A whirlwind of a week has just passed us Ghana-based Lumanaians.
Eventful indeed, we did the GBC, hosted a client party, celebrated
Farmer’s Day and retreated to the local “eco-lodge,” Meet Me There, to
talk about future goals… and our feelings.
A little over a week ago, Sammie, Justine and I headed north to Ho for
a GBC radio interview, which broadcast out to the Volta Region. This
all went off without a hitch, although Justine may have another
version of the story since it was her mobile phone digits that were
distributed out across the airwaves for all of the Voltarians to jot
down and begin dialing non-stop. This didn’t cease for several days.
At least she’s got a sweet ring tone that I take pleasure in singing
along to, thoroughly annoying those poor, unfortunate souls within
earshot.
As a follow up to this radio interview, the GBC decided they wanted to
send a crew out for our big client party blowout in the Atorkor L.A.
Basic School courtyard to film interviews with some of our feature
clients (Lumana recently instituted the “Cooperative of the Quarter
Award”) and capture footage of the soiree itself. The four
cooperatives selected, one from each of the villages Atorkor, Dzita,
Anloga and Whuti, began arriving for the interviews hours before the
GTV crew was to arrive, in their Sunday best on Tuesday. Once the crew
arrived, they had their own vision for how they wanted the interviews
to go over, so they chose a few of the clients to film in their
homes/places of work, staging their day-to-day tasks for all of Ghana
to see.
The crew continued to film the presentations made by our loyal Lumana
advisors and partners, Madaam Beaula, Mr. Seth, Mr. Tettey, our own
Eric Fiazorli, loan officer extraordinaire, and none other than the
head honcho herself, Executive Director, Sammie, to the 200 or so
clients in attendance. Included in the ceremony was the Atorkor
school’s cultural group pounding traditional drumbeats and providing a
copious display of youngsters dancing throughout. The event concluded
as everyone filled their bellies with food served up in one of the
open-air school classrooms.
The following day, Justin and Mark from Tilapiana, a fish pond
development project, came out on the Atorkor town for field tests and
feasibility assessment for bringing their project to this area.
Walking from one local farm to another throughout the day, I learned a
lot about tilapia farming and gained further confirmation that Ghana
does indeed make you sweat.
All that eventfulness was not even the half of it. Ok, roughly half.
But the following day, our Lumana retreat facilitator, Martina,
arrived from the Emerald City. Once we’d settled our things at the
Pink Hostel in Asylum Down, we ate a bit of Ghanaian stew in the
pulsing Accra night, subject to rather vulgar dancing all around us.
It was time to get back to the innocence of the rural Anloga. Friday
was Farmer’s Day, a national holiday here in Ghana, so the wait for a
trotro became slightly daunting. After about 3 hours of standing under
the African sun, we were Volta-bound to return in time for our staff
bonding retreat the next morning.
My only complaint about the Lumana “Meet Me There” Retreat was the
lack of a trust fall session, but at least we got to untangle
ourselves from the human knot (if you haven’t tried it, it’s a real
hoot; highly recommended). We took great leaps and bounds to identify
new initiatives for expansion and ate pizza. As it so happens, eating
a bunch of cheesy goodness can inspire and motivate those suffering
from the lactose drought that plagues this region.