Pow wow - Poverty amidst prosperity in Canada

I have spent the past few years highlighting issues of poverty in Ghana through this blog. Many times I get feedback that asks me to look at poverty where I come from.

The sad fact that many North Americans don't want to face, is that we have some populations who live in 'developing world' conditions right in our backyard.

On this summer's holiday back home in Canada, we ventured out to a pow wow. First Nations people across North America celebrate their annual festival - called a pow wow - in the spring and summer months. Pow wows consist of dancing, drumming and traditional outfit contests. There is singing, dancing, smudging, and sales of food, clothes, jewelery etc.












We had a great time. But we also visited the reservation that hosted the pow wow. And we were shocked, disappointed and amazed at the way people are living in 2011 in a country like Canada.

The following statistics from the Public Service Alliance of Canada speak volumes:

*One in four First Nations children live in poverty.

* First Nations people suffer from Third World diseases such as tuberculosis at eight to 10 times the rate of Canadians in general.

* More than half of First Nations people are not employed.

* One Aboriginal child in eight is disabled, double the rate of all children in Canada.

* Among First Nations children, 43 per cent lack basic dental care.

* Aboriginal children are drastically over-represented in the child welfare system

* High school graduation rates for First Nations youth are half the Canadian rate.

* First Nations youth commit suicide at five to eight times the Canadian rate. The suicide rate for Inuit youth is six times as high as in the rest of the country.
* Diabetes among First Nations people is at least three times the national average.

* Recent Census data shows that 23 per cent of Aboriginal people live in houses in need of major repairs, compared to just 7 per cent of the non-Aboriginal population.

* Overcrowding among First Nations families is double the rate of that for all Canadian families. A recent government study found that more than half of Inuit families live in overcrowded conditions. Some three-bedroom homes are known to house as many as 20 people.

* More than 100 First Nations communities are under boil water advisories right now, meaning they have little or no access to clean water for drinking and sanitation.

* More than half of First Nations and Inuit people are under 25 years of age. This is the fastest growing population in Canada If poverty is not addressed today, it will continue to negatively impact First Nations families for generations to come.

Ghana and Africa as a whole has become the target trendy destination for eco-tourism and voluntourism as well as paid volunteering. Why do we not look inward at communities in North America that lack education, potable water, sanitation, access to health care in their communities?!

The First Nations of North America are the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about. Maybe it's not cool to meet up with friends and say you volunteered for two months on a reservation....

Maybe the photos you bring back will not be as exotic as those from Africa. You will not have paid over $3000 for your trip and flown across the globe. But is it any less important?

Ignorance of native issues in Canada is rife. As a city girl, I had no idea how much land across Canada belongs to our aboriginal groups, no idea what their culture was or how it has been eroded. No clue about the poverty that characterizes most reservations. The first time I ever visited a reservation I was already in my late 30's. I'd already lived in Africa for years. And this place was less than a two hour drive from my suburban home... Is our ignorance an excuse? Where is the media coverage? Where is the education on the sordid history of the clash between the aboriginal groups and the colonizers that led to the state of affairs today? How can we all turn a blind eye to the dysfunctional relations that have allowed part of a modern society to slip down through the cracks into the silent abyss?

I would venture to say that it is incredulous that westerners feel the superiority to come to Africa offering help of various kinds, when they have not even looked at the gaping wounds in their own societies. After all - CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME!

Lives Apart: comparing Canada and Ghana

Happy belated New Year – can you say that? Like with Birthdays?

I have been home – across the world and back – for the holiday season. It’s surreal to visit your family as a guest, a fly on the wall of their collective reality, when mine is so different and so far away. I pick and choose which parts of home to embrace, and which to leave behind; remove my emotional investment.

There is a price to be paid for this definitely. I think over the years it has eroded my sense of home in it’s entirety. Sentimentality is replaced by a certain cynisism and the problems of the West seem to pale in comparison to what I see on the streets of Ghana. I am left in limbo. Not truly immersed in or entrapped by what being here means to it’s people, yet so far removed from what it means to live in a Western society, with reliable water and power and shopping malls on every corner.

I found an interesting website, If It Were My Home, that points out how different our lives are, based on the ‘lottery’ of where as a human soul, we are born.

It’s very North American centric, but allows you to compare the standards of living in Canada or America to most any other country in the world.

