Last post - a video of pictures from our trip, and an interesting article on caskets in Ghana!

Here are a few last things that are interesting from our trip to Ghana... enjoy!

A big thanks to Kate on our trip for putting the following pictures to music in a video format for us to show at an assembly at our school where we talked about the trip to the student body. Make sure your speakers are turned on!  :)

Also, an interesting thing that we learned while on the trip is that casket-making is a serious business in Ghana.  Often Ghanaians are buried in caskets that are shaped and painted like what their career was in life - for example, a fisherman might be buried in a fish casket, a seamstress in a sewing machine casket, an electrician in a light bulb casket, etc.  We saw a few examples of shops that sold these kinds of unique caskets while driving around the country, but I found the following article on CNN.com when I returned home.  Make sure to click through the pictures in the article! Read article here: In Ghana, what you do defines you in life... and death.

Final day in Ghana - Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park, Arts Center, final Ghanaian meals, and goodbye to Ghana...

On our final day in Ghana, we had the privilege of visiting the Kwame Nkrumah National Park.  Our flight home would leave that evening, so we had the better part of our final day in Ghana in the capital city of Accra to see a few different sites and various parts of the city.  As someone who really is interested in world history, I was happy to have the chance to go to this place that draws people from all over the world to learn more about the influential leader who led Ghana to independence from Britain in 1957.  We started with a short tour of an inside museum (which was air conditioned... it felt wonderful) and got to see some furniture and outfits belonging to the leader, as well as many pictures and stories of his life. To learn more about Kwame Nkrumah and this very important era in Ghana's history click here.

This is the mausoleum that holds the final resting place for Kwame Nkrumah and is the beautiful focal point for this memorial park.

Dr. Nkrumah's final resting place.

A bronze statue of Kwame Nkrumah in the exact spot that he proclaimed independence for Ghana in 1957.  In Nkrumah's speech on that day, he famously said... "At long last Ghana, your beloved country is free forever… but the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked up to the total liberation of the African continent.’’

Bronze sculptures blowing celebratory horns.

There were a lot of peacocks freely walking around the park.  I read on a plaque that peacocks were a favorite of Dr. Nkrumah and that's why they are a part of the his memorial park.

Dr. Nkrumah's Cadillac.  Stories that I read about the leader said that he loved this American car.

There were a few signs honoring important figures that had visited and contributed to the park, like this tree that was planted by Nelson Mandela.

Mr. Johnson, one of MA's faculty leaders for the trip - this guy is awesome!  The restaurant that we went to for lunch on our last day in Ghana is called Assase Paa and is a vegetarian/vegan/all natural cafe that our Project Okurase friends said they usually take their visiting groups to for a meal.  It is conveniently located very close to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park, so we were able to walk over to eat lunch after seeing the park.  They had really tasty and cold (cold is extra wonderful when it's so hot outside!) fresh squeezed fruit juice, so we all enjoyed some of that.  Yum!

This is a very typical Ghanaian meal called "red-red" - a stew made of black eyed beans, traditionally prepared with red palm oil and tomato paste, and often served with fried plantains.  It can be made with meat or without - we had it prepared for us both ways while on the trip. Our group ate red-red several times over the course of our trip and I really enjoyed it.  Parents, if you want to make a typical Ghanaian meal for your student to bring their taste buds and memories back to our special trip, this might be one to try - it is pretty family friendly (by which I mean that my young girls at home would eat it and most likely enjoy it).  :) I found several recipes online - I will definitely try and make it at home.  Here is a link to one of the recipes I looked at online:  Ghanaian Red-Red recipe!

After lunch we went to the nearby Accra Arts Centre for about 45 minutes of shopping before we had to depart for dinner before we went to the airport for our flights home.  It was a very large market with so many fun things to look at - many of us purchased souvenirs to bring home to family.  Several of us learned the art of bargaining (which is not always as easy as it seems!), and it was a bit crazy at times being approached to buy anything and everything that was sold in the many, many stalls.  I was too busy shopping to get any pictures myself, so the following four photos are taken from google images.

Here is a picture of our last dinner in Ghana, at a restaurant called Abajo - this was the meal that I ordered. If you order fish in Ghana, this is very typical of what you will get - the entire fish, extremely fresh!  I realized while eating my fish that I ordered a few times on the trip, it took me quite a bit longer to eat than it would at home because you were really picking the meat off of the bones carefully.  At home I would order fish and it would be a nice fillet cut with no bones - a bit easier to eat and definitely different than ordering fish at home!  The rice to the left of the fish is a popular Ghana staple dish called Joloff rice.  The flavors of Joloff rice are very tasty, and it can be prepared with or without vegetables and meat.  I will attempt to make this one at home too - yum! Here is a link to a Joloff rice recipe online: click here.

Our journey started with jubilant Ghanaian drumming and it ended with the same.  Our guests at Project Okurase were wonderful in making sure we truly experienced as much of the culture as we could while in Ghana.  Our host Powerful is drumming in this picture - he is the second one in from the right with the striped shirt.

Powerful also brought in a dance troupe to dance to the drumming while we ate.  What a memorable way to spend our last evening in Ghana!

Our table - eating, talking, and watching the drumming and dancing show.  It was an interesting meal for me because the atmosphere with the drumming and dancing was joyful, but knowing that we would be leaving Ghana in just a few short hours was making me think back over our wonderful trip and feeling sad to be leaving.

Powerful and I saying goodbye outside our bus, just before we walked into the airport terminal.  I can't say enough wonderful things about how Powerful led this trip, and the impact he made on me and the others from our group.  He radiates peace and happiness and has an awesome, magnetic personality.

The two happy MA leaders (Julie & Matt J.) and Powerful.  Saying goodbye was sad and I can only hope to be back to Ghana in the future to visit our new Ghanaian friends again!

On our first flight home, from Ghana to Amsterdam.  Everyone was tired and several of the students weren't feeling well - tummy issues, etc.  Even though it is sometimes difficult to really rest on these long flights, I think everyone was thankful for our wonderful trip and the flight time ahead to relax and reflect.

We missed these two sweeties while we were gone, our daughters!  Here is a photo of them just a few minutes after we returned home from the MSP airport and got out the gifts we had gotten for them in Ghana - dresses, dolls, jewelry, and drums.  The smaller red drum is ours to keep at home, and we brought the slightly bigger brown drum to our church praise team to use in worship.  And our fluffy white dog jumped in the picture too... she might look like a stuffed animal, but she is real.  :)  They loved their gifts and were happy to see us home, healthy and full of stories from our wonderful trip.

If you've been following this blog and reading along through the stories and viewing the pictures, I'm not sure what else I can possibly say to convey the wonderful and thought-provoking time that we had on this amazing journey.  I have traveled all over the world, and being in Ghana was truly unlike anything I had ever experienced before.  The people were so kind and welcoming, always being thankful to us for our visit, happy to talk with us and learn more about who we are and what we thought of Ghana (although we really came seeking to learn more about them and their country... we all ended up learning from each other).  I would be willing to bet that each and every person on this trip from MA would say that it changed their perspectives on many things and really made a huge impact on their lives in very deep and profound ways.

I would encourage everyone reading this to really explore the world, as you're able, to learn more about each other and other places - to learn more about different cultures, different histories, different landscapes, different joys and sorrows than your own.  You can do this global exploration right in your own city, in your own country, and all over the world.  Is it always comfortable?  No way.  Will you often be stretched outside of your own personal comfort zone and challenged to really look at people, places, and culture in very different and eye-opening ways?  Absolutely!  I always tell my 11th and 12th grade students at school that I highly recommend trying to study abroad during college - travel and learning new things in a different setting overseas is never something that one will regret.

It is interesting how many of my viewpoints and definitions, if you will, were stretched and changed.  For example, if you were to ask me before this trip what it meant to be rich, I would most likely answer you this way: someone who is rich has a lot of money, they are wealthy.  Now by American standards, I am not rich by any means - but in comparison to the rest of the world (outside of mainly North America and Europe), my family would be considered upper class.  Did you know that the majority of the world, well over 50% of the global population, live in poverty and subside on less than $2 per day?  Some of you, like I did, when asked to think of extreme poverty, may think of a picture from a Save the Children commercial of a starving African child, crying with tears running down their face and flies around them.  While the situation depicted in a photo like this is certainly true in many areas around the globe, do you know that this too happens in places closer to home, places in the U.S.?  Income equality and poverty affect so many children and adults each day, both at home and abroad, and that trickles down to penetrate so many other areas of life - including but not limited to: healthcare, growth and malnutrition, housing, education, access to clean water and food, jobs, safety, injustice, crime, hatred... and the list goes on.  Don't be afraid to ask yourself what you can do to engage in any or all of the above stated issues.  You may feel that you only have one lone voice, but it only takes one proactive, brave person to take on an issue of concern to help others.

