More updates from Ghana

Ghana is a series of rhythms. There is the obvious rhythm of the drumming and dancing but there are rhythms of everyday life that you start to notice when you get over jet lag and get in tune with things. There is rhythm in the megaphoned mosque prayers that broadcast  before 6 am to start the day in a spiritual framework. There is rhythm in the popcorn movements of the tro tro carrying loads of people from place to place. There is rhythm in the fu fu pounding.  There is rhythm in the movements to bring the fishing boats in from the ocean and land them on the beach with a series of rope pulling and song. This is an amazing, alive place.
 
Yesterday was partially a day of Charleston work for me –getting my NIMH grant reviews done and turned in and partially a day of being on the land in Kokrobite by the ocean. The air is cool (for Ghana) and the ocean rhythms were relaxing. Nana Serwaa came home from spending the weekend with her grandma and was fun to play with.
 
Today has been all about Okurase and our health outreach program coming up on Saturday. Nana and I started our day at 4am. After the looooong tro tro ride to Asamankese, we spent the day meeting with doctors, dentists, nutritionists, etc.. all people coming to the health outreach day. Nana thinks it will be as well attended as our groundbreaking (2000 present for that day) and we are gearing up.  Got to meet the new Municipal Chief Executive who is lovely and pledged to help us get electricity – quite a task that we have worked on now for 2 years. We reviewed the architectural design with him and he was so pleased and proud.  The most significant part of the day was meeting with the director of Social Welfare for the region and our 3 OVC (orphans and vulnerable children) boys from the village who have hydrocele (sort of a testicular hernia).  Social Welfare had to record photos and I tell you these boys, ages 7, 7, & 11 did not even have a recognizable penis given the swelling. It was so difficult to go through seeing the children suffering and I just wanted to burst into tears and get in a fetal position to see that little children in our world go through this and NO ONE has tried to take care of it. Well, I’m here to say that this is now going to change. They will have surgery in 1 months time. The interesting thing is that through this discovery of these 3 boys, we have found that hydrocele is nearly epidemic in the village. So, we are going to put out health information on Saturday and get with the research to get to the root of this highly treatable problem. After the surgery, the boys can now get into school and not worry about being ostracized.
 
After the tons of appointments and dealing with the prevailing negative attitude of professionals toward the people in the village, we went to the village. By and large professionals have given up because compliance with health care is so hard to get. Nana and I tried to restore hope in the professionals because we have never had an event to date that was not packed.  Once in the village we visited the building we are going to use as an office til the centre is built. It’s looking good and will provide us a place to store food that OIC International brings us  since we are on their OVC feeding program. Swung by Nkabom House and boy do we have work to do. The rainy season has not been our friend but luckily we have able carpenters on the job.
 
Another highlight of the day was visiting Nana Ampofo, III, the village chief. She was as wonderful as always. Everyone wanted to know about Marcia Thomas from USA for Africa. She visited last week and they loved her. They watched the Obama speech with her and were thrilled about it. Every time one of our friends or colleagues visits Okurase, they become a part of the heart of the village and people never forget them.  Iris sent a whole lot of tic tac to Queen mother. This is a candy she likes and it’s wonderful to see an 80 something year old woman cheering and singing a song over candy.  She was so upbeat even in the face of painful knees from arthritis.
 
We took another very long tro tro ride generally zipping along at around 120 kilometres/hour but honestly I think there is real progress on the road construction between Accra and Okurase.  So, off to an African sleep here in Accra. Meetings in Accra and back to the village tomorrow. Will stay there overnight – peaceful, quiet, beautiful sunsets and starts (low ambient light) are guaranteed now that Obama has stopped the rain.
 
Cindy

Update 3 from Ghana – July 17-18, 2009

Am writing for two days as internet access was spotty yesterday. We started our day spending hours getting together documents for tax exemption and shipping. The packet is massive. I realized how much I take for granted being able to print something out from my computer and photocopy in about 5 minutes. It changes the scope a bit when you have to travel a long way and wait in a long line and then take a long time to photocopy. But in the end we got it together.

We also had to develop a project profile. Seems that our project needs to be registered with every government agency that might ever relate to what we do. This way those agencies can connect us with private funders looking for NGO’s to work with. So we now have our profile.

