REFLECTING ON THE JOURNEY

It is Friday, December 29, 2006. I have been in Ghana for 166 days. In that time I have seen many parts of the country. I recall steeping off of the airplane into the warm humid arm, that seemed to drape itself around me like someone else’s blanket; if you use someone else’s blanket long enough, it comes to feel like your own.

That first evening, arriving at the JHR house in Osu Re (an area of Accra) and heading for a drink at the bar that sits below the JHR office sits before my minds eye like an enlarged photograph.

That week, I moved with the entourage of fresh JHR staff through Accra on a combination of business and pleasure outings. That was the beginning of our orientation. We arrived on Monday, but by Friday we were all sent in different directions. My direction was north to Tamale.

Thinking back, it amazes me. Tamale is a city that most of the people on the planet will never see. It’s combination of Dagomba heritage, cultural influence from Southern Ghanaian influences, and the remnants of the reach of the Islamic empires – set in motion by the prophet Muhammad and stretching to circle the Sahara – overwhelmed my senses at first. Actually, the flat land and fields decorated by trees, and the rural village life that a I passed like pages in a magazine in my ride from the airport were my initial impression. Later that evening, I was led on a tour threw the city, and that was where y senses were overwhelmed. The streets and sidewalks zig-zagged with bicycles, motorbikes, woman carrying huge loads on their heads, roaming hawkers, and small farm animals. To the soundtrack of Dagbani banter and car engines, the setting sun cast the scene in shadow. Without streetlights and much of a sense of my surroundings, I felt visually impaired.

When I arrived at Radio Justice, it took some time to assert myself. There were so many things that I was contending with. For one, I was not sure of where I would be living and I was adapting to life in the village compound that I was staying in for the time being. The week long orientation, and the previous week of training in Toronto had a dual effect of preparing me, and highlighting that most of us didn’t fully understand what we were really supposed to be doing. The organization itself had only been operating for two years, and while I believed that I had the necessary qualifications, I had never actually done what I was now charged to be doing.

I got along very well with the people in the office, and they were patient with me as I learned what life is like for Canadian (and for a foreigner, White male) in the Northern region. I wanted to learn about the country, the city, the station and the staff before I asserted myself. I just did not feel ready to come in there and start telling people how it is. I know I had a lot to offer, and a job to do, but the thing about this job is that it requires adaptation to the particular media house and staff that one is working with.

I spent most of my time listening and observing: two eyes, two ears, and one mouth actually reflects the ratio that I probably spoke one-fifth of the time and absorbed what was around me four-fifths of that. Conversations, music, arguments, newspapers, local television, and scenery took my attention captive.

Within a short time of my arrival in Tamale, Pierette was set to touch down in Ghana before returning to Canada after a few months in Kenya. Because I had flown with my luggage to Tamale, opting not to make that first trip alone through a countryside I had never seen on a bus with so many bags to manage, meeting Pierette in Kumasi was my first opportunity to venture out. I recall that morning, leaving the Mr. Fresh’s house before sunrise; I was nervous and excited. I had been offered so much advice and given so many warnings about the highways, about traveling abroad, and about my destination of Kumasi.

The trip went quite well, and I waited in the Kumasi STC station for near two hours before I met with Pierette. When I saw her walking through the parking lot, I could hardly believe what I was seeing. We had sat in the basement of a Scarborough church on a Saturday afternoon some months ago when I had told her that I could see that she needed to step out to see what was next for her: “you need to go somewhere, like Kenya”, is what I said, not knowing that she had applied for a position teaching in that very East African country. My statement was as much intuition, confirmation (for her), and a double-edged sword that also fell upon me. She did not know that she would actually being going to Africa that day, nor did I.

A couple of months later, I left the Office of the Registrar at York University where I was working as a temp. I swung by the Tennis Canada offices on the campus to pick up Sharifa, who was working there to drop her at Highway 7, where she would head home to Brampton. Just as she had stepped out of my car to the bus stop, my cell phone rang. I began to drive as I spoke to a woman named Emilee from Journalists from Human Rights. She told me that my interview with them had been successful and she was offering me a position to work in the Northern Ghanaian city of Tamale for 8 months, and that she needed an answer by Monday.

By the time I hung up that phone call, I was out of the parking lot and in the left turning lane. A huge decision, a huge opportunity was sitting before me. Even now, I feel like I can return to that very moment, sitting there at a redlight that was about to change, and I was moving forward into the next level of my life.

I wasn’t sure that I was going to go though. I had applied for the position, but I had not expected to get it. Not that I was expecting not to get it. I just had not really thought about really leaving Canada and working in Ghana.

There were a few people laid upon my heart that I wanted to speak to. The thought of going was like a mountain set before me, but the thought of not going was terrible - I couldn’t entertain it for even one solid moment. It seemed that God had reached out to me with the blessing I needed, and to turn it away would mean that everything would be harder. I thought of the challenges and sacrifices of getting up and leaving, but they paled in comparison to what it would take to regain what I would be throwing away by saying ‘no’.

So there I was, in Ghana and Pierette on her way. When I saw her in the parking lot, we began a short but powerful journey. For the next few days we would move through Kumasi, down to Cape Coast, Elmina, and to ‘The Last Bath’ which is just north of the coast.

