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Ghanaian migrant women in Finland and distance mothering
Recently, I wrote about how Ghanaian migrants living in Finland generally pursue their wellbeing. I outlined the many ways in which they pursue and enhance their wellbeing.
I have also been thinking about the phenomenon of Ghanaian migrant mothers here in Finland and how they are mothering their children left behind at home in Ghana.
Research indicates that in migration, family structures back in the home country usually provide a unique platform for the fulfilment of mothering responsibilities across international borders.
Strategies and resources
Ghanaian migrant mothers resort to various strategies, including how to financially support themselves and their families, both in Finland and Ghana. That is, they use resources that are available in order to fulfil their parenting responsibilities.
As I wrote some time ago, many Ghanaian migrants in Finland have acquired huge expertise, knowledge and resources (academically, economically, technically or technologically, etc.).
Many of them, like other migrants in Finland, who may have been professionals and highly educated in their original countries find themselves working as cleaners, waitresses and bouncers at restaurants and pubs, considered to be low paid jobs.
Demeaning as this may suggest, they are nevertheless happy to find a source of income in order to survive and be able to send some support to their relatives and to cater for their children in Ghana.
Guardianship and fostering
Usually, Ghanaian migrant mothers who have left their children back home in Ghana may not have to worry much about getting someone to care for the children. This is because of the culture and tendency for kin members to live in households with extended family members.
Guardianship or the fostering of young relatives is very common and shows the sharing of responsibilities and the encompassing nature of families in Ghana. Women (and also men) usually live with and are the guardians of a sister’s or brother’s child with ease, and is often done voluntarily.
Fostering is usually without much difficulty and is based on the con sent of the parents of the child. Ideally, kin members foster children in the larger family, although in some circumstances children from poor homes can be fostered by strangers.
For the Ghanaian migrant mothers in Finland who have children back home in Ghana, there is much at stake. They are actively engaged in supporting their children’s lives back home, such as meeting their needs in education, healthcare, etc.
A major say in children’s lives
Even though the children are lucky to live with relatives in Ghana, their parents abroad, particularly the mothers, have major say in the lives of the children.
I remember some time ago when a lady friend here in Helsinki requested my help to find a place in Winneba for her son who had gained admission to go to the university.
From the discussions we had, I could see she was in total control of affairs of the son. It was not only that she released the funds for the son’s fees and upkeep. She also discussed the major part of the son’s education directly with the young man.
Why children can’t join them
You may ask why mothers leave their children behind instead of taking them along.
A number of reasons have been identified. Research on African migrant mothers in some parts of Europe has shown that some mothers leave their children behind so that the children would receive culturally appropriate education in the home country.
Other mothers have no other option than to leave their children behind because they may not have been able to secure them travel permits.
Struggles and the way forward
The Ghanaian migrant mothers face struggles as they balance work, their own wellbeing and mothering from a distance.
They admit that it can put pressure on them and feelings of guilt and regret for being spatially absent from their children.
All the same, the efforts by the Ghanaian migrant mothers to ensure effective mothering of their children from a distance indicates their ability to ensure their wellbeing as well as good parenting. They are determined to push forward and achieve the best results.
Thank you!
By Perpetual Crentsil
Email: perpetualcrentsil@yahoo.com
SIKAMAN is gradually becoming a health-conscious nation because piles is now a national disease. Some natives claim that piles, alias kooko, has gone on strike and has attacked different parts of their bodies — buttocks, forehead, inner ear, inner nose, lips, and hair. Now they do not know where next it would attack, and soon a petition would be sent to Parliament to declare piles a national tragedy.
It is interesting when you consider the way people assume that even common malaria is caused by kooko. Well, the medical authorities have come out to say that piles is a disease of only the last end of the alimentary canal. It has a name. Go and check the name in your biology textbook, or ask the nearest herbalist.
The health consciousness of the average Sikaman native is not limited to kooko, though. People are becoming very much aware of their pot-bellies. They can’t be carrying it all their lives, taking into consideration that half the time, it is laden with gallons of beer.
Even Kwame Alomele is gradually trying to unload the burden that precedes him. “I no longer have the stamina to carry a pot. I am now health-inclined and want to be a slim-macho, doing a sport. I am applying to be a member of a golf club and hope to do wonders with the tiny ball. Fact is I want to be up-and-doing like Gordon Avernogbor, the Grandmaster of GBC fame.”
The media have helped to carry this health idea far. Ghana Television does weekly health programmes, and the FM stations have various programmes and tit-bits on health. Radio Gold is on a Diabetes Month health beat, and patients are made to acquire some knowledge about what they may be suffering from and how they can manage their conditions.
In the print media, the Weekly Spectator has singlehandedly launched a powerful health crusade, and the sky is the limit. In fact, the Spectator has been hailed in medical circles as one of the papers that have zealously carried the health mantle aloft in recent times. The Mirror also runs a health column with my good friend Dr. Anyah in the chair.
Tune in to any of the FM stations and you’re likely to hear a health tit-bit that can be useful to you. You’ll hear something like, “if you eat too much yorke gari, you’ll develop coccidiosis, which is a fowl disease. So check the level of gari and beware of zorzor.”
