Friday, 10 June 2011-Accra

Friday, June 10, 2011--AGISS

This is written in the afternoon while waiting for Osman.  I am very happy because I just got back from the computer lab, where I finally had internet access!  Actually, I had it yesterday, but made the mistake of weeding through e-mails first so that by the time I got around to typing my own message to everyone, just as I was ready to send, the connection broke.  But now I’m feeling better about all (two or three) people who are looking for my blog to get underway.  I got three entries uploaded—a good eight or ten pages—so that will give everyone something to read.  Meanwhile, I’ve got to keep up here with what’s new.  I’ve worked out the system so that I enter everything I can recall quickly here in rough form in my journal, then pull it back out and edit it for the blog entries, which need to be a little more linear. 

Morning announcements—I learned today that the student leading the morning assembly each day is the head prefect among the girls. When I asked one of my class prefects, she told me that prefects are selected by the students, but based on certain qualifications to be a candidate.  “Hail Mary” was said this morning, twice.  When the prefect or a teacher wants something done, they simply say “Again.”  There is no pleading or cajoling.  Students do so without grumbling.  When a teacher needs something done, s/he gives a little “Hssss,” at the nearest student (actually the same sound is used in the classroom to signal to be quiet), and calls them over, cupped hand down with the fingers pulling back into the hand several times.  Again, every student I have seen asked in this way has immediately done what is asked.  Of course, there are no tardy bells here (and apparently no tardies either for that matter).  Some students arrive a few minutes late for class, particularly where a large number have had to go some distance to get chairs from another location for seating in the aisle.

After assembly, Osman drove me off through Zongo.  I thought we were off to take care of a couple of minor errands, but he had other plans.  Roadwork is being done on the main road that runs down from the gate end of the AGISS grounds, and so we again ran into a couple of dead ends on the way to our destination and enjoyed the task of making a u-turn and heading off in another direction.  Some of the streets we were on today on our detours were heavily rutted and I couldn’t help but think how hard driving here must be on suspensions and shock absorbers.  Osman regularly drives over the various concrete drainage channels around the school grounds.  These are about 10-12 inches wide and one to three feet deep.  You’d be in definite trouble if you didn’t take them at a direct enough angle and had a tire slip into the channel.

When we got out in Zongo, we walked deeper into the neighborhood than I’ve been before.  Zongo by no means presents a romantic image of life in Ghana—the narrow walkways twist and turn, rutted and with water from unknown sources trickling down the middle, strewn in places with trash, mud, and piles of debris.  Small kiosks boasting even smaller inventories of snacks, candy, soda, and the ubiquitous bags of water are tucked away into corners or tightly up against a wall.  At every turn there are people—walking, sitting, standing, working, and some seemingly just hanging out at just before 8:00 in the morning.  I am aware of all of this, and of the other sites that I would never see at home in St. Louis—like the pile of coal (charcoal?) that had been dumped at the intersection of a couple of the slightly less narrow walks and was being loaded into bags by a woman, or the chickens and occasional goat that wander about.  Yet, for all the superficial differences, and despite the fact that I know that some of these people are probably struggling to get by, underlying the differences are a number of things that point to just how similar most people and their concerns are around the world regardless of the differences we see.

Our two or three minute walk ended when Osman ducked between the corners of two buildings  standing at right angles to each other and into a small courtyard about the size of the one he shares with his neighbors at his home.  The difference was that the rooms in the buildings facing the courtyard here had been turned into a private school: Patience Prep and Junior High.  Karim, one of the teachers for levels around 4-6 is a friend of Osman’s, and so I was able to pay a brief visit to his class.  He had about 15 or so students in his classroom, which had maps of Ghana and Africa on the walls.  They greeted me and he had them sing a song for me, which I asked them to sing again so that I could record it.  I don’t know if I’ve written earlier about the utterly non-sectarian fashion in which Muslims and Christians seem to interact and get along in Ghana, but it is striking, which is to say there is nothing striking about such interactions at all.  Nobody seems to draw any attention to them—one’s neighbor/classmate is one’s neighbor or classmate and a fellow Ghanaian, and there’s not much more to think about.  I’ve begun to think that if Turkey represents a potential model for a stable, open society in a country with a largely Muslim population, then perhaps Ghana might be such a model for nations where Christians and Muslims both dwell in substantial numbers.  To return to Patience Prep and Junior High, the song that Karim’s students sang for me captured this particular aspect of Ghana as well as I expect I will hear it captured anywhere during my visit:

Why don’t you help us develop a nation, a nation for Muslims, a nation for Christians.

I am a Muslim and you are a Christian, we can’t be enemies; we’ll just be friends.

I took a couple of pictures of the entire student body out in the courtyard, perhaps 40 or so with their teachers.  Kids are kids everywhere—everyone wants to jump into the picture.  There are actually more students than this in the school, but it being Friday, some of those who are Muslim do not attend, instead spending the day at services with their families, just as my student Brian did at Berkeley Middle this past year.  Karim walked back out to the main road with us and I asked him why parents might choose to send their students to Patience or another private school when there are state schools.  He said that some of the parents feel that the quality of the education in private schools is better.  This is really the point I wanted to make when I referred above to the similarities that underlie people in Zongo and in St. Louis or anywhere else.  Most all of us want what’s best for our families and are willing to do what we can to make that happen, even if it involves financial or other sacrifices such as paying private school fees even though a less expensive alternative is available.

We stopped by Osman’s to greet Amina and Shaida and I also got to meet Osman’s mother.  It being Friday, she was dressed more formally, and she came out and we were introduced.  She does not speak English and that is why Osman said she has not wanted to greet me before.  After our brief introduction, she returned to the room where I usually see her.  Of course, my complete lack of Wali makes it just as difficult for me to greet her as vice versa, but I’m less bothered by my inability.  Given the discussions I’ve had about what woman are expected to do for men in the way of household duties, I asked Osman who was fulfilling those duties for his father while his mother is here.  He explained that his father, as a Muslim, has two wives and so his step-mother remains in the north and can perform all the tasks required for his father. 

Osman’s mother is not the only person who seems to be better dressed in Zongo today, at least to my eye.  Many women have on fancier dresses and head scarves/wraps, and I’ve seen a few men in long black tunics with hoods that I have not seen before.  The normal tunic, in white, symbolizes purity, and Osman confirmed that the black version is worn more frequently on Friday.  We passed a number of the small mosques that dot Zongo, most of which are painted in some combination of green and whte, and several had Friday prayers in progress.  I have not previously associated Muslim services with singing, but groups of men were singing/chanting in at least two mosques that we passed today.  When I asked how these various mosques are funded, thinking back to my Turkish experience of two years ago where at least the upkeep costs for some mosquescome from fees charged to shopkeepers in an adjacent area, Osman told me that construction can be funded in several ways.  Sometimes, Muslims in the vicinity of the new mosque make the required contributions.In other cases, a wealthy individual, either a Ghanaian or a foreign national, may choose to pay for a new mosque to be built as a symbol of his devotion.  Additionally, some NGOs and governments of Islamic nations carry out mosque building programs. 

During our drive through the neighborhood, I noticed several older women chewing on small sticks of wood, perhaps four inches long and a quarter inch broad.  Osman explained that these sticks are used partly to keep the teeth clean, but also confirmed that, like qat in North Africa, the chemicals in this type of wood also have a mild stimulant quality to them.  Chewing is generally restricted to older women.  Mind you, all of the above activity took place in the morning before I had even taught any classes.  Things get going early here, probably in part because mornings are typically the coolest time of the day, and so it is the best time to be active. 

I did get back to my rooms for about two hours to finish preparing my lesson plan for the first form students, whom I had not seen since Monday.  The lesson focused on the different kinds of sources for writing African History.  I saw Osman do a review session on this topic the first thing on Monday, so I had a pretty good idea of the different sources that needed to be covered, but I worked up my notes to include a number of additional examples from Ghana, the U.S., and around the world.  I also planned to incorporate some methods that are not listed in the textbook, such as art history and the use of photographs.

The class went very well.  We used a three column organizer to record information about the advantages and disadvantages of using each of the different sources for writing history, with the third column for the miscellaneous notes that I added about writing history in general. ( I need to speak with Osman about the educational term “writing”—here students “write” exams as well as “writing” history.)There is a definite difference, though, between the students in the second and third form classes that I have had and those in the first form today.  There is a definite sense of youngness about those in the first form, reflected perhaps in the fact that while most worked very hard, some seemed a little more distracted than I have seen in the classes for the other forms.  However, the first form students also seemed the most excited to see me, and I ended up with a group of six or eight staying well after class to ask me questions: Is there racism in the U.S.?  What is American schooling like?  Why am I a vegetarian?

While I was teaching, Osman was off making the final arrangements for tomorrow’s “excursion,” to use the Ghanaian word for what we would call a field trip.  We stopped by the home economicsbuilding to see Rejoice, and inquire about tomorrow’s food, and she had lunch delivered for me again—kenkey (fermented corn that is much more solid, and is wrapped in a corn husk, which extends through the center.  It came with another good vegetable sauce—I liked the kenkey, which a student earlier in the week said was her favorite.  I guess this will be the standard arrangement for my lunches while I am here—I have absolutely nothing to complain about on that account.

After lunch, I spent time working on my journal and blog, culminating in my successful uploading of my first blog entries as I mentioned at the outset.  Osman picked me up shortly thereafter, and we were off through Zongo once again.  It being Friday evening, there was a lot of traffic, still congested because of the ongoing construction blockages that made it difficult to get around.  A couple of times, we passed through the back alley right along the outside of the AGISS school wall, passing an empty corner lot with a couple of huge speakers that must be the source of much of the music I hear coming up from that direction at nights.  We ended up at Connie’s Corner, just by his home for a beer and discussion.  He told me much about the application process for TEAhere—there is the initial application, then a test, followedby an interview with personnel at the U.S. embassy.  It seems that they are very concerned with candidates’ English language skills and their ability to communicate their ideas effectively in a variety of circumstances.  After all these stages are completed, the candidate’s file can finally be sent on to the people at IREX, the International Research and Exchanges Board of the U.S. State Department.  The U.S. application process was a lot easier, I have to say, but in the end if the process here produced participants like Osman, it certainly did work well.

Karim, whom we had been trying to go to see when we got entangled in the web of traffic in Zongo during the evening, came to Osman’s for dinner.  Amina had prepared a delicious rice dish with fish and soup, pineapple and watermelon.  We talked about Patience Prep and Jr. High and the school system in Ghana in general.  Patience was founded by his brother ten years ago, after he had been teaching in another school, and Karim has been there for two years.  He teaches English, Math, Science, and Moral Instruction.  I had noticed during my visit that the classrooms at Patience contained several maps of Africa and of Ghana, but none of the world, so after dinner I presented Karim with a couple of world maps and an inflatable globe for his school.