While traveling and learning in Ghana, my eyes were opened to richness of spirit, faith, welcoming nature, community, love and care for one another, serving others, attitude, outlook, work ethic... and again, the list goes on.  Am I rich in any of those ways?  This trip really made me look long and hard at not only what kinds of things are going on in another part of the world that is very different than my own, but also what is going on in my own life as well.

In conclusion, I will forever be changed and forever be thankful to have had this amazing CFE experience.  Thanks for following along, and I will post a few more short tidbits on another post or two to end this blogging adventure.  Peace and love to you, through Christ Jesus who loves us deeply and cares for us all... no matter where you live or what your situation!

Back in Accra at the end of the trip - last day at Asaasi Yaa...

At Asaasi Yaa - our second to last night of reflection and discussion on our trip.

Our last full day in Ghana was spent relaxing at Asaasi Yaa beach resort - taking some basic surfing lessons from Sarah, our SAGE guide, swimming, walking on the beach, playing cards, reading, and taking a hike up a mountain near Asassi Yaa.  Some of the group decided to hike, others stayed back. I really wanted to go on the hike, but unfortunately I had a migraine headache at that same time, so I stayed back to rest.  Everyone that went on the hike seemed to really enjoy it!  The group climbed 246 stairs to make it to the top - way to go!

Back at Asaasi Yaa they were busy preparing for a music, dance, and cultural festival that would take place at the resort that weekend, Easter weekend, called the Mother Earth Festival.  Powerful would be drumming at the weekend event and was helping the resort staff with preparation details.  Here is a poster that was put up in the courtyard to display some of the activities happening that weekend.

One last look at Asaasi Yaa during the day.  We would leave the next morning to spend the day in the city of Accra, go to the Kwame Nkrumah memorial gardens and museum, check out a local arts center market, and have a final dinner together before heading to the airport for our flights home.  If you ever find yourself in Accra, I would recommend the places we stayed in the area - Asaasi Yaa (in Krokrobite) and One Africa House (in Elmina) - both are very peaceful, scenic, beautiful locations right on the coast.  The accommodations are simple and basic, yet comfortable, clean, with friendly staff and good food.  I will miss this place!  It was a nice spot to begin and end our incredible trip.

Video on how to make the football nets out of the recycled pure water sachet bags...

Here is the YouTube video that our group used to show the villagers in Okurase how to make the nets from the pure water sachet bags.  We showed this video at the village elders meeting on our first day in Okurase so they could see what we were planning on doing there with this project, and we showed it to some of the school children that were helping us with the nets.  It's a short video, but it is interesting to see how it is done.  This video was done by Peace Corps volunteers in Ghana. Many of the scenes (some at the soccer field, one where you can see a school in the background, some children helping tie the bags, putting the net up, etc.) look very similar to what we experienced on our CFE trip.

Click here for video: How to make soccer nets out of pure water sachet bags

Day 9: Last day in Okurase - Ashanti stools & drum making shops... next stop, back to Accra before heading home to MN

Our last morning in Okurase before heading back to Accra for a few days before our flight home was spent by most of the group walking into town with Powerful to visit the shops where they locally make Ashanti stools and the wooden bases for the West African drums that we played the day before.

The picture above is of two of the wooden Ashanti stools that were made at this shop.  These stools are traditionally symbolic of a village Chief's leadership and used all over Ghana.  We saw a similar looking stool on our first day in Okurase at the gathering of the village elders.

 Next the group moved on to where they carve out the wooden bases for the West African drums.  Some of our students took their turn at carving out the wood.  It's hard work and the artisans do it all in traditional ways - no modern machinery here at this shop.  The work is extremely detailed and exact to make the best quality product possible.

After the work of carving the wooden base of the drum, then the partially finished drums are put on a truck and taken elsewhere in Ghana to finish the drums - to put on the animal skin for the top of the drum, sealer and stain applied to the wood and the other finishing touches to the drum before they can be a complete product and sold all over the world.

The rest of the day before the group left for Accra was spent saying goodbye to the local people that we had become friends with over our week in the Village of Okurase.  It was hard to say goodbye - hard to say goodbye to people that we had come to really have friendships with, hard to not be sure if we'd ever see these people again, hard to answer the question by some of the children "when are you coming back?"  Just hard.  We gave our final hugs and waves goodbye and boarded the bus for the few hour ride back to Accra.  Our last few nights before we headed back home would be spend at the same place we started this Ghana journey - at Asaasi Yaa, by the sea.  

