Feature: Working Together For Change - A Ghana Story

Luke Harman, fresh from his Platform2 [1] volunteering trip to Ghana and now repping for CAS, tells us some anecdotes from his P2 experience and his own perspective on how we can alleviate poverty for our Ghanaian brothers and sisters...

When I volunteered to work in Ghana for 10 weeks at the start of 2010 I had no idea of the lasting effect the events of two or three days would have on me. The whole 10 weeks spent in a small community called Kasapin was incredible; the freedom the children had to go and play with whoever they wished, the sense of achievment in building a new school block in a community with huge problems of overcrowding in it's schools, and the sense of community that made me feel more at home than I ever had in any place in the UK.

'... Despite the excited children happy to get a few days off I struggled to cope with the sight of teachers desperately trying to dry out textbooks in the sun or trying to recover any re-usable materials from the roof'

But over short stint, I saw something really special. I saw first hand the changing of despair and dispondency into hope and into action. And all it took was a little bit of working together!

It was a Sunday night and the first rains in fiive months had just arrived, and with them a storm which we heard had ripped the roof from the Methodist School where I was teaching. Locals told us that the dry seasons are lasting longer and longer each year in Ghana - and that the erratic rainy seasons are becoming more severe.

Despite being told I wasn't prepared for actually seeing the school, and despite the excited children happy to get a few days off I struggled to cope with the sight of teachers desperately trying to dry out textbooks in the sun or trying to recover any re-usable materials from the roof. Children were going to have to share already overcrowded teaching spaces and limited resources. 'This will take forever to fix' I remember thinking. How wrong I was.

The following day we had organised a march of school children through the market and thrown together all our unwanted possessions to sell at a market stall, along with bags and jewellery made by volunteers from the offcuts donated by local tailors. The children marched, banged their drums held their banners high, danced, sang and shook buckets and - coupled with our stall takings and church donations - the community raised a third of the money required to replace the roof in just one day. I've been informed that the school's roof has now been totally repaired and new resources bought.

"Little drops make for a mighty ocean"

In a community where they have so little to give the generosity was remarkable. "Little drops make for a mighty ocean" I recall the head teacher Mr Asante saying and how right he is; when we come together and work for the same goal, putting aside any differences, we can achieve so much. This may only be a tale of working together on a small scale, imagine what we could do if we all worked together on a global scale...

Words and photos: Luke Harman