A Different Mindset

One particular relationship stands out to me during my time in Ghana. In my consulting project, I worked with Esther, one of the first Ghanaian

women who joined the organization. During these five weeks, I had the privilege to hear her story and walk a little bit of life in her shoes.

Esther’s story opened my eyes to a very different perspective on life…

The youngest child of nine children, Esther’s oldest sister raised her after her mother died shortly after childbirth. Esther went to school until she was 15 and then quit school so that she could attend a vocational school to learn a trade and begin earning money. Her uncle help fund her schooling, and Esther started sewing out of her sister’s apartment when finished.

She struggled for several years to save enough money to buy her own hand-powered sewing machine; a significant investment of 100 cedis (approx. $65). Slowly but surely, her business grew to the size it is today. Esther’s business is now flourishing, and she has six employees

and one apprentice working consistently.

By Western standards, we’d say that her store is an initial success. We’d start looking into additional production options, untapped market opportunities, and other money-generating expansion plans. We’d also start saving the profits for business capital and personal profits. Maybe save up for a car, new house, etc. Sound normal? This isn’t a bad approach, per se, but it is a typical Western mindset; our goals tend to focus on an individual accumulation of personal wealth.

Not Esther.

Even having a tough childhood, struggling through obstacles in her past, the thought hasn’t even occurred to her to spend the money she earns on enhancing the comforts of her own life. Instead, what is her passion?

Giving back. The minute she reached financial stability approximately two years ago, she founded her own NGO, a non-profit organization targeted at improving the lives of villagers by teaching basic handicraft skills. She pours all her time and finances into this organization, making countless trips to local villages, meeting with local businessmen, and establishing an initial training program. Mind you, this is a woman who never finished high school.

Her vision for the NGO is incredibly inspiring. She envisions this organization as a stable, international business that is financially viable, creating market

demand for products from multiple (10+) low-income villages throughout Ghana, positively and permanently impacting the lives of the women and—by result—their families and villages, while also sourcing national and international volunteers to build up the organization and business knowledge. (This vision was fleshed out and established following a brainstorming session that I conducted with her; see picture for result.)

Esther’s story and passion holds true for many of the women I have met here. I am in awe at these women; they are unswervingly passionate about reaching out and supporting other women to help them succeed as they have—but their definition of success is so different from America!

That is, once these women's businesses are generating enough profit to pay for food, water, and housing (i.e., basic life necessities), they start using the additional funds to help those much less fortunate. There's no aspiration to become rich, move into a bigger house, own multiple cars (or even one), or anything else similar to the "American dream" of material possession. Instead, they start an NGO to improve impoverished villages. Incredible.

This mindset has the potential to have an incredible impact on Ghana. Why are we in the Western world missing out on this impact? The people here prioritize relationships and “being” first; I’ve found that the Western world typically prioritizes stuff, money and “doing” instead. The Ghanaian priorities mean that life moves slower here, but is that necessarily bad?

During this project, I’ve been challenged to ask myself, “How would my life and the lives of those around me be different if I sought to put people first? How would my life change? And how would the world be different?” It’s a question worth pondering.

Globalization Juxtapositions

From eating in a Pizza Hut at the Pyramids at Giza, Egypt to listening to the Spice Girls play at the Great Wall of China, the trend of globalization is creating a broad palette of cultural juxtapositions. Here are a few of my favorite from Ghana...

Memory 1:

On our trip last weekend to the Nzulezo stilt village, we had to take an hour-long canoe ride to reach the village. After an incredible experience walking on what felt a bit like a Venice of Ghana, so to speak, we begun the canoe journey back. We were crossing a wide lake with dark green, tree-covered hills surrounding us with stormy clouds hanging overhead when…


...a cell phone rings. It’s not mine or any of my American companions; instead, it’s our canoe guide’s! We proceeded into the dense marshes while listening to him chat away on his phone in Fanti (the local language).

Memory 2:


While visiting the stilt village (a tiny community of 400 people living in huts entirely built over the lake), we met with the village chief. We were sitting in a circle around the chief, listening to his recitation on the history of the Nzulezo people, when…


...a nearby radio starts blasting the local Ghanaian favorite pop song, “Big Booty Girl”.

