Chapter 16: a license to kill

morning jerks...

starting off, i’d just like to apologize for accidentally naming the last email “chapter 16” when it was really only chapter 15. not like this is really that big of a deal or anything, but evidently some people thought it was; and i received a barrage of emails in response notifying me of this mistake. hooray, to all of you out there who reminded me of how retarded i am - thank you. you are indeed much smarter than i am. you guys should at least give me some credit, ‘cause this is the first time i’ve screwed this up. and that in itself is surprising. anyway...moving right along. here’s chapter 16. enjoy...

okay, so i don’t know if you people ever remember me talking about how we were having ourselves a wee bit of a chieftaincy dispute back at my place (sankpala, n.r.) last year. if not, i’ll sum it up quick: the dead chief’s brother was appointed (“technically”) the interim chief during the period of time between his brother’s death and the new chief’s accession to the throne, which - surprise, surprise - could only happen after the dead chief’s funeral. most folks - yours truly included - never gave the dead chief’s brother the time of day, recognizing instead the new-but-not-officially-enstooled chief as the rightful ruler over the metropolis of sankpala. however, that’s just it - the other guy (the brother) was the ‘official’ chief, and whenever an important event came along (like a holiday, a festival, or whatever...), the shit would hit the fan. it made for quite an interesting first year at site, rest assured; but time has passed. the community finally got off their asses and gave their dead chief the funeral he deserved (i’m assuming this ‘cause i only me the guy once during the site visit in oct. ‘03) - and the following week, during the festivities of the islamic new year (when every elder was either promoted or enstooled throughout the village) the new chief ascended the throne. party time. all’s well that ends well...

this couldn’t have come at a better time either; the annual fire festival - the dagomba/gonja traditions of chaotically ushering in the islamic new year by running around in war paint and burning nearly everything down to the ground - went down in mid-february (i think....somewhere around there), and last year, that’s when i was evacuated from site because of *drum roll* a certain chieftaincy dispute. as you’ll all remember, friends, i spent last year’s fire festival in the neighboring village of kusawgu with my friend, brett. this year, we rocked that out at my place - and it was a hell of a lot more fun. i had some of my counterpart’s sons make some torches for me and kris, which turned out better than expected. granted, they did make us two apiece, which is definitely overkill, but it was a pleasant gesture nonetheless. the only downside to this year’s fire festival was the fact that it began to rain towards the end, but overall, it didn’t really hinder that much of the festivities. this year we even got the chief’s (‘official’ chief, as you’ll remember) permission to videotape the event - the footage of which turned out like something straight out of National Geographic. i’m glad i have that now, ‘cause, looking back, the fire festivals are some of the highlights of my time served here. hopefully i can somehow show you guys that sometime. you may find it enjoyable. then again, you could find it lame. i don’t know.

all right, so that was a month ago or so, right? right. let’s see...what else have i done? oh yeah, i’ll update you guys on the quagmire that is the infamous sankpala forest reserve project. that’s always fun to talk about. okay, so remember my old counterpart mohammed? remember how he was in charge of monitoring the forest reserve - and how he ended up being the one responsible, in the end, for burning half of it down the night before the team i had assembled and i were going to go out and hack out a fire belt on the perimeter of the reserve? well, because we now have an official chief running the show in sankpala, mohammed was now able to be held accountable for what he did. the seemed pretty cut-and-dry to me: punish the guy who screwed up, replace him with someone else to handle the forest reserve, and enjoy the rest of the morning. then again, i’m assuming this is cut-and-dry ‘cause i’m an american - and, more importantly, i’m not a dagomba. this ended up being a huge ordeal that lasted a couple of weeks (and several very long - and boring - meetings with the chief, the sub-chiefs, and elders of the village). i don’t wanna go into details all that much, ‘cause even reflecting on that period of time just pisses me off. what you need to know is that i was summoned, finally, to retrieve the book of laws from mohammed, destroy it, construct a NEW book of laws, and hold on to it until we found another person suitable for watching over the forest reserve. as of today, that position is still not filled. not that it matters...by now, the majority of the forest reserve is completely burned down and i’ve lost most of my enthusiasm over the whole deal. some of that, i’m sure, has to do with the fact that mohammed wasn’t fined or punished in the slightest. don’t ask me why - i don’t understand it myself - that’s just how shit works around here...