We then went to visit the Minister of Women and Children’s Affairs. This was the first Minister to visit of the new administration. Turns out the Minister had to run to parliament and asked us to meet with her Deputy Chief. This was a good turn of events as he fell in love with Project OKURASE and is on board helping us with the tax exemption and customs. We have rescheduled with the Minister. All of this took a day and the better part of a night. We took the very long tro tro ride home and I figured out I am doing pretty well in Ghana if I can sleep in a tro tro over very bumpy roads.

Early Saturday morning I went to the Street Academy to participate in a walk. They are our close partners and we want to support them in whatever way we can. We had kept my being in town a secret from Ataa Lartey, the Executive Director. He was very shocked when I showed up for the walk. It was so great.

The walk itself involved over 100 children and I noted the irony or perhaps the metaphor of trying to keep street children in the “right” lane (or the most positive side of the street) while the dangers are zooming by. Streets don’t get closed off for walks or races. My job was to walk on the outside and keep the children safe from the cars while dancing and taking photos. The boys were oblivious and tended to veer in the bad lane without realizing it as they danced and hit each other and pushed. The girls tended to veer in the bad lane with greater purpose and rule breaking intent but were guided back rapidly. We ended the walk near independence square and had a bit of a celebration. The Street Academy raised a bit of money and a lot of awareness. It was good.

Later after banku with Street Academy friends we arrived back at the Arts Centre. I learned that an important drummer had died and his funeral was that day. So there was a memorial going on and I attended on behalf of Project OKURASE. It was an all out celebration of this man’s life-amazing dancing and drumming. I had a chance to see many people who know Djole and always ask about the children and we sang songs about when is Djole coming back to Ghana.

After leaving the Arts Centre, our taxi driver, Uncle Russ picked me up and he, Kwabena and I headed to the airport to pick up David and Lucia from England. David is a builder and Lucia a teacher and they are here to help. We are extremely grateful. After a series of mishaps and nearly picking up the wrong group (one that included 18 kids rather than 2 adults), we finally found them and headed back to Dansoman to Nana’s house. All lights were off everywhere and we learned that Nana has had spotty electricity all day and night. Another thing I take for granted.

It has been a good day of connection and re-connection with partners that are precious to us and critical to the success of the work we are doing here. It is amazingly cool in Accra.

Everyone has been talking about Obama’s visit. It seems that prior to his visit the rains were heavy day and night and when he came to Ghana the rain stopped. Everyone was very upbeat about his speech here and many of the road signs expressed Akwaaba to the Obama family. He is loved here and word on the street is Michelle is actually Ghanaian. I am certain I have to write a letter to our President. He has done well.

More soon,
Cindy

Update 2 from Ghana – July 16, 2009

Today has been a day of taking care of many little things and some big things mainly related to carpentry. The roofing panels arrived at Nkabom house to repair the two small houses. We have opened an office in a building on Okurase’s main road and needed to repair the ceiling before we can move in. All this is taking place mainly over the phone with the help of many many people. We are very fortunate to have tapped into a group of people in Accra who just want to help and will do whatever possible to be involved.

Nana and I met Abibata today. She is a representative of a women’s group in Tamale in northern Ghana. Together with this group, some women in Okurase will start a fruit drying business. We visited African Women’s Development Fund to inquire about grant funds for the fruit drying training. Abibata and I will write a grant before I leave. She is wonderful and a very interesting person. She is a filmmaker, mainly of documentaries and a colleague of Dominique, a woman I have met in Cambridge and come to know.

We visited Dr. Kofi and Mrs. Vivian Ghartey with Site for Africa. They were thrilled with the Shrek spectacles Rhion sent and these will be put to good use in the vision clinic we are holding on the July 25th. Mrs. Ghartey, we learned, is expert in shipping and has given us good tips to proceed.

We traveled to Osu to get a wireless modem set up so that we can access internet when possible without having to go to an internet cafe. Everyone please be patient with us. Regardless of access, sometimes it takes 3-5 minutes to open a message. We set up a telephone dedicated to the project

As I write we are sitting at Nana’s table printing out shipping documents. We are working on our NGO tax exemption and preparing for the arrival of our bikes and sewing machines!

Otherwise, Nana’s adorable and bright 3-year-old daughter, Nana Serwaa is keeping us entertained.

More tomorrow as we plan to be up and going well before the African sunrise.

