed to Mohammad) is law and should be strictly followed. Various passages in both of these sources explicitly declare homosexual acts to be abominable, and thus to be avoided. Thus, if one engaged in a same-sex relationship, he would be sinning against God and carrying out the “work of the devil.” However, sinning against God is often not the first argument Ghanaians make as to why homosexuality is wrong. Most point to the...

Since being pulled out of my site in June, I have been in the middle of one of the biggest transitions of my life. Ask any Peace Corps Volunteer, and they will tell you that the first month or two at site is the hardest. You are dropped into a place where you don’t know much of the language (except what little you learned during training… unless you’re a Deaf Ed volunteer, in which case you know nothing), don’t know where anything is located, and only know the one person who brought you to your site. Those first few months are therefore spent trying to learn some practical phrases in the local language, making friends, and figuring out which lady sells the best street food. I went through this process back in August 2018. I arrived in Wa and, after deciding I didn’t care much for the person who brought me to site (he was a little too sexist for my taste), realized I had zero friends. Thankfully, I made friends with Christie, the only deaf teacher at my school, who let me trail ...

As a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV), I interact with a culture different from my own every day. This took some getting used to, but through our three-month training and by spending time with locals as much as I can, it is easier for me to navigate my new environment than when I arrived. However, while this training and spending time with locals helped me to integrate better into Ghanaian culture, it did not prepare me for the other culture into which I would soon be immersed: PCV culture. The way PCVs behave and communicate is unique to ourselves. In fact, much like our host countries’ cultures (as PCVs are found in nations across five different continents) as well as our own native U.S.-American culture, there are both positive and harmful aspects of our way of life that have come about to help us cope with the unique challenges we face. The most notable parts of PCV culture, of course, are the “strange” ones that most people cannot understand from the outside looking in but ar...

This week, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi hosted over 50 JHS and SHS students from 8 different regions across Ghana. The reason? STARS conference, standing for Students Taking Action Reaching for Success, where students got to participate in workshops on leadership, gender equality, science, entrepreneurship, self-esteem, and computers. They even got to experience yoga for the first time, which all of them enjoyed. The best part, though? Having 9 smart and sassy students from 4 different schools for the deaf participate! We had sign language classes every morning, which the students helped me teach. In addition, we had a session on deaf misconceptions, where the students talked about their experiences navigating a world biased towards hearing people. In a society that still uses the term "deaf and dumb," we opened a lot of kids' minds to injustices that exist barring equal access to deaf individuals to many of Ghana's institutions. I wa...

You might be thinking-- is this some sort of early Halloween post? Well, most Ghanaians don’t celebrate Halloween, so that would be a no. However, if you are in Ghana, not a day goes by without hearing some story or comment about witches or juju (like voodoo). This got me curious-- what do Ghanaian witches do? What do they look like? So, to get me out of my house and better integrated into my community, I took a day to ask people for the answers to these questions. Q: What is a witch? A: Someone who is accused of casting spells, causing problems for the community. The vast majority of the accused are women, although some are men. Oftentimes, the accusation is based upon strange behaviors seen or sounds heard from the house of a “witch.” Many report that witches become invisible in the night or turn into black cats to be able to carry out their magic (hence why black cats are often killed in Ghana). Only the ones being victimized by their sorcery can see them when they are i...