The Village Stay Day Two:

The purpose of the village stay is for us to experience the reality of subsistence farming in Northern Ghana. To achieve this we live in a host family for at least a week. During that time we live, eat and go through life as they do. 

This morning I woke up at 3 AM to a nice surprise; besides the rice and stew I share with the others Mamunato made me a Milo, the local hot chocolate, and a loaf of bread. After eating I went back to bed till 6 am; I didn't go for the morning prayers.  Sleeping is challenging since there is no fan or window in my room. I leave the door open but because of its location there is no air movement. It also doesn't help that it is a metal roof, the masonry walls and floor accumulate heat all day

I decided to go for a walk to Gbahili again, I was hoping to be less affected by the heat this early in the morning but by the time I came back it was already hot and muggy. At around 8:30 Abdulai and Dumba his eldest son took me to the farm. I didn't know that it took one hour of walking to get to his maize (corn) field. It is two hectares of well spaced row planted maize that stands about a foot high. We did a little weeding and then walked to one of his rice fields, which was another twenty minute walk. It's a hectare of rice about a foot high. The weeds are a problem and Abdulai is considering using an herbicide for the second time. The first time it rained shortly after the application and it ruined its potency.

A woman from the village was harvesting maize from an adjacent field. We help her peel them and load her metal container. I help her lift it up on her head, this bowl had to be at least 40 to 50 pounds. She headed back on the same trail we walked for more than an hour.

Abdulai helping peel the corn, behind him is the rice field.

All loaded up and ready to go.

On the way back we took a short cut but we had to cross a flooded part, just enough to get my pant legs wet and for me to considering investing in a pair of rubber boots. By the time we came back it was close to noon and I was pretty tired. In total I walked around more than three hours and was feeling the lack of liquid. While preparing for my bath I discretely snuck in a few gulps of water. It may take some adaptating for me to become a good Muslim...

I tried to rest sitting in the shade of a cluster of trees just outside the compound as the room is very hot during the day. I decided to show the kids a movie so we watched "Bugs Life". I had to show it in the room and I had to stay with them; they were so excited I was worried about them tipping the computer on the floor. I already busted one on this trip, I need for this one to last undamaged till December. There were a few other kids from the neighbourhood compound. Abdulai join us for the last part.

Then we killed a chicken, I mostly watched. I asked if it was one of the one I brought; it's hard to tell.

He told me he is keeping the one I gave him in a separate box so they get used to the surrounding before releasing them in the general population. This way the will always come back at night to the coop.

I joined Abdulai for the before “break” teaching and praying. In the Mosque everyone was sitting on the floor on mats and someone was reading and making commentaries. The whole thing goes through loud speakers so the whole village can hear and believe me the whole village can hear because it's very loud. The loud speaker was interrupted a few times when the generator stalled. Someone ran out at one point and filled it with gas, another time someone tinkered with it for a few minutes and got it humming again.

Mamunatou cooking the evening dinner.

After prayers we “broke fast” and ate some porridge; my portion was enormous and I couldn't eat more than half. Then there were glutenous balls of clump rice swimming in a thin soup. It had that strong taste of palm oil and chicken fat. With it came the skinniest chicken leg I ever saw. I ate some of the rice ball but it was difficult avoiding the fat it was swimming in. I ate as much as I could and left the rest, including the chicken leg.

I excused myself and went to bed. As I was laying under the net wearing nothing but my boxers, Mamunatou barged in. Actually she say before entering “excuse me”, which are some of the few English words she knows, and as soon as I made a noise she took it as an invitation to come in. I didn't need a translator to understand that she was ordering me to eat the chicken... I got dressed and ate the stringy chicken. Went back to bed and I slept with a plastic bag near the bed, just in case. 

Three more days to go...

Dom