i’ve also intensified by art-whoring lately. since the last time i talked with you folks, i’ve designed two t-shirts (one for guinea worm week, one for gender and youth development). i’ve painted an hiv/aids mural at the stc bus station in tamale, i’ve painted a guinea worm mural in kusawgu, i’ve drawn up some gonja pamphlets for something or other (sanitation and water, i think...), and begun illustrating a children’s book for a pcv that early terminated back to the united states. i’m pretty sure that’s all for right now, but i’ve got three or four upcoming t-shirts/murals/drawings that i’m doing for other volunteers in the near future. due to such whoring, i’ve begun charging people for various projects. i accept cedis (local currency), beer, and tuna fish. a man’s gotta find a way to live, guys...

kris and i also vaccinated the village for polio and elephantiasis over the course of the last month and a half, which i always love doing ‘cause i get to walk around the village and do something with people besides friggin’ guinea worm work (which gets really monotonous and lifeless after awhile). plus, i’m actually doing something i know is going to end up working - unlike the uphill-battle-that-can’t-be -won that is guinea worm eradication in ghana. i also enjoy making little children cry, which is something that happens in result to walking around with a red cross cooler full of medicine. even in rural west africa, kids hate medicine. in know that polio is right up there with yellow fever, tuberculosis, typhoid, and malaria with diseases that are pretty prevalent here in ghana, but only known in america in such immortal computer games as ‘oregon trail.’ i see people with polio all the time, though, and it’s pretty bad shit. elephantiasis, which is a mutation/swelling of the legs and feet, is even more horrifying - and i highly recommend each of you google search that for pictures or whatever, ‘cause it looks weird as hell. anyway, i even went out to some surrounding villages during my vaccinating that had never seen a white person before - EVER - and consequently made several children wet themselves. i’m blaming this on my mohawk, ‘cause i’d like to think i’m somewhat of a likable guy, you know...

since our last talk, i’ve also gotten to know what fun it is trying to work out deals with the national ghanaian government. holy shit, does this suck. you see, sankpala lies right on the main road that divides the country in half, running all the way from accra to the burkina faso capital of waga-dugu (or however you spell it) - so we get a lot of traffic coming through our town...which is cut literally in half by that stupid friggin’ road. i’m serious - i can’t even buy bread without having to cross a virtual expressway...fun stuff. anyway, every few months someone gets killed in our village because drivers come barreling down the road in their lorries or cars or cattle trucks or whatever - not slowing down in the slightest, and, more often than not, keep driving after hitting someone or something. goats and sheep and cows are hit pretty much every week, but when people are being killed - and it’s usually little children who don’t understand the concept of looking both ways before crossing the street - then one would think that some would’ve stood up long ago and said something along the lines of, “this is bullshit - this has to stop.” coincidentally, that person ended up being me. funny how that works out. i saw an accident here first hand in which a tro was overturned and several people were killed, and that was enough to make me want to contact the ministry of roads and highways and ask for some friggin’ speed bumps on either side of the village. i’ll keep you guys updated on how that goes, but as of right now, the ministry is saying they’ll do it, but that people from accra will have to come up and that sankpala itself will have to fork out the money for the endeavor. at this point, i just want those things constructed so i don’t have to attend any more funerals over something as a lack of rumble strips.

speaking of ghana’s deadly highways, our local american doctor here in tamale - and a close friend to the tamale peace corps sub-office and its often-sickly pcvs (yours truly included) - dr. harmon, was killed in a car crash down by cape coast last month. this sucks not only ‘cause he was a good guy and it was a senseless death that could’ve been avoided, but also because now the entire three northern regions of ghana are without a non-ghanaian doctor. so, more or less, if we’re sick or need treatment with some competency involved, we kinda have to go down to accra to have that all worked out. in all seriousness, this sucks; one doesn’t feel like having to ride an stc bus for 14 hours when crapping blood and vomiting profusely, you know? speaking of being sick, guess who has giardia again? that’s right guys - i’m spraying clear, frothy ass-liquid all the damn time, and that also sucks.

