I have been interacting with some people in the compound more so than others. There is only one woman, her name is Hanah and she works at the mango packhouse. I have been trying to get to know her better because most of my co-workers are male and I would like to get to know the Ghanaian women. Her husband, Mohammed, is a Field Assistant (provides technical training to the farmers) and they have a little boy named Abdul who is extremely cute. At first he was a little scared of me but now he always gives me high fives and waves to me. One day he was even comfortable enough to throw a cup of water on me… kids are really the same everywhere. Abdul can take any object, attach a string to it, and it becomes a toy. I have been giving Hanah food to cook with so that I can eat the meals she cooks for her family. ITFC provided me with a gas stove but my room gets boiling hot if I use it and it is difficult to cook in the dark. Mohammed is always reading textbooks in his spare time. In September he is taking an exam so that he can go back to school. When I get home from work I have been helping him with his mathematics and statistic. We have worked out a deal where I will tutor him if he teaches me Dagbani.
This is
Mohammed
and I, working
on some math
Another person I have come to know and trust is Salman, a field assistant and irrigation supervisor for the Gushei farms. He has been a great help with my work; I’ve gone around with him to the farms and the pump houses to learn how everything works and take photos so that I can compile a user manual. In the morning we always walk together to buy porridge in the village. He has also been sort of a cultural informant for me. I can ask him questions when I am frustrated and confused about the culture here and he helps me to look at things with a different perspective.
Most Ghanaians in the Northern region are Muslim and practice polygamy; someone told me that the chief of Gushei has 30 wives and over 100 children. I’m not sure if this is true but it is common for a man to have 3 or 4 wives. Most of the villages I enter I receive at least one marriage proposal or am told “I love you”. It is hard to tell whether or not they are joking. I usually laugh and say “I already have 5 husbands” or “Only if you give me 4 goats and 2 bags of maize”.
I have had some pretty entertaining conversations with my co-workers regarding gender roles. I was in the truck with one of the field assistant managers and told him that I thought if a man could have multiple wives then a women should be able to have multiple husbands. He made this funny noise that Ghanaians often make where he sucked his teeth and then he said “oh no! I could not imagine that!” I know that I can not win anyone over in one conversation, but I’m all about the small victories here. I hope that just by sharing my perspective and using myself as an example (a female engineer traveling alone) that I can at least open up their minds to the thought of equal opportunities for men and women.
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