For "Not Coming to America," scroll down....

Textile Project Update

Soul of Somanya Tote Bag Prototype

Many people have assured me that slow but steady wins the race, and I know they're right. But it can be a little frustrating, especially when I also know that some of you who contributed to our Indiegogo campaign are eagerly awaiting our first textile products. And then there are those who want to purchase the fabrics to make fabulous creations of your own.

Well, here's what's going on. Originally, we thought we'd begin by importing some fabric yardage to get some of you started. But on closer examination of the full range of issues, and since we have limited funds to work with (does anyone have unlimited funds these days?), we ultimately had to change our approach. 

Think of it this way: We can buy a 6-yard piece of fabric and sell it for, say, twice our cost (which is probably all that the market here will bear). But then no one in Ghana gets a new job. OR...we can hire a few Ghanaian youth with no marketable skills and train them to sew, and then take that same piece of fabric and have them make several, maybe even a dozen, tote bags or table runners or iPad sleeves or placemats. Now not only do some people who had very little chance of finding work at all get jobs at a living wage, but Soul of Somanya makes...well, substantially more money to recycle back into offering work to more people, who will then make more beautiful products for us to sell so that we can create even more jobs...and so on. 

Prototype in Progress

So we're putting our efforts right now into what will best help us to achieve that long-range goal. This is not to say that we won't eventually have the fabrics for sale by the yard as well. In fact, some day we hope to have our own staff of fabric-makers. But first things first. Baby steps.

So where is the project right now? Well, we have first drafts of a fair number of products, which SoS supporter Johanna Stange of Baltimore and I made up using less expensive, domestic fabrics. Currently, we are remaking the ones we like best using the lengths of beautiful, authentic wax prints that I brought home from my various trips to West Africa. 

Once our prototypes are finalized (or as soon afterwards as funds allow), Johanna and I will be traveling to Ghana to begin training our new staff of workers. That's when the real fun will begin! 

Thank you all for bearing with us during this much-slower-than-hoped-for period of diversification. We are so grateful for your patience and support.

Not Coming to America

Not a day goes by that I don't miss my good friend and co-founder Arkuh Bernard Tettey. So it was with great disappointment (spiced with a huge dollop of frustration) that I received some news recently from the Department of Homeland Security. They didn't exactly deny our application for Bernard's training visa, but they described some pretty challenging hoops we would have to jump through just to continue the application process...and with precious little hope of a good outcome. In fact, they made it pretty clear that, as a small organization without a "well-established training program," we were unlikely ever to be approved.  

After ranting for a few days to anyone who would listen, I finally settled down and, taking a few (hundred) deep breaths, started gearing up to start leaping through those hoops, however high they might be. (After all, my African name "Adanki" means, among other things, "stubborn.") But in the meantime, a window suddenly opened where a door had been slammed almost all the way shut. Within a few days, Bernard received a call from his father offering to send him to school for a degree in marketing!  

This kind of education is something that will help Bernard all his life, and it won't do West Africa any harm either! This young man, with his steady intelligence and unshakable integrity, represents the very best that Ghana has to offer. He, and other young people like him, are Africa's greatest hope for the future. And now he'll be learning things that he'll be able to implement--and teach me to implement--so that we can offer good, secure jobs to more of his country's people. It's all very, very good.

Meanwhile, it will be business as usual at Soul of Somanya Ghana. Our wonderful staff of artisans will be handling the day-to-day operations, with Bernard commuting home from Accra on weekends to oversee their progress. I wish I could be there to help. I so miss being a part of it all. But I'm keeping very busy here right now transforming the fabrics I've been using as table cloths into colorful purses and pillow covers and placemats and such--and having a wonderful time doing it! So I guess I'm where I'm supposed to be right now. And I know you join me in wishing Bernard all the best as he starts this new phase in his life.

Chasing the Fair Trade Bead...in the Real World

When is a bead a "fair trade bead?" 

There is a lot of confusion in the minds of many buyers about what, exactly, the phrase "fair trade" means. Does it mean that this bead has to have been officially certified as fair trade by a licensed certification agency? Or that it has to have been produced within the framework of "...a trading partnership which aims at sustainable development for excluded and disadvantaged producers..." (part of the definition of fair trade agreed upon by the Fairtrade Foundation, Oxfam and Traidcraft)?  Or just that it has to have been produced and acquired legally and ethically, with no person having been exploited during its production or distribution process, and with the producer of the bead having been paid a fair price for his or her labor? And if that's the case, how can the average bead buyer know? How does one go about finding out?

The bad news is that it's all very complicated, and it can be a bit overwhelming to the would-be bead buyer with a conscience. Even certification does not absolutely guarantee fair practices--how can it? With all the good intentions in the world, there's no way that any agency can monitor from minute to minute the production and trading activities of the dozens of small producers and distributors they have certified. There's no way for them to be absolutely sure, for example, that the producers' children are not being used as a source of free labor when no one is there to observe it. And even if an agency were capable of keeping tabs on and dealing with such violations of fair trade principles, what about the bias of buyers in developed countries towards taking that "Fair Trade Certified" label as gospel? If we only buy "Fair Trade Certified" products, aren't we further marginalizing the thousands and thousands of small producers who haven't been fortunate enough to have access to, or even to hear about, such a thing as a certifying agency? Aren't many people less likely to purchase uncertified goods made by ethical producers simply because it's harder, if not completely impossible, to ascertain by whom and under what conditions those goods were produced? 


The good news is that there is a rising consciousness in the Western world about Fair Trade principles and practices, and that this generally bodes well for the future of artisans in developing countries if we can just figure out how to get good information out there to prospective buyers. 


