Accra--Workaholic style

Greetings everyone!

It has been awhile, no? In true JS fashion I put too much on my plate and got mixed up in a mumbojumbo of work, school, and social activities. Also, some learning experiences left me a little shell shocked and reflective. Per usual. So I'll summarize.

Things that I'm doing:

• Organizing a conference to discuss aid effectiveness in Ghana (and the rest of the world) with students from Ashesi, Legon, and NYU. This is coming off November 21...hopefully we pull it together! It is a perfect chance for people (like me) to find out what people living in the developing world (national staff) think--eventually we'll be working together, may as well start learning now!
• Finishing up classes for the semester, writing too many papers, and trying to figure out how to get to an exam on a SUNDAY in November.
• Training new counselors from the National Aids Control Programme for the pilot program I'm working on and trying to launch the third aspect of the program before the end of November
• transferring the data to a new system so that I can actually leave Accra on time.
  
• Trying to figure out how to only take one undergraduate class next semester and graduate. :)

Things that I've done:

• Took a trip to Kumasi to see the cultural center, visit the palace of the Ashanti king, and roam through the hectic market
• Spent my fall break here in Accra working...
• Took a trip to Kokrobite beach
• Applied for graduation May 2009
  
• Gave up dairy (it's a slow process, but quite necessary) (no more chocolate velvet cheesecake...)
  
• Stopped chewing ice! (why I gave up dairy)
• Attempted to vote in the 2008 election. Let's just say that my ballot didn't arrive until Monday, Washoe county won't return my emails, and the Embassy doesn't really just let you add things to the diplomatic pouch....I voted, but it may not be counted. Sigh. Actually, no, it's a complete conspiracy. They have all of this talk about how they want the youth vote to rise and they want absentees to vote and they're doing every thing they can to have your vote counted--but that's crap. They refuse to send out absentee ballots in a timely manner, they don't accept write ins until 14 days before the election, the Embassy makes you wait in line with the people applying to immigrate just to submit your ballot, and no one answers emails! I did everything right. Conceivably, my vote should get to Washoe county. But it won't. Think about how many people are relying on absentee ballots to vote--it's a complete joke. Sigh.
• went to Aburi gardens yesterday--we ate cinnamon bark, smelled all spice leaves, rubbed some menthol leaves on us, and rode bikes around a village. We had the PERFECT day. We also spent a good amount of time sorting through Halloween's festivities, commiserating on our health, and gorging ourselves on jollof rice and fried chicken. Yum.
• Avoiding any and all political arguments.

Last week I had a discussion with a Ghanaian coworker regarding development projects. He told me that if he could go back, he would have never entered into development. Here's an interesting fact: Ghanaians going into development projects have a higher salary. For instance: a driver for the civil service (or NYU) makes 100 Ghana cedis a month. A driver for a development project would make about 300 Ghana cedis per month. That's huge! The same goes for every person in every position. So rather than being fueled by the desire to help people, the national staff is fueled by nothing--this is just a job. What's the incentive? They can't even take bribes (whereas many other people must --take bribes-- to survive/live their lavish lifestyles). Realizing this disparity behind values and beliefs of expats versus national staff was quite shocking. I mean, expats have it pretty easy--everything is covered: food, house, nanny, cook, car, driver, etc. The salary goes right into the bank and expats get to lead a fairly cushy life style. But still, I believe that people get into development with the fundamental purpose of helping in some way. But basically, what I concluded was that development will never work because no one wants it to work and that my entire career path is a joke. Of course, I've snapped out of that. As long as I do my best and believe in what I do, some thing will happen, even if it's just laying a foundation for the next generation. I mean, look at this pilot program. We are getting interest from several other countries and being hailed as the number one response program on the continent. That's pretty impressive.

Then we have work. Work in general just drives me insane. I'm so tired of being talked down to and constantly being out of the loop. Unless I do things myself or say things in a way that persuade others to actually do their job rather than read the paper, nothing ever happens. It's incredibly frustrating. I like to get things done and I am fairly proactive about doing them. When every one of your supervisors is NOT that way, life can be a little difficult. In a moment of absolute frustration, I decided to write a report on September's data and send it to the Chief of Party without having it approved by my supervisor...not in a brown nosing way, but because that is in my scope of work and it was my job. I couldn't wait for her to open her emails and MAYBE look at it the next week.

The report got great feedback from the Chief of Party and we edited it and sent it off to Nigeria, Senegal, and Washington. Even though my supervisor made me feel like crap after it, I can't help but be a little bit proud.

Anyway. I could go on forever. At the end of the day, I'm really starting to miss my friends and family. This town is like high school and the expats all know every one's business. I don't really like that. I love this country, but I'm starting to think I need some thing less comfortable. I was reading through the devex report on the world and realized that I live in a Ghana bubble. Just because I'm in a developing country doesn't mean that the world has stopped killing itself. Wars, cholera, measles, malnutrition, etc etc etc are still happening and I need to stop living in this fantasy world where every developing country is like Ghana. I let myself get too comfortable.

I miss you all and can't wait to see you in December (Reno) and in January (New York). I can't wait to be cold and get to wear clothes again. I can wait to be homeless and cold in New York in the middle of winter....Regardless, we'll have to have a huge reunion fest to celebrate me actually coming back. It's questionable at times ;)

Love you!!
J