Ghana
Gazette, 21st July
2001
Our work is over, our job is done. We have visited all three microcredit
projects we came to see and are now spending a couple of days relaxing
in Accra before catching our flight on Sunday. This last week we've been
to Tamale visiting a project called Maata-n-Tuda which means 'Women of
the North'. We travelled to Bolga in the far north of the country to meet
women making pito, the local beer.
We also met basketweavers
and Share
butter producers. Share butter is a cooking oil made from nuts. Maata-n-Tuda
have a group lending scheme like Sinapi Aba (who we visited last week)
and Full Circle in Norwich. The difference here is that the groups are
built around the work so, for example, the first women we met in Zorbesi
were all basket weavers. The scene was idyllic: 40 women surrounded by
children, cattle and goats, sitting under an enormous Baobao tree splitting
and dyeing cane and weaving. The women explained to us how joining Maata-n-Tuda
has changed their lives. Before they had sat in their houses feeling isolated,
underconfident, purposeless. Now they have jobs to do, they bring a second
income into the household, they have the support and friendship of one
another and they can pay for their children to go to school. As with the
women I interviewed in Norwich for the Full Circle video, and as with
the women I've interviewed all over Ghana for this one, the key word that
keeps coming up is confidence. These tiny loans are just the start of
things.
Maata-n-Tuda planned our 3 day trip around the women's production processes. They wanted us to see how the women made baskets, butter and beer from beginning to end. My jaw dropped when they told us this.
"We really only
need to get a few shots
and some interviews," I smiled. "The women want to show you
what they do," they insisted.
We gave in and spent three days travelling back and forth between villages seeing nuts gathered and ground, millet germinated and boiled and cane dyed and woven. There was a lot of sitting around but we didn't care because the time we spent watching pots slowly boil or cool was the best time of all. We were with the women. We couldn't speak their language but we could sing and dance with them, take their photos with the digital camera and show them themselves on the screen, and give them tiny polaroid stickers from the i-zone camera that looks and feels like, and gives as much pleasure as, a toy. Diana learnt how to play a traditional board game called Oware which is a bit like backgammon without the dice. I used our Yahtzee dice to play counting games with the children.
The finale was a feast of food fried in Share butter, served with the freshly brewed pito beer, flies kept away with the handwoven fans they gave us as gifts to remember them by. We gave them postcards of Norwich and tins of Colmans Mustard Powder and told them how to make this famous Norfolk sauce.
And now for the tourist bit. We made our way round the country on the STC - State Transport Corporation - buses. They often broke down but they were cheap. The 10hr journey between Tamale and Accra (500 miles) is 40,000 cedis - around £4. An alternative to the STC buses are the tro-tros: private minibuses packed with passengers and animals, roofs stacked high with luggage and the occasional goat! The tro-tros leave from stations but they don't have set timetables - they go when they are full. In town, the simplest way to get around is by taxi. You can get shared taxis on set routes for literally pennies - we had one in Tamale that cost us 8p each - or you can hail a taxi of your own and pay up to a pound for most journeys. There are few other cars on the road.
But right now we are about to walk. It is a a rare cool and cloudy day so we are confident we can make it to the National Museum on foot without overheating. That's it for the Ghana Gazette - thanks for reading.
On The Line was founded by Oxfam GB, Channel
4 and WWF-UK and is registered charity, number 1073841
For
more Ghana Gazettes, click below
Ghana Gazette 7th July
Ghana Gazette 14th July