Memory 3:

Leaving the office one day last week, I was walking with my boss down the tiny streets of Cape Coast. Lined with sewage gutters and old squat buildings and huts, we passed some children playing in the dirt on the side of the road. Our hearts completely melted when…


...we saw this adorable little Ghanaian girl carrying a Barney doll, wrapped in the Ghanaian “baby swing” on her back.

A Mini Case-Study: Challenges of the Tourism Industry in Ghana

We took this weekend to explore the West Coast of Ghana. Covering 100+ km to Axim, we visited the famous village on stilts, Nzelo, before heading towards Axim, location of the most renowned beaches in Ghana.

The sweeping beaches were just as said: spreading towards the horizon, the mist from the pounding waves covered the lingering palm trees. The “resort” we stayed at was by far the most advanced/polished service experience that I’ve had in Ghana.

A quick description of the property:

• 35 rooms—chalets, dorm, and rooms
• Can accommodate up to 76 people
• 25-30% average occupancy throughout the year
• Two restaurants with bars, a business center
• They even had a swing set!
• Market: expats and volunteers, some international visitors, very little Ghanaian business

During our breakfast the next morning, the resort’s owner/manager came to welcome us, and I took the opportunity to investigate his perspective on the tourism industry in Ghana. As a local Ghanaian and a hotelier since 1990, Jonas had much to share on the topic.

He identified several key challenges unique to Ghana:

• Cost of flying/travelling to Ghana—Once Ghana Air (the national airlines) declared bankruptcy years ago, there is no low-cost option of traveling to Ghana. Even for Europeans, who are directly north of Ghana, it is cheaper to fly to Thailand (300 pounds) than to Ghana (700 pounds). This high cost is a primary factor in many lost tourism revenue opportunities; who can afford to spend their entire holiday budget on the flight?

• Lack of national transportation infrastructure—it’s nearly impossible to get to many of the primary tourism destinations even once you are in Ghana, because of poor roads, limited access, and unreliable transportation. For example: Mole National Park is the biggest tourism destination aside from the slave castles in Ghana. The only way to reach this park is through an 75km, completely treacherous road.

• Under-developed marketing for Ghana as a tourism destination—While several African countries are aggressively targeting international marketing opportunities (i.e., Kenya and South Africa), Ghana’s tourism board has done little to nothing to increase Ghana’s mindspace. This cripples the hotel owners, since who will come to Ghana if no one knows about it?

I was struck by the underlying source of many of these problems: the government. Even if the government didn’t “cause” the problem (take, for example, the lack of knowledge internationally about Ghana as a tourism destination), the problem has continued to exist or grown bigger through lack of action (e.g., Kenya has an incredible mindspace for Western tourists as the safari country of East Africa… but what is Ghana known for?).

Much of this problem is caused by the short-term focus prevalent in politics and Ghana. Why try to generate revenue and development when your party may not be in power to harvest and claim the results? Additionally, people want to vote for politicians who create immediate results, and it’s harder to invest in the long-run.

On a local level, Jonas wrestles with hiring and training the local community, because many of them would rather work towards the quick money from the fishing industry instead of the steady work at the hotel. The staff that does work there is fantastic, however. Modeled after the Asian style of hospitality and service, Jonas trains his staff to deliver excellent service in their Ghanaian style. To positively impact the local community, Jonas hires locals for brief maintenance jobs and tries to source all of his products locally. He’s also taken the initiative to build his own road to the resort and paid for street lights to be built in Axim’s city center, since the government wasn’t going to develop that any time soon.

It was striking to realize that for Jonas and the Axim Beach Resort, the biggest challenge and business limitation was the government. I hadn’t considered that for some places, you need to have enough initiative to overcome ordinary challenges and lack of governmental support. How much greater a challenge is that situation? How would you work to solve it as one individual?

Tourism is predicted to surpass gold and oil as the top source of the Ghana’s GDP soon. The question is, will it happen in time to develop the infrastructure, enact the laws, and preserve the habitats that are the destination?

