Whats for lunch?

Today I saw a small girl eating a rat. She was about 3 years old and clutching the rat as if it were a bar of chocolate. It still had its fur and tail on but some of its back was missing where she had bitten some meat off. I was filming an interview when I saw her and I didnt really know what to do or think. Instinctively I swung the camera over to film the little girl and the picture is just a screen grab from the clip so the quality is pretty bad. But its pretty clear that shes holding a rat. I suppose the rats in the countryside here are basically just very small rabbits so the people have no problem eating them...and it adds some much needed meat to their basic diets. When I started filming her she got nervous and ran away and I went back to filming the interview with an eight year old girl who doesnt go to school because she has to mind her small brothers and sisters while her mother goes to work in the farm...

Barbershop Tales

So I had my first Ghanian barbershop experience last week...and I must say it was quite entertaining! While waiting for my egg and bread breakfast to be made at a streetside stall I spied a barbers opening for business across the road and made an impulse decision to get my beard of two months shaved. I entered a brightly tiled room covered in mirrors and was welcomed by a young Ghanian man who had quite the surprised look on his face on seeing me. I'm pretty sure that by the look of relief on his face when I asked for a beard shave that he I thought I was going to ask for the dreads treatment! Most people in the north of Ghana are Muslim and many of the men have beards so I guess he was surprised that I would want to shave such a fine specimen:

Barber - "So why do you want to shave your great beard"

Sightly nervous mise -"Eh...well too many people are calling me Jesus when I walk down the street" (This is true...I get called Jesus pretty much every time I go to town, a typical Jesus conversation might go something like this..."Hey Jesus...how are you?" ... "Fine thanks, just going to the shops for some eggs..how are you too?)

Barber - "Ah!!! But it is a blessing that you are called Jesus...this is a very good thing!"

At this point in the proceedings he had shaved a good portion of one side of my face and given that he now seemed to dissaprove of my motivation for shaving I was worried he might refuse to continue.

Mise : "And its very hot at the moment for a salaminga with a big beard" I said hoping that this more logical reason would appease him. Luckily it did and he resumed the shave. As he continued to work I noticed that he was completely avoiding my mustache and that little bit of hair that grows in the dimple space above ones chin.

Mise (now looking very dodge with my skanger tash) - "Ehh you can shave my mustache aswell"

Barber - "Why would I do that...you don't like the way I made it?"

Mise - "Do you think I look good with this...I look like a salaminga Mexican!!" I said jokingly (apologies to any Mexicans reading this for using that stereotype).

This comment really got him and he stared roaring laughing all the while brandishing the razor in the vicinity of my upper lip.

Barber : "A Mexican ... yes...like in the movies!...ok ok ok I take the mustache off!"

This, however didn't include my chin dimple hair which he proceeded to shape into a nice neat little square. I decided that I'd pushed my luck enough for one shave and allowed him that little victory.

The final stage of a beard shave here in ghana is a liberal dousing with disinfectant (dettol in my case) followed by a few sprays of a cheap aftershave. As I left the barbers with dettol fumes stinging my nostrils I crossed the road to find that in my absence Shannen had been presented with a gift of 10 yams and a guinea fowl from some villagers whose kids we had helped to get to school. Shannen's scared of holding the bird so the newly shaven Jesus has to hop on the back of the bike, balance atop a pyramid of yams while clutching a struggling guinea fowl...not the smooth as my chin exit I had hoped for!

Where is Create Change at?

So I just thought I'd pop up a wee update on how the Create Change project is coming along so that you dont all think I'm just out here on a holiday! Since we returned to Tamale in late December Shannen and I have been working pretty much flat out (apart from last week when I went to see some wild elephants-more about that soon) to edit all of the video footage which we have captured thusfar.

We currently have quite a large bank of footage but because we are hoping to produce over 20 short films we are still a few weeks filming away from having enough footage. So my work at the moment consists of conducting interviews with a range of local people which has so far included characters such as the local chemical seller aswell as numerous school childrens' parents. Besides interviewing I also have to get alot of footage from the local rural villages where we are working. Just this morning I found myself knee deep in a watering hole near Kpaumo filming women and girls collecting water.

In this case we are putting together a short film about the water situation in their village which sees them drinking this dirty water from the dam, resulting in health problems such as guinea worm among the villagers. Its pretty shocking to see the condition of the water (so filthy I had reservations about walking into it!) ... and the amount of work which the women and young girls are expected to do to ferry it back to the village in barrels on their heads. Its the start of the dry season now and in the coming months this water source will dry up completely forcing the women to search for water in the countryside which can sometimes take upwards of 6 hours per day.

Through the video which we are making we hope to raise money to build a borehole in the village of Kpaumo which will provide the village with a source of clean drinking water year round. This will have obvious benefits such as the eradication of guinea worm infestation but will also result in lowering the workload placed on schoolgirls on a daily basis so that instead of carrying water for 2 hours every evening after school they might get some time to study using all those text books which we bought them at the start of the project last year!

So the next few weeks will see things continuing in the same vein...out in the field filming during the day (trying my best to get some semblance of shade from the ~40deg heat!) and then uploading and editing the footage in the evenings. Not a bad way to spend February I suppose! And after that...well thats material enough for another blog posting... !