Email Number 9
Email Number 9
Accra, Ghana
August 26, 2006
Dear Family and Friends,
This may be a bit bittersweet: it will be our last blog entry to you from Ghana, and while we are very anxious to return home to see all of you, there are many things that we will miss about our 3 ½ month stay here. Bittersweet or not, we are leaving here in 9 more days and will arrive home on September 5.
We have just returned from our second vacation here in Ghana. We had a very nice trip to the Cape Coast – the western coastal section of the country. Driving along the coast we were delighted with the coconut trees, mist, sun, surf, mud huts with thatched roofs, fishing boats, women with babies in tubs bathing or selling things and sun. In spite of all those wonderful things the overwhelming poverty is depressing. The coast, however, is noted primarily for the many slave castles and forts that can be found on the coast. We visited two of them: Elmina Castle and Cape Coast Castle, and previously we had visited two others.
Slavery as we all know was an insidious institution. Some 15,000,000 slaves came through these slave castles. About 1/3 ended up in the US, and the remaining 2/3 were divided evenly between South America and Cuba and the West Indies.
One of the most emotional moments for us was during a tour of the Elmina Castle. We were in the room from which slaves departed onto the ships that would carry them across the ocean, and were standing at the “door of no return”. Our guide asked us all to repeat in unison: “Never Again!”. As we said that, we were saying it as Americans with regard to slavery, but also as Jews with regard to the Holocaust, and so it was a very powerful moment for us. And also as human beings and citizens of the world, for in our lifetime we have witnessed other tragedies which should not have happened: the Cambodian Killing Fields, Rwanda, Kosovo,and now Darfur in the Sudan, among other atrocities. Somehow even though we make these pledges of “never again”, they happen again and again.
The conditions of the slaves in the castles, and on the ships were as bad as bad can be, and just as bad when those who managed to survive landed in the “new world”. Dark, no food or water for many, shackled together so that no one could move, living in excrement and with dead comrades all around, women being selected for raping by those in command, and many many more inhuman conditions.
Slavery could not have happened without the cooperation and participation of many Africans, among whom slavery was often practiced, although not to the extent that happened during the slave trade. And usually families were not broken up, and frequently slaves were able to become members of the tribe or group to whom they were taken to.
In many of the slave castles, the “door of no return” has been changed to “doors of return” to welcome back the ancestors of slaves who have made the return journey right through those very same doors. And in each of the slave castles we visited we saw wreaths and flowers as memorials. In Elmina, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, we saw many Ghanaian school children and college students visiting and learning about their history.
Because slavery is so much a part of our American experience, we hope that you will one day share some of what we have. We thought it was an important thing to do as Americans and as human beings.
One of the most exciting things we did was to go on the “Canopy Walk” in Kakum National Park. The “canopy walk” is a suspension bridge 120 feet high and about 1.200 feet long erected in the jungle tree canopy. It is very narrow, about 18 inches or less, and yes, it sways and bounces. But fear not, it is just about impossible to fall off because the sides are close to armpit high. We were fortunate to go very early in the morning with a light drizzle falling. The jungle was very quiet and beautiful. Unfortunately the drizzle kept the birds out of sight, but we enjoyed the solitude immensely. And best of all, Hinda did it with flying colors, but did have a few very scary moments. By the way, once you start walking, there is no turning back, because there may be someone behind you and there is no room to pass!
On this trip we stayed in two very nice beach resorts, and were able to enjoy some excellent seafood, and we even watched it being caught by local fisherman in dugout canoes throwing nets in the ocean. One of our favorite’s is called a “cassava fish” since it’s scales look like a cassava – the main ingredient of fufu, a staple of food here and throughout West Africa. We ate coconuts on the beach right from the coconut trees growing all around us. The area in which we traveled has the best pineapples of which we partook liberally. And the ocean which was a bit rough was also warm and refreshing.
We took a very interesting side trip to a small village called Nzulezo. Nzulezo is built on stilts on a lake at the end of a river that is only reachable by an hour dugout canoe ride. Only 500 people live there. It was a very beautiful and peaceful canoe ride up a long canal into the lake. The water was like glass with trees arching from one side to the other. And at the end, Nzuelezo.