COCKROACH DIET
Well, healthy living in general has to do with healthy eating. At least, that is what the nutritionists say. And the cockroach has been the most qualified nutritionist in the world. The reason is that the common cockroach is so health-conscious that it eats only a balanced diet — anything from rotten fruit to human excreta. It doesn’t reject food.
The experts say fruits and vegetables, which are alkaline in nature, are good for the human body. There is some truth in this. The silver-back bear, perhaps the most powerful animal in the world, is a vegetarian. It can uproot a tree almost effortlessly, and the power in its arms is attributed to its vegetarian diet.
Anyhow, man cannot continue eating fruits and vegetables perpetually as the main diet. The stomach would get bored, the tongue will revolt, and the human body will subconsciously start crying for banku and okro soup plus giant crabs.
Ideally, a balanced diet — carbohydrates, protein, fats and oils, vitamins and minerals — in their correct quantities are enough to ensure healthy living. It means that you can’t fare well when you eat bread in the morning, bread in the afternoon, and kenkey and shito for supper. There would be a traffic jam in your intestines. And believe me, the traffic lights will also go off.
The killer menu is maintained for three days, and you’ll have what is termed as “treasonable constipation,” a sin against your body. No purgative can save you unless rice and okro soup. That combination is the best purgative in town. In 1983, it used to be one of the famous diets in Legon when famine besieged Sikaman. Students had to abandon lectures and stay close to the WC. Anything can happen. You can’t trust your own stomach.
Exercise also begets health, and brisk walking is the golden rule. I have a friend who is a positive thinker, and he told me walking is no problem to him. He once walked from Osu Christianborg to Circle to Abeka and back to Christiansburg.
No ice-water. No one gave him an award, but I congratulated him. Not that the guy is broke and can’t fix himself up in a trotro or taxi. Walking is his hobby. And his health is always excellent, his appetite ever-ready — no need for bitters. As for his sex life, your guess is as good as mine. He can deliver more than AK-47.
Exercise is good, but it must not wear you down. Do not over-exert. What about sex? Research has shown that excessive indulgence in sex is harmful to the central nervous system because it drains the body of its vitality.
Sex is basically for reproduction, but Ghanaman thinks quite differently. Some experts say twice a week or less is just what the body can cope with. Others say abstain and live long.
But what is the body’s most formidable adversary? It is WORRY. Worry has killed many more people than the Second World War did. About 90% of the population are chronic worriers. People are so addicted to worrying that even when there is nothing to worry about, they worry that there is nothing to worry about.
Worry causes hypertension and its attendant complications of heart disease, stroke, renal failure, and mental illness. The question is, how can man stop worrying? There is a formula by which you can stop worrying.
Make a date with Sikaman Palava in the coming weeks and get your formula for longevity, your life without worry.
This article was first published on Saturday, August 16, 1997.
Christmas has been celebrated ever since I became aware of events as a child and I believe it will continue to be celebrated till thy kingdom come.
The month immediately after Christmas is the month of January and is usually associated with harmattan and its related health challenges like catarrh etc.
Except this year that even on the January 2, there was rainfall in some parts of the country. This is very strange indeed and I pray that the false prophets do not take advantage of it to come up with all kinds of fear mongering predictions.
Growing up, one of the issues that parents and people in general talk about is how long January is and how difficult it is to successfully manage things economically in catering for the needs of the family.
It therefore requires prudent planning to ensure that one is not found wanting in having enough money in the pocket, to cater for the needs of the family after the Christmas holidays.
ln January, a lot of issues crop up. This is the month that students will be returning to school after the holidays and so you can imagine the financial burden it places on parents whose children are in secondary and tertiary institutions.
Money has to be found to provide for provisions at all cost. These days the Free SHS has lessened the burden of parents a bit but if a parent has children, in the tertiary level, then the issue of hostel accommodation comes in and it is not easy to handle.
After managing to see the children off to school, then comes the issue of how to manage to the end of the month when money will be made available to you, as a salaried worker.
Those who ran their own businesses usually do not face such challenge but are also affected in a way because the people who should be buying stuff are not financially sound to patronise goods and services being offered.
In January, I honestly believe that most adults, if they had the power to wish for anything, would wish that they were children. I believe that even for those who are not hypertensive, their blood pressure, if measured and compared to those of previous months, will show a sharp rise each morning in January.
Generally rise in blood pressure is caused by stress apart from the other causes that cones from the food intake and lack of exercise. They say a healthy workforce results in a healthy economy; reason why we pay special attention to the health needs of our leaders.
The cost of the absence of say the President or the Minister for Finance to the state due to illness is huge and likewise the aggregate cost of workers who provide the requisite services for the economy to run smoothly
The whole issue has to do with the low salary levels for most civil and public workers in the country.
One former President once said we pretend to pay them and they also pretend to work. Salaries are not being paid based on living wage and so salaries people receive are not enough to properly take care of their needs and this is what mostly account for this perennial phenomenon which I term as the January Headache. This question of the chicken and the egg, which comes first, as far as salaries are concerned, must be urgently addressed.
The issue of hire purchase, could be one way of addressing this January Headache and government can liaise with supermarkets and other business establishments to take advantage of the Ghana Card, to provide this service to ease the burden of workers especially those who are parents each January. God bless.
NB: KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’
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