Bonnie Wong
Class of 2003 (Honours B.A.– IDS & Cultural Anthropology)
"Hi there, I was a Trent-in-Ghana (TIG) participant in 2001-2002, a transfer student from the University of Toronto. I am currently in China teaching English in the northwest province called Xinjiang, famous for its desert and mountains - beautiful! TIG helped me understand my position in the world a little better and what i am capable of doing as a young Canadian. It's an ongoing journey of discovery, of myself and of my world. I welcome any emails, questions, comments, etc, Hope everyone is well!"
-Bonnie Wong
2123 Hubbard Crescent
Ottawa, Ontario K1J 6L3
(613) 747-1098
Student Reflections
Bonnie Wong
"Africa Awaits"
Africa is indeed like another world itself. As a first-time African traveler, I had been yearning to see for myself what this mystical and exotic continent had in store for me.
I was constantly stimulated by my new surroundings and over time, it became my new home. All the sights, smells, and tastes of this new world was at first very intriguing and eye-opening, but 8 months later when I began my preparations to come back ‘home’ to Canada, I was already missing what was at one point so foreign and strange to me.
For my placement, I chose to work for a small grass-root NGO in Walewale, Northern Ghana called NENFOUND (Neighbours In Need Foundation). Their mission is “to give assistance to people in rural communities to help them to improve their standard of living.” This is done “through the participation and empowerment of rural peoples.” Initially formed as a locally based group to contest for the position of P.O. (Partner Organization) in the WATSAN (Water and Sanitation) projects lead by CWSA, Tamale, (Community Water and Sanitation Agency), NENFOUND has successfully worked in 140 communities, animating and mobilizing the people to establish and train WATSAN committees to oversee the operation and maintenance of the community’s facilities.
As for my role within NENFOUND, I found myself immersed in a project that was of great importance and where I thought I could be of most use, especially to the local students of Walewale: AIDS/HIV awareness and prevention. To me, education is a fundamental vehicle for reaching the youth and spreading an important message across. And from the beginning I had wanted to work with school children, doing some sort of hands-on project with them. Having put together a team who voluntarily joined the crusade of spreading the message of the disease, we gave presentations to many of the Junior, Primary and Secondary schools in and around the village.
Probably one of the biggest issues, if not the biggest, I had to deal with was identifying and clarifying my role as a student intern for NENFOUND. I constantly had to ask myself: Who am I? Why am I here? What am I doing here? What do I want to get out of it? I didn’t know, couldn’t decide and was unable to say definitely I was one thing and not another. Student, intern, worker, tourist, visitor … I was all of them, but which one did I identify with most? I could not confidently decide, and depending on my mood or what I was doing, I would answer differently each time. Usually I would tell the person who was asking that I was a “student from Canada who was here as a volunteer on a short-term placement.” That response was usually satisfactory and the person simply nodded his/her head and that was that. All these thoughts, and more, swirled inside my head throughout my time in West Africa, heightening during my placement period. I realized through all these intense weeks of not knowing ‘who I was’, that in reality, being comfortable with yourself and within the situation and environment that you are currently in is the most important thing. Knowing whether you are a ‘development student’ or an ‘intern’ is irrelevant if you are not comfortable in your milieu. Those are terms that I have fretted over, and I think, unnecessarily so.
In essence, placement is not about accomplishments. Placement is about relationships formed. Relationships with your co-workers, neighbours, the town, your loved ones back home and yourself. It’s about balancing these relationships and keeping them true and thriving despite all the variables that are changing from day to day. To me, the most pivotal thing I realized that ‘placement’, or a short work stint in a foreign land, is not really about what you did but how you did it. It’s not about the fabulous project that was accomplished in record time with limited funds. It’s not about the doing, rather it’s about being. To me, placement is about learning more about yourself as you are immersed (somewhat forcibly too) into a society that is foreign, with strange people and strange language(s). It’s about trying to make connections amongst the community members, be it at the local bars or at the side of the road under the mango trees.
Like one of my colleagues told me, “We are more alike than dislike.” People are people, wherever you are in the world. Only certain habits and certain behavior differentiate us from the ‘brother’ across the ocean. We all need to eat, drink, sleep, dance, party and make love to survive. But like somebody else reminded me, “You can never deny where you come from.” We are all living under the same blanket of stars and planets. My experience in Ghana has taught me that peaceful living is possible despite your religion, ethnicity, gender or age. It has also shown me that although there are great strides to be made in terms of development, Ghanaians are generally content and doing ‘fine’, extracting the very good from the horrible bad as each day goes by.
One of the things that I gained deeper insight into was the act of giving respect and knowing when to appreciate an act of kindness. I was humbled many times by the pure kindness of villagers who would slaughter their few remaining chickens in my honor, just because I had taken so much time out of my perceived ‘busy’ schedule to come and greet them. What astonishes me most is that these acts of compassion were demonstrated to me over and over again by some of the poorest people in rural Ghana, where it was obvious that although their level of education and annual income would never even amount to what we deem acceptable, their hearts beat continually with compassion and true dignity.
Travel and living abroad is one of the best ways to develop many social skills, such as patience, compassion, tolerance and the ability to harbor your way out of difficult situations. There is also a sense of gratification and authenticity when you hear people talking to you about their life story in front of you; everyday I had many enlightening conversations, some filled with light-hearted jokes and others filled with despair and desolation. I chatted with newfound friends in my neighborhood, co-workers at the office, strangers I met at the rice stand, cheerful women selling cloths at the market and even cab drivers who I’m sure tried every bargaining trick in the book on me!
As for the constant cluttered streets of the city, I will never forget the French Renaults and Japanese Toyotas that spew exhaust into the already dense air as cab drivers chat incessantly with each other from their open, and sometimes missing, windows. Pedestrians on peddle bikes and motorbikes compete impatiently for any small opening of road in order to surpass the stalled object in the middle of the path, be it a broken-down vehicle or a family of goats. Blaring car horns, which appear to be devices that must be used to announce their arrival at every corner and stop, is combined with the hawks, yelps and shrieks of chickens, street vendors, and Ghanaian “highlife” music to create a street cacophony that is vibrant and colorful.
It is always assumed that the adventure ends when you step onto the plane again, but in essence, that is where the effect of the experience begins. What I realized most upon my return was that I learned not only about the lives of the people I met overseas, but I also gained a deeper understanding and appreciation for my own life back in Canada. The ability to remember can be sometimes difficult and painful, depending on the memory, but remembering the good and the bad is necessary in order to keep the experience authentic and not let it be glossed over. For me, I will never forget the daily calls to prayer of the Muslims at the neighborhood mosque, later followed by the a capella singing and drumming of the Catholics in the local church; the smell of putrid garbage roasting outside the compound walls; the sight of little black bodies running after you, waving and yelling and laughing to get your attention for the ninety-eighth time that day; the taste of spicy hot soups and stews which melt in your mouth, sending warm chills all throughout your body; the touch of a young woman’s hand when you shake them, rugged and tough like rubber already from many years of hard labour. These are just some of my memories entwined into my experience, among countless others.
-Bonnie Wong
May 14, 2003