My Home Away from Home

I am officially one month into my Ghanaian journey! As I reflect over the past month, I realize how much I have to be thankful for. I am thankful for the small things: figuring out my daily tro-tro route to and from work; finding which foods I enjoy and which foods my stomach admonishes me to avoid; gaining enough practice of hand-washing my laundry so that I can now do it in forty-five minutes as opposed to in an hour and a half. All of these things that I did not plan to combat before arriving, but which I am glad to have grasped in a month’s time. And then there are the larger, more obvious things that I am thankful for: “clicking” and continuing to bond with my new five best friends; settling into my volunteer work (which I will elaborate on in another blog post); and getting over the initial feeling absence from life at home and the sense of isolation – by way of separation – from the culture that I’ve grown comfortable in, America. As I stream through my consciousness and recognize that I have so much to be thankful for, I realize that I can point to two pivotal factors that have made the aforementioned thanksgivings possible: the prayers from my loved ones and friends, and my gracious host family. I have yet to elaborate on my “life at home” in Ghana, which little logical sense because I spend more time there than I do anywhere else. I will do that in this post. However, before doing so, I feel it is both appropriate and necessary to simply say “Thank You.”

Before departing for Ghana I talked with people – many close friends and family members – who told me that they would be praying for me and thinking about me as I enter this next chapter of my life. Since being away, I have come to appreciate what a special gift it is to have people who care for me in such a way. I am young and, for the first time, leaving the comfort and familiarity of my mom’s cozy casa. The same is true for thousands – even millions – of kids my age across the globe. However, as I set off, I am humbled by how I am different from many of those millions. Not because I am any better; I am not. Simply because – as I leave – I leave with a confidence and peace of mind that I am not alone. No matter what I may encounter abroad – however new, awkward, or unsettling it may be – I have the support and armor of the thoughts and prayers of some special friends and family members at home. I know most of these people, and so to you I say thank you. But I also want to especially thank those of you that I may not have formally met yet, but you still keep me in your thoughts. You may bump into my parents at the grocery store, decide to glance at my blog, and then feel compelled and generous enough to pray for me. Thank you. Being away has strengthened the trust and contentment I have in my community at home. I feel the thoughts and prayers. I feel them when I am scrambling to catch a tro-tro but can’t understand what the tro-tro mate is saying. I feel them as I teach my English classes and one of the students can’t understand me, and I can’t understand him. Yet we keep trying and – with the joint help of the class – that one student has the ever elusive “Aha moment”! I understand and recognize that it is not me, but the prayers that make my best days here possible, and in help me struggle well through the tough ones. And I selfishly ask for you to continue praying for me and thinking about me because I know that my experience would not – and could not – be the same without you. Thank you.

One area of my life in Ghana – and perhaps the most important – that has benefited from the thoughts and prayers is my placement with my host family. It is not hyperbole, and I have no reservations in saying: I could not have asked for a better host family. I live in a neighborhood called “Mempaseam,” which means “I don’t want trouble” in Twi. Just as an aside: The name alone should bring you comfort mama that your boy is keeping his nose clean and shall “not forsake his mother’s teaching.” I live with the Sai family. There are eight and then me. There is a grandma and grandpa. They have five children, three of which are between the ages of nineteen and thirty-one and live with me. Of the three that I live with, the two youngest are women (Hannah is 19 and Pearl is 23 yrs. old), and the oldest, Charles, is a male (34). Charles has a wife and two kids – one seven year old boy and one fourteen year old daughter – and they all live in the house. And then there is me, the obroni. At home I am referred to as “Kobi,” with an accent on the “i”. Kobi is short for Kwabena, which is the name given to a male born on Tuesday. Ghanaians place great importance on the day a child is born. They expect each child to live up to his namesake. They recognize all of the great people that preceded the newly borne child with that birth-day and groom him/her to follow in their footsteps. To some, a family of eight may seem like too many, but I love it. There is always someone at home, and there is always something to do – or to share in doing – around the house. The Sai family truly is a “Renaissance family.” I have only stayed with them for three weeks, but I have already experienced several “firsts” and completed tasks I had never before attempted. Just two days ago, I cut open my first coconut with a machete and drank the coconut milk out of the hollow center. Charles cuts his own hair, and – following a bad haircut that I received from a local barber – he showed me how I too could cut mine. This past Monday, I cut my hair for the first time! I have learned how to make groundnut soup and squeeze my own pineapple-orange juice. Two weekends ago, by the sweat of our brows, Charles and I spent all day Saturday and all of Sunday morning doing stonework on the façade of the house.

The family does everything together. Every Saturday morning, the family and neighbors wake up at 4:00 AM to jog an eight-mile loop through all of East Legon. First, we jog six miles to the church that our family attends, Trinity Presbyterian Church. Then we play futbol or volleyball for about an hour in the Church courtyard, and then jog two more miles home. I have come to love the Sai family’s sense of unity, and come to appreciate their inclusive spirit as they have welcomed me as one of their own. They treat me like I am their son. Charles calls me his brother, and when the grandmother calls for me she says “Kobi, my son.” She prays with me every night and counsels me on how to lead a courageous, self-aware, and responsible life while in Ghana and beyond. The unity within the family is not limited to humans though. The family owns ten rabbits and seven goats. Every night before sunset, Charles and I walk about a mile to a meadow called “The Bush” and pick foliage for the rabbits to eat. On these walks we talk about everything: the importance of one’s faith and his family, politics, gender roles in our respective societies, the correct and erroneous perceptions of our respective cultures, and World Cup 2010 predictions. I practice my Twi with my family. They laugh at me, clap for me, and encourage me. I go to church with the family every Sunday morning. Charles and Hannah teach Sunday school to fourth and fifth graders, and I began helping them last week. Church, and religion alike, is serious in Ghana. I will devote a future blog to the role religion plays in Ghanaian society. But that’s neither here nor there. Last Sunday I spent seven hours at Church! Sunday school was two hours long. The service then lasted from 9:30 to 2:30 and unfolded as follows: one hour of singing and worship, a one hour briefing on the current status/activities of the church, a two hour sermon, and one follow-up hour of song and dance. After church, Charles and I were invited by Charles’ brother-in-law to go see an Accra “Hearts of Oak” futbol game. The “Hearts of Oak” are the premier futbol club in Accra.

As I strive and continue my constant assimilation into Ghanaian culture, I remain both grateful and exhilarated by my placement into the Sai family. I do not think it is possible that, nor do I foresee, I will ever become assimilated enough to call myself a “Native Ghanaian.” Simply because Twi can never be my first language; I will never look like the average Ghanaian; and I have been calibrated to live the American way for all of my nineteen years of existence. However, with each day with my host family, I grow more and more comfortable, and fall more and more in love with Ghana. As I am included in my family’s daily activities; as I fetch my own water to take cold bucket baths and use the bathroom; as I cut my own coconuts, juice my own juice, and hand wash my own laundry; as I go on the Saturday neighborhood runs and attend the five hour church services; and as I sweat with Charles – my brother – as we install limestone to the façade of the house, I am constantly learning and filled with a heart overflowing with gratitude. I am supremely grateful because I have found “My Home Away from Home” in Ghana, West Africa. My home is in Mempaseam, Accra with the Sai family.