3) In the Field, Kpando, Hohoe

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Jan 31st:

Travel day to Kpando: all of the coaches met their respective drivers at 8:00am. Joshua will be driving Laurie and me for the next two weeks. We left Accra around 8:30am and arrived in Kpando around 11:30am. Our hotel was not ready until 4:00pm. The CU Manager met us and then took us to Roses’ Restaurant. The restaurant was in a back alley at the back of a building. Laurie’s comment later was ‘where the heck are we going?’. Anyway, it was air-conditioned. The menu looked quite full with a good variety. I asked for the pizza ... not available, the burger ... not available. I then asked what was available ... fish, chicken, rice only. For the next three days I had fish (tilapia) and rice. There was a Nigerian soap opera on and everyone in the restaurant was glued to the story line (in English). It was a bit hard to follow but basially it was about a Relick (Beachcombers) type of low life who took bribes and preached morality to a local village and drank too much. He caught people in the act and he broke into a chief council to break up a meeting. People were howling with laughter. What a hoot!

Hotel: I got the suite. It had a fridge, shower and TV (to watch the Ghana vs Egypt final). Unfortunately none of these things worked. I did have toilet paper, No.#3 sandpaper I believe and I needed it! My bowels gave out about 4:00pm, I have never seen a purge like it! I have had thicker urine than this stuff. To think people pay money to cleanse themselves. I took Immodium.

Day 8, Monday, Feb 1nd
We started in the CU at 8:30, (Hohoe Community / ASSI Credit Union, Box 483, Hohoe, West Volta) most of the first day was spent interviewing the manager, Mr Kofie Godfried. My bowels held out without only minor discomfort.

Day 9, tuesday, Feb 2nd
Laurie put his input into the Kpando report this morning. We then asked Kofie to review it and provide us with his comments. He thanked us and had nothing to say about the report except how grateful he was for what was contained in the report. Amazing!
Kofie once again bought us lunch. At lunch the regional chief was in the restaurant. Unfortunately we didn’t meet him. He was dressed in a Dashiki and carried a purse. Kofie informed us that his shoes identified him as the Chief. He is a very dignified person who carries himself with great dignity.

After lunch we went to the Commercial Bank to exchange our US$ for Cedes. At the bank we were centered out by a security guard who welcomed me back and said how glad he was to see me again. (aside: there must be someone out there who looks remarkably like me and travels the world meeting people; I am constantly being ‘recognized’, especially by customs people). The guard and Kofie whisked us away from the bank, towards the outskirts of town. We were escorted into a building which was open to the street where two men were sitting at a desk. They asked us ‘what do you want?’; I said to exchange US$ for Cedes. After much to and froing, they said ok and gave us a rate of 1.3 cedes per US$, compared to 1.37 we got in Accra. No one questioned this! One of the fellows counted my money while the other one (Tony Soprano type who also turned out to be Kofie’s landlord) watched and directed. He then opened a drawer full of cash and proceeded to count out my cedes. The same routine was repeated for Laurie. We felt like we had just done a deal with a couple of shady characters. Thank God we had Kofie with us. Wow!!

Without any request on our part, after we left the money changer, Kofie drove us in the other direction through town out into the countryside. He took us to meet Father Arnold, a priest who oversees a replica of the Lourdes, France, 13 stages of the cross. Apparently, in the 1950’s, the Virgin Mary appeared in a grotto on the side of the mountain where Father Arnold now lives. We met with Father Arnold and signed a visitor’s book. Like all the people we have met so far he was a warm and friendly person who welcomed his visitors from Canada. He has visited the US but not Canada. In 40 degrees Celsius then we walked up the mountain to visit all 13 stations, a statue of St Michael and a 70’ statue of the Virgin Mary. I pretty sure I was seeing visions by the end of our trek.

One thing I must mention, we were without electricity from 8:00am to 10:30pm.

When we returned to our hotel we sat outside in the shade since our rooms were very hot without air conditioning. Kofie brought us a dinner made by his wife called ‘aplay’ and we ate outside. Interestingly, he did not eat with us but joined us later. We watched the sun go down and enjoyed the meal. I was not as keen on the food as Laurie; I ate enough to be polite. Laurie ate more and unfortunately lost it later that evening.

After dinner we chatted with Kofie, we discussed many things, capital punishment, human trafficking, literacy rate (<55%).

With no lighting the stars were very bright. I pointed out Orion and noted that Betelgeuse at home was in the top left of the constellation whereas in Ghana it is in the bottom left ( a 45 degree shift).
We went back to a completely dark hotel about 9:00.

Day 9, Wednesday, Feb 3
Savings at Kpando. Savings means savings. If a member wants to withdraw money they must request in writing to the board. The manager then writes a credit union cheque drawn on the Commercial Bank. All activity is by cash. E.g., an electricity bill would be paid by cash by all individuals.

