First Few Days in Ghana

I arrived in Ghana on the night of the 26th after spending a much needed day and night of relaxation at a hotel in London. About 10 of us from the program all had the same KLM flight from Amsterdam to Accra so we all flew the last leg of the trip together. Arriving in Accra felt much like it did the last time I landed in Nairobi, just a homecoming of a different sort. If you’ve ever been to Africa and fallen in love with it like I have, there’s something about stepping off the plane into the hot African night that is so welcoming. The crowds, small taxis, and bad traffic, all become sweet signs to welcome you back to the continent. It feels so good to be back on the continent. The people are unlike anywhere else I’ve ever been, filled with the type of joy and welcoming hearts that you can’t buy no matter how hard most Westerners try. It’s funny to think I made me first trip here less than a year ago, and here I am on my third one within 10 months. Some places just draw you back to them, and this continent does that for me.

The hostel we’re staying at is just about perfect for us. It’s not air conditioned as a whole but each of our rooms do have window units, and most nights we wake up freezing cold rather than kicking off covers from the heat. Accra is a costal town, nestled in the backwards “C” of the West African coast, so it stays pretty warm and humid, much like Texas weather in July. On Wednesday, only about half of the 40 students were here yet, so we just had the chance to sleep in before all venturing out to exchange some money and go by the mall. Malls are not typically the places I run to in a new city, but we’ve been pretty confined to where we can venture off to by ourselves so far. That’s been the most frustrating part of the trip in some regards, but also understandable. This is the only study abroad program UT has in Africa, so the stakes are pretty high for our professors right now. It gets easy for me to feel comfortable here because I’ve traveled to other parts of the continent before, not to mention much more dangerous parts, but I’m trying to abide by the authority of our program directors as much as possible.

Ghana is one of the safest and most stable countries in Africa. Having gained independence in the 1960’s, it avoided much of the political corruption and ethnic conflicts that have eroded other African countries after de-colonization. The comment I always here about people who’ve traveled to Ghana is that their favorite thing is the people, and I can understand why. There is a very strong sense of nationality here, and not as strong of an ex-pat or foreign influence like I saw a lot of in Nairobi. While Ghanaians are some of the most educated Africans (college was free here until about 8 years ago), the average GDP per person is still less than $400. As the director of the Aya Center told us today, Ghana is one of the richest countries in resources, but like so many other countries around, also one of the poorest economically. As we got to tour some of the slums today on our air-conditioned buses, that is the hardest truth for me to wrestle with. Seeing urban poverty like that doesn’t shock me as much because I’ve been around it before, but now that I’ve studied how countries get to that place, I feel a different kind of heart-break. I think I first traveled to Africa looking at the people as simply disadvantaged, but the more I’ve studied and the more I’ve traveled here, the more I realize that many of the luxuries I enjoy in the US are what keep people in poverty over here. Two of my friends Andy and Ali, and my roommate Danielle and I all grabbed a drink after we got back today, and talked about some of the things we passed through. Andy mentioned how he had come to the same understanding now of poverty, but that he didn’t think Americans would ever be willing to give up our cheap comforts to give someone else across the world a better life. No matter how hard you try to reason out poverty, the only thing that can truly overcome it is an understanding of the gospel. I am one of only a handful of believers on this trip, I’ve only openly had a conversation with one other girl about her faith, and my impression is that most people here have pretty harsh or apathetic views of religion, particularly Christianity. Very quickly I’m reminded how without a gospel worldview, the world can be a very hard place to come to grips with. The poverty we passed through today is just as hard for me to go through as it is for anyone else, yet there is a comfort in knowing that one day the part of town they call “Sodom and Gomorra” here will be renewed, it will be redeemed by the return of Christ, turning the sewage into flowing waters and every sickness into strength.

More than anything, I feel this is my main purpose on the trip, to continue to pour that truth into conversations. I’ve found myself more as an apologetic than anything, as many people have some pretty harsh things to say about religion. I’m constantly reminded that the gospel is the “aroma” to some, and “foolishness” to others. This trip is a challenge for me, and a gift from the Lord to test me on how much I truly believe he can change hearts.