Church, Football & all things Ghanaian!

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29/07/07



I woke up at 6am. I never knew there was two 6am’s in one day. I was asked if I wanted a special menu but I want to eat what they eat - or at least try their food. After breakfast we all went to church. It is a small wooden hut with very old school desks. The service was sort of like Pentecostal, Full of music, singing, chanting & shouting in the local dialect, Fante, Even though I didn’t understand the words, I still found it very moving & full of energy. I found out they were celebrating women & how they hold the key for the Future of Africa (very different in every way to a Catholic service!!!)




I spent the Afternoon playing football with the kids & then games I had thought up. The orphanage co-ordinator, Samuel, and I walked to the next village & every person I meet waved & the kids screamed “obruni, obruni” (white man, white man). I am the first white man they have seen for about 2 years. The houses in the village are small wooden shacks all crammed in tight. The lucky one’s have corrugated metal weighed down with stones for roofs. It makes North End seem like Beverly Hills!!! I went to Samuel'’s friends house & I could not tell if I was inside or outside!!! The people who owned the house hugged me & welcomed me & one woman kept thanking me for coming to Ghana & she wanted to cook me some fish one day (How do you respond to that!!!).





We walked through the rest of the village and the horror of how these people live hit me. I saw kids crapping into open sewers - there is no running water in this part of Ghana. How can this place still exist in 2007, it looks like a hell-hole but the people make it nice & welcoming (a bit like England in reverse!!!). These people have been living like this for thousands of years & it does not look like some things have changed that much. We had to get a taxi back home as so many kids were following us (they don’t want anything from me except a hello & a smile).
Tomorrow is Monday & that is when I start work. I have to get the kids ready for school & then walk them to class. Then I have a few jobs around the orphanage to do. I go to bed that night thinking “Why in God-forsaken places do you see God & faith everywhere?”

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Photos

Just one of the many churches found in Ghana.
This one needs a new roof, but it still does not keep the congregation away!!!

Kids in the next village.
A very strange experience to have men, women & children coming over to say hello to the white man!