Unfortunately, we have found Ghana, and other parts of Africa as well to be filled to overflowing with garbage, especially plastic which may never disintegrate. It just doesn’t seem possible that it will ever get cleaned up. There is a severe problem with clean water for drinking, washing, cooking, etc. Our concern is that this government, our government, and other governments are spending money for new buildings, stadiums, etc. and for water and sanitation presumably, but we cannot see any results. In our opinion, until every village has a supply of clean water, and there are toilets for everyone so that people don’t have to use the streets, things like the building of stadiums and new government office buildings should be put on hold. While we see on TV that this government is fairly free of corruption, it is still pretty corrupt at the level of the police on the streets and who knows where else. We see it every day, including this last trip where our driver had to pay the police several bribes in order for us to continue on our journey. The contrast of being on a beautiful clean beach while right next door the beach is strewn with garbage and human feces is striking. People are crippled by guinea worm which comes from bathing and drinking water infected by the bacteria needs to be addressed throughout this continent. And the fact that AIDS is still increasing – 40,000,000, with the majority being here in Africa should be unacceptable to the industrialized nations, but it apparently isn’t, given the limited resources that are spent by those governments to deal with the pandemic. And malaria continues to be the largest killer of all – more than a million pregnant women and children a year succumb – needlessly. It can be prevented with simple methods. It is these contrasts with the natural beauty of the African environment and the beauty of the African spirit and people that are very frustrating to us. But in any case we feel compelled to continue to do the little that we can to help here and there.
Just a quick update on the Keta Tree Project – we have collected $1,750 in donations and will present the money to Pro-Link and the Keta District Assembly on September 1. Pro-Link will buy the coconut trees during the next few months and they will be planted by the community members. For those of you who contributed, thanks for helping to keep an entire community above water – literally!
So, we are once again coming to the end of another adventure. We worked hard and tried to give as much as we could, but we also learned much about Ghana, the Ghanaian people, and West Africa. We have been enriched yet another time. Our hosts and work colleagues were welcoming and warm and were all of the Ghanaians we met.
We will be bringing back lots of photos and stories to share with you and are looking forward to that very much.
See you soon!
Love from Peter and Hinda
Accra, Ghana
August 26, 2006
Dear Family and Friends,
This may be a bit bittersweet: it will be our last blog entry to you from Ghana, and while we are very anxious to return home to see all of you, there are many things that we will miss about our 3 ½ month stay here. Bittersweet or not, we are leaving here in 9 more days and will arrive home on September 5.
We have just returned from our second vacation here in Ghana. We had a very nice trip to the Cape Coast – the western coastal section of the country. Driving along the coast we were delighted with the coconut trees, mist, sun, surf, mud huts with thatched roofs, fishing boats, women with babies in tubs bathing or selling things and sun. In spite of all those wonderful things the overwhelming poverty is depressing. The coast, however, is noted primarily for the many slave castles and forts that can be found on the coast. We visited two of them: Elmina Castle and Cape Coast Castle, and previously we had visited two others.
Slavery as we all know was an insidious institution. Some 15,000,000 slaves came through these slave castles. About 1/3 ended up in the US, and the remaining 2/3 were divided evenly between South America and Cuba and the West Indies.
One of the most emotional moments for us was during a tour of the Elmina Castle. We were in the room from which slaves departed onto the ships that would carry them across the ocean, and were standing at the “door of no return”. Our guide asked us all to repeat in unison: “Never Again!”. As we said that, we were saying it as Americans with regard to slavery, but also as Jews with regard to the Holocaust, and so it was a very powerful moment for us. And also as human beings and citizens of the world, for in our lifetime we have witnessed other tragedies which should not have happened: the Cambodian Killing Fields, Rwanda, Kosovo,and now Darfur in the Sudan, among other atrocities. Somehow even though we make these pledges of “never again”, they happen again and again.
The conditions of the slaves in the castles, and on the ships were as bad as bad can be, and just as bad when those who managed to survive landed in the “new world”. Dark, no food or water for many, shackled together so that no one could move, living in excrement and with dead comrades all around, women being selected for raping by those in command, and many many more inhuman conditions.
Slavery could not have happened without the cooperation and participation of many Africans, among whom slavery was often practiced, although not to the extent that happened during the slave trade. And usually families were not broken up, and frequently slaves were able to become members of the tribe or group to whom they were taken to.