As the director of a small organization that tries its best to follow fair trade principles, I'm just as confused as anybody else, and with better reason than most, since I've experienced first-hand how difficult it is to carry out the ideals of the Fair Trade movement in real life. 


Here is the Fair Trade Federation's list of principles upon which their members are supposed to operate (from their website at http://www.fairtradefederation.org): 

• Creating Opportunities for Economically and Socially Marginalized Producers
• Developing Transparent and Accountable Relationships
• Building Capacity
• Promoting Fair Trade
• Paying Promptly and Fairly
• Supporting Safe and Empowering Working Conditions
• Ensuring the Rights of Children
• Cultivating Environmental Stewardship
• Respecting Cultural Identity

This is wonderful. There's not a thing on this list that I don't believe in and approve with all my heart. I want to uphold all of these principles. They represent the ideal I strive towards. The problem is that, when you're actually on the ground in a rural town called Somanya in the West African country of Ghana (or, I suspect, in any other developing country), things just aren't that simple. 

The Soul of Somanya crew in September of 2010 with two guest teachers,
Kathie Power Johnson and Sarah Thomas.

Let me tell you a story.


Soul of Somanya's original idea was to have the beadmakers I taught on my first trip design and produce jewelry, which I would then do my inexperienced best to help them market in the U.S. and elsewhere throughout the world. However, further experience showed us that, with a couple of notable exceptions, these particular beadmakers seemed unable even to fill bead orders within a time-frame that would allow us to satisfy Western retailers expectations. What were the chances that they would deliver orders for jewelry on a workable schedule? Because we're not talking about a three-day or a three-week or even a three-month lag here. Orders, if they ever came back at all (which more often than not they didn't) were taking as long as six months to show up, and even then, they almost never contained the specific bead designs we had actually ordered. 

Now I know all about Africa-time. In fact, unlike many Westerners, I like it, and I fully subscribe to it when I'm there. It's wonderfully relaxing. Typically, within a week of arriving in Somanya, I'm a different person--fully de-stressed and completely happy. So I have no desire to be instrumental in changing what I regard as a healthier and much saner approach to life...at least, not by very much. But six months? How could we possibly succeed in the world market if we couldn't guarantee delivery in less than six months? The answer, of course, was that we couldn't.


I can't pretend to know why the artisans were taking so long to complete and deliver our bead orders. Perhaps some of them had emergency situations arise. Perhaps some were simply reluctant to put in the extra hours required. Perhaps some were too busy filling other people's orders to fill our orders, despite the fact that we were paying market (rather than wholesale) prices, and even advancing them the money for the necessary materials and supplies. But in that case...was business really that

a

good? Relative to others living in this place, where most people survive on less than two dollars a day, did they even really need our help? Strike that. I knew they did. Almost everyone in rural West Africa needs help. But at least these artisans owned businesses that were going concerns. At least they were successful to the point that keeping up with the demand for their goods was apparently a challenge. And anyway, their level of need aside, the bottom line was that if Soul of Somanya couldn't count on a dependable supply of jewelry to sell, we'd go under fast, and then we'd be of no use to anyone here. Having no capital, no experience and no connections, the odds were already stacked against us. So how could we make this work to the greatest advantage for the most people? 


Ultimately, we decided we would have to change the original plan. We would continue to buy beads from the beadmakers' cottage industries, but we would hire a separate staff of artisans to make the jewelry at our own place of business, where we could guarantee a pleasant and healthy work environment, regulate the quality of the goods being made, ensure the timely payment of a living wage, and make sure that what was being produced was what we most needed right then based on which products were selling well at any given time. We could evolve towards being a co-op once our staff was ready to establish their own cottage industries as jewelry artisans. And meanwhile, we could dedicate ourselves to serving a group that very clearly needed our help desperately--namely Krobo youth who, given the scarcity of jobs in Ghana's rural areas, are at high risk for migrating to the larger cities looking for employment that turns out to be non-existent. With heartbreaking regularity, they end up living on the streets as prostitutes, beggars or thieves. But we would be in a position to prevent this from happening, at least in a handful of cases. And at the same time we could feel secure in the knowledge that we were operating firmly within Fair Trade guidelines.

This decision to hire a separate jewelry-making staff was not a popular one with the beadmakers I had taught, and I was not without mixed feelings on the subject myself. Perhaps if I'd had the resources to stay in Ghana for many months and work closely with these artisans over an extended period of time, I'd have been able to close the gap between when our orders were being placed and when they were being delivered. But I didn't have those kinds of resources. And given their inability right then to meet us at least part of the way towards being able to do business effectively in the West, I just wasn't seeing a better alternative. Moreover, in an unexpected twist, the appropriateness of our decision was confirmed near the beginning of my second visit to Ghana when one a spokesman for the group argued very eloquently that they had planned on having their children make the jewelry while they continued to make the beads. Children who, as I happened to know, were minors.

Not on my watch. The legal working age in Ghana is eighteen, and some of these children were more like eight. I know that living in rural Ghana is, in many ways, much like living on the North American frontier back in the day, and that many parents view their children's labors in the family business as being absolutely necessary to the family's survival. They may be right--who am I to judge? We're talking about subsistence-level economics here, where the most basic form of survival is a daily challenge for many, if not most, local families. And it's not as if they were planning on sending their children off to work in sweatshops. But I couldn't allow any of that to matter to me. There was no way I was going to sabotage our ability to help here by breaking the laws of the land; nor was I willing to justify the ends of our efforts by means of selling goods that were being produced using child labor, however customary the practice might be for some people in Somanya. For me, the beadmakers' announcement of their intentions to use their children in this way settled the matter of who would be making the jewelry for once and for all.


As for placing orders for particular bead designs, we quickly resigned ourselves to the fact that this was not going to be a productive way to try to do business in Somanya. It appeared to me that the beadmakers were happier creating whatever designs were inspiring them at any given moment. As an artist, I could understand that, and I was in favor of coming up with a system that would accommodate this kind of creative flexibility. So we decided to just buy from them at market (rather than wholesale) prices whatever beads they had available whenever we needed beads and had money to spend. 

But therein lay another difficulty: we very rarely had any money to spend. We were still in our start-up stage, and we were struggling just to make payroll every week. There were whole three-month periods when we couldn't afford to buy a single bead, making do instead by designing our jewelry around whatever we still happened to have in stock. Moreover, whenever we did finally manage to come up with enough money to make purchases, we were typically desperate for the beads; we needed them right now. But the various beadmakers didn't necessarily have beads on hand to sell to us right now. No one's fault--that's just how their system of production and distribution works. And even if they did have beads on hand to sell to us, it was usually just one or two bead designs, and we almost never needed a large quantity of one or two things. The difficulty in predicting whether any particular bead design would be available when we needed it had already prompted us to shift to a one-of-a-kind or a-few-of-a-kind approach to jewelry production. So while it was apparently more cost-effective for the beadmakers to make large batches of one kind of bead, what we needed was a wide variety of beads, but not very much of any one thing. We found ourselves at cross-purposes.

In many ways, nothing much has changed since that first, start-up year. With regard to our jewelry artisans, we qualify as fair trade right down the line. We have created opportunities for these economically marginalized producers; our relationship with them is transparent and accountable; we are working towards building capacity; we are promoting fair trade; we pay promptly and fairly; we offer safe and empowering working conditions (including allowing the artisans' children to accompany them to work when they have no other safe and healthy option); we make sure all of our artisans are of legal working age; we use and create eco-friendly products; and we try very hard to respect the cultural identity of our artisans while allowing them creative space for the innovations that they, like most artists, crave. In addition, they have a say in how the business is run. (For example, they voted early on for a 5-1/2 hour work day, so that's what they work.) 


Just as an aside, the business model we've ended up following leans a bit more towards the paternalistic than what we originally intended, but this, too, has been our young artisans' choice. None of them so far has been interested in starting his or her own cottage industry--they are simply not at that stage of their lives yet. Many are still trying to save money to go to high school. And since our philosophy dictates that we show respect for what they want rather than imposing upon them a business model that is more politically correct but that forces them to take more responsibility than they are ready or willing to take on at this stage of their young lives, we've acceded to their wishes in this. 


Anyway, with that single caveat, I am very comfortable stating that Soul of Somanya, Inc. is run strictly on Fair Trade principles...right up to the point where we are in need of beads. And then things get a little blurry. Because, more often than not, we are forced to go to market to buy beads from the local bead sellers rather than from the artisans themselves. And those artisans, who would be receiving the full market value of their products if they could be depended on to fill our orders in a timely fashion (and if they were able to navigate around our admittedly irregular timing in placing those orders,) are instead having to share the profits with their bead sellers.


There is no exploitation here. Kroboland's bead sellers are NOT the greedy, blood-sucking middleman stereotypes that Westerners have been taught to envision. On the contrary, they provide legitimate, much-needed services to the beadmakers of the area. They provide, for example, transport for large quantities of these very heavy goods. That's huge. Very few people in Somanya can afford a car or truck. They also provide the tables for displaying the beads, and the canopies that protect both the products and the customers from the elements. They take other financial risks as well, such as buying large quantities of beads that may or may not ever sell. They are an important part of the Krobo bead industry, and they should be receiving an income for the services they provide. Moreover, the local bead artisans typically have long-standing and very friendly relationships with their bead sellers. 


But buying some of our beads through these middle(wo)men places us in a distinctly gray area with regard to Fair Trade principles, and this makes me itchy. Much as I like and respect the bead sellers we've dealt with, I'd rather see all of the money we spend on beads going directly into the pockets of the people actually producing them. That is one of the paramount principles of Fair Trade, and I'd like to be able to uphold it with regard to the beadmakers as well as with regard to our own staff of jewelry artisans. But our real-world needs--the needs of the youth we have pledged to serve--don't mesh with what the beadmakers can supply. So what are we supposed to do? Import beads from somewhere else? I don't think so.

In a perfect world, Soul of Somanya would have already developed a wide enough market for the Krobo beads that we could buy whole batches in one design directly from the beadmakers' huts. In a perfect world we would have unlimited capital so that we could buy the beads when the artisans have them rather than when we need them. In a perfect world, we could provide a consistent, predictable demand for their beads so that these artisans could gradually adjust their production schedules and output to fit that demand. In a perfect world, the artisans of developing countries would be trading on an even playing field, and they wouldn't need our kind of help at all.


But this isn't a perfect world. This is the real world. And in the real world, these artisans need all the help they can get if their products are to become more visible and accessible to the people who can afford to buy them. And I can tell you this with perfect certainty: Soul of Somanya is helping with that. At last count, we had shipped Krobo beads to 40 different countries, including such unlikely places as Iran, Iceland, Estonia and (most recently) Latvia. In every case, these were first-time-Krobo-bead-buyers who had found out about the beads through our efforts. We are helping to grow the market for these beads.


And here's something else I can tell you: No one--and I mean no one--benefits from little organizations like ours giving up simply because, for all their striving to do so, they can't manage to adhere 100% to the letter of larger and better-funded organizations' definitions of Fair Trade. 