Returning to Tamale, the next few months contained a wide spectrum of experiences. I got to work on my workshops and human rights stories, I was experiencing volcanic personal growth, and I was getting to know the place that I was living in. I went from being hospitalized and three weeks of recovery, to standing twenty seats back from Jay-Z in Ghana. I did all that I could to help a young girl that had come to our station with razor blade cuts all over her body, I was busy producing “Freedom Thursdays”, I was navigating the plentiful obstacles in the way of progress, and enjoying my time with everyone at home (Aunite Wakila, Layata, Sister Saphora, Mr. Fresh , Chelpong and Melimba).

I went from what was a discouraging misunderstanding with JHR, to a renewed motivation. I even got to meet the Governor General, Ms. Michaelle Jean.

Amidst it all, a number of factors came together bringing about a new arrangement. I had been hospitalized again for four days to be treated for malaria (though it had not shown up on any tests…once again). There was also the fact that I was the only person on the current wave of JHR staff that had an 8 month contract, everyone else was scheduled for 6 months. With that, new placements would be coming to all of the media houses working with JHR in January. Those two factors (my health and the possible overlap) led to an offer to start a new placement.

I had planned to be in Accra for the Christmas holidays, but was told that I could stay in Accra and begin a placement at the radio station at the University of Ghana. With that news, I felt abundantly blessed. I recalled the few times that I had visited the campus in Accra, and the deep desire I had to explore the grounds. During one of my visits to Accra, I had gone into the library and the book store and had driven around with Kweku, but had not spent much time there. I was not sure when or how, but I intended to spend more time there.

With the offer to establish a new placement at the University, I filled with gratitude for God’s orchestration.

During the days when my circumstances were discouraging, I was really affected. I would lay awake thinking about the situations that I was dealing with. My mind would not let me sleep, searching out an answer to it all. While I felt like there was a heavy stone in my heart, I also had the determination that I was going to give my best and work at turning things around.

A few years previous to that very month, I think it was Novemeber 2004, I had been working at the Air Canada Centre. I was working in the Executive Suites as a Concierge. Early on there was a major misunderstanding. I had requested a shift exchange with another employee who agreed. Being new on the job, I did not know that I was supposed to have the manager sign a shift exchange form. I had requested the Friday off in order to attend the viewing of the Uncle of my girlfriend at that time. While at the funeral home, I had switched off my phone. When I was on my way home, I turned my phone back on top find that I had a bunch of messages. My supervisor had called demanding to know why I was not at work. When I called her and told her, she accused me of being at a club. In actuality, I was riding the rocket (taking the TTC). She refused to believe that I was at a viewing, and then questioned me about the name and address of the funeral home. Later on I found out that her mother had passed away a few months before I started working there, and she had thought I was using the funeral story to touch a soft spot with her. As ridiculous and insulting as that situation was, it changed our relationship. For the next few months, I was under a microscope. Every mistake I made (and there were a few too many) was blown up. One suck-up who actually made up lies about me to gain favour with our manager added to the mess.

The problem continued for months, and even led to my supervisor trying to convince me to quit, as the union was too strong for her to fire me. Eventually I met with the supervisor of the supervisor about the situation. She really wanted things to get ironed out and insisted that I weather the storm. I appreciated her support, but decided to give my supervisor what she needed to let me go, by not showing up for any more shifts.

When I thought back about that situation, I always felt bad. I would imagine doing things differently; I would imagine giving my best, striving for excellence, and rolling that boulder of disdain uphill.

Walking down the street in Tamale two years later, I had the chance to right my wrongs and continue to give my best my clouds were making it hard to hold to hope.

I could feel God’s guidance to continue to give my best, and to make my best better, and I could feel His hand on a turnaround which occurred quite suddenly.

With the offer to take a placement at the University, I had just over a month left at Radio Justice. While the days were long (early beginnings and later endings), the raced by.

When I look back, I see that I could not have arranged a better plan. I was faced with adversity, but given the strength to overcome it – and was blessed in the process. I was able to experience the North, and to see a much less developed and much more rural aspect of Ghana, and now I have the gift of being in an environment combining the media and academia.

A few days after arriving in Accra, I decided to visit Radio Univers, though the placement was still being negotiated. I took a tour of the station, got a copy of the program schedule, and left with a sense of how the station operates.

Though I have been given time-off for Christmas and New Year’s, I am preparing. Part of my preparation is for my new placement, part of my preparation is for my remaining eleven weeks or so in Ghana, and yet another part is looking to what is next.

I see more now. By God’s grace, Ghana has been good to me. It’s funny, I met three women around my age from New York yesterday (two of whom are of Ghanaian parentage). They were visiting for the funeral of their Grandmother, and brought one of their friend’s along. They conveyed stories from the past week and a half, and insisted that they were looking forward to going home. When I think of the two and a half months ahead of me, it seems like a drop in the ocean that will pass like a rapid wind, though it also feels like a storehouse full of priceless treasure. When I see airplanes in the sky, excitement of my impending return stirs a thick stew in my heart. There is joy and sadness, and so many other feelings inside.

I have been brought a long way since that May evening that I answered my phone to be offered the chance to take a step that would change my life, and being where I am with respect for the future, rather than letting time pass focused on the future has been one of the keys to that progress.

I remain, by God’s grace, focused on where I am and each step ahead for me and this path that I treasure.