Below is a snapshot of a comparative analysis between Canada and Ghana.



What strikes me is what the statistics don't say. What they cannot. Like the fact that if you are in Ghana in January, you will wake up to a sky full of sand, blown far from it's home in the Sahara desert - it is in your teeth, all over your home. You wake unsquinting to a sun that stares back at you - calmly and defined like the moon, easily visible through the haze. The light of the day like a permanent twilight will guide and mold your mood. This is the unknown season of harmattan...

The stats cannot explain the fact that you will have no idea, no concept of what it is to walk outside to the assault of a Canadian winter morning cold. The kind that takes your breath away and brings you to tears instantly. Your eyelashes, coated with your tears, instantly become icicles. The tips of your ears, if uncovered, begin to lose feeling and you are overcome by shivers.

Life in two places can be so very different, and living between the two is a surreal experience indeed.

Up in The Air - Observations of a traveler

I’m in an airport again. Ran around like an absolute mad woman at the office today, delusional in the belief I would get all the loose ends tied up and leave early. Got home the usual time, threw the last things into my bag (realized the humidity in Accra is rotting the zippers of the luggage), and had a shower. Then ran around the house trying to organise food for the boys at home for the week, and had about half an hour to unwind. Now I’m sitting in Accra’s International airport. It’s 33 celcius outside and it’s 9pm. The air-conditioners are not working in the airport today. Little tickly beads of sweat are gathering into fluid streams, and find their way down my temples, behind my ears, under my bra. I feel soggy.

An hour ago I was fresh and clean.

This scenario plays out about twice a month. I travel a lot for work. Every chance I get, I travel for pleasure as well. Sometimes I like to combine the two. I probably travel too much but who’s to say what’s too much. Last month it was Sierra Leone, now it is Canada, later this month it will be Lebanon and Jordan (but that one’s for pleasure!), and then the day we get back, we’re on a plane to Nigeria.

Whenever I am in transit I find myself considering my identity, my place, my cultural constructs of the world. Where do I belong?

I’m looking down at myself. My t-shirt was bought in Houston while at an Oil & Gas exhibition. My jeans were bought last year on the trip to the PDAC show in Toronto. My shoes were bought when down in South Africa last year for a wedding. We got my watch in Los Angeles on Rodeo Drive (which was a bit surreal). My laptop from a mall in Germany, my phone on a trip through Dubai.

Living in Ghana, where adventures with local salons have led to disaster*, I even have a hairdresser in Dubai! Go to her every time I’m passing through. I think that might be an indication that I travel too much.



This trip is taking me via Heathrow, back ‘home’ to Canada. The term ‘home’ doesn’t really fit into my reality. Though Toronto is my birthplace and I grew up in the surrounding suburbs, I have lived in a completely different world for close to 15 years. I’ve spent 14 of the 22 years of my adult life (that’s 63%), on another continent in a world so far away on so many levels. My concerns are not the concerns of anyone I know in Canada. My day to day reality, something so different, so removed. And now that has become the norm for me.

I think the day I first realized the extent of my alienation was when I arrived at Pearson International some years ago, carried along by the drowsy crowds of arriving passengers, and noticed acutely the accents of the immigration officers. I picked up the certain nuances that characterize a Canadian accent - something I didn’t realize existed before I left her shores.

In the expat world of Ghana, I spend time amongst Ghanaians, Nigerians, British, Germans, Jordanians, Polish, Lebanese, South Africans, Americans, Spanish, Italians, French - and the odd Canadian.

For now, that life is home. Our house, a 70’s monstrosity, was once the Libyan Embassy. With company furniture and a few local nick nacks, we have no sentimental connection. Our next home will be a boat, and we will take it where our whims carry us.

Over past few years, whenever I arrive back in Toronto I find that I’ve lost the connection to the city. It has become like so many others – arrive one week, notice the new buildings, smell the unfamiliar air, off to another destination the next week.

With an outsider’s eye, the city no longer feels comfortable. It has no spark, no recognizable beauty. It is a suburb. Life goes on here, mothers take their kids to school in their 4x4s, each neighborhood has it’s chain store mall, the sidewalks are straight and the grass is cut. There are laws and rules and things work. Elevators go up and down, water comes from the taps. In winter a grey hue descends and covers everything. It wills people to hibernate against it’s grizzly embrace. In summer it is peeled away and people live more each day for those few ‘thawed’ months, when the sun visits.