just so you know, my fan has died. it only lasted another week or so after i sent that last email out, so i didn’t really become all that emotionally attached to it. nay, instead kris and i went out one day and bought a new, high-tech, super-fan...one that came with a free calendar! how awesome is that? buy a fan in the u.s. of a. and see if it has a friggin’ free calendar inside. in doing so, it shall be for naught, ‘cause that just doesn’t happen in the states. i’m now deeply attached to my new fan and my new free calendar. kris is as well...

remember the bike project i did a couple months ago? brett and i had ordered forty bicycles from britain and the united states and had them shipped up from the south, and we distributed them between sankpala and kusawgu for half the accra price. the first time around, it went surprisingly well (especially considering i was the ONLY person overseeing all the workshops). due the stress level of that first workshop, i didn’t want to ever do that again. brett, apparently, didn’t feel the same way. this probably had something to do with the fact that he wasn’t around for the last one - he was off on vacation back in the states with his girlfriend. so - what the hell - he decided to register us for yet another workshop. the kicker? this time around, it would be TWICE AS BIG. 80 bicycles, 5 workshops, countless villages...fortunately, brett’s somehow more organized than i am and he did most of the grunt work (logistics, transportation, and accommodations, etc.). anyway, this time around it wasn’t so bad - we pulled off another bike delivery that was twice as big without any problems whatsoever. it went so well, in fact, that i’m in the process right now of ordering another bike workshop, for 80 - 100 bikes this time, for sometime within the next three to five months. i’m sure this next one, however, will be a horrible ordeal...in accordance with murphy’s law, third time’s the charm, and all that. we’ll see - i’ll keep you guys posted...

you guys get the feeling i’ve been doing a lot over the course of the last two months? typing this out, i’m thinking the same thing. i guess i’ve been busting my ass - been more busy than i thought i was. huh. well, here’s something else i’ve been doing - baby sitting. not really, but close. i’ve started a guinea worm youth club at the sankpala primary school, and that alone is enough to reassure me that i never ever ever want to teach elementary school students for a living. holy shit. all right, so we’ve got about 37 boys and 26 girls, ranging in age between 8 and 15, that meet once a week (sundays at 2 pm...which adjusted for ghanaian laziness a.k.a. “ghana time” means more like 3:30 pm) and talk about club ideas and projects that they can do around the village. as bait, i’ve employed the use of an adidas soccer ball (“football” here, folks...you say soccer and they look at you like you’re retarded) that i picked up in the states when i went home in december, and made it available only to those children who were in the youth club. naturally, this got children to join. i’m trying right now to get a second one ‘cause they boys don’t really share or play with the girls after the meetings are adjourned (which is the designated football time). i’m also trying to get these guys t-shirts, which is a pain in the ass - but i need to get them something or else otherwise out attendance - which has been surprisingly well over the last seven meetings - will drop off and the club will dissolve. i don’t want this to happen (seriously, now) ‘cause these children are slowly being molded into my own personal army; one that i am using to hunt around the village for suspected guinea worm cases and come up with drama presentations to perform at market days. you know, grunt shit that i used to have to do before. come on now, why work when you can have children do it for you? that’s why i’m here working for the government, people - ‘cause i’m smart.

st. patrick’s day - not much to mention. it wasn’t the doherty but i got drunk in navrongo and wished it was cold out. that’s about it.

guinea worm week just went down. always does in march. i never participate in them ‘cause, well, i do them every week. why the hell would i want to go to another village where i don’t know anyone, get called ‘white man’ a lot, and sleep in shitty quarters when i could do the same work in my own village, where people bow to me...and where i have a new, sweet fan? doesn’t make much sense, does it? of course not, so, consequently, i didn’t take part in guinea worm week this year - but lots and lots of volunteers throughout the country do. and not just peace corps. nay, friends; the dutch, the canadians, the british, etc., go out to random communities and work for a week. sometimes they don’t even inform current volunteers who are already posted at said communities that they’re going there in the first place. so, because of this, the current volunteer walks into his goat-ravaged porch one evening to find, say, three dutch girls - who don’t speak the local language, don’t know the local customs, can’t drink the local water, can’t eat most of the local foods, etc etc etc. if you couldn’t already tell from my cryptic verse, i, in fact, had three dutch volunteers in my community for a week - quite a surprise to me as well as everyone else. oh well...

