We safely arrived in Tamale early last week after a long 12-hour bus ride that turned into a 24-hour ride when our bus broke down near Kumasi. After a couple of orientation days learning more about solar energy and the Ghanaian culture we were ready to take to the field to see it first hand. We got to experience our first community in a place that already had solar power that Saha Global implemented in order to ask questions and see how it was being run. After this we were able to go out and monitor other communities as well. It was great to see how the solar centers had such a positive impact on all of the communities.

It was a very exciting day when we found out our teams and communities in which we would be working for the next two weeks. Our team has had a great time together and it is so much fun getting to know everyone better considering we all come from such different places, and have different personalities. Our team consist of Haley, Emily, Trey, and Bridget along with our translator, Shak.

Another really exciting thing for us is how awesome our village, Kushini, is. We had a meeting with the chief to pitch our idea of building a solar center. He was so excited about it and they couldn’t wait to help us start with the construction. The next day when we went back, instead of doing the traditional route of building an entirely new building, the village donated a building to us that was not being used anymore. So instead of taking time to build a new one we are using the time and resources to fix up the great building they already have.

Even though this isn’t the stereotypical procedure for building a solar center we are so happy that we are able to use this building in the community. We will be painting the building in the next couple of days and then will start training the women on the solar equipment.

-Trevon, Hailey, Emily & Bridget