Come and Dine

Recap of the 25^th

I do not even know where to start.

How about the very beginning?

Let me remind you that I am completely by myself in a stranger’s house and strange land today. I woke up this morning to Joyce making me, the only one here, breakfast in her pink school uniform before she went to school for the day. She had also washed the heap of dishes and cleaned the whole house before school as well. I am so impressed by this girl. She is the non-creepy equivalent of the “vera, vera sneaky” butler guy on Mr. Deeds who is always there at the right time and “appears” whenever he is needed. Joyce is like that. Even when I have to do mom things with my mom eyes, I will never be as on top of it as this girl.

Her brother Joseph and some of his friends came over before I left to go see the kids. As I was walking out the door, he was sitting at the table singing about the “goodness of God” to himself which is typical for him and asked if I wanted to hear the song he just wrote.

“Sure?”

It was good… straight from the heart. I smiled the whole time because I knew God was too. Who needs pitch when you’ve got a good heart right? What was really funny was that one of his friends chimed in after he was done and said, to paraphrase with American church culture lingo, that maybe God gave him that song, but really should give it back because he can’t sing. I was laughing so hard because that’s exactly what I would have thought at any other time or place but here in Ghana with this sweet guy. That got us on this discussion of music and that Abraham has a keyboard somewhere, which I was ecstatic about and made Joseph find before I left so I could get “dry cells” aka batteries for it.

The kids were great today for the most part. As I have told you before, this is not easy for me, so I have to make a conscious effort to act out of love rather than hide behind the pain of injustice. I stayed there for a while, just hanging out and playing with the kids. One of my instant favorites was sick today and she lay out on the porch outside with flies buzzing all around her. She looked like a limp banana peel tossed on the ground. Of course I was concerned about this, and I realize I do not know this child’s history and what her norms are, but this was just common sense. The “aunties” who take care of them were of no help to me in acquiring medical information. They just said her stomach was bothering her… just today or is she sick all of the time? Communication barrier times a thousand. I was getting really irritated because they weren’t doing anything about it and because I couldn’t understand anything that was going on other than she is obviously sick. She’s three. See, as an educated medical person like a PA for example, I could figure out what was wrong with her myself. Ahh- I was so frustrated by all of this, and on top of that, sad. I told Abraham he better see to this himself because she is not well. I am so excited I am going to school to learn.

I took my good camera today just for fun, and I am so glad I did. I got some really amazing shots that will serve as poignant reality checks and reminders why I am doing what I am doing in life. And… they are super cute and why NOT get some more of those?!

I left shortly after they had their lunch and realized on the long way home, now that I am “woman of the house”, there was a serious lack of safe drinking water in the house. I stopped to by a huge pack of sachets. There is about 20  500 ml sachets in each. HEAVY!! Point of amusement: me trying to carry this gracefully down the street. Point of greater amusement-I actually stopped to try and put it on my head like the woman do here…. I’m strong right? It can’t be that hard. Bad, bad idea.

I do not know how these women do what they do here. To me, the most mundane, routine tasks these woman do here is one remarkable feat after another.

I was a legitimate damsel in distress. White girl can’t fetch water. Clarification- I could but I could no carry it without hiding who heavy it was. These two boys, bless their hearts, for the secondary school here,  came to my rescue. Luckily, they were nice, respectable young men and walked me all the way home carrying my water. I wish I could have filmed this because I know I would have been laughing so hard at myself. This whole situation: me “fetching” water to “save the family farm”, realizing I am SO not on the Carroll College Women’s Bball weight lifting program anymore and having these two high school boys walk me through this little African town. Just another day in the office I guess.

This afternoon was I put the batteries in the piano and sat around the kitchen table with people I do not know and sang and played for hours. It was a blast, and really, probably one of the most enjoyable things I have done since I have been here. I miss my music like I never thought I would. The sky had started to get dark, and finally, with a commanding clap of thunder, the floodgates opened. Excited, I stood up from where I was sitting and ran outside, opened my arms and let the raindrops soak in.

This was magical.

And that’s when the power went out.

Yep. To me, no power means no fan, which means I sweat, especially since it was so humid.

I bring you back to the key word of this trip: ADAPT.

Abraham was still not home and it began to get dark. Joyce and Joseph where still here, and I am trying to imagine myself here alone with all this going on… I don’t know where anything is. I wouldn’t know what do to or what needs to be done. I am so jumpy when it comes to mice and the huge cockroaches that come out at night and more than anything, it is so dark here. Joseph had lit candles throughout the house while Joyce made spaghetti, or talia as they call it, I bought today because I have had pasta ONCE since I left the U.S.

The three of us sat down at the table, like a family, and had the most wonderful candlelight dinner together. Joe was full of stories, and I pegged him as one of those who cannot talk and eat at the same time. He was telling this story of a Ghanaian minister and his wife was asked to go Accra for a fancy banquet where they served talia to eat. The wife had caused such a raucous because she could not properly use her silverware. Ghanaians do not use silverware; they eat with their hands, so this woman was helpless with her knife and fork. He and Joyce were laughing so hard at this story, which of course made me laugh, but I didn’t get why it was THAT funny. I just chalked it up to culture differences and humor and kept eating and doing the courtesy laugh.

He asked if I had funny shories to share and because I was so hot and thinking about cool weather, I told them a story about a boy who licked a flagpole in the middle of winter because they have no concept of this. I don’t know why that of all things came to me but it did. They were thoroughly amused as I made sure to provide them appropriate visuals and demonstrations.

I noticed that Joe had hardly touched his food and Joyce and I were well into Round 2.

