Ms. Lagen has a friend living in Tucson who knows a fine man and his wife from Ghana. The man, whose name is Kwaku, teaches at a college in Kentucky; so Ms. Lagen flew to Kentucky to meet him and also met his wife, Ama.
While she was there, Ms. L had dinner with Ama and Kwaku and made plans to visit Ama's mother who still lives in Ghana. In fact, to our delight and surprise, Ama's mother lives in the little village of Egyei Krom, outside of a larger city, Kumasi, north of our village of Brenu Akyinim. Ama has now arranged for Ms. Lagen and me, Ms. Kierzek, to stay with her mother in that village before we return to the United States at the end of our teaching experience. We are extremely thrilled at the prospect of staying with a villager in her own home. It will be for a couple of days. She does not speak English, but we're confident that we will do just fine. She will be taking us to another village that is very well-known for its beautiful wood carvings.
That makes two particular crafts we now know of that we must investigate: this wood-carving and the beautiful woven cloth called kente cloth. We will, of course, bring back samples of each to show our students!!!
In addition to this lovely couple, we have made the acquaintance of another wonderful person. Her name is Florence Clark and she is a Tucsonan who has recently set up an orphanage in Ghana and is trying to finance the private education of the children who live there. She says that Ghanaian students must take a very important test before middle school and they must score high in order to go on in school. She wants to be sure they all make it to the next level of schooling. She cares so much about these children---there are twelve of them presently living at the orphanage--- that she is even now trying to establish a business near the orphanage to help support the cost of raising the children, that is, buying their food and clothes and paying for their schooling. I have so much admiration for people such as Florence.
Here's the interesting part: the business she's starting up is fish farming in a lake nearby the orphanage. Who even knew there was such an industry in Ghana as fish farming?
2 comments:
Hi Mrs. Lagen it's me Kali Van Ooyen. I really miss you. I hope you come back. As you know I'm in fifth grade. Our new princible is awsome. I'm waiting for them to announce the winners of the fundraiser. I hope I'm a winner and get the limo ride to Eggees and back to school. I'm in Mrs. Smith's class and next Friday is our last field trip to STARBASE. We have been there four times already. We are going to get a tour around STARBASE and we get to learn about air planes and fly them virtually! I'm really going to miss this school next year. I'm either going to La Cima or Cross Middle School. I hope you are having a great time in Ghana, Africa. What do you eat there? Is the food good or not. Please try to blog it. I turned 11 on 9/11 so it was my golden birthday. What is the weather like over there? Is it warm, cold, cool, or hot? That would give us an update about what the weather is like, so please try to also blog that. Tell Mrs. Kierzek I sined up for chorus and I'm goin to stick with it. The new music teacher is so nice, not that you weren't a good teacher because you were. She teaches us hard stuff but that's how we learn. Do you think that the kids in Africa are better than I was? This year is going very well. On my mid-term report, I got all A+'s. I hope that you think I'm doing a wonderful job. I hope I get gold honor roll. I will think of you a lot. Thank you for being my teacher in music and fourth grade. I miss you both and will always remember you.
Love,
Your student Kali Van Ooyen
Well written article.
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