So. Is every bead we use or sell Fair Trade by most definitions? Nope. Does that mean that people are being exploited by us so that we can create and sell these products? Absolutely not. And does any of this mean that you shouldn't buy what we sell? That's up to you. But I can promise you this: Somanya's economy in general, and the bead industry in particular, is the better for having us there. We're trying. On a vast sub-continent where fighting poverty is like bailing out the ocean with a teaspoon, we're dipping our spoon in and out as fast as we can, and so are a lot of other little organizations like ours. We're all doing what we can with the resources that are available to us. 


I wish it were more. I wish this were a more perfect world. Since I began working on this project four years ago, I've become aware of how many people are out there trying to make things better. I suspect that they've all struggled, as Soul of Somanya has struggled, to do it "right;" to do it in accordance with principles that represent an ideal of fair trade that is absolutely worth aspiring to. And I'd be willing to bet that they, too, have become mired at times in the complexities that comprise the real world. 


I can only hope, with all my heart, that the near-impossibility of being perfect doesn't make them stop trying to be--and to do--good.


(For a more thorough--and excellent--explanation of the FTF's principles, visit their website at: http://www.fairtradefederation.org/)


FYI, the bead in the picture at the top of this post was part of a direct transaction between Soul of Somanya and the artisan who made it. We placed an order for a quantity of his beads, advanced him the money to buy the necessary materials, and paid him the full retail value of the beads when he  delivered them. If only it were always so simple!  

A Krobo Leopard?

I just had to post this necklace. Made by Rosemary Holland, formerly of South Africa, now living in New South Wales, it is being "worn" by another work of art. The leopard was created by Chris Holland. (The beads were purchased from Soul of Somanya.)

Fashion-Conscious: This Leopard Knows
How to Look Good!

Rosemary's Blog

Two New Banahenes

(Note: Since I don't have still shots of every stage of my own and Megan's naming ceremonies, I'm going to blend pictures from ours with those from later ones, when friends and guest teachers who have joined me in Somanya received their African names. Hence the variations in people's clothing.)

As instructed by Manye Mamiyu, we showed up at her house the following Sunday at dawn. Well, not quite at dawn. We were actually running behind by maybe half-an-hour, but I didn't foresee a problem. I had already been learning that, by West African standards, being only a half-an-hour late is like being an hour early here in the U.S..

Manye Mamiyo Banahene and Her Spokesman
Adamnor Banahene Samuel

However, Manye Mamiyo was a little irritated about it. She immediately asked why we had inconvenienced her by being late.

"I'm so sorry," I told her. "But we very much wanted to be wearing African clothing when we received our African names, and the seamstress didn't finish until just now." This was true. Megan had gone to the seamstress at daybreak to pick up our new outfits, which had still been receiving their finishing touches as she waited.

Manye gave a dignified nod, seeming satisfied with this explanation. "Thank you for that," she said graciously. I nodded in return.

We handed over the two bottles of gin and the seven Ghana Cedis she had told us to bring. One of the bottles was immediately passed to a woman seated nearby. She rose and carried it into the house through one of the doors opening off of the front porch. We never saw it again. The other bottle, however, ended up playing a prominent role in the ceremony that was now beginning.

Manye Mamiyo Saying Prayers

Manye arose and, taking the second bottle of gin and a small glass over to the stairs we had climbed to reach the porch, she began speaking as she poured libations to the Banahene ancestors. I was later told that her words were prayers, though whether to the ancestors or simply about them I don't actually know. Originally, the Krobo people were ancestor "worshippers." (I put the word in quotes because there is some controversy about whether the term accurately describes these traditional beliefs and practices.) After colonization by the British, however, the vast majority converted to Christianity under the influence of missionaries from various countries. Today, some 80%-85% of the people living in Ghana's Eastern Region are Christians of one denomination or another. (For more statistical information about the people of the Eastern Region, click here.) However, many traditional rituals, beliefs and customs coexist with the newer practices, with no noticeable sense of conflict or inconsistency. Here is my understanding of the situation, but please remember that these are only impressions, interpretations and memories of what I observed and was told while in Ghana, combined with things that I have since read. I think that, for many modern-day Ghanaians, ancestors, while not worshiped as gods, are nevertheless still formally honored on a variety of occasions, and that the pouring of libations is a spiritual act that demonstrates reverence for these relatives who now exist in the spiritual world. (Here is a fascinating site for those interested in learning more about the traditional spiritual beliefs and practices of the Krobo people).

Manye Mamiyo Pouring a Libation
to the Banahene Ancestors at Guest Teacher
Helen Sigler's Naming Ceremony

When Manye had finished her prayers, she came back and sat down on her ceremonial stool. She proceeded to pour gin into the little glass and took a swallow, afterwards pouring the few remaining drops on the floor of the porch. Her spokesman then took the bottle and poured again, repeating her actions, and then again, this time handing the glass to each of us in turn so that we, too, could demonstrate our reverence for the ancestors of the family we were joining. It quickly became apparent that some of the people present didn't want to actually drink the gin. In those cases, they simply brought the glass to their lips and then poured a few drops out on the concrete floor.

Mel Receiving her African Name
(and being Queened)

Once the glass had made its way around the porch, a shorter stool was placed in front of Manye and I was directed to take a seat on it. She brought out a simple little bracelet that consisted merely of a piece of cotton string and a few very plain beads. She tied this around my right wrist. (I would later learn that this bracelet would signal to the world the fact that I was now a Queen Mother. However, it had a special value, and I would be expected to return it to Manye Mamiyo within a week or so. Of course, at this point I didn't even know I was being made a Queen Mother, so the significance of this bracelet completely escaped me for the time being.)