All of this is a foreign world to me. At ‘home’ in Accra I dodge potholes in the road, look away at traffic lights, as the beggars push their thin babies to the car window. I argue with the house cleaner/cook about putting mint instead of basil in the spaghetti sauce and for forgetting that bleach isn’t to be used on the coloured clothes… I worry about the generator not starting or the water supply being cut off for weeks. I worry about the malaria spreading mosquitos every night when we’re out past 6pm. I consider 26 degrees celcius a cold day and 38 degrees a hot day – and I can expect the average temperature all year to be 30 to 34…



11 hours have passed and I’m in another airport. I’m surrounded by a whirlwind of colour and sound – undecipherable chatter and coats and bags and parcels and the swoosh of late passengers dashing toward gates.

I sit quietly and am very aware of myself as one among the many. Just another passenger headed to another destination.



But my trip is not like any other. I happen to be heading to Toronto. Though I don’t live there anymore, it is my family that draws me back. I am lulled by their welcoming arms at the airport. The delight and excitement in my mother’s eyes when she first catches sight of me among the crowd. I am attracted to the nostalgia, to the din of the family’s chatter on a Sunday afternoon, while my sister cooks up a gourmet meal. There is a tenderness and a level of comfort that has no equal. When I am back in Ghana I keep the memories of these visits in a place deep within me. Mementos. They remind me what the term home actually means.

When love is illegal - Homosexuality in Ghana today

Being gay is illegal in Ghana.

Under Ghanaian law, male homosexual activity is officially illegal. Criminal Code 1960 - Chapter 6, Sexual Offences Article 105 mentions unnatural carnal knowledge – and homosexuality is included in this description.

Coming from Canada, one of the most liberal countries in the world (especially with regard to homosexuality see map of sexual freedoms here), it’s almost shocking to me. The topic does not impact my life directly, but I am a definite believer in human rights, and so the subject holds a certain importance.

This topic can spark heated debates if ever broached with Ghanaian colleagues in my office – though I am usually a lone warrior for the cause, inevitably against a tirade of Christian rhetoric about the evils of homosexuality and the belief that it is an illness that can be cured, or at least prayers can be said to cure a person of it.

Today I came across this article on Ghana’s popular Joy FM site. I found it interesting both that the issue is in the forefront of the news in Ghana today, and that there is now an official Gay and Lesbian Association of Ghana (GALAG), with a spokesperson who is not afraid to appear in public. This says something.

The article points out that Ghana’s heros have come out publicly in support of gay and lesbian rights,

“Nelson Mandela said that he considered “homosexuality to be just another form of sexuality that has been suppressed for years”; Kofi Annan, a former UN General Secretary, supported gay rights with a move to extend benefits to the same-sex partners of UN staff; and as well as signing the UN declaration calling for the decriminalisation of homosexuality, Obama also recently spoke at a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Pride event, describing homophobia as an example of “worn arguments and old attitudes”.

Yet deeply entrenched cultural attitudes in Ghana die hard. There is a widespread belief in Ghana that homosexuality is a morally deprived lifestyle choice of the west. That it is not something inherently African, but a cultural export from Europe and the Americas. Interestingly there are more and more vocal African raised advocates for gay rights - including Cheikh Traoré, a half Nigerian, half Mauritian Muslim, raised in West Africa. He is currently an AIDS educator in the UK, and speaks openly on growing up gay.

Locally though, tolerance for diversity can be lacking. A Ghanaian born and bred gay man describes his alienating experiences in this article. BBC even covered an article on the subject last year.

The official line in Ghana – even from the minister of human rights – is that Ghana is ‘not ready’ for Gay and Lesbians as an accepted group. Again, it is individuals that suffer.

My amazement in all this, is that in general, Ghanaians are far more comfortable with human closeness than any western culture. It is a common sight in Ghana to see two grown men, walking down the street hand in hand, or with their hands lingering in embrace when they greet an old friend. None of this is seen to threaten a man’s sexuality. I love this about Ghanaians. In contrast, in North America and the UK, where opinion is supposedly more liberal, straight men would never been seen in such close contact with a male friend. They commonly squirm and cower away from male to male hugs, and insist on a rough pat on the back just to assert their ‘maleness’.