Cindy

Update from Ghana – July 15, 2009

Arrived in Ghana last night and took most of the evening to negotiate with the parking attendants to actually be able to leave the airport. Seems that if you slow down in a taxi they can just boot you and demand payment on the spot. We worked it out. Let no one in their right mind mess with Nana Ama Yeboah. They will not come out well.

Today we have done a great deal of planning and working out a way to get internet access. We met with Loren, our architect in Ghana who is doing the structural side of the drawings. We are very close to finalizing the Ghana end of things and going for the building permit. It is very exciting.

Nana and I are having a great experience planning for the opening of the bike shop and sewing centre. We will see immediate benefit to the people of Okurase.

We will be holding a health fair on July 25th. Dr. Ghartey will conduct a vision clinic and we will be providing dental care and educational programs on HIV, environmental cleanliness and its relationship to health. Nana has set this all up and it’s great. She has also made an important link with child welfare. Steve McLeod-Bryant sponsored a little boy for school and this enabled him to get on the National Insurance Scheme. The boy has a very bad hernia and the insurance will allow medical care. He will wait 4 months to have surgery. NOW THIS HAS CHANGED. Due to Nana’s link with child welfare, this little boy Evans and 3 other children with hernias will get the needed medical procedures in 1 month. Child Welfare has a way of working out things quicker. So, naturally we are thrilled. We are meeting with the children, their parents, and child welfare on Friday morning to plan how to proceed.

As always, Ghana proves to be very welcoming, very exciting, and demands thinking out of the box. More soon.
Cindy

Project OKURASE Starts Two New Job Training Programs

Pedals for Progress (P4P) has joined forces with Project OKURASE to bring two new job training programs to the village of Okurase: a sewing centre and a bike shop.  It all started with a need for sewing machines. Rhion Magee found P4P and we asked for donated sewing machines. Through the good graces of P4P Ghanaian partner WeBikes, we were able to have twelve sewing machines delivered to Okurase. While this first donation has initiated the sewing program it quickly became evident that the need was much greater.

P4P had 50 sewing machines that they wanted to ship to Okurase. The shipment would include three manual foot pedal machines donated by Furniture Assist, a New Jersey nonprofit that collects used furniture which it donates to disadvantaged families in New Jersey. The foot pedal machines are much needed because they do not require electricity and we have not yet been able to attain electricity. The goods were available but the question was how to pay for the transportation costs.

This is where Joey Penman, a strong supporter of Project Okurase and the Clif Bar Family Foundation, a major supporter of Pedals for Progress, came in. They combined their efforts with Project OKURASE funds and had enough funding to ship not only the fifty sewing machines, but to allow P4P to place those machines among a full container of bicycles. Certainly receiving an unexpected 480 bicycles in addition to the 50 sewing machines will greatly change this small village.

The donated bikes from the New Jersey-based nonprofit will go towards creating our bike shop called “Okurase Bike Program”. Those living in the village will be trained on how to make proper repairs and will sell the bikes to others in Okurase and the surrounding villages. This program will not only raise the standard of living for those in the village, but will help raise funds to build the Centre’s school and job training buildings.

P4P’s donation of 62 sewing machines has allowed us to open “Rhion’s Sewing Centre”. Women in the village will be trained in sewing by those who already sew and they will sell their clothing and products in Ghana and other countries. The women will be paid fair trade for their work and 100% of profits from selling their merchandise via Project OKURASE will help fund the Nkabom Centre for Skills Training and Formal Education. The women in Okurase will be working closely with Rhion Magee, our volunteer product designer in Los Angeles. Rhion is developing designs for Project OKURASE such as recycled market bags, clothing and other items. Women in Okurase will sew according to the designs. Then, Rhion and Project OKURASE will market the products. Although our focus is on women, men are absolutely welcome to learn to sew.

Pedals for Progress is a New Jersey-based nonprofit that is the world’s largest recycler of used bicycles. Pedals for Progress has received, processed and donated over 115,000 bicycles, 1,000 used sewing machines and $10.8 million in new spare parts to partner charities in 32 developing world countries. In addition, they have built schools and saved lives.

Many thanks to Pedals for Progress, David Schweidenback, Joey Penman, and Rhion Magee for helping empower women in Ghana! This partnership is a great example of the united link. Unity is strength—–Together we can make it happen – www.aunitedlink.com.