Manye then began tying on another bracelet, this one a strand of chunkier, off-white beads with a faint wave of turquoise and gold mixed in. She was careful to fit this bracelet to my wrist exactly so, the idea apparently being that it should be hard enough to get on over my hand that it couldn't fly off if I waved my arm. Once she was satisfied with the fit, she sawed off the tails from both bracelets with a little paring knife.

Kathie Power Johnson, Guest Teacher,
Going Under the Knife

(Just as an aside, at this point in a similar ceremony some two-and-a-half years later, when my friends and guest teachers Kathie Power Johnson and Sarah Thomas were receiving their African names, Manye said something to one of the women watching the ritual, who then disappeared into the back room, only to emerge a moment later with a huge butcher knife. Manye took it in her hand and began bringing the blade towards Kathie's wrist to cut the tails from her bracelet. I'll never forget the look on Kathie's  face when that huge blade started coming towards her. I'm sure she was wondering why the *%$&#@*%& I hadn't warned her that this ceremony called for ritual cutting! Even Sarah, who received her name after Kathie, couldn't quite suppress a little wince when the knife came back out. But their expressions got a smile from Manye and a chuckle from pretty much everyone on the porch.)

Sarah Thomas, Guest Teacher,
Receiving her African Name

But back to the story: As Manye was tying on my bracelets, she was also talking, though for some reason no one was translating for me, so I had no idea what she was saying until later. Here's what Bernard eventually told me she had said: "I am now your mother and you are now my daughter. You now have two homes and two families, one here and one in America. You will always be welcome here. You will always have a place to stay here. You will always be safe when you're here, because I will protect you. And you will never have to stay in a hotel."

When she had finished, her spokesman found a pen and a piece of paper, and he wrote out my name for me to keep, which was a good thing because I no longer own a memory, and the name is a long one. As it was, it took me the better part of a week to memorize it. Here's what it said: "Manye Dede Adanki Banahene III."

Bernard had been videoing the whole ceremony, but he stopped for a minute when I looked at him in some confusion. "It says 'Manye'," I told him. I already knew that this word meant "Queen Mother."

He shrugged and smiled. "She made you a queen," he told me.

To say that I was surprised would be a gross understatement. I was absolutely astonished. Me? An African Queen? In this lifetime?

Impossible.

But I had already been waved back onto the bench to watch while the whole process was repeated for my niece Megan. Five minutes later, she was Manye Dede Tsaako Banahene II, "Queen to the Youth." (She was 22 at the time.)

The Building Where the Ancestral Spirits Reside

Following more libations and prayers, we were walked to a new location, where the ancestral spirits reside in a small building marked with the Banahene name. Its doorstep was filled with dirt and gin bottles that had been overturned, presumably after having been emptied during the pouring of libations.

The Placing of Relics that are Part of the Ceremony

Manye's spokesman proceeded to do a sort of rhythmic, ritual tapping on the door of the residence. I seem to remember someone telling me that this was by way of asking the ancestral spirits to accept us as part of the family, but don't quote me on that. Whatever the case, something apparently signaled our acceptance by the ancestors. After more prayers and more libations, the ceremony was finished. As we walked back through the royal neighborhood, a woman came out of her house and pointed at me and then at herself and said, "Adanki. Adanki." She, too, was an Adanki Banahene, she was telling me. I was now a part of her family. And my hostess for that first trip, whose name before she married had also been Banahene, now became my sister. She later presented me with a circlet of beautiful old beads as a sister gift. It, along with the off-white beads my new mother had given me, will always be my most prized possessions.

Three Queens at a Durbar (Festival Ceremony)

But the full import of what all this meant didn't really hit me until the night before I was leaving to come home to the U.S., when I went to say goodbye to my new mother. I was waiting in a hallway with several other women who spoke a little English. We were all laughing at our awkward attempts to communicate with each other when, much to my astonishment, a beautiful young woman of perhaps 25 or 26 came out of a doorway nearby and stopped in front of me, saying, "I am your daughter."

Talk about being flabbergasted! I was quite sure I would have remembered if I'd ever given birth! But she was perfectly serious. Apparently, by becoming a Banahene, I had climbed right up into the middle of their family tree and taken up a recognized position there. I simply couldn't get my mind around it. But after a few seconds of just sitting there gaping at her, I finally shook off my surprise and said, for lack of any other words coming to me, "Well you're my very first daughter." At this there was a little flurry of disagreement among the women who were sitting around me. Thinking that I meant "my first-born daughter," they all hastened to assure me that I had many daughters who were older than this one.

So here I am, almost 60 now (55 then), and I don't even know how many children I have. I feel somewhat ashamed that I have not tried to meet them all and at least learn their names, perhaps even gotten to know them a little. But, aside from always being extremely busy working on Soul of Somanya projects whenever I am in Ghana, I suspect that such introductions would require the giving of many gifts on my part. As it is, the list of people to whom tradition dictates that I should bring gifts each time I come is growing rapidly, to the point that I could easily fill my entire airline weight allowance with nothing else, thereby jeopardizing Soul of Somanya's robustness, since it would mean I could not bring with me much-needed supplies. Moreover, gifts cost money, and Soul of Somanya (and therefore I) simply have none to spare. So I have postponed this pleasure, though with great regret. I have, however, had the pleasure of speaking to another of my new relatives since I returned home, a cousin (brother?) of Manye's spokesman. Having come across my story when researching the Banahene family on the internet, he promptly called me up to let me know that I now have a relative in Texas, where he now lives.