The streets of Cape Coast

I will have such a difficult time leaving Ghana. Just walking the streets here in Cape Coast, and everything feels familiar.

The smells are refreshing and striking: the slight misty ocean breeze mixes with the smell of fresh bread baking and the local tilapia fish roasting on the grill. Walking over malodorous sewers, you’ll catch a whiff of the fried plantains and savory goat soup coming from the alleyways and homes behind.

The streets are covered in a hodge-podge of short buildings framed by the red cliffs behind them. Every building is covered in ads for one brand or another—especially Vodophone and MTN ads, since these two major cell phone companies competing for leading market coverage. You can just hear the waves crashing against the sea shore before the bustling fishing port.

Heading for my favorite shops, I see Francesca, a Global Mama (the name of the Ghanaian women associated with my organization) who sells the highest quality beads and jewelry in Cape Coast. After stopping in for a chat, I pick up half a pineapple to munch on from my “abubera”—pineapple seller—and wave at her little daughter, Blessing. A quick visit to greet my Rasta friend, Ahmed, and my friend from the Volta region, Kwame, along with a short lesson in Ghanaian artwork, on the way back and I’ve nearly covered a third of Cape Coast.

I’m walking back when I catch a glimpse of a bobbing plastic crate on someone’s head down the street. Is that polo (aka, the delicious Ghanaian coconut cakes)? It’s an incredible snack—almost like coconut cake meets trail mix bar. Chasing her down, I spend 10 pesawas (approx. $.066) for a huge bar. Mmm! The streets are covered with people selling every type of food imaginable—and all off the top of their heads. I’ve tried nearly everything in sight, with one item left: snail kabobs. They’re supposedly a delicacy here…

It’s small, warm, content world here in Cape Coast, and I’ll be sad to say goodbye in a few short days. If I can take just a sunbeam of the light and happiness and grace I’ve found here back home with me, along with the 3,000+ photos I’ve taken, I’ll be thankful.

More to come soon….

Perspective: Environment in Ghana

While at the Mountain Paradise Lodge last week, I had an opportunity to speak with the owner and manager, Mr. Toni. A true hotelier, he not only understood hospitality, but he was also very passionate about the environmental preservation of the surrounding area. 

I asked Mr. Toni for insight into the Ghanaian perspective on the environment. His answer was sobering; he said, specifically, that many people here see the environment as “Nature’s gift to be consumed unsustainably.” Why, I asked. Toni summed up the problem to lack of education: essentially, a lack of training and education on why and how to sustain the environment for their kids and their kids’ kids. Some of the problems, for example, include:

• Deforestation—because no one replants the trees that are cut down for firewood
  
• Inorganic chemicals and harmful fertilizer—because it’s easier and quicker to spray chemicals than to weed, and no one realizes that farmers are dying at an earlier age each year because of the exposure to these chemicals
• Poison hunting—the easiest way for hunters to now hunt game is through poison: they simply set the traps and then take the animals. Since the hunters are selling the meat to others, the safety of the meat isn’t really a concern to them.
  

Toni said that many of these problems permeate from governmental issues. Specifically, no politician wants to be the one who presents an expensive, energy-intensive and long-term focused solution when the profitable quick-fixes are available today. Thus, some politicians encourage the use of chemicals for farming. Others just avoid the topic altogether.  

To only increase disadvantageous solutions, there is also international political pressure. Take, for example, the Volta Dam Project. China is funding a dam and hydro-electric plant to be built in the lush, tropical area of the Volta region that will flood and harm/destroy much of the surrounding habitat. 

What’s the solution? When I asked Toni this, he responded that help needs to come from inside and outside. An internal education initiative is needed with outside support—financial and political.

Looking back, it was a conversation to remember. It was incredible to meet someone in my industry who is truly passionate about making a long-lasting, positive difference in the world. And Toni acts on these passions—he’s started up a volunteering initiative with a local village, has adopted nearby land to protect it, and more. Pairing passion to make a difference with the action to get there—a goal for many of us. 

* Online article on Ghana's environment from a privately owned Ghanaian newspaper

Note: Apologies on the lack of external support—it was extremely difficult to find online information about Ghana’s environmental conditions.