In Ghana, in certain instances, cross-dressing is accepted if not named. In the heart of Jamestown (a rough and poor neighborhood in Accra’s south centre), there is a man I’ve seen many times in wigs and skirts. “He’s a bit mad”, I’m told. It’s all in good fun. No one bothers him and he’s free to be himself. I suppose his perceived mental illness grants him reprieve from societal scorn…

Again, I find it amazing that homosexuality is so abhorred by Ghanaians, when - if any Ghanaian will be honest with themselves - they know all about a common practice called ‘Supi’ – which is basically a condoned (or conveniently ignored) form of lesbian relationship that develops in boarding schools between older girls and the ‘freshers'. It is seen as a way for girls to develop their sexuality, but not viewed as homosexuality outright, despite the physical relationships that develop between the girls. I would love to discuss this particular topic further and encourage my Ghanaian friends and readers to contribute…

The bottom line is that no matter what the law states, or whether outside pressure will convince Ghana to decriminalize homosexuality, it will continue to exist, despite any raging debates in Ghana and beyond about whether being gay is chosen or genetic, cultural or contrived... and individuals will continue to struggle with their identities, mostly in private.

The issue becomes quite difficult for gay visitors or even expatriates who enjoy a level of acceptance in their home countries and find themselves in a place where the very act is illegal! I know legally married same sex couples who have come to Ghana on official government posts, only to be forced to hide their relationship, for the sake of appeasing the laws of the country. Some gay travelers websites warn couples about the laws of Ghana here.

Despite this lack of tolerance though, there is a small but thriving gay community. There are even a few very gay friendly bars. I’ve been to a few ‘gay friendly’ parties, with mostly local revelers, that were some of the most fun and memorable in Ghana. After all, the gays in Ghana are Ghanaians. They have the same innate friendliness and act as ambassadors for the country just as well as other Ghanaians do. They are the sisters, brothers, sons and mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts and others - of the close-minded ones. They are individuals of this society, part and parcel of it. I personally think the place is better off for it.

Carrying dead bodies – punishment for bad parking in Accra

I was not shocked when I heard the story, but then I’ve been in Ghana a long time now… Here the authority of the military is many times unquestioned and more times abused by the ones in the uniforms. Human rights organizations would be up in arms, if they knew, if they cared. Ghana is not high on the radar though for these organizations. Ghana is the ever-promising ‘Gateway to Africa’! Embassies pop up here from every country on the globe, and investment is flowing in. In fact, this monthly ironically, CanademVolunteers, a Canadian International Development forum highlighted an article where “Ghana is Commended on Good Human Rights Record”.

Meanwhile, for the man in the street, life goes on – cowboy style, where those with a shred of authority lord it over those with less or none.

A couple of weeks ago, the ‘army boys’ up at the 37 Military hospital (home of the infamous bats in the trees above), decided it was time to stop a growing practice that was causing some congestion on the throughway in front of the hospital. The private mini vans which take the place of a formal public transport system, have organized themselves over the years in Ghana, into fairly organized associations and each driver/vehicle belongs to a specific organization, with a specific route and stopping points. The hospital in question has become an unofficial meeting point for the vehicles – ‘tro tros’ to all of us in Ghana. This does create quite a mess, as the drivers pull over ‘en mass’, and chaos ensues, with hundreds of street sellers, shouting, scurrying and touting their wares to those getting into, hanging out the windows of, and transiting the tro tros. Passengers dart around as well, and can be seen dashing out in front of the oncoming traffic… a very unsafe practice and a nuisance to all.

However, methods of dealing with this in other societies might be to:

A) Create a public transport system with designated stations
B) Or at least, create a designated station for the existing associations of tro tros.
C) Add no stopping, no parking signs and have a police patrol in front of the hospital

I doubt that physically dragging the drivers and their ‘mates’ (the guys who hang out the door calling out the destination and collecting money from the passengers), down into the mortuary of the hospital and forcing them into hard labour would be on the list.

Hundreds of drivers over the course of a few days were physically beaten and made to do such things as weed the lawns of the hospital, clean the floors of the mortuary, and even clean and carry corpses within the mortuary.