I hope that someday I can meet them all. I hope I can take a more active role in this family I am so honored to have joined. Maybe some day I'll be able to stay in Somanya for more than five or six weeks, and have the luxury of leisurely days that aren't pledged to the completion of training and other Soul of Somanya tasks that simply can't wait for a year or two until I can come up with the money to make another trip. I hope so. I so love being there, and I know that a richer and deeper kind of adventure would be mine if I could spend unhurried hours getting to know this Krobo family that has so graciously, so unequivocally, welcomed me into its bosom--even into its history. For now, I can only dream about it. But one day . . . .

A Most Unlikely African Queen

It was during my first visit to Ghana that I was made an honorary Krobo Queen Mother. Even now, four years later, I have trouble at times believing that such a thing could ever have happened to me. I mean, there I was, a 55-year-old white woman of no particular prominence, who had first stepped foot on the African continent only two weeks prior to my queen-making ceremony. Moreover, while I had come to Somanya hoping to be of some use to the people there, I hadn't really had a chance to actually do anything yet--certainly nothing deserving of such a distinction. The ceremony took place on my second Sunday in Somanya, and I had only taught my first class in jewelry-making on Thursday! So why was I being given this great honor?


It has occurred to me since that part of the reason may have been a strategic one on the part of  Manye Mamiyo Banahene, the Queen Mother who gave me the title. After all, having been made a queen (even just an honorary one), how could I not come back and continue the project after this first visit? As a prime motivator, the honor was a compelling one. Perhaps she knew that the conferring of it would bind me all the more forcefully to my original purpose in coming here. Perhaps she even sensed my hunger for the more exotic aspects of this journey. But far from resenting this form of manipulation (if indeed it was manipulation), I admire her cunning and sagacity in devising such a scheme, not to mention the determination to help her people that the strategy demonstrates. When you have as little to work with as this woman does, you have to be incredibly resourceful to get things done. More power to her (or, as they say in Ghana, "More grease to her elbows!"). I only wish I were as ingenious.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me start by giving a little bit of background on the Krobo Queen Mothers. Ghana is a democracy, but the traditional government of the Krobo region is still a vital force, and holds a great deal of influence with the people of the Krobo tribe. There are, or so I have read, upwards of 370 Queen Mothers in this region. They are an integral part of the traditional government, having successfully lobbied for admission into the decision-making bodies of the Manya Krobo Traditional Council and the Regional House of Chiefs after having had their traditional female base of power eroded by European administrators throughout the period of colonization. 


Krobo Queen Mothers are traditionally responsible for the welfare of the women and children in their communities. They have a very personal approach to their work, and are routinely (and warmly) welcomed into the homes of those under their care. Thus they are able to identify and help to solve various sensitive problems that might otherwise remain invisible to them and to their communities. Among many other accomplishments, this amazing group of women has been in great part responsible for breaking the culture of silence surrounding the HIV and AIDS pandemic in the area; for substantially contributing to the reduction of the HIV and AIDS prevalence rate from a staggering 18% clear down to 6%; for successfully promoting the banning of certain aspects of traditional and cultural practices that degrade and endanger females; and for helping to re-ignite awareness of the need for education for everyone in Ghana--including girls and women.  (For more details about the Queen Mothers of Kroboland, visit the Manya Krobo Queen Mothers Association's blog at http://manyakrobo.blogspot.com/.)


In other words, these women are incredible. Moreover, if I understand correctly (and please feel free to let me know if I am in error here or elsewhere in this post), they do not get paid for their work. In fact, I'm told that they finance their efforts from whatever money they are able to raise and/or from their own incomes, which are sometimes at the same subsistence level as those of the people they are serving. I greatly admire these women. They are committed, determined, wonderfully resourceful, and apparently tireless in their efforts to help their communities. As far as I'm concerned, they are true heroines, and I am very honored to be associated with them, even in a purely honorary capacity.. 

But back to my story: Within the first week of arriving in Somanya, Megan (my niece) and I were taken to visit the Queen Mother of our district, Manye (Queen Mother) Mamiyo Banahene. Now, I had read before coming that one of the first things visitors should do upon arrival in a West African town is to visit the Chief or King in order to to get his blessing on whatever agenda or project was being proposed. But we were told by our three young guide/protector/partners that the person we needed to visit was Manye Mamiyo. So one night, at what seemed to me a very late hour for visiting, we set off in the pitch-black darkness that characterizes nighttime in Somanya everywhere except on its few main streets.

The darkness seemed very thick and close around us. It was almost completely impenetrable to my streetlight-trained and aging eyes, with only the occasional reflection of moonlight on a white t-shirt or a brief gleam of starlight on a dark arm or cheekbone to help me maintain some sense of which way I should be walking. I remember that Bernard, ever gallant and sensitive to my needs, eventually dropped back to guide  me, taking my hand whenever we came to a rough spot on our path as we picked our way through the woods and past dozens of crumbling mud-brick houses and broken-down hovels that I, by this time, knew to be the homes of typical Somanya families. The silence was broken only by the sounds we made walking and the occasional deep croak of a bullfrog or the startling squawk of some family's rooster. I reflected, not for the first time, that a more cynical person would be fearing for her own safety walking through these forest paths and lightless back alleys with only the company and protection of these three young male strangers. But I never once felt that kind of fear--my gut was consistently communicating to me that I was safe with these young men; that my niece and I were both safe. In fact, I was honestly more concerned about turning an ankle and becoming a burden on them or, worse, being rendered unable to do what I had come to this place to do.

