I could sit here and type about something new that happened
to me or something that you might not know about Ghana or what I ate for dinner
but I really don’t feel like it. I think I’ve done enough of that. Instead, I’m
going to talk a little bit about me.
I’ve felt a very small amount of anger for a couple of weeks
now. It’s sort of just always there, lurking. I couldn’t really figure out why,
but now I know, and this next example might give you some insight into my internal
struggle.
This Saturday, a big group of Proworld volunteers is heading
over to the famous village on stilts, quite the tourist attraction. It takes 4
hours to get there and 4 hours to get back. I will not be going with them.
The not-too-fond-of-tro-tros part of me says, “Why would you
want to spend 8 hours travelling on a bumpy road, just look at some houses and
lie on the beach?” The anti-tourism part of me says, “What, you’re going to go
into someone’s backyard in a canoe, stare at them, and then leave? If you’re
going to go at all, don’t go with a huge group of tourists, at least”. But the
anthropologist in me is screaming, “Go there! Go now! See how other people live
on the water, you will literally die of happiness!”
I’ll be going to Eguafo instead. I haven’t been there for
like, 2 weeks and I really need to see everybody. I’ll have all day.
I just feel really conflicted. I don’t think I’m getting as
much as I could out of this experience as I did last year. Maybe I came in with
inflated expectations. Maybe part of it is being in a city, where you don’t
talk to everyone you see. Maybe part of it is that I have internet almost every
day. Definitely part of it is that I’m not taking enough initiative to try new
things. And part of it is that…
I spend almost every waking moment with at least one North
American person. Almost every day, somebody mentions something she misses from
back home, like steak or … whatever, mostly steak actually. I think that this
is part of my anger. Because I agree! I miss steak and my leggings and cars not
honking and the plethora of clean public toilets. But you can’t just compare
countries. You need to look at them in isolation.
Why can’t we talk about the good parts about Ghana? LOOK UP!
Don’t you see the beautiful lights and colors and smells and swirling ocean of
bobbing heads as people jostle down the narrow roads of El Mina? Don’t you see
the way the rain soaks into the wood of the road shacks and the way the taxis
pop against the gray sky? Aren’t you in awe as you see a mother and her
children eat dinner outside in pitch black darkness, only by the light of a
kerosene lit flame?
Unfortunately, I see most of this while sitting in a
tro-tro, driving past, never interacting with any of these people, as I head
towards some expensive restaurant that really only tourists eat at.
The point of me saying all this is that… I’ll get to the
stilt village eventually, just not on Saturday.
Last semester I wrote an ethnography as part of my Methods
in Cultural Anthropology class with one of my best and favorite professors.
When I was close to being finished, he asked me if the experience was worth it.
I said, “Yeah, I definitely think it was worth it, but I also think I will
never do it again.” He informed me that every person who writes their first
ethnography swears, “Never again”. He went on to tell me that ethnography is
“not something you do. It’s something you are”. Then he offered me an
understanding smile. And I felt trapped. I still feel trapped; even more so now
that I think I might have an ethnographer’s soul in me. A very timid, naive ethnographer's soul in a very confident and mature Emily.
PS: I've realized recently that I often think that my way is the right way.
Yen koh,
Ekuwa
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