In many of the slave castles, the “door of no return” has been changed to “doors of return” to welcome back the ancestors of slaves who have made the return journey right through those very same doors. And in each of the slave castles we visited we saw wreaths and flowers as memorials. In Elmina, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, we saw many Ghanaian school children and college students visiting and learning about their history.
Because slavery is so much a part of our American experience, we hope that you will one day share some of what we have. We thought it was an important thing to do as Americans and as human beings.
One of the most exciting things we did was to go on the “Canopy Walk” in Kakum National Park. The “canopy walk” is a suspension bridge 120 feet high and about 1.200 feet long erected in the jungle tree canopy. It is very narrow, about 18 inches or less, and yes, it sways and bounces. But fear not, it is just about impossible to fall off because the sides are close to armpit high. We were fortunate to go very early in the morning with a light drizzle falling. The jungle was very quiet and beautiful. Unfortunately the drizzle kept the birds out of sight, but we enjoyed the solitude immensely. And best of all, Hinda did it with flying colors, but did have a few very scary moments. By the way, once you start walking, there is no turning back, because there may be someone behind you and there is no room to pass!
On this trip we stayed in two very nice beach resorts, and were able to enjoy some excellent seafood, and we even watched it being caught by local fisherman in dugout canoes throwing nets in the ocean. One of our favorite’s is called a “cassava fish” since it’s scales look like a cassava – the main ingredient of fufu, a staple of food here and throughout West Africa. We ate coconuts on the beach right from the coconut trees growing all around us. The area in which we traveled has the best pineapples of which we partook liberally. And the ocean which was a bit rough was also warm and refreshing.
We took a very interesting side trip to a small village called Nzulezo. Nzulezo is built on stilts on a lake at the end of a river that is only reachable by an hour dugout canoe ride. Only 500 people live there. It was a very beautiful and peaceful canoe ride up a long canal into the lake. The water was like glass with trees arching from one side to the other. And at the end, Nzuelezo.
Unfortunately, we have found Ghana, and other parts of Africa as well to be filled to overflowing with garbage, especially plastic which may never disintegrate. It just doesn’t seem possible that it will ever get cleaned up. There is a severe problem with clean water for drinking, washing, cooking, etc. Our concern is that this government, our government, and other governments are spending money for new buildings, stadiums, etc. and for water and sanitation presumably, but we cannot see any results. In our opinion, until every village has a supply of clean water, and there are toilets for everyone so that people don’t have to use the streets, things like the building of stadiums and new government office buildings should be put on hold. While we see on TV that this government is fairly free of corruption, it is still pretty corrupt at the level of the police on the streets and who knows where else. We see it every day, including this last trip where our driver had to pay the police several bribes in order for us to continue on our journey. The contrast of being on a beautiful clean beach while right next door the beach is strewn with garbage and human feces is striking. People are crippled by guinea worm which comes from bathing and drinking water infected by the bacteria needs to be addressed throughout this continent. And the fact that AIDS is still increasing – 40,000,000, with the majority being here in Africa should be unacceptable to the industrialized nations, but it apparently isn’t, given the limited resources that are spent by those governments to deal with the pandemic. And malaria continues to be the largest killer of all – more than a million pregnant women and children a year succumb – needlessly. It can be prevented with simple methods. It is these contrasts with the natural beauty of the African environment and the beauty of the African spirit and people that are very frustrating to us. But in any case we feel compelled to continue to do the little that we can to help here and there.
Just a quick update on the Keta Tree Project – we have collected $1,750 in donations and will present the money to Pro-Link and the Keta District Assembly on September 1. Pro-Link will buy the coconut trees during the next few months and they will be planted by the community members. For those of you who contributed, thanks for helping to keep an entire community above water – literally!
So, we are once again coming to the end of another adventure. We worked hard and tried to give as much as we could, but we also learned much about Ghana, the Ghanaian people, and West Africa. We have been enriched yet another time. Our hosts and work colleagues were welcoming and warm and were all of the Ghanaians we met.
We will be bringing back lots of photos and stories to share with you and are looking forward to that very much.
See you soon!
Love from Peter and Hinda
posted by Peter and Hinda Schnurman at 2:38 AM
1 Comments:
what a great experience you have :), your grandkids are so lucky, you have many wonderful stories to tell them, it will be so good to see you online soon again, love
aylin
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