Eventually we emerged safely onto a street that was marginally brighter, and fairly crowded with buildings on either side, though the street itself was deeply rutted and still treacherous to anyone less nimble-footed than a goat. And then we were approaching a two-story building that, while larger than the typical home in Somanya, was certainly no less dilapidated. Our guides spoke briefly with a woman who was standing on the porch that ran the full width of the house. She then disappeared inside, emerging a few minutes later to motion us up onto the porch and towards a long wooden bench, where we sat and waited  for the entrance of Manye Mamiyo.

A few people came out of the house and gathered around, taking seats nearby. After awhile, a man in traditional dress (which, for males, consists of a length of colorful wax-print fabric wound around the body and up over one shoulder) approached from the street. After ducking into one of the darkened doorways of the house, he returned to set a carved wooden stool against the wall in (as it turned out) anticipation of Manye's entrance. (I was later told that only people of great distinction in Ghana have ceremonial stools, and that the degree of carvings and other ornamentation on those stools are indicative of their rank and influence.)  He then sat down before us on a stool made of plain wood. He introduced himself in English as Adamnor Banahene Samuel, Manye's spokesman and translator. I later learned that he is a well-educated man who had, for many years, been a teacher.

Let me state here that one of the most frustrating things for me when I'm in Ghana, and the thing that most holds me back as I try to learn to negotiate my way through the culture, is that, when people translate, they tend to mention only the parts that they deem it important for me to know. Unfortunately, what they think is important and what I think is important are two vastly different things. But no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to convince anyone (even Bernard) that I want to hear it all--every single word! Instead, a typical scenario has someone talking for three or four minutes without a pause, after which my translator-of-the-day will offer a one- or two-sentence explanation of what has been said. Grrrr!

But Manye's spokesman is the exception to this rule. He always seems to translate line by line. Unfortunately, in his case, while his English is very fluent in terms of both vocabulary and grammar, it is still fairly heavily accented. Add to that that my hearing is very poor and you have a recipe for confusion (mine, not his). Despite his best efforts, I usually feel that I'm missing more than half of what's going on. So, while I am going to try my best to convey the gist of what was said during that first meeting. my renderings of his translations may sometimes be a bit off.


Manye eventually came out of the house and took her seat on her stool. I suspect that we had awakened her, for she was garbed much as her spokesman was, in a length of brightly-patterned fabric that had merely been wrapped from behind up under her armpits and around and over her breasts, where she had tucked an end in to keep the cloth in place. Her shoulders had been whitened with some kind of powder or ointment, which I later learned is a kind of remedy for prickly heat. She wore a turban of a different print on her head. It served to accent her amazing face, which was basically unlined, making it hard to tell her age, and which had a crease on one side that looked as if a bullet had once grazed her cheek. I wondered if this might be a scar from some ritual cutting that had been made at sometime in her past. Whatever the case. it merely served to add character to an already-interesting and (I think) very beautiful face.

She did not smile, but regarded us very solemnly for a moment or two before speaking. Then she asked us what our business was in Somanya.

Everyone turned to me. I realized suddenly that, as the elder of the group, I was expected to do the honors. I hadn't anticipated having to make any speeches, and I hesitated for a minute, wishing one of the young men would take on the task. But they just waited, looking at me expectantly. I was to find that semi-formal speech-making is expected in Ghana in pretty much all such circumstances, and I have gradually become more or less used to jumping right in and addressing whatever assemblage I'm facing. But that night, I was a bit intimidated at having to speak so off the cuff. Finally, drawing a deep breath, I explained as simply as possible what our plan for the project was at that point in our thinking. She listened as my words were translated for her, and then nodded. Then she spoke at great length, though I caught very little of her speech from its translation. Finally she stopped and just sat, looking at us.


I thought this might be a good time to present her with the gift I had brought for her--a necklace I had made of crystals and freshwater pearls--so I  asked Bernard if the time was right. He bid me wait by placing a hand on my arm, and then asked her if it was okay for me to approach her. She nodded again, and I brought out the necklace and walked it across to where she was sitting. She examined it closely, and then nodded yet again. Still no smile, so I wasn't sure whether she was pleased with the gift or not.


She spoke then again at some length. I was later told that she had commanded us to come back on Sunday at dawn to receive our African names. We were to bring two bottles of gin--one of high quality, the other ordinary--and seven Ghana cedis (Ghanaian dollars). We were then told that we could depart.


We shook hands all the way around and then started making our way home. I was dying to know what had happened; whether Manye had approved of our project, and whether she had liked her gift, so I asked Bernard how he thought the visit had gone.


In his usual verbose way, Bernard said, "Fine."


Ooookaaaay.


I tried again. "Do you think she liked her gift?" I asked him.


"Yes."


I probed a bit further. "A lot or a little? I mean, did she love it? Or was she just somewhat pleased?"


"She liked it."


Right. I tried a different topic. "Do you think she approved of the project?"


"Yes," he told me.


"Okay, what did she say about it?"


"She said it was good."


"Oh, come on, Bernard," I said in frustration. "She talked for several minutes! She must have said more than that!" 

He smiled slightly, but only said, "She said it was good that you come here from America to bring prosperity to the community."


I gave it up, lapsing into silence. Clearly details were not going to be on tonight's menu.


I would later learn that Bernard could be very talkative when he was in the mood, and I would learn to read his moods a little better and, when I could bring myself to do so, wait until he was ready to speak for the details I so craved. But for tonight, it was enough to know that we had the royal stamp of approval. We could go forward with the project, secure in the knowledge (mistakenly, as it turned out) that we had followed the correct protocol.

I was, even then, before I got to know and love this amazing woman, very happy to have received her blessing on our efforts. I did not know at the time that she was very soon to become my mother, and I her daughter. But that is a story for my next post.


To be continued....   

Whose Taboos to Choose?