We presented our report and were thanked for our recommendation. The meeting with the board was truly special. They are wonderful sincere people. It has been a privilege to work with these people.
Feb 3rd:
We traveled to Hohoe from Kpando and arrived there at the credit union around noon. This place is about half of the size of the Kpando operation. It is located on the second floor at the back of a building. We had to follow a dirt path to the rear of the building and then climb a flight of stairs to reach the CU office. We met the manager, Mr. Moses and briefly chatted about his CU. They have about 600 members and use 10 runners to collect cash from market workers. Hey have no computers but are planning to acquire one in May/10.

Following the meeting with the manager we went to our hotel (Matvin Gardens). It is clean but no towels, no soap, no toilet paper (30 ceded/night). Interestingly the girl at the bar had trouble calculating how much to charge Laurie for his beer and water.

Laurie and I walked part way to town and gave up due to the heat. One thing we noted is the increased presence of Moslems in this part of the country. The ‘calls to prayer’ were happening very frequently.
I worked on the CU review until about 8:00. Pooped, I then went to bed.

Day 10, Thursday, Feb 4
Today we reviewed the operations at the Hohoe /ASSI Credit Union. ASSI stands for ‘acquisition of small scale industry’. The credit union has problems. It has a 70% loan delinquency rate and received a bad audit report for 2009. The manager, Mr. Moses, seems very dedicated and appears to be overworked. His two female clerks did little work while we were there. It looks like the expected Ghanaian male:female scenario, where the women do all the work, reversed here. He asked us to recommend additional staff, we will be recommending a bit more work load sharing.

For the first time at a credit union, I had to have a pee during the day. I asked one of the staff where the bathroom was. She said there wasn’t one and that the men simply peed against a post at the base of the building ... so I did!! I am going NATIVE.

After lunch (rice and chicken leg) we met the Treasurer, a really nice lady who runs a shop across the street from the credit union. She sells everything from gas stoves to TV antennas. It’s amazing, there is shop after shop on the street that sell everything imaginable, it’s really hard to nail down what particular type of business any one of them is.

So far today (5:00pm) we have only been without power for about 10 minutes. Hopefully this continues through the night.

9:30pm, just returned from a bar in Hohoe. We had Really nice evening with our driver and Mr. Moses. Met a young fellow, David, who is a chemical engineer for agricultural development, they still use DDT in Ghana. We talked about many things including Shaman. Apparently the practice is illegal and discouraged by the government. We also talked about Nigerians (bad) an people from Lagos (worse).

The lights are now back on after being out from 6:30 until 8:00.

Ac- bay ka ka means thank you very much in Twi. Ac-bay means thank you.
This has been a great day. Something ‘big’ just ran under my door.

This is a Muslim part of the country. Calls to prayer are based on local time in Mecca. In the middle of the night there is dead silence and then the calls are BLASTED out to the faithful, first call (Mecca sunrise) is at 3:30am Hohoe time.

Day 11, Friday, Feb 5
I have not had a bowel movement since the Sunday night purge. 4 days and counting.
The hotel we are staying at asked us to pay for our entire stay. For 4 days the bill was 120 Cedes or $90US.

I had to go to a local print shop to print our report.

Despite some very serious problems identified in the report the manager read it and expressed his sincere gratitude for our write-up. I think he was surprised that we said we would take the time to present the material to the board. The poor guy is swamped, while he deals with a stream of customers going in and out of his office, his secretary spent her time chatting up our driver and showing family pictures to him.
We met the board at 1:00 and presented our recommendations. The mood was less upbeat than in Kpando. However, the people were very gracious and express sincere thanks for our coming to their part of the world to help them. I hate the heat but honestly love the people here. What amazing resiliency and positive attitudes even though, from our perspective, they have so little. Wow!!

Our driver took us back to our hotel at 2:30. There has been no power since 8:00am

Laurie and I walked into town around 4:30. We went back to the restaurant that Moses took us to last night. We both had rice and fish.

It’s Friday so it’s the beginning of funerals in the city. As we were eating a parade of celebrants(?) walked back and forth in front of our restaurant singing and dancing. They were dressed in red, the colour signifies the age of the deceased. Prior to their arrival a hearse, with sirens blasting slowly preceded them down the street. It’s PARTY night in Hohoe!

Day 12, Saturday, Feb 6

Well the bowel drought ended with a vengeance today. I have had three bouts of explosions. All controlled, thank God.

We went to Wli Falls (highest in West Africa) and then to Gemi Mountain (highest in West Africa at 890 meters). I took an immodium in the morning and could not do the climb all the way up. I had to use an outdoor toilet at the mountain.

At Wli we meet several ‘yea vu nonn’ (white people) from Europe and the US. One girl, Donna (UK) is working in an orphanage. She said the kids live in horrible conditions and the thing that surprised her is that over time you come to look at their conditions as ‘normal’. She said when she arrived she saw a bunch of kids scrapping over a piece of chicken and then witnessed them going to bed crowded together on a concrete floor with ‘maybe’ a scrap of cloth to lie on for the lucky ones.