so yeah. this ended up being extremely annoying for me, seeing how i had to drop everything i was doing just in order to chaperone a few people from denmark...or holland...or luxembourg (or wherever the hell it is that the dutch come from) for the whole week. this could have been halfway tolerable, perhaps, had the volunteers that global 2000 sent me been somewhat accustomed to ‘village’ customs instead of ‘tamale’ customs (where they’ve been posted for a mere six weeks, might i add). i lost count of how many times i’d cringe when one of these girls would go waltzing around with me on a filter inspection or something wearing western tank tops (not cool), using their left hands for just about everything (also not cool), and not bowing to any of the right people (very also not cool). that, and they were giving balloons out to the children here. balloons! would you give a balloon to a two year old? yeah, probably not. i don’t know, maybe some of you would. anyway, the bush-village kids that we happened to come across as we trekked around during the week - all these kids (who, regardless of age, due to lack of balloon exposure, might as well have been two years old) had never EVER seen a white person before...let alone four in one sitting (three of which were adamantly passing out balloons, while the fourth looked on in disgust after failed attempts of ‘maybe that’s not such a good idea’...and other comments of that nature). *sighs* anyway, all in all, they were decent people - i just hated to abandon every project i’ve been working on just in order to go running around the surrounding communities with hopeless and helpless scandinavians for a week. you know. that ol’ tale...

following guinea worm week, it was time (once again) for peace corps’ annual disco-themed party in tamale, sponsored by the ever dedicated and smiley-happy guinea worm volunteers (of whom you are so very familiarized with by now). not really all that much to touch on there; most of the volunteers spread out throughout ghana all come together at a fancy hotel (by tamale standards), deck themselves in disco outfits, and have a party. that simple. i did get the honor of emceeing the event, though - further attesting to the nation that i somewhat rule...

as you can see, i’ve been busy. other things that i’ve done that i’m not about to touch on (due to the fact that this thing is already long enough as it is) include:

building a dock of rocks (rock-dock...heh) for the dam (a project i was against from the start, seeing how when the rains come the whole friggin’ thing’s going to be submerged anyway...

receiving an enormous tank of water from global 2000 (a 1000 gallon plastic tank with a screw-on lid at the top and a lockable faucet on the side. i got this because the bore hole in my village is in shambles and there’s no other clean water available)...

herding cattle - something that i happen to be surprisingly good at, believe it or not...

and...being granted permission to kill someone in my village. now, this last one probably scares most of you - hell, it scared me when i found out - but it’s the truth. the elders in my village learned that someone had unscrewed the cover of my water poly tank, perhaps stealing water from it while i was away in tamale some time, and decided that when the perpetrator was finally apprehended, that i had the chief’s full permission to KILL the person responsible. i’ve never had the permission to kill anyone before, believe it or not, so this is kinda weird for me. flattering, but weird...

and that leads us to this morning, as i sit in the tamale sub-office, reassuming my role as interim peace corps volunteer leader (manager and boss of the sub-office) for the fourth time. the southern perimeter wall of the office compound was knocked down by a huge-ass tree that was struck down in a thunderstorm, so that has to be put back up nice and quick-like...we’re somehow undefended on that front. this may not have been all that bad if they weren’t consequently burying (finally) the old king of the dagombas, the yah naa himself. *note: in chapter 4 i mentioned the old king having his head chopped off and his entire line wiped out in a massacre a couple of years back, hence there is no dagomba king at present*. should be an entertaining week; the funeral’s on monday, they’re supposedly going to choose a successor (the two opposing factions over who should be the next king, the abudu and abdani dagombas, are again clashing with bows and arrows, clubs, and cutlasses), and the tanks and soldiers are prowling once more the streets of tamale. damn. good thing they left me in charge of the office and not somebody else, right? so if i live through this week - if the office walls that are crumbling down aren’t breached and all us pcvs aren’t hacked to pieces by pissed off locals - i’ll be sure to drop in on you guys again in a few weeks (no more of this two-month-between-mass-emails thing...this is way too damn long and way too much damn work...). until then, i hope all is well with each and every one of you. you guys take care of yourselves - i’ll talk to you later. stay outta trouble...

until next time...

col. brian j. hough, a.k.a. chief maliguna
9th royal donkey cavalry brigade

p.s. still not a hippie. make sure you write that down, bp