The problem lies with the way garbage is disposed of here. There is no garbage collection, or waste collection of any kind. In order to get rid of trash, it’s either littered along the sides of roads, in gutters, everywhere, or burned. Not good for the environment, and not so fun to breathe in either. Water sachets literally blanket the streets.

Food waste, allthough there really isn’t much (people don’t waste here, if they can help it) is mostly given to the chickens, goats and lizzards that roam around. Okay, I’m joking about the lizzards but they are EVERYWHERE.

From a personal view, I really don’t like water sachets. While it is a clean, safe, sanitary way to provide water, I think that the impact on the environment is terrible. I’m not sure that there are any easy solutions though. Years ago, they used to sell drinking water in big containers and you’d just dip your cup into it. Maybe I’m just cynical, but that seems like a lot of trust to place in a complete stranger.

In Canada, we are so lucky to have the infrastructure that provides us with safe and easy drinking water. Is it too much to say that we go overboard? The water we shower with is safe to drink. The water we flush our toilets with are safe to drink. We wash our clothes with “safe” water. It all seems a bit much. I can only think of the ridiculous amounts of money we spend on purifying water that doesn’t need to be. How can we create  infrastructure in countries that makes sense? After all this I’m only left with questions. It reminds me of those advertisements for antibacterial everything. At what point have we gone to far?

Pollution in Local Stream

Water Sachet

The good news is that I found myself a working computer cafe! There’s a lot around, Its just that none of them actually seem to be working.

Well, I arrived in Accra over a week ago and spent two nights at a hostel there with the rest of the group. It’s pretty crazy. Stepping out of a plane after a ridiculously long flight, it’s pretty bizarre to feel the hot humid air. It was something like 9:00pm and still so warm. Accra is crazy though. So many people, so much sun and these huge gutters that you have to try not to fall in. Well actually they have the gutters here in Mampong too…

We settled in with out host families last Friday. My community is Mampong-Akuapem. It’s in the Eastern Region of Ghana. I’m with my counterpart as well as another counterpart pair, It’s great, there’s 4 of us from the program in one house. Plus everyone in the group lives really close together. One of our supervisors lives in the house next to us, and then two down from that are 3 other participants.

The house I’m staying at is a Compound house. That means that there are multiple houses that are attached, with a courtyard in the middle. The kitchen, bathing room and toilet room are all separate from the house we sleep in. There isn’t running water so we have to go fetch water from the stream everyday. The locals all laugh as me and Dara (the other Canadian in my house) try to carry water on our heads. It’s harder than it looks…We always get soaked. Apart from us, no one really spills a drop on themselves. It’s pretty incredible.

No running water means no taps, no showers, no sinks, no washing machines. Everything is quite a lot more complicated. To take a bath you first have to go to the kitchen and fill up a bucket from the water we collected in the morning. And by morning I mean 5:30 am! Then you take it to the bathing room and try to figure out the easiest way to wash. For example I have yet to figure out which makes the most sense, washing your hair first or your body first? And people here bath at least twice a day. And another thing. I never realized just how much water it takes to flush a toilet. But when each bucket you use is one that you’ve walked 5 minutes to the stream for…It changes your perspective. Don’t get me started on laundry Because it’s an adventure and a half.

I’d love to write more, but my session is about to time-out. So next time! I hope everything’s terrific with all of you and that you all have a Merry Christmas and New Year!

Flashback. It’s a Saturday morning and she bounces into my room yelling, “Wake up Bron! Let’s play doctor!” I somewhat grudgingly agree although my sleep deprived brain isn’t fully aware of what I’m agreeing to. She pulls out her box with her plastic stethoscope, toy syringe and band-aids and starts to come up with the most creative cures for each mundane illness I come up with. A bad stomach ache was cured by drinking a cup of water, putting a Dora the Explorer band-aid on my hand and then reading her cinderella en Français.  I wish my real medical care had been that good.

There is a huge deficit of New Brunswick doctors. On top of being one of the overall poorest provinces in Canada, about 1/10 people here don’t have a family doctor. The walk-in clinics here are crowded.

This had been my second try to come and see a doctor. The first, I had been turned away ten minutes before the clinic even opened, and told that they had already accepted all the patients they could take for the night. I was shocked. Never once had I been turned away from a clinic like this. Have I waited four hours to see a doctor? Yes. But to be turned away entirely? This was something new. I was told to be more than an hour early, in order to ensure a spot on the list for the night.

Take two. I show up an hour and a half early. When the desk finally opens, people swarm it. I am still only number six on the list, despite haveing been among the first there.

Sitting in the consult room, the nurse asks me why I’m there. “I need a new prescription for anti-malarials.” She leaves and the doctor comes in. Here’s where it turns back to make-believe.

“So…your here for…[looks at chart] oh…[looks confused]…”

“I need a new prescription for an anti malarial. The last one kept me awake for three days.”

[Doctor gives me a blank stare.]

She finally speaks.  ”Oh umm…Anti-malarials…Do you know any?”

“Okay! Let’s play doctor! I’m the doctor and you’re the patient!”

Alright, so I didn’t really say that. I wish I did though. I was surprised and frankly confused. While I don’t expect every run-of-the-mill doctor to be an expert on tropical disease, I do expect them to have some basic knowlege. It seems to me that malaria is extremely common in many parts of the world and even simple Canadian doctors should know something about it. At very least, they should try to make themselves look good!  After the above incident the doctor left for ten minutes. I suspect it was to go google it in the back room.  Too bad she didn’t try that earlier.

Fredericton’s a great place. People are extremely friendly, they don’t try to hit you with thier cars and they give canvasers money… Nice right? My point is, I don’t want to generalize too much here. I’ve met great people in this city and nothing’s going to change that. I mean, just this morning I had a lovely chat about MRIs with this woman I met on the bus. Weird? Yes. It sure beats talking about the weather though.

I’ll start from the beggining. A few weeks ago, I ended up getting into this really interesting conversation with Marcel, the guy I’m billeting with here in Fredericton. We got talking about women’s rights particularly in terms of healthcare and abortion. Marcel told me to go for a walk by the Morgentaler Clinic on a tuesday sometime. Last week, I finally did.

There are Morgentaler Clinics all over Canada and they specialize in providing safe and compassionate abortion care. The Clinic in downtown Fredericton has been subject to a huge protest for the last month. It’s called “40 Days For Life” and was organized by a catholic pro-life group. although there are protesters at the clinic year round, this new “campaign” was started in protest of a law suit going on which asks for abortions to be covered under New Brunswick’s provincial healthcare. Quebec and New Brunswick are the only two provinces that do not honour the Canada Health Act by failing to provide this service free of charge.

The protesters here in Fredericton are particulary nasty, and gather en masse each Tuesday (the day the abortions are performed) to pray, yell and otherwise harass the women entering the clinic. They’ve gone as far as to set up a fake clinic next door, hoping to trick the women into thinking that it’s the Morgentaler Clinic.

Last Tueday morning I went down there my self to see what was going on. At 7:30 in the morning there were already people gathering. The Clinic Escort (staff from the clinic, helping women come inside) were standing ready with there coffees and winter clothes. None even so much as raised an eyebrow when I started taking photographs.

Here are a few from that day:

This man hid his face, when he saw that I was taking pictures. Proud of his cause?

This woman was my favorite. When I started taking pictures of her, she asked me what I was doing. I nicely explained to her. She then demadingly asked me why I hadn’t asked her permission first. In very nice language (as sweetly as I could manage) I calmly explained to her that because she was on a public street, and part of a potentially offensive protest, that she had no reasonable expectation of privacy. I think she was expecting me to apologize and leave. After I explained, she rudely said, “Okay” and went right back to ignoring me. I think I heard her mumble something about me being a sinner under her breath. I didn’t realize how obviously pro-choce I looked, I mean, I could have been there in support of their protest!

This man’s sign simply say’s “Prayers to End Abortion” but some of the other’s where quite  a lot worse. “Jesus Loves Us Mommy” seemed to be quite popular.

Oh, one other thing about this man. When I got near him, he said demandingly, “Who are you?!” I said, “Um, I’m not quite sure what you mean.” To which he said again, “Who are you?!” I was just annoyed after that so again, trying to look all innocent I smiled and said, “My name is Bron, How are you this morning?” He walked away.

Here’s a quote from the 40 Days blog. It creeps me out to read the blog and frankly just makes me feel sick.

“We heard a sad story from one vigiler how a mother and father walked by with two young children, maybe 5 and 6 years old. The mother shouts out, ‘I agree with abortion! I had an abortion!’ Can you imagine? Saying that in the presence of these little ones! You can just imagine one of them asking, ‘Mommy, what’s an abortion?’ What would the answer be? The father just seemed to hang his head down, as they walked on.

“This was a poignant reminder that despite all the rhetoric from the ‘pro-choice’ crowd how the real issue is ‘choice’, not abortion, the real issue really is abortion. This is what women have to live with for the rest of their days. This poor woman may think she’s got some kind of handle on it, but the truth is abortion has got a hold of her. Lord, as you hold her aborted child close in your arms, have mercy on this mother and her family.”

It’s a direct quote from their blog. Don’t believe me? It’s at: http://www.40daysforlife.com

However, I recommend reading this: http://antichoiceantiawesome.blogspot.com/

It’s called Anti-Choice is Anti-Awesome, and it’s the blog of a clinic escort at the Morgentaler Clinic. It’s great.

And also:  http://www.morgentalernb.ca/

“I have a commitment to human values, to human dignity, respect for people who are different, to social justice, to a richer life for all people, to democracy in its broadest social and political sense”

Henry Morgentaler – 1965

 My personal favorite. “BE LIKE MIKE!”

 This one was in my room.

 I don’t even have words…

 And Another…

I just realised I forgot to take a picture of one of my favorites. It said,  “In case of fire, follow his way.”  Every time I walked by I wanted to yell , “No. In case of fire, get the hell out!”

All in all a great week though. Great people, drums and bonfires. Who could ask for more?

Mount Traber Bible Camp