United Artists for Hope Music and Arts Festival

Our highly anticipated music and arts festival will take place on Saturday, May 2, 2009 at the Navy Yard at Noisette in North Charleston. The event, a family-oriented, eco-friendly festival, will feature a variety of musical acts, children’s area, arts and crafts, African bazaar, dancing and drumming workshops, plus much more. The sole purpose of the event is to raise awareness about Project OKURASE’s work in Ghana to save children from the HIV/AIDS crisis in Africa and to raise money for a sustainable, safe water treatment system through a partnership with Water Missions International.

Project OKURASE’s roots are closely tied to North Charleston through the children of Djole, a West African dance and drumming group based out of North Charleston’s Union Heights community and sponsored by the Gethsemani Circle of Friends. During the summer of 2006, the children embarked on the ultimate field trip to Ghana and came home with a mission.

As a result of Djole’s trip, Project OKURASE is building an arts-based center bordering the village of Okurase. Ground-breaking for the complex took place in March 2008 and the money raised from the music festival will be earmarked for a sustainable, clean water treatment system for the center. The goal of Project OKURASE is to develop a model that can be replicated in communities around the world with the central focus for the center being on green design, sustainable architecture, job and skills training, family and village-based formal education, and a family-based model for caring for children impacted by HIV/AIDS.

Come out on May 2, enjoy the festival and support the cause!

20,000 Bricks = One Building

It’s no joke. The power of bricks has come to the forefront of just another one of Project OKURASE’s sustainable initiatives. In August of 2008, the village of Okurase began benefiting from the Alero Olympio Trust’s loaned brick-making machine. The machine was made in India and makes environmentally friendly, compressed earth bricks that do not require firing. They are made from laterite, the red soil of Africa.

Women brickmakers wearing their Charm and Hammer hard hats.

Through job training and the empowerment subsequently instilled in each of the brickmakers, Project OKURASE has its first 20,000 bricks, earmarked for the Job Training Building at the Centre. But more than just bricks, Project OKURASE has found a way to feed a brickmaker and his or her family, a way to create a sustainable solution to the need for occupational development amongst the people of Okurase, and a way to connect us all to that beautiful endeavor.

You can join in the excitement and support our proud brickmakers by purchasing an environmentally friendly brick for $20 US or 10 Great Britain Pounds. Just visit our Web site, www.projectokurase.org, and click on the donate button to make your tax-deductible contribution.

Ghanaian Recording Artist, Walter Dee supports Project OKURASE

Walter Dee, christened Walter Hammond, started his musical career at 11 years old. Now 25 years old and recently launching a second album, Walter Dee has committed a portion of his proceeds to Project OKURASE. The connection between Project OKURASE and Walter Dee was evident when Project OKURASE’s co-director, Dr. Cindy Swenson met Walter Dee during a 2008 trip to Ghana. Walter Dee has also dedicated his career to saving orphans through the power of arts and music. He believes that the beautifully arranged single and easy-to-sing along nature of his single, Save the Orphans and the Needy, will make it a household song for both adults and children and get the message to stick in their heads and hopefully, their hearts as well. Project OKURASE is excited about Walter Dee’s appearance at the United Artists for Hope Music Festival later this year.

Clemson University and Project OKURASE

On January 4, two graduate students from the Clemson University School of Architecture – Kyle and Lindsey – will arrive in Accra, Ghana to begin a tour dedicated to establishing the architectural model for Project OKURASE. We have many people to visit, lots of Ghanaian architecture to see, and many samples to collect. They will take back what they learn and the University will then work for a semester to build the model. We are very thrilled to have established this relationship with Clemson University and look forward to where this takes us.

USA for AFRICA Supports Project OKURASE

USA for Africa (United Support of Artists for Africa) joins in support of Project OKURASE. Marcia Thomas, executive director of USA for Africa met with Powerful, Cindy Swenson, and Kobina Boni in Los Angeles to discuss ways the two organizations could work together. USA for Africa followed up with financial support of Project OKURASE and links to African organizations that can help with medical care for the village. USA for Africa is well known for its landmark music video, We Are The World.

Almost 25 years later, the words of their song are still applicable to our work through Project OKURASE.

We are the world, We are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving
There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
It’s true we’ll make a better day
Just you and me

- Words and Music by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie