As the Week Opens in Accra...with AID EFFECTIVENESS: From a Carrot to a Spring Chicken, the Evolution is Complete!

Earlier this morning, I sent a text message to my significant other who is unfortunately in the Ashanti region for a funeral that I was looking like a carrot! I mean, come on: check out the orange attire. More precisely, the orange top, which has "Secretariat" written on the back. Look more closely, and you'll see "AID EFFECTIVENESS/GHANA CSO AID/EFECTIVENESS FORUM/31 AUG-1st SEP 2008/ACCRA-Ghana". Not to bore one with trivialities, but I think it gives you a sense of atmosphere. If you consider the fact that my colleague from the office who is an IT officer came dressed in tie and shirt--and looking rather swanky--you can imagine his horror when he, too, had to turn into a carrot;-)

That I was wearing brownish trousers that looked more green than brown underscored the Clarke-Kentish evolution I underwent.

How my girlfriend laughed her head off, though I guess she did it discreetly, considering how odd it might have looked at a funeral, you know...

Still, the headline was apt as a txt message later to her, as it reminded me of Areeba, when it was changing to spacefon". That was back in August 2005. It appeared I was not to impressed with the evolution, because I felt the quality was poor.

Well, here, today, as I sit at the Ghana college of Surgeon's makeshift secretariat in room 12, I know in my heart of hearts that the quality being delivered by the "volunteers" is sound.

Since this morning, we've mostly been running around like spring chickens trying to ensure that those coming for today's meeting and the main conference will be happy people holding hands, as it were.

This picture is me in the Secretariat right here holding the folder that was given us this morning. The picture above is not very flattering, but as they say, a picture proverbially paints...you know...

By the end of this post, I'll find one that accentuates the positive about me, cos I'm feeling a bit self-conscious [lights just went off to peple going "WOAH...."...back on!] about my size. I have been exercising, but being tall and already broad, I need to look muscular, and build the muscles to look stronger than flabby. I'm not happy at all. You didn't need this blog of mine to know that I am working, albeit slowly, on my weight.[just rectified stuck paper in a not-so-user-friendly CANON printer that was about to feed when the lights went off...just some of the things a volunteer needs to be ready to do!]

I am not happy at all. Smaller portions of food and more exercise is what I need. I an encouraged by the fact that tomorrow is the beginning of a NEW month, and a new ZEAL to do things better.



I never knew that the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons, located in Ridge, near the Ghana Institute of Journalism, has accommodation. Wow...

No news now that that's where the CSO Forum is being held...

If you're wondering how I became a volunteer, well, it's a long story that can be summed up this way: given TWN's experience with UNCTAD XII CSO Forum, it was deemed necessary for the organisation dealing with the CSO Forum [Send FOUDNATION] to require people to assist. My colleague with the tie (see above) put my name down on the request of the big boss at work for people needing assistance with web stuff and uploading. As I write this, nothing has come in my email for uploading.

I await in anticipation...as the gruesome images of yesterday's film in METRO TV's foreign movie segment, which featured Alien vs Predator sinks into...somewhere. PREDATOR being the "enemy's enemy", or convenient "friend" was bloody bloody bizarre. Looked like the predator was not interested in killing the humans there, but Lance Henriksen's character did not know, and got himself killed when the Predator walked away from him and he retorted. Ouch!

Incidentally, the AEFgh.org website rocks. Check it out here: www.aefgh.org

Mid-Week Madness: UN's Still Coming to Town!; Shoprite Disappoints -- and So Do Their Salesgirls!

It was always too good to be true: a high-power retailer like Shoprite coming to Accra, and not taking Ghanaians for a ride.

For the past few weeks, I have been through Shoprite to meet only a scene like this mostly at the margarine/butter side. A quick glimpse reveals a full house insofar as margarine/butter is concerned. Move down a few departments, like the biscuit section, and you find that the shelves have been empty for a while. I have only complained to one or two people who have assured me it would be full up.

No such luck.

I'll have to bring you picture of the empty stores I'm talking about some time--'cos there are quite a few! Who's monitoring these things?

I am sure they will not be losing sales by any stretch of the imagination, but they must be putting those who patronise the shop off quite a bit! Not that I mind that they lose or anything, but I do wonder about claims of quality, where the provision of it is next-to-none.

Whilst we are at it, is it a quintessential Ghanaian trait for sales-girls working in retail outlets like these to not smile at you, at worst, and greet you at best? How long does it take to say "good evening", or "good afternoon". I've ended up a couple of times asking: "so you won't greet?".

To which they will grimace, or feign a smile and say "sorry, you were distracted", or "sorry, but you didn't see it", or some such excuse.

Until Ghanaians begin to demand quality service from them--even if they are under-paid--we will be worse off. I sympathise sincerely about the bad pay, and probably bad conditions of service, but this takes the biscuit!

You would at least expect a greeting, not silence for your goods to be passed through like robots. Robots, we are not, thankyou!



UN Still Coming to Town
The UN Conference on Trade and Development is still coming to town! It aint going anywhere. There are a number of interesting conferences and interactive seminars that will be held during the time. It appears, though, that some of these will take place during the official UNCTAD conference, scheduled for 20-25 April.

The emphasis on "official" is important, because it means that if you are not formally accredited to the main conference--and frankly, it's too late now--you cannot attend. All is not lost, however, for there is the civil society forum, which I mentioned in the last post, which you can access here. That means that any one of you--be you journalist or non-governmental organisation, or citizen--can register here.

All that said, I shall be at the heart of things during the period, and be sure to be blogging as avidly as ever!

Today's edition of the NPP-sponsored Statesman newspaper has an editorial on UNCTAD XII, in which the title appears to be a thinly-veiled exhortation to be vigilant about globalisation.