World Cup Madness!

Ghana is a HUGE football (soccer) country. They love the sport and take it very seriously. Soccer pitches are ubiquitous. Now, when I say soccer pitch, I don’t mean a field with freshly cut grass. Here, a majority of the fields are not fields at all, and more of a cleared space of dirt or dust on which kids and teens can place a couple of nets and a ball and play. Unfortunately, sports here are more of a male-dominated aspect of life, but soccer is still an important facet of Ghanaian life nonetheless.

The excitement about the World Cup in Ghana started about 7-8 months ago, when Ghana beat Egypt to qualify for the Cup. This sparked the excitement and anxiety for the start of the World Cup, in which Ghana would be competing. This was the first time I would be in a country where their main sport is football for the World Cup. Of course, my family and I were incredibly excited! As it got closer and closer to the start of the World Cup commercials on the TV became more Black Stars (the Ghanaian team) and football related, Ghanaian flags began to pop up on shops and cars throughout the country, and the general feeling of hope for the team began to rise.

The first game of the World Cup that Ghana played in is one that I will never forget. They were set to play the US (how ironic), a team that they had beaten twice previously in other World Cups. My family and I were rooting for Ghana and the US, but would’ve liked to see Ghana win the match. There were high expectations for the Black Stars, but most Ghanaians had no doubt that they would win, easily. The time finally came for the match. My family and I had traveled to a city in Ghana called Kumasi by plane earlier in the day, and were settled in the hotel to watch the match. It was a tense 90 or so minutes to say the least. The US came out strong with an insane less-than-a-minute goal scored by Captain Clint Dempsey. This weakened Ghanaian resolve as they desperately tried to equalize. They were able to, to the relief of every fan in Ghana. The game ended up going into a couple minutes of injury time with a second US goal, and those few minutes of injury time were some of the most heart-attack inducing of my life. Ghana just needed to equalize to gain a point but, in the end, weren’t able to. It was a devastating 2-1 loss for Ghana, but an incredible achievement for the US.

I finally got a taste of watching Ghana play among Ghanaians during their next game against Germany, which they tied 2-2. We decided to venture out to a favorite roadside spot which sold drinks and showed World Cup matches on a giant screen with a projector. This was probably the best choice ever. A ton of Ghanaians turned up and created this awesome, thrilled, revved up atmosphere that made watching the game 10 times more exciting.

Let me help you understand exactly what it’s like watching a Ghanaian World Cup game with Ghanaians. CRAZY. Ghanaian football fans LOVE to shout “PENALTY!” a n y t i m e the ball comes anywhere near the penalty box. They also love to yell “GOAL GOAL GOAL!!!” anytime there is even a run made towards the goal. And when there is a goal scored, especially a Ghana goal? Say goodbye to your functioning ear drums because the Ghanaians LOVE to cheer/scream/yell and celebrate like they’ve achieved world domination and not only kicked a ball into a net. The game was probably the most fun I have had in a long time and it felt so great to be right there cheering along with all of the passionate fans.

The fact that the Black Stars were able to tie the machine that is the German team was an incredible accomplishment and, although they did not make it past the group stage, many Ghanaians are extremely proud of how their boys played in the Cup. Watching the Cup in a country where soccer was their number one sport was incredible. The fact that Ghana was also contending made it an amazing experience that I will not forget. 

Life in Ghana: Housing Situation

Housing here in Ghana is very different from most housing in the US. In Ghana the social classes are very different and it shows in the housing. Here, you have the very rich living side-by-side with the very poor. An example is Oxford Street, one of the richest streets in Accra, filled with shops, a mall, and large billboards that may be a faint cousin to those in Times Square. On one side of the street are these attractions and nice restaurants, visibly very clean and well kept, and on the other side, are the slums. It’s a very strange sight to see such a prosperous area to your right and be able to look to your left and see the exact opposite.

Another example is one that really surprised me. The Flagstaff House in Accra is the White House of Ghana, and one of the most ornate buildings in the country, yet across the street are many low income buildings. Imagine that in America. Right across the street from the White House you see a grouping of run-down buildings right there. My dad works towards mixed-income development but this is very different. Instead of mixing the people of different incomes in a single living area so that their income differences are indistinguishable, here it is obvious to see who lives where.

What really frightens me is that a majority of the people live in places like the slums and run-down buildings. The poverty here is much easier to see as it is sprinkled everywhere. When I say slums, I mean one or two room homes that are literally made of mud and tin. They are EVERYWHERE. In the city, along the roads, there are miles of little shops and right behind them lie a neighborhood of these tiny homes that make up the slums. Unlike in the US where there are specific areas that are more poverty-stricken, here, everywhere you look, even if you’re enjoying a nice night out at the mall or a nice restaurant, it is right there. Even houses that may look nice on the outside aren’t as pristine and put-together as one may assume on the inside.

In addition to the established expensive homes and homes in the slums, there are many homes under construction throughout the city of Accra. Because of the bureaucracy in the country, it is extremely hard to get anything done in a somewhat quick manner. Unfortunately, this results in half-finished homes and buildings that may not be finished for years. These unfinished homes scatter the city and largely subtract from the obvious progression that a majority of the city is working towards.

My African Teaching Experience!

My experience here in Ghana has been very different from my brother’s experiences because they have been fully immersed in Ghanaian life by attending a Ghanaian school for the full six months (January-July) while I finished my semester with online classes. Because of my online education, I was missing out on being around kids my age and learning from them while here. After finishing my classes online, it was arranged that I could “tutor” at my brother’s school for grades 4 and 5. I was quite apprehensive about what the tutoring would entail, but decided to give it a go and help out in the Maths and English classes. My first day was pretty uneventful; I was introduced to the class (“Good Moooorning Auntie Layla”) and sat in the back of the Grade 4 room to observe the class. It started to look like I would just be observing for the hour of Maths class, but the teacher motioned for the students to turn their homework in to me to be marked. I had a minor freak out about whether or not I was qualified to grade the student’s work, but I called back my memory of long division and got to work.

After this first day, things went more smoothly. I would go into each class for about an hour and listen to the lesson, walk around and help students with any questions, and mark the student’s work when they finished. This all changed a couple of weeks into my teaching when the Grade 4 teacher was nowhere to be seen when I showed up. Grade 4 is Ayande’s grade so as soon as I arrived he ran to tell me that I would be teaching the class in the absence of his teacher. I went straight to the school administrators’ office to figure out what to do (and buy myself some time) and he informed me that he had always wanted me to teach the class, and this was a prime opportunity to do just that. We headed back to the Grade 4 classroom and picked out a simple enough lesson for me to teach; multiplication using boxes and dots. By the time we had settled what I would teach and I was in front of the class at the board and writing out the lesson, the teacher arrived. He informed me that I was more than welcome to continue, so I did. The lesson was easy enough and I had been with the class for a few weeks then, so I felt comfortable standing in front of them and teaching them the lesson. Never in a million years did I think that I would be teaching a fourth grade class in West Africa how to multiply, but there I was, and it felt pretty great. The kids were extremely responsive, which allowed me to ask them questions and invite them to come up to the board, making the lesson a lot easier for the both of us to understand. I finished the lesson, thanked the class, and headed over to Year 5, where I would continue to observe and mark papers.

After the teaching incident, I felt an itch to do more, to teach more, to help out more. A young Year 4 student, Minella, came to me after class one day and asked if I could help her understand improper fractions. I met with her in the modest school library and that sparked a revolution of kids coming to me for math help. It was starting to feel like I was really making a difference and, even though I was regressing to my ‘observe and mark’ routine, I felt that I was helping the kids out in the best way I could.

The next time I taught the Maths class went a lot smoother. The class was working on handling and interpreting data, and I was able to teach them terms like Median, Mode, and Range. That was the first class where I was teaching the students concepts that they had never known before. I think it was then that the magnitude of what I was doing hit me. Even though there was a bit of an accent barrier that made it harder for the students to understand what I was teaching, I taught for about 1 hour and administered a test after the lesson, which all of the students passed.

In no way have I had the in depth experience at the school that my brothers have had, but I’ve been able to experience and learn from the differences between schools here and back home in the US. The teaching and tutoring I have done has allowed me to transfer my love of Math to the students, something that I hope will stay with them for a long time. I only have a few weeks left, and I am doing all that I can to teach as often as I can and help the students out in any way possible. I’m not quite used to being called Auntie from students as I roam the halls of the school, but I know for sure that I will miss it when I’m back home.