When asked about this highly disturbing and unwarranted form of punishment, the lady in charge, a lieutenant colonel, said “We need to teach them a lesson”.
Are these children? Are there no laws? And what ethics do the lawgivers possess – to force a citizen, without arrest or proof of guilt of a crime, to carry a dead body? What humour or justice or sense of righteousness is there in something as twisted as this??

The whole story is covered in the Ghana media, but not worthy of mention apparently at the BBC or any of the other foreign media houses, who rear their inquisitive heads, when there is a story ‘worthy of global attention’.

Instead Ghana is left to deal with these 'local matters', these incidents, which are numerous and far less reported outside of Accra, certainly. What does the government feel? Is this practice acceptable in their view?

They have not been available or perhaps not even asked to comment. For his part, the Brigadier General did comment that this goes against their regulations on dealing with civilians.

What will the repercussions be? What about the psychological affect on those forced into this bizarre punishment? What about their rights?

Well, the officers may be questioned.

Maybe.

What I Saw on the Way Home From Work

Back when I lived in the city centre of Toronto, my walk home from work could be quite interesting, given that my apartment was located above a dodgy martial arts studio on a main street, opposite the largest Psychiatric hospital in the country. I could bump into a wide variety of eccentrics, intensely chewing on cigarette butts or pacing in ever shrinking circles. In the evenings I would meet ladies of the night on duty, taking shelter from the wind in the stairwell. I always thought it sweet of them to ask "How was work". "Fine thanks!" I'd blurt out and add another comment about the bad weather, but never looking them in the eye or inquiring as to their 'work'... My embarassment for the most part....

Now that I live in Ghana, all traces of embarassment have been washed away by heat, time and a generous helping of in your face reality. I have long ago been hit by the stark truth that everyone is too concerned about their own troubles to focus on my shyness or lack of it.

On my trip home from work on any given day I will see things that Toronto does not have in it's vast list of possibilities or imagination. The cigarette chewing, mumblers would be fascinated, I'm sure.

And now I am never too timid to inquire, observe, absorb.

Yesterday was a work day like any other. Drove through Accra's streets and turned into our 'upper middle class' (a very rare breed this side of the world) neighborhood. We turned off the main paved road and onto the loosely defined cul-de-sac dead end dirt road we live on. As usual, we passed the local boys - some belong to the lady who runs the corner store out of a metal shipping container, and the others seem to have no home at all. They are always amusing themselves on the side road, and bow out of the way as the 4x4 pulls around the corner. We veered into the drive, honking subconsciously at the large looming gate, for the guard to swing'er open.

Except the boys looked more excited than usual, they were dancing around something, and there were flames behind them. So my curiousity won a short internal battle and I jumped ship and went to 'say hi'.

They were all too happy to show me their proud catch - roasting, popping, bubbling and ashen, limbs hardened and extended over the bicycle tyre fire. "It's a goat!" the smallest one, Solomon piped up. The others moved aside to display it. Face up in clenched defiance, the goat burned, singed black, hair gone up in a putrid acrid smoke swirl. It's captors wholly excited and obviously proud. "We'll all chop!" (A Ghanaian slang meaning to eat). "Snap us!" (another Ghanaian term, for take a photo). I happily obliged. I was then cordially invited to join the barbeque which I declined but promised, in that ever hopeful Ghanaian way, "Next time!".

I slipped through the gate and closed that world behind me. The sharp contrast that faces me daily was right at my gate today. The smoke billowed up and over the gate and led me, as if by the hand, to my door where we parted ways again. The smoke, back to it's fire and the laughter of excited children. Me, into the air-conditioned cocoon, where meat is something on the weekly grocery list, bought filleted, without head, tail, legs...normally seasoned and served with an accompaniment. And completly devoid of the sense of pride and joy experienced by the barefooted boys a few metres away...

Photo of the day (today being the first)

Thought I'd start this, as I've found some great artistic, funny and engaging pictures lately.



This is the closest I come to being patriotic - a great surreal view...

Maybe it's the nostalgia for snow - being that it's 32 degrees here in Accra today, with a humidex reading of over 80%, and having personally not lived through more than a week of true Ontario-style blistering cold, snowy bitter hell for over 11 years, I can freely romanticize the crisp cool beauty of the calm, sunlit snow blanket.... nice.