Youth Alive! gets on Coastal TV

Trip Start Mar 27, 2008

Trip End Oct 01, 2008

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Flag of Ghana Cape Coast, Ghana
Thursday, July 31, 2008

I cannot believe that the August issue of Youth Alive! is due to go to press at the end of this week! Where has the month of July gone? It has been an eventful couple weeks for the newspaper; last Wednesday Coastal TV called Sossah to say they had a cancellation on one of their programmes, Beyond Politics, and could we fill in. So at 6pm Sossah called me to say that we were going to be in TV and that he would pick me up within the hour. This was a bit daunting considering I was still at the Abusua office, and more importantly had not showered in a couple days- certainly not screen ready. So I rushed home, threw on some clean clothes, pulled my hair back and put on a little make-up. That was just going to have to do.

'So what are we talking about on air' I asked Sossah. He wasn't entirely sure and said the host would prepare the questions with us when we got to the studio. We met with the host Tommy, a very tall and very nice man who questioned us about the Youth Alive! project and its aims. Once he felt ready that there was enough material he shuffled us into the studio and we took our places. The show lasted for about 30 mins and I was surprised how calm I was. I think I answered the host's questions clearly, and hope it was remotely interesting for the audience.

The next day at CHRAJ we attended a conference on child labour and trafficking, which was organised by the International Labour Organisation (ILO). In attendance was a smattering of the who's-who of Cape Coast, from tribal chiefs to council members. The conference for the most part was interesting, though some of the discussions seemed to get side-tracked and did tend to drag on. At one point we were all entrenched in a heated discussion about whether a woman's rightful place is "in the kitchen". What this had to do with child labour I do not know, but I certainly put my two-sense in. Later that day I was hit by a wave of nausea and quickly excused myself and headed home. The next day and a half was not pretty and involved a lot of vomiting. Once I was mobile I ran some tests with my local doctor and he diagnosed me with typhoid. Again. Not really sure whether that's what I had but he put me on enough medicine to knock out a horse, so hopefully whatever was in my system is now gone.

This week is also the last week of lectures with the nurses and it has been bittersweet. I have really grown fond of a lot of the nurses and while I am happy that we are successfully wrapping up the course I'm sad I won't see them anymore. It has also provided a routine to my schedule that helps me get through the week, as I am a creature of habit and need a routine. So it's back to the drawing board for me and Mr Aggrey as we try to come up with new public education initiatives for the upcoming months.