One of the most difficult things for Westerners to get used to when visiting Ghana for the first time is being asked for things--and asked often. Not so much by beggars on the streets--in fact, that has happened to me only rarely, at least in the rural areas--but by people you have just been introduced to, by casual acquaintances, and even by people you are getting to know fairly well. This is an uncomfortable experience for most Americans at first, even when we've been told to expect it. Why? Probably because of our own strong cultural taboo against "begging" or "pan-handling," which survives despite our changing consciousness about homelessness and other phenomena that make the practice necessary for so many as a matter of survival, even here in the U.S.

I have certainly experienced some notable exceptions to this disconcerting custom of asking. Bernard, for example, rarely asks me for anything unrelated to making Soul of Somanya a going concern, and my host parents on my first trip to Ghana wouldn't even take money for my share of the groceries when I offered. There have been others as well. But in general, there seems to be no taboo against just asking for what you want from anyone you think might be able to supply it.

I suspect that this custom is even more compelling when it comes to Americans, since the average Ghanaian apparently holds a deep-seated, completely unshakable belief that all Americans are endlessly rich. Nothing I've ever said has ever changed this perception of me in Somanya, as far as I can tell. They simply don't believe me when I say I am not rich.                                                                                             

But then, why should they? While I technically live below the poverty line by U.S. standards, I have nevertheless been able to access enough money (whether my own or someone else's) to fly across the Atlantic--not once but three times so far--to visit Ghana. That fact all by itself speaks volumes about the differences in my situation and that of most West Africans. Such journeys are almost as unavailable to the average Somanya citizen as a trip to the moon would be for me.

And that's not all. Each time I have come, I have brought with me visible evidence of my prosperity, including (but not limited to) a bounty of jewelry-making supplies and hand tools, two laptops, two printers, two cameras, one glass grinder, two rotary tumblers, at least one power drill, a number of cell phones, and a variety of clothing and other gifts. Never mind that all of these things were either donated or financed by donations. I was able to get them.

I have also sent money for four years' worth of rent so far on a house (our place of business in Somanya) that is, by local standards, both larger and much nicer than most. And if this isn't enough to demonstrate my boundless wealth, last year I sent the money to buy that most coveted of all treasures--a car. Again, this was all done by way of donations and/or income from the sale of Soul of Somanya products. All I was able to offer was time and energy. But that's irrelevant. I was able to send the money.

So why would anyone there believe that I'm not rich?

[Just as an aside: I find it ironic that I have the opposite problem here in the U.S., where many friends and SoS supporters have had trouble believing that I don't feel deprived because I don't own my own home (I've honestly never wanted the responsibility), and because I drive a leaky (but dependable) '97 Saturn, and have no television (free at last!), no microwave (what's the big rush about heating up water for tea?), no bed (I sleep, by preference, on my ancient but comfortable couch), and nothing a rational person would ever dream of calling "decor." Instead, I live in a modest one-bedroom apartment that I share with the perfect roommate (my dog Hannah) and a happy (if usually somewhat disorganized) clutter of Soul of Somanya inventory, shipping supplies and paperwork. The fact that this lifestyle suits me right down to the ground is irrelevant to many who know me. From the average American perspective, I am, if not poor, at least very far indeed from being rich, and this despite the fact that I have air-conditioning, an endless supply of electricity and running water (both cold and hot), dependable phone and internet service, plenty of books to read and food to eat and, last but not least, that miracle of modern plumbing, a flush toilet--all things that are rare-to-non-existent in most Ghanaian homes. Obviously wealth and poverty are relative concepts.]

But back to my Ghanaian experience of being asked for everything from tuition money to pretty underwear. Consider this: I spend a fair amount of my time here in the U.S. asking people for money and goods to take or send to West Africa in order to help the people of Somanya to a greater share of the prosperity we enjoy here. So why am I uncomfortable when those very same people ask me for those very same things to benefit the very same people for whom I am soliciting aid? It occurs to me that this practice might even be understood by us as their version of fundraising for people in need--namely themselves.

Be that as it may, my discomfort with their custom of asking so freely has its roots, of course, in the American work ethic, to which I subscribe, and which forms the very foundation of SoS. Soul of Somanya is about giving work, not stuff. The theory is that if one has dependable, living wage employment, one can buy one's own stuff.

But who am I, after all, to say it's wrong to want a few things to come more easily than that? It's not as if the people of Somanya don't work hard. They do. They have to in order to survive. Is it their fault that the paid work (if any) that is available to most of them doesn't produce enough income for even those things that we, as Americans, take for granted as being absolutely fundamental to our very existence, not to mention our happiness?

So the people of Somanya ask, hoping they will receive a little something extra to enhance their bare-bones lifestyle. But SoS can only offer them work, pleasant work, satisfying work, at a living wage and in a safe and healthy environment. And even this we can offer only to a few.

It somehow doesn't seem like enough, at least not to us. But ask one of our artisans, who now has money for nutritious food and vaccinations and proper schooling for her children, and I suspect you'll get a very different answer..

And anyway, I learned early on to keep my eye on the small picture when in Ghana, because if you look too often at the big one, you are quickly overwhelmed, and then you're no good to anyone. SoS can't eradicate poverty in Ghana. We can't even eradicate it in Somanya.

But we might, if we are fortunate enough to find an abundance of generous hands and hearts over here, be able to open up a few options for a handful of people over there, whether it be for more schooling, better medical care, improved nutrition for a few children, or just a little easing of the scarcity in a few lives.



No, it's not enough. But you do what you can...and then work to get better at it so you can do a little more, and then a little bit more, tomorrow...and the next day...and the next.