November 6, 2024 - A Break From Normal Content

Today was a hard day - perhaps the most challenging I’ve had since being on Watson. I debated posting this as it started more as a journal entry than as a blog post but I’ve been struggling with feeling connected today.

I woke up as I have every day since I’ve been in Ghana, sweaty and sore from coffin-making the day before. But for the first time since being here, I felt utterly overcome with emotion. I had spent most of the night in and out of restless sleep, checking the election map every few hours, trying to reckon with the fact that I would know the results before my family and friends back home were awake and processing the news as well. 

Despite being abroad, I’ve been following the election coverage closely since I left in July, even if it’s just listening to NPR’s Up First for 15 minutes while I’m getting ready in the morning. In the UK, I couldn’t tell anyone I was American without the election being brought up, but there was something comfortable about this, about feeling like I was still able to continue the conversation despite being physically so far from the USA. Now, here in Ghana, staying with my host family of about 20 people, the USA election is something more of a myth they have heard about from friends or perhaps seen on TikTok. In fact, with their contentious election coming this December, I have been learning and speaking more and more about the politics of Ghana rather than the US. 

Today, I woke up, and the day felt indescribably heavy and utterly lonely. Admittedly, the first thing I did was cry, but only for a minute. I forced myself to put on a brave face, knowing I had to report to the workshop bright and early for a full day. I went through the motions: as I am currently living above the shop, I went downstairs, I ate a bit of breakfast, I sweated buckets as I sawed and planed and hammered. But I was agitated, and I could feel myself on the edge of emotional overload. Work in the shop is intense - there’s an expectation that I have to be on my game, and being the only woman to train in the shop, I constantly feel watched. While I intend to write a full post about my experiences in the shop soon, I will add that my time thus far has been equal parts rewarding and challenging as I navigate the balance between cultural immersions and my boundaries as a solo female traveler. 

There was extra weight today on the solo and female. As I tried to focus on work, I found myself constantly getting emotional, biting back tears. Tears for all the people in America who were going to wake up soon to this same reality, tears for all the women in and out of my life who would feel real fear later today and indescribable hurt knowing that their country would rather elect a felon/rapist/racist/homophobic/bigot rather than a woman, tears for my younger host brother Ernest who has been sitting with me each night as I assist him in looking into foundations in Ghana that can help him apply to college in the States because that’s "where his dreams come true," and tears for myself in the most selfish way for being so far from home and away from the people I love who are all struggling with the same emotions.

I held onto these, though, because on one of my first days here, I was told that crying is not always understood or accepted in more traditional Ghanaian families. I also held onto them because part of the challenge of this chapter of my Watson has been recognizing and grappling with how I take up space as a white woman of privilege in an impoverished and developing community in Ghana. I was not sure I could explain accurately to my host brothers in the shop my sadness without sounding ignorant of the many challenges faced here. Moreover, while Ghanaian tradition dictates respect for women, the role of women is much more confined to the domestic sphere. I have been asked more than once why I am working here or studying to be a doctor when I could just stay home and raise a family. The one time I explained some of Trump’s beliefs, there were murmurs of agreement concerning his beliefs about women. But unlike in the US, I have understood this gap in alignment between my host brothers and me as entirely cultural, and they have shown me so much care even in my first week here.

Today, though, most of all, I was craving the company of women who understood how I was feeling and grappling with the emotion that although I had women around me, I was mourning something that they might not have ever known. The complexity of grieving something in a space where it has perhaps never existed weighs heavily on me, and the guilt set in over feeling selfish and sad for women who may be entirely content with their lives. How does someone hold space for cultural difference while also acknowledging their privilege and simultaneously recognizing that privilege may not be something that’s even sought after?!? (I believe this is essentially the white savior complex in action). 

All of this made me wary of sharing my emotions today. I felt I would be misunderstood, and carrying these emotions made me feel the farthest from home I have since taking off from Logan Airport back in July. Also, for only the second time since I left, I ached to be connected with other fellows - I wanted to hear that someone knew exactly what I was feeling. To tell someone that being away from home right now feels both like a gift and a curse. A gift because I put off the reality of another 4 years under Trump for about nine more months. A curse because I can’t hug my sisters, my moms, my cousins, or my best friends or be hugged by them as we all process this together. Because I know there will be rallies and protests and work to do in the coming months that I will have to sit out.  Because I can’t accurately put into words how it feels to know that, in so many ways, the country I left will not be the same country I return to. Because the words “we’re in this together” feel different this year from thousands of miles away. 

By the end of the day, I was drenched, hot, hungry, tired, and angry. One of my host brothers asked if I was okay, and I just started crying. I tried to explain through a very wavering voice what a Trump presidency meant, what he stood for, and why it hurt me so much. I then quickly apologized for my emotions, but he just stared and finally said it was hard for him to understand because, in Ghana, there is only love. People fight and disagree, but mostly, there is love. I tried to process the ways that I, in turn, didn’t understand him - that I’m so used to feeling divided, to feeling overwhelmed, and overextended, to saying yet again that the fight continues. But it does, and Ghana leaves us something to aspire to. To love each other as hard as we can, especially when faced with adversity and hate. For all the ways I felt incredibly alone today in the strangeness of being gone from my country during this time, I feel grateful to get to learn from the love here even when or perhaps especially when it looks and feels so different than home. 

At the risk of sounding incredibly preachy or cliché, today will be a day we will all always remember. Ironically, it’s also my 100th day on Watson. Perhaps a reminder to all of us that we can do hard, once impossible-seeming things. All my love to back home and to the other Watsoners (is this what we’re called?) who may be feeling similarly today. I know I’m not shouting into the void with these posts, but today, I’m feeling specifically in need of conversation, so please comment or reach out if you have any thoughts at all. 

Sam