MY FIRST EXPLOITS WITH THE UNIVERSITY IN RURAL GHANA THROUGH TTFPP
I first head of this acronym TTFPP during my orientation in 2014 at the University for Development Studies. TTFPP stands for Third Trimester Field Practical Programme to be done in two years. A programme designed to enable students of the University have a feel of live in rural Ghana as a partial requirement for the award of an undergraduate degree. The coordinator did his best by explaining to us and finished up by saying: we would meet for it after the second trimester.
Fast forward to the end of the second trimester, we enjoyed some holidays and reported to another campus of the university for orientation to start the programme. Freshmen and women of the university's four campuses converged on the Nyankpala campus where groups of 12 students each were formed to undertake the field work in each assigned community. The third day came which was the day for my group to move out to the field with some other groups. The old but faithful school buses were our means of transport.
Soon we were on our way to a community in the northern part of the East Gonja District of the Northern Region of Ghana. It was fun-filled trip to rural Ghana but soon missed our way after almost two hours of travel on an unfamiliar feeder road. It quickly dawned on us that we had missed our way but was fortunate to get the right route after we sought direction from another village on the way. We soon got to the first community called Tunga where the first group in our bus were assigned. After they alighted we continued to my group's community called 'Kpalayili or Kpalape' which means the village of Kpala. Kpala was brave hunter from Latinkpa(the next community after Kpalape) who first settled in the present day Kpalayili.
We met our contact person on arrival who facilitated our community entry process for us where we met the chief and community elders in brief meeting. After the meeting, we were given three rooms to settle in the community. We settled to know more about the community the next day through a transect walk.
The next day was a fun-filled day as I and my group members learnt the terrain of the community and the other settler groups in the area. These were the Chekosi and the Fulani groups. I just could not resist the temptation of taking some photos of the Fulani children and some places of abode.
We ended the day's transect walk and this is just first part of my story....stay connected to read the second part @abdulnuruwumpini.
Till then its bye for now Steemians