Reflections...!

Dear all,

(photos in this blog are from the balloon party Anna and I had at house 3, and some dancing at the school!)

The weekend gone I had my end-of-stay camp in Kumasi. Alright, for me it is more like a mid-stay camp, but for all the other volunteers everything is most definitely in the end stages. Because of this I am now looking towards my time left as being incredibly short! I have two and a half months left in Ghana, which sounds a lot but I know it will go far quicker than the first few months. The remaining time is split up in so many different ways: I now have just over two weeks until my Mum visits, and when she leaves it is practically July. During July both Anna and Maria are taking their travelling months a couple of weeks early and are travelling beyond Ghana to Togo, Benin and Nigeria (Anna) and Niger (Maria), during this time I will most likely be alone in the house! Then, half way through July my own travelling month begins, and I plan to go to the north with another volunteer. And then August begins and I have only 10 days remaining in Ghana! You see how time will disappear!?!!

On Sunday Kattie left Ghana to return to Denmark. As I write this she is waiting in the airport and by the time I get around to posting this blog will already be back home. I find this almost impossible to imagine; how can Kattie, who was so new with me, be going home already?! Here, everyone says “time is running” and although during those first few weeks truly I never, ever imagined I would utter that phrase I simply can not help myself saying it these days! On Sunday I received my certificate of participation from ICYE-Ghana. We all had a group photo, the remaining one-yearers and myself (7 from Germany (2 absent due to illness), 2 from Finland, 1 from Sweden and mee) standing together with Annie, Shiela and Kojo from the office. On Saturday we all sat outside and discussed what we had learnt from Ghana (patience for one!), our projects, challenges, expectations and returning to our own countries. It was really great to hear about everyone else’s projects (those I did not already know about) and learn that actually every project is flawed and has problems and challenges in the same way that mine does. It was funny to talk about my Ghanaian experience as if it is ending, which it really is not, and this only heightened this sense of time running away from under me! At least, a chapter has ended with Kattie leaving.

These past few weeks I have slowly come to realise how different a long term volunteer experience is with a short term experience. Mostly, it is the attitudes of the short term volunteer s that differs so much from ours. In the Home there is a constant flow of short term volunteers who come and go, mostly for one month or so, and it is always interesting to see their reaction to the school and the Home in general. A recent volunteer who stayed for a month really highlighted the difference in her constant expression of her desire to do something and be remembered; in the end she actually spent her last week painting the walls on the school compound to satisfy this. It looks beautiful, I admit! Personally, I now realise that any forward planning is next to impossible, and planning to make any “grand difference” is unrealistic. This can of course be both a positive and negative experience. Firstly, those rosey-tinted glasses of making a big impact and change are well and truly off. Sometimes, I myself see the obrunis coming around the school door and I think “ahhh not ANOTHER ONE” and with this I realise what the teachers and aunties must feel sometimes! I have heard many volunteers (from Ghana and otherwise) saying that the lack of guidance is hard to get used to, but when I see the amount of volunteers somewhere like OSH gets I just wonder how annoying it must be to have to think about new people every single month, occupy them, deal with their questions, hear all their ideas and put up with their disruption. This may seem a little harsh, but to the teachers and aunties I’m sure nothing is more annoying than a group of young people marching in with their colouring pencils, sweets, books, pens and balloons, making the children all hyped up, making a mess and then leaving again! I really just hope that long term volunteers can add something a little more, or at least piss them off less because we are more of a constant presence who know how things work and operate. From our point of view, the long time spent at a project can also highlight the frustrating and annoying things. Really, I have time to get frustrated and annoyed!

However, I feel like during the last month I have relaxed into the totally relaxed atmosphere of workinghere. This was definitely we all discussed during the camp. I really do love spending time with the children and what better time to do this than when the school is not having lessons and just chilling out in front of Tom and Jerry!

Quite often I have one child on my lap, three surrounding me and one doing something with my hair! I am also reallyenjoying the graduation dances, and they are getting better and better with now around 5 dances or so. There are only 15 “official” dancers but the rest of the kids sort of spread themselves around and try to copy them – often I am trying to make Abraham, a lovely new favourite, make the moves with his hands! It’s just really, really good fun. I honestly must say that one of the best things is hearing my name popping up everywhere!

Maybe one child will call me and just stick their tongue out at me or run up and hug me or put their arms around my shoulders. I know for sure that this kind of relationship with the kids would not happen over one month!

Anyway, I am rambling! It is the first of June at time of writing this and this time last year I finished my exams and drank champagne with Lizzie and Kat in Nottingham. I feel that deserves a mention even though I wont post this blog for a couple of days yet!

Love to all, Sal xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx