Intensive Course with Dr. Akua Benjamin
Intensive is really an accurate word to describe how my second week in Ghana was like. 9am to 5pm class days felt more like 9am to 12am with all the work that was expected of us. Papers and an hour and a half presentation doesn't seem like much but with limited time, resources and extremely slow Internet, a challenge it surely was. Yet although at the time it seemed like the work and stress would never end, I must admit it was extremely beneficial to my professional and personal development; as cliché as that my sound. The crash course discussed the Ghanaian context of social work, cultural interactions, ethnic diversity, traditions, local/ geopolitical structures, human rights and critical self-reflexivity. It was helpful in really beginning to conceptualize my role as a foreign male intern from the global north in Ghana. Although clearly time would be required in grasping a complete understanding of the complexities of insider/outsider elements in Ghana, the intensive course was a good start.
More importantly, I felt that the course really (and I mean REALLY) helped me understand the harsh realities many Ghanaians face. The intensive course brought me back to my first couple of days when we attended the city tour in Accra. The tour began with a drive through administrative and economic districts, which were scattered throughout different regions of the city. But of all the places we had visited, I recall feeling greatly impacted by our drive through Sodom and Gomorrah - the poorest district of the city. Sonny our tour guide, explained to us that many of the residence that live in Sodom and Gomorrah live in homes, which are no larger than 4 by 4 meters. These homes are built on mounds of garbage, which is right beside a stagnant body of water where the city waste is dumped and accumulated. You can smell the stench of the district from about 5-6 Km away! To see the extreme poverty and unsanitary living conditions that these people were living in was absolutely crushing. I was seeing first hand everything we had read and studied in our course reader. Economic liberalization, IMF structural adjustment policies, Globalization, Hunger and poverty were no longer an abstract theoretical entity for they were now a reality to me more than ever! The only thing I can really say to myself these days is...DAMN!
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