When we returned to the hotel we met the chairman (a woman). She asked what we called the Chair in Canada. We said some say chairperson, some say chairwoman. She informed us that the first person (Adam) was a man and therefore when she is in the chair, she is a man!

She asked us to re-present our board report to her and we did so from memory.

She also provided us with excellent feedback to take back to CUA next week. Ipromised to send her our report electronically the first chance I get ([e-mail]). Poor Mr. Moses looked very uncomfortable while she was there.

7:00pm: I am now about to explode again, adieu for now.

I’m back, ten pounds lighter. BTW, the Manager and his Secretary accompanied us on our visits today. She strikes me as a spoiled brat. Our driver spent much of the day chatting her up and she was only too willing to have Laurie and me foot all the expenses.

I have not eaten anything since breakfast. As well, I can’t stomach the idea of drinking beer, inexcusable in this country!

New words:
Yea vu ...white man
Babo font ... evil
Nonn ... woman
So, ‘babo font yea vu nonn’ means ‘evil man and woman’

Day 13, Sunday, Feb 7
This is a day I would rather forget. I don’t think I can ever remember feeling so sick. I took both Immodiun and Gastrolyte before we left Hohoe at 8:00 in the morning. As an unbiased imbiber of both products, I must say I prefer Gastrolyte. Requiring either is not a condition I would wish on anyone, well, almost anyone. We went to the Monkey Sanctuary on the way to Akatsi. Big disappointment, basically a few trees with about 30 Makah Monkeys in them. On the plus side, we did hook up with the British girl (Donna) again and I gave her the tooth brushes.

Our driver wanted to look up the credit union manager so that we could meet him for drinks. There must be a God, since the driver had lost the manager’s phone number. I had it but kept quiet and said ‘it’s alright, we can meet him tomorrow morning’. A little deception but in retrospect it spared the manager from meeting the whitest white man he will ever likely come across in his lifetime.

We arrived at the ‘Volta Paradise Hotel at 2:00. Thank God they insisted on carrying my luggage, I think I would have expired if I had to. To make matters worse, the power was off and didn’t come back on until 6:00pm, just before sunset. The end result, in 35+ degrees Celsius, there was no escape from the heat, well almost no escape. Picture this, a naked man in a bathtub filled with cold water, it was WONDERFUL.
In the afternoon I started the antibiotics (Apo-Ciproflox 500mg).

I didn’t eat breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Day 14,Monday, Feb 8

I woke up feeling a bit better. For breakfast I had coffee and toast. I could have easily skipped eating but felt that would not be wise.

We arrived at the credit union around 8:30. This, by far, is the biggest building we have visited. The credit union floor space itself could have housed 4 to 5 of the credit unions we have visited. They even put us in a separate room with a desk in it. All that being said, the credit union only has about 480 members. The difference here is that it is very well run. Where the first CU had 20% loan delinquency and the second a whopping 70%, this one has virtually none. The end result, they have money to spend on premises and computers.

Because the CU is so well run we changed our plans. We will wrap up this review in two days rather than four. With the extra day we will travel down to the coast to visit a Slave Castle.

At the hotel we ran across Mr. Evans Otsyina (024 7894009). He said he has visited Oregon and found it very cold, in May. There he couldn’t get over how people had to make small talk over dinner at the conference he was at. He is teaching a local farmer’s co-op how to fertilize their crops. He complained about the banks not wanting to talk to farmers about loans. We said we would get him in touch with the credit union manager we are working with. It interesting how quickly caution enters into a conversation, he asked me for my business card. I told him I had used all of them up (big fib!) since we were warned not to provide contact information to even the credit union staff we are working with, let alone complete strangers. Other considerations, probably not related, are that we are only 35 km from the Togo border and it is amazing to see that almost every significant building has bars on the windows and doors.
I couldn’t eat lunch and only nibbled at a spaghetti dinner.

Day 15, Tuesday, Feb 9
We finalized our report to our final cu today. They are eagerly planning to convert to an automated banking system ‘shortly’. I cautioned them not to rush into it for several reasons. The manager was not thrilled with my presentation. The Board had good questions. It was the first time we have had any feedback and it was very good to see. Laurie and I were measured given handmade shirts in thanks for our efforts.

It was very hot today, the difference being humidity. Around here it can get cloudy and look like a sure sign of rain from a Canadian perspective. However, it never rains until late March. I had a nice chat with a lady board member who assured me that global warming is making weather temperatures much hotter in Ghana than they used to be when she was young.

I had ‘red-red’ for dinner, basically spicy beans with a side order of plantains. Not bad.

Toast for breakfast nibbles for lunch and dinner. I pretty tired and will be glad to get home this weekend. Cold, glorious cold!

I had the last of the antibiotic tonight.

New word
Ghana ... ‘white man’s laxitive’

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Photos

Church in Kpando
still active

Restaurant in Hohoe
Fresh Chicken strangled on the spot ... no waiting!

Norm and Kofie Godfried
CU Manager

Baboon
This guy was a member of a group of about 6 that was walking along the road on our way to Kpando

Convient??
it is an actual urinal!!??