I got some work!

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After 4 months of waiting, things are finally moving. It has been almost 5 months since I arrived in Ghana for my volunteering mission. I came with some anxiety about work, as I have no academic background in the humanitarian or development fields, but also with hope, expectations, and a strong willingness to learn. Through this mission, in addition to immersing myself in a new culture, I wanted to discover a field that I might be interested in pursuing professionally, and potentially consider going back to my studies if that turned out to be the case. Thus, I have to admit that I felt quite disappointed during those first four months, as I was not really included or involved in my host organization’s activities. The days felt long and were filled with self-questioning. The fact that one of the four of us was even planning a premature departure for this reason was also mentally challenging.

Fortunately, everything changed after an unexpected field visit. I was invited by my local mentor to join him in evaluating a project that was coming to an end. The project focused on training young people from the northern border areas in technical skills such as organic farming, poultry, and electricity. The purpose of the trip was to assess the project’s impact: how the trainees were doing, what challenges they were facing, what positive results they had seen, and how they felt about the training overall. Listening to their experiences made me truly realize how things that are considered basic when you are in a good financial situation can be very difficult to access when you are living in a remote area and dealing with poverty. For example, having basic tools to work as an electrician, access to transport to reach a work site, or quality materials to fence a piece of farmland. 

Group evaluation meeting with TVET

 

Personnally seeing these realities was a powerful moment for me. It triggered many ideas, even though, due to a lack of funds and the project coming to an end, most of them will not be implemented. Still, it strongly motivated me to focus on my own microfinance project. 

This is actually the project I mentioned in my previous post: installing a water pump in a community to enable them to grow vegetables during the dry season, when farming is usually not possible. In addition, we aim to connect them with one or more restaurants in Tamale so they can sell their produce at a better price than in local markets. I was able to meet the community I will be working with in December, and the project is now on a good path. Let’s now see how it will go!

First meeting with the Bunglung community (microfinance)

    

First meeting with the Bunglung community (microfinance)

 

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