Goats and children smile in Ghana!
It’s been nearly two weeks since I left for my trip to Elmina, Ghana. Since then I’ve learned a lot about the culture and the people here! Every day I see exciting new things, and I always learn something new.
Working in healthcare in Ghana allows me to directly interact with the communities here, in a way that positively impacts them. Today I went on a community outreach mission, the aim of which is to immunize babies and educate their mothers in the rural parts of Ghana.
The babies here are all immunized through this community outreach method or on a Tuesday in the health center. The health center is overflowing and packed on Tuesdays with mothers and their children, who’s weight is also monitored up until the age of 5.
This past week, the nurses who normally do the community outreach were on strike, something that has become uncommon in the US with our lack of unions. Luckily the strike ended yesterday, which gave me the opportunity to accompany the nurses on the outreach to the village of Sanka.
The tiny village of Sanka is not far from Elmina, but the only way there is by a path of mud, often half puddles (as it is the rainy season here in Ghana). The houses are all close together, and made of stone, mud, sticks, and some newer ones are made with bricks. Clotheslines and billowing sheets connect the tiny homes, and the children run back and forth with a hoop and stick, playing a game from the Victorian era in England.
Here, a large change for me was switching over to all metric system and the British way of spelling everything! Weighing babies in kg and seeing speed limits in km was very different to the system used in the US, and using Celsius is something that takes some getting used to.
One thing that is very different from the US is the amount of goats that roam the streets, and that there are chickens eveverywhere. Today I found a goat that was four days old. Even in the museum we are staying at, chickens and goats roam the grounds. Luckily I’m used to waking up to the sound of roosters every day!
I can’t wait to see what else Ghana has in store for me!
Until later,
Liddy