Women's Outreach

So since I have been here, HEPENS has started a women’s outreach in the community of Kakumdo.  Liz and I have served as the main teachers, with the wonderful Ghanaian woman Maggie as our translator and comrade. 

The women are just the greatest.  Usually, Liz and I go in really unsure of how things are going to go, not sure if they will accept what we say, and worrying about the fact that we are teaching on things that we have never experienced (such as pregnancy, breast feeding, menopause, etc.) whereas many of the women have.  But each and every time we have held the session, it has gone SO well and the women are so welcoming, so engaged and so appreciative.  It is so uplifting when we see them nodding in agreement, asking really good questions, asking for clarification, and asking us to come back next week and teach about such and such issue they want to know more about.

Each week Liz and I will prepare a topic, make popcorn or buy bananas, get water, and go to the shanty 90-year old Catholic church and wait for our women to come.  They usually show up 30, 40, 50, 60 minutes late, but when they come, we get so excited!  Then we teach.  Maggie translates into Fante because many of the adult women do not speak English.  And they ask questions throughout and then at the end we eat and drink and exchange greetings! 

We have taught about menstruation, fertility and pregnancy, family planning, and breast health.  We are hoping that once we leave, Maggie and others will continue with the weekly outreach!  Sustainability is always the goal!

A few weeks ago we made some popcorn for the women with our NGO leader's family members.  It was a riot chilling with these older women making popcorn over a coal fire stove.  

Then we went around the community to see the women.  We brought them popcorn and they were overjoyed!  It was a lot of fun just conversing with them.

This has probably been one of my favorite experiences here.  Women, when gathered together, share a special connection and that is no less true in this setting.  These women are so special.  I just love each one of them and I don’t even know any of their names!  They are so beautiful and are truly the epitome of the African women we think of.  They wear the beautiful head wraps and dresses and just have this wonderful motherly feel about them.  They are hardworking, stern, but loving women.