We were all tired on that long bus ride back to Accra and there were mixed, bittersweet feelings - sad to be leaving the village, sad to have said goodbye to new friends that we had only just met a few days earlier, sad to know our meaningful trip would soon be coming to an end... but also looking forward to some down time at Asaasi Yaa and at the beach, and anticipating going back home again to see our family and friends that we had been missing while away.  

As I've said several times before on previous blog posts, we have had such an amazing experience on this very unique school CFE trip. We've all learned and seen things and met people in this beautiful country that have made profound impacts and changed our lives in more ways than one. I feel confident speaking for all in the group when I say that we are grateful for this opportunity to have experienced Ghana, a very special place that holds experiences that we will surely never forget.

Day 8 in Ghana: visiting the schools, drumming workshop, and a soccer game!

Eating breakfast at Nkabom House in Okurase.  A typical breakfast included hot oatmeal, a thin omelet, toast w/ jam, fresh fruit, coffee &/or hot chocolate.  A nice way to start the day!

Check out that net!  This is the soccer goal net that we made out of recycled pure water sachet bags.  Here we are just adding a few more strips to the net to make sure it is the correct size to fit properly in the goal.

 

The group with all of our completed batik shirts - so neat to see the final product of the day-long batiking process!

This was the main day that we visited some of the schools in Okurase.  We brought two soccer balls, a ball pump and extra pump needles, and two trash/recycling bins to donate to each school.  

These were the items that the MA advisor groups donated and collected over the past few months at school through the MA upper school International Project for 2016 called "Growing with Ghana".  It has been exciting and satisfying to see those donated items go to schools and a community that are really thankful to have new equipment that will be well used and go toward further bringing the community together. 

We also broke into three groups of four students and one adult each and divided up to go into different classrooms and deliver the message of picking up trash to keep your environment clean, why that is important (for good health, good soil to grow healthy food, take pride in your community, and more), and how you could reuse the pure water sachet bags to make sports nets (soccer and volleyball), make a fence for your home to keep your animals in your property (many families own a few chickens &/or goats), and we even taught some of the teenage girls later in the day back at Nkabom House how to make reusable sanitary pads out of the sachets.  This is a huge thing for them since girls are not able to go to school during that time of the month.  Having pads that they can use (which aren't normally available/are too expensive to purchase) allow them to keep going to school, which is an obvious benefit to them, their future, and family.  The girls who learned how to do this can then teach other friends how to do it as well - the benefits of this kind of pride in learning something so useful can be very positive and far reaching!

The students seemed so happy to see our group visit their school and they all wanted to say hello and have their photo taken!

Students from our group educating some Ghanaian students on why it's important to pick up your trash, clean up the community, and recycle items for reuse.

"Di wo mantem ni" is Twi for "Keep your community clean". This is the phrase that we had printed on the bumper stickers that we brought with us from Minnesota that we stuck to the new trash/recycling bins that we donated to the schools and greater community. In this particular group Mrs. Johnson wrote on the blackboard while the MA students spoke to the Ghanaian school children.

It was both interesting and gratifying to be at the schools and speak to the students, but also a bit difficult at the same time trying to correctly communicate a newer idea to the students.  We had support from our friends at Project Okurase (Nana and Ben) in translating our messages in English to their more understandable language of Twi, which was extremely helpful to us while in the classrooms.  It was such a memorable day of learning for all of us in the group.

Back to Nkabom House after spending the morning at the school to participate in a traditional West African drumming workshop!  Powerful is in the center (in the yellow shirt) and he led the drum group in different ways to strike the drum to produce the different tones they can make.  After we learned the three basic tones, then we learned some traditional rhythms and all played them together - it was really cool to hear and fun to participate in!

We also got to each create our own rhythm on the drum and everyone copied our rhythm as a group and played it back to us - pretty cool!  I heard several of the students say when we were done, "I really did better at the drumming than I thought I would... I wasn't too bad!"  After the workshop was over, almost everyone in the group purchased at least one drum to take back home as a souvenir or gift for a loved one.  The drums were handmade and beautiful carved by local villagers.  What a cool memory of our trip to be able to bring home! 

We ended the day with a much anticipated soccer match with the community soccer players. The MA group members that chose to play were dispersed between two teams that also had Ghanaian players on them as well.  Several other of the group members sat on the sidelines, cheered for the players, and enjoyed hanging out with some of the kids from the village, laughing, taking pictures, and more.

After the game was over, we hung out for a bit on the field with the players and everyone that came to watch, took pictures with our new friends, and just had a good time being together.  Once again, a very memorable event - one of many on this special trip!