“Joe! Why aren’t you eating?! Aren’t you hungry?” I said in disbelief.

That’s when the table fell silent for a brief moment before Joyce started laughing again, which made him laugh. Was a missing something? I looked to Joyce for help. She explained to me in her broken English that the story Joe told earlier about the preacher’s wife was actually about himself.

Still confused.

Joseph doesn’t know how to use silverware. He doesn’t know how to eat his talia without using his hands.

OH.

For reasons I can’t explain, that really hit my soft spot. She had put out silverware for me and Joseph was trying to be kind and use them as well, but he simply didn’t know how. It was awkward to him.

It is important that you realize that Joseph is a very, very smart young man with a thirst for knowledge I find so inspiring. Through our many conversations yesterday, I learned that he is the eldest of his many orphaned siblings and takes care of them all and sees they are properly placed in good orphanages, which at 9 years old, he dropped out of school to do. He has such an incredible story. He had always loved school but wasn’t able to go because of his family situation. He was not a Christian at the time because his deceased father was Muslim, but was invited to church by a white man that was visiting here and he fell in love. He prayed and prayed for his family and that God would give him strength to take care of this brothers and sisters. One day in the market two years later, he said a man he had never seen before came up to him and told him he would pay for his school (I am translating the best I can because they do not talk like we do so there are a lot of details left out). He has never seen him before or since.

Now Joseph is at the top of his class in secondary school and will graduate this spring. He is our equivalent of a student body president over 2300+ kids and because of cultural traditions, has to address his student body on various occasions and is served food to eat in this setting. To take the food means you take the leadership and everyone watches you.

But he doesn’t know how to use silverware.

This was all making sense now.

School was in session. We twisted our spaghetti around our forks. We used our knife to scoop the remaining noodles onto our forks. He asked so many questions, SO many questions, and I felt it was my duty to teach him as best as I possibly could because this kid has something very special about him. I loved that he felt he could ask me these things, and I love teaching.

“At school, they serve me big chicken. How do I cut it?”

I had to think. We had nothing in the house that we could cut.

Ah. I got it. I got up and ran to my room, scaring the mouse that was in there, which made me scream bloody murder and run back down the hall to the kitchen. Once Joe said the coast was clear, I quickly went back down the hall, grabbed one of my beloved Clif bars out of my bag and RAN back to the table.

I took it out of the wrapper, grabbed my knife and fork and showed him how use the two pieces together to cut something in half. I placed one half of my chocolate chip bar on his plate and kept the other on mine for demonstration.

Bite by bite, by the flickering candlelight, we cut our Clif bars into small pieces one at a time and learned how to properly use silverware.

I loved this so much. It made me feel good that I was helping someone in a practical way, and I so admired his love of learning. I shared my “dessert” with Joyce who had moved next to me to observe. He kept asking questions about food, proper etiquette, when you laugh when you are not suppose to while you are speaking in public (lol), and what to do when you are giving a public address and people are intentionally trying to distract him. What do you do?

It took me a while to understand why he was asking all of these questions, but eventually I got it out of him: because of his prestigious position in school, he is the focus of a lot of hatred and jealously. There were 82 people who applied for this position, but it was handed to him. His life is literally in danger. He has been beaten. His food has been poisoned. He lives in a secure building above the head master in which no one is allowed to enter. His “safe” room has been ransacked and has had everything stolen from him. He wakes up every morning at 4 to go to class early to avoid confrontation. He is harassed incessantly during his mandatory, formal speeches at school. Even in Damongo, he is not safe in public because there are a lot of boys here who go to his school (they are on midterm break now and start again Monday).

I was appalled by what I was hearing. This day was nothing but an inning of curve ball after curve ball. Hearing this made me mad. How could they treat him like that?

What was even more shocking is that he thinks that he is one of the most fortunate people in the world because of all the opportunities and blessing God has given him and for His protection. What an incredible attitude. He, in the most literal sense, depends on God for this daily help and safe-keeping.

I was honored to be sharing a table with him. What a marvelous, inspiring story.

I forgot to mention that he wanted me to teach him how to play the piano, so we had lessons during the rain yesterday. He soaks things up with the same desperation this land does with the rain.

Abraham and his beautiful girlfriend Zee finally returned and about 10 last night. I was so relieved.

I woke up with a start in the middle of the night. I heard something. It was coming from inside my room… mouse or rat feet crawling around on my floor. Instant panicked. If this thing climbs in my bed,  heart failure imminent. The power was still out so none of the fans were on, and I could hear EVERYTHING. I know I shouldn’t be so scared (this is not a snake), and I hate that these things make me so jumpy. I was inches away from calling my dad (because he was going to…? Come over and kill the rodent?). BUT, at 2 am this morning, I learned how to pull it together and conquer fear. I had to listen to me murmur my own pep talk (You are in Africa. This is no place for wimps. I survived college basketball. I can do anything… Pull it together, sister!!). I had to breathe deeply and slowly. I had take control and make myself stop sweating out of fear, block out the noise and go to sleep. I know that does not sound like much, but this what I call a Stage 5, Class AA moral victory. I was the most proud of myself I have ever been when I woke up this morning.

The power is still out, but I managed to recharge my computer while the generator ran this morning for a short time. The sky is still eerie, so it will probably rain again.

I have no idea what today holds, but that is what I love about my life here. It’s like a surprise every day. Every day, I have the opportunity to feel experience things that move me deeply and see things my imagination cannot even create. I see beauty. I see pain. I see vivid color juxtaposed to the monochromatic dust on my feet, on the faces of children, and the huts they live in.

This is what it is be fully alive.

May God give you the same breath of life.