The Methodist School for the Blind

I wasn't able to take any photos for this entry.  George is sensitive about my recording sights that he considers "Ghana's shame."  And this is a good example.

There is a school for the blind in Wa which serves 200 children from 5 regions. Bea's good friend Mariam works there as a cook.  The other afternoon we stopped by to  pick up some guinea fowl Mariam had killed and cleaned for Bea.  Shortly after we got home, Bea received a call that the school's dining hall was burning.

If this wasn't bad enough, it was only 2 months ago that the boys dormitory burned. At the time, the boys were in the dining hall. After that first fire, they were housed, at least temporarily, in the dining hall.  They were all outside the building when the fire started, so fortunately no one was hurt or killed.

The few, the proud, the ridiculous.

In the category of "Really???", Wa does have a fire department. The fire department is government-run -- The Ghana National Fire Service -- and they are about 10 minutes from the Methodist School for the Blind. So they came, but when they arrived they reported that they had no water in their tank and had to go out and look for water.  As you can imagine, that took some time to get to a pond and fill the tank.  The fire service returned about an hour and a half later.  There wasn't much to do by then.

By the grace of God, all the children and staff survived both fires but this is a good example of the struggles developing nations face.  You implement a fire service, but training is so poor that your firemen can't understand why they need to keep the water tank full at all times.  Everyone is nonchalant about this.  Around here, expectations are always low...for just about everything.

Mariam was crying the when we stopped by the next morning.  Earlier on the day of the fire, she had taken many jugs of palm oil to the market to sell.  Mariam gathers palm leaves and has taught the students to extract the oil. The profits help support the school.  Since she had taken them to the market, she had just been paid and was planning to take the money to the bank the next morning.  All the money burned.  All her clothing burned, too. She said the only clothes she has were the ones she's wearing and they were dirty and smoky.

The layers of problems that are faced daily are overwhelming.  I am leaving Mariam two sets of my clothing so she at least has something. What I would like to do is go yell at the Ghana Fire Service.  Shoot. You're a FIRE service.  You put out FIRES with WATER.  Get the damn water in the tank, right?

2 sets of clothing is a small thing.  A very small thing. It's actually nothing.