final update maybe?

I have officially finished at site and am on my way to Accra to close out my service. The last few weeks at site had some exciting developments.

First, we finished building my women's agro-processing/shea butter processing facility and had a one week training on how to use the machines. Now, the women are the proud owners of their own grinding mill and they have my counterpart's younger brother working there everyday so they can earn some income and pay the lights bill. People come everyday to grind their various crops and to make shea butter. The women have also used it to produce a lot of shea butter as a group and hopefully the man who did the training is going to set them up with some buyers for the shea butter. In the beginning of this project I was worried because I had heard from other volunteers that women don't like to use these machines because they see making shea butter as a social event, but that is totally a lie. One of the machines churns the butter for you, which is typically done tediously by hand, and people have been coming to use it all the time. This is the one that I was told would never be used. I think either I have a progressive village or the other volunteers didn't have proper training for their groups and therefore the women didn't know the value of this machine. We've already had some problems with the machines, but we're working on it and making progress. As the villagers say, everything is tough in the beginning but soon things will be running smoothly. It also helps that the machines are under warranty for the first six months, so we can call for assistance when we have problems.

Second, the district finally got their act together and almost finished up the work at the clinic. They got the painters out there and they did a nice job painting the buildings inside and out. They also sent the electricians out, who did half of the wiring and then took a break for a couple weeks, but they finally got out to finish. I managed to get some furniture and basic medical supplies, like scales, stethoscope, blood pressure cuff, and thermometers for the clinic. After all of this was done, the only things left were installing some mosquito netting and connecting the electricity. Those still need to be done, but because I am leaving now they decided to open the clinic before those were finished. So, we had an awesome opening ceremony this past Monday. There were representatives there from the district assembly, district health office, subdistrict health office, and nearby villages. The man who originally built the clinic was even there and since he is a well known political figure he invited TV Africa to film the event. Most of my village and the chief and leaders of a neighboring village all came out to celebrate the opening. It was a long ceremony in which many people gave speeches mostly thanking me and encouraging the village to support the clinic. There was even a break for drumming and dancing in the middle of the ceremony. As thank you gifts for me, the village and my women's group each gave me local clothes to wear, so I had two costume changes during the ceremony to show off my new garbs. After the first costume change, into nice traditional cloth, they told me I had to go greet the chief and led me out there with the drummers. I sort of danced my way to the chief and squatted to greet him and was shocked when he told me they were enskinning me as a CHIEF! They made me the Malititinaa, or the chief who helped them. This is a huge honor and I did not expect it at all. Since the ceremony was in my honor, they also made me dance in front of everyone as they put money on my head to show they liked my dancing (no, not like a stripper). Unfortunately though, all that money goes to the drummers. At the end of the ceremony we made the chief the first patient and the nurses checked his blood pressure. They also held a baby weighing after the ceremony so all the babies in the village and nearby villages were weighed and received their vaccinations. That was definitely one of my best days in the village and such a relief to actually have that project become a success.

The last big thing that happened was my replacements came to visit the site. I am being replaced by a nice married couple, the husband being a natural resource management volunteer and the wife a health, water and sanitation volunteer like me. I hung out with them for the first two days of their visit and introduced them to my women's group, who the husband will be working with. I showed them around a bit, but then left for the rest of the week so they could get to know the site on their own and not be in my shadow. I'm excited for them to continue my work, but its weird introducing people who are going to replace you and be compared to you all the time.

Yesterday I left my site for good and it had mixed emotions about it. Everyone in the village kept asking why I was going to go home and leave them, so I had to explain a hundred times that my family misses me and I have to go back to school. I was very sad about saying goodbye to all of my friends, but I'm ready to come home. Two years was a good amount of time and I think I did good work, but home is definitely calling. Now onto closing my service in Accra, a short trip to Togo and Benin, and then home on August 16th!