North to Paradise

by Ousman Umar

When I got out, I wondered if anyone would recognize me. I didn’t wear flashy clothes, just a gray T-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops. The only thing that stood out was my long, unkempt hair, which you almost never see in Ghana. It made me look like a hippie. It turned out I was the one who didn’t recognize things: the village had changed completely since I’d left. Houses there burn down on a regular basis, and then they’re rebuilt, sometimes in a different place. Plus, it rains heavily, and everything gets covered in mud. The village is constantly shifting. And I had been gone for a long time.

The cost is thirty cents per quarter. I think that this is the best form of cooperation: not feeding bellies, but feeding minds. And always in collaboration with the local communities, which know their needs better than anyone else. That’s what we do. Some nights, I fall asleep thinking about the eleven thousand children we have reached. If these efforts save just one of them from the experience I had, it will have been worth it. That is why I will continue to tell my story: