12 The Mad House: Cleaning Up, Brainwaves, Inspiration!

I can resist the urge no longer. I wash my hair, freshen up and get stuck into tidying the MAD House. First I tackle the kitchen and chuck out all the ‘randon’ (favourite word of the facebook generation) rubbish.

I wipe down all surfaces with bleach. I gather up the copious plastic Coke and Fanta bottles, draining the dregs of some and throwing the rest in the fridge, I bundle all similar items together, first aid in one corner, food in another, the mad profusion of phone and camera charges somewhere else. I even find a lace cloth to drape over the sundry food items permanently on the table.

And then what an exciting discovery! Sorting the kids’ stuff piled on the desk in the corner by past and present volunteers, I find a treasure trove of useful materials for the resource-starved Maranatha and Asi-Daahey schools; pencils, crayons, chalk, writing materials, colouring books, stickers and even flash cards and text books!

I’m encouraged that all this stuff will give the students something to use for at least a little while. Next we need to supply decent books to read. And a library! Computers might be a stretch since the beach village has only limited generator power and no internet connection.

I wipe clean an old dish rack and use it to organise the pencils and crayons and bits and bobs on the desk for the local children who regularly play at the house. The desk is a thrilling vision of order. ‘A Place for Everything and Everything in its Place’ is a motto used by mums universally and stands the test of time and applies to all cultures!

I spend hours lost in the bliss of writing and the rest of the weary volunteers return after their challenging stints at the Asi-Daahey school and busy hospital with touching stories to tell.

Delightful Alix, in her broad Yorkshire accent, shares a sad case of a young woman, diagnosed with AIDS, in shock, denial and shame, claims she doesn’t know how it happened because she doesn’t have a husband or boyfriend. Perhaps she is embarrassed to admit she is sexually active, perhaps she contracted the disease through an injury or maybe she was born infected.

What a tragedy. HIV and AIDS are rife throughout the continent of Africa with 40 million people predicted to have the disease by 2020 and as many children left orphaned. It is a chronic pandemic that the rest of world has forgotten.

The volunteers who are working at the hospital, Hannah, Grace, Alix, Jess, Charlotte and Susie are doing it tough, witnessing countless dramas in A & E.    

More medically trained volunteers are always needed and new influx is due to arrive next week.

Forging onward, Elisabeth has been organising a bigger MAD House as the number of volunteers now coming to these projects in Ghana is increasing and this little crowded house with just one shower and one toilet and two bedrooms is groaning under the strain.

She has found a much larger house to rent close by, in fact it’s being re-named facetiously the MAD Mansion! Of course it is far from palatial but the extra bedrooms and bathrooms will amply accommodate the eager young gap year students from the UK, Europe, the States and Australia who are coming this summer.

After my house cleaning frenzy, a satisfying creative writing session and an inspiring interview with our Liz, I am feeling uplifted and positive again and ready to shop!

And I have a mission: to replace the grog I tipped down the sink! In my mumsy zeal, I took a whiff of a mysterious plastic bottle and poured the pungent contents down the sink! Turns out, the strange liquid was a local brew of ‘rum’ so I’m off to the liquor store.

And there’s a groups of chatting ladies in headscarves with theirs laps full of bananas, mangoes, oranges and pineapple. I stagger home with bags of tropical fruit then… Brainwave! I stop by the grocery store and buy some tubs of Ghanaian ice cream!

I give the MAD housemates, whom I hasten to add, only drink sensibly in moderation, a bottle of Ada Foah special rum to redeem myself.

That night we dine royally on mountains of spaghetti lovingly made by Gifty, garlic bread inventively toasted in the frying pan followed by my bountiful fruit salad and ice cream served in mugs!

We are all sitting around the table feasting and laughing when there’s a surprising knock at the door. We freeze and send Sam, the nominated MOTH (Man Of The House). Sam opens the door to find, not a cute little child, but a big black man!

He’s the electrician who Elisabeth had contacted two months ago to fix a faulty switch! Sam manfully sends him away to come back in half an hour. He doesn’t return. Perhaps he will show up in two months! A relaxed style of customer service; just another unique feature of life in the remote village of Ada Foah!