My Final Thoughts

If there is one thing I have learned in my 19 years of life it is that a) Never underestimate a good cup of coffee and b) You have to learn to be comfortable with feeling uncomfortable. Apologies, I guess I just gave you two pieces of unsolicited advice instead of one, but let’s be honest, they are both equally important.

Normally I despise the people who claim to be “changed” after studying abroad. My gag reflex triggers when I hear someone say they finally understand what racism means or how they have finally come to terms with being a privileged, middle-class white man from the United States. I do not want to disvalue these opinions, I could probably even say that it is a good thing so many come to this realization after studying abroad, but I do not think a month in a country such as Ghana makes someone understand the world’s problems.

What I think a study abroad program in Ghana does teach is a broader understanding of things such as poverty, education, feminism, racism, etc. A student learns these things not through sitting in a lecture hall and being taught, but through experience. Especially through the experience with discomfort after the initial—what I’m going to begrudging call—“realization.”

My series of realizations began before I even arrived in Ghana. I was standing in line, boarding pass in hand, ready to board the British Airways flight from Heathrow to Accra. I looked around me, and realized that our group was the only group of (mostly) white people boarding the plane. Of course I knew I was traveling to a country in which I would be the minority for the first time in my life, but it took an experience for my thought to turn into reality.

As we flew into Accra that first day, I marveled at the lush jungles that span almost every inch of ground with its plethora of shades of green. I had not known what to expect Ghana to look like, but I think I was mostly prepared to see a desert covered in red soil and dirt with brightly colored houses unevenly placed throughout it.

My discomfort only grew as we walked through Accra’s airport. Although I had prepared myself to take cold bucket showers and bring my own toilet paper with me everywhere (which by the way, is completely unnecessary), I had failed to prepare myself for the loudness and forwardness of Ghanians. Four weeks later, I now know to keep my head down and avoid eye contact as I walk through art markets (that is, unless I want to haggle for the next twenty minutes.)

During my month in Ghana I learned more about poverty, policy, and education than I have in any other class. I am not going to say my trip to Ghana changed me, but I will admit that it impacted me. With everyone interaction and every meal, I fell more and more in love with the country. The students in university inspired me with their talk of bettering their country and making their parents proud. The children in the orphanages empowered me as I learned what they dreamt to do with their lives.

My professor told us once that her three favorites words are impact, purpose and empower. I think those three words are also the best that encompass my experience with Ghana. As much as Professor Dr. Johnson taught us about student development and education policy, I was touched by her love of those three powerful words.

Dr. Johnson facilitated conversations that were meant to make us feel discomfort. Our dialogue group was a diverse set of students from a multitude of backgrounds and a variety of majors. I was able to have a conversation about race with a first-generation college student studying behavioral neuroscience. I know our conversation would have been entirely less impactful if we had been forced to do it in a classroom setting on campus. I remember tiptoeing around topics such as money and family, because I am aware of my privilege and often avoid conversations that confront it. But this dialogue was the perfect time to do so.

Oddly enough, my discomforts often appeared not because of my environment in Ghana, but because of different social interactions. I wasn’t bothered when the water pressure disappeared in our showers every once in a while and I had to resort to a bucket shower. Nor was I disgusted when one in six public bathrooms was without toilet paper. But I was nervous when we sat down and interviewed university students or sat in on high school classes.

I couldn’t exactly pinpoint why I felt this social anxiety that hasn’t hit me before. I can now say that it was a number of things. I was acclimating to a new country, I was worried about what people might think of me (especially because I already so obviously stand out), and it’s simply a new experience that comes hand-in-hand with uncomfortable situations.

But if I hadn’t sat down and asked my University of Ghana student, Emmanuel, about his family life, I would have never learned about his experience living in a rural village in Ghana. If I hadn’t approached a child at the Kumasi Children’s Home, I would have never played football (ahem, soccer) with a dozen children who are all intensely stronger than me. In the past four weeks I’ve consumed an amount of jollof rice equivalent to my body weight, danced into the late hours of the night with new friends, met the most inspiring children to ever be seen, and learned more than ever imaginable.

No, I am not a “changed” person after traveling to Ghana, but I am a more compassionate and understanding human. Not only that, but I plan to take home the trait of Ghanian niceties that made me feel so whole and welcome while I was there. Students often liked to ask me what my favorite thing about Ghana was, I never knew how to reply, but if I could now I would say that if a country’s wealth was measured in terms of beautiful people, Ghana would be the richest country in the world.