The beginning of 2008 has, so far, proved to be a time of new beginnings and inevitable change.
Just three months into my eight month stay in Ghana as a journalist trainer with Journalists for Human Rights, (JHR), I have already changed placements and my residence.
One week ago I began volunteering with another newspaper, having resigned from my initial position before Christmas break. (I am intentionally omitting names to save face.)
Why you ask?
In short, the editors were uncompromising, the reporters too busy or disinterested to look up from their computers and the environment highly political. Human rights issues were claimed to be of importance to the paper, but weeks after producing four human-rights related stories with one reporter (who is not actually a writer, but rather a photographer) I was instructed to work alongside, only two were published. To top it all off, one of the stories ended up in the paper riddled with errors made during the editing process and in my absence.
That was the last straw for me. With every avenue turned and twisted down, in addition to many suggestions voiced and ignored, I was beat, my motivation stomped out. Following a final meeting with my JHR country director (there were several), a new placement was settled upon for my remaining five months in Ghana.
Now, the chance for a fresh start in my JHR role, to perhaps approach things differently with what seems like a more enthusiastic group of reporters and most definitely a more responsive editor. If I’ve learned something over the last few months, it’s to stick it out and stick around. Let the reporters see you are present in the newsroom with or without something to do and get the conversations rolling even if they range from China’s presence in Africa and the future of oil in Ghana to whether you have a husband waiting for you back home and when you’ll be available for “personal, intimate intercourse.”
In addition to easing into a new newsroom, just four days ago I moved from my four-bedroom, two-storey home on the Labone/Labadi border, to a much tinier three-bedroom bungalow in south Labadi. I now live with two of my fellow JHR trainers, Alison and Hannah, who have become not only my very dear friends but ultimate confidantes. Alison and I both decided to move from that two-storey house after Hannah, who had been looking for a place to live for a month, tracked down our new home in the exact area we were hoping to live, minutes away from our previous residence. It was not the location we wished to abandon. In fact, I will dearly miss that dirt road, strewn with dried or burning sewage and those groups of children calling out “Sofia!” each time I pass by.
What I won’t miss is the nit-picking about how much milk and laundry detergent I am using, the constant reminder that money is owed or needs to be spent, or those discussions about unresolved issues including the biting and barking guard dog and crying children with the family next door have. All that has suddenly ceased and I am no longer sitting on the porch for hours at a time, contemplating, complaining and chain-smoking. (Well, I have to admit, I am still chain-smoking)
My anxiety has diminished. My heart settled. And, I can breathe again, despite still having yet to recover $810 worth in rent money, find a new tenant to sublet my room for the next three months and negotiate with both the landlord and his lawyer.
On a side note, some of you may be wondering why this is the first work-related blog I have written since I arrived.
All of you who so graciously made generous donations and provided moral and emotional support to get and keep me in Ghana certainly deserve to know, not just how life, but how the JHR role is going.
Well, it’s been a struggle to say the least. But, despite having days where I feel useless and just want to return home, I have renewed hope and rekindled motivation that I can make my JHR role work here in some way.
Before I departed for Ghana, I claimed to have little to no expectations. I was lying, and only to myself.
Without expectations, there is no hope, no drive, no desire to pursue anything new and persist through it all when challenges inevitably arise.
I am back at square one, wondering how I will feel at the end of all this? Whether after eight months in Ghana I will feel satisfied with the work I have accomplished and life I have led? Or, perhaps I will just have started to claim my ground here, wishing to continue on in a similar or entirely new role.
Life in Ghana is good, whatever mishaps or bloopers I have stumbled upon.
Already there is an endearment and love for this country and its people too difficult to describe.
A part of me can’t ever imagine returning to lead that same life back home.
Another side can’t possibly see myself here indefinitely.
Just another contradiction I am dealing with and working through in Ghana, Africa.
Just three months into my eight month stay in Ghana as a journalist trainer with Journalists for Human Rights, (JHR), I have already changed placements and my residence.
One week ago I began volunteering with another newspaper, having resigned from my initial position before Christmas break. (I am intentionally omitting names to save face.)
Why you ask?
In short, the editors were uncompromising, the reporters too busy or disinterested to look up from their computers and the environment highly political. Human rights issues were claimed to be of importance to the paper, but weeks after producing four human-rights related stories with one reporter (who is not actually a writer, but rather a photographer) I was instructed to work alongside, only two were published. To top it all off, one of the stories ended up in the paper riddled with errors made during the editing process and in my absence.
That was the last straw for me. With every avenue turned and twisted down, in addition to many suggestions voiced and ignored, I was beat, my motivation stomped out. Following a final meeting with my JHR country director (there were several), a new placement was settled upon for my remaining five months in Ghana.
Now, the chance for a fresh start in my JHR role, to perhaps approach things differently with what seems like a more enthusiastic group of reporters and most definitely a more responsive editor. If I’ve learned something over the last few months, it’s to stick it out and stick around. Let the reporters see you are present in the newsroom with or without something to do and get the conversations rolling even if they range from China’s presence in Africa and the future of oil in Ghana to whether you have a husband waiting for you back home and when you’ll be available for “personal, intimate intercourse.”
In addition to easing into a new newsroom, just four days ago I moved from my four-bedroom, two-storey home on the Labone/Labadi border, to a much tinier three-bedroom bungalow in south Labadi. I now live with two of my fellow JHR trainers, Alison and Hannah, who have become not only my very dear friends but ultimate confidantes. Alison and I both decided to move from that two-storey house after Hannah, who had been looking for a place to live for a month, tracked down our new home in the exact area we were hoping to live, minutes away from our previous residence. It was not the location we wished to abandon. In fact, I will dearly miss that dirt road, strewn with dried or burning sewage and those groups of children calling out “Sofia!” each time I pass by.
What I won’t miss is the nit-picking about how much milk and laundry detergent I am using, the constant reminder that money is owed or needs to be spent, or those discussions about unresolved issues including the biting and barking guard dog and crying children with the family next door have. All that has suddenly ceased and I am no longer sitting on the porch for hours at a time, contemplating, complaining and chain-smoking. (Well, I have to admit, I am still chain-smoking)
My anxiety has diminished. My heart settled. And, I can breathe again, despite still having yet to recover $810 worth in rent money, find a new tenant to sublet my room for the next three months and negotiate with both the landlord and his lawyer.
On a side note, some of you may be wondering why this is the first work-related blog I have written since I arrived.
All of you who so graciously made generous donations and provided moral and emotional support to get and keep me in Ghana certainly deserve to know, not just how life, but how the JHR role is going.
Well, it’s been a struggle to say the least. But, despite having days where I feel useless and just want to return home, I have renewed hope and rekindled motivation that I can make my JHR role work here in some way.
Before I departed for Ghana, I claimed to have little to no expectations. I was lying, and only to myself.
Without expectations, there is no hope, no drive, no desire to pursue anything new and persist through it all when challenges inevitably arise.
I am back at square one, wondering how I will feel at the end of all this? Whether after eight months in Ghana I will feel satisfied with the work I have accomplished and life I have led? Or, perhaps I will just have started to claim my ground here, wishing to continue on in a similar or entirely new role.
Life in Ghana is good, whatever mishaps or bloopers I have stumbled upon.
Already there is an endearment and love for this country and its people too difficult to describe.
A part of me can’t ever imagine returning to lead that same life back home.
Another side can’t possibly see myself here indefinitely.
Just another contradiction I am dealing with and working through in Ghana, Africa.
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