October and November 2022, Ghana

When I left Frankadua in March 2022, I did so knowing that I wanted to return. During that first visit, I had taught at Retca School and seen first-hand how difficult it was for the children to learn without many of the basic facilities we take for granted.

The school had no electricity, very few textbooks and several unfinished classrooms. Teaching Computing to children who had no access to computers was particularly challenging. Before leaving, I committed Village Projects Foundation to building a library and computer laboratory for the school.

Just seven months later, I returned to Frankadua to turn that commitment into a reality.

For most of the trip, I was joined by Oli Batchelor, Tom Grist and Phil Moss. Mark Jeffries arrived slightly later than the others, but quickly became part of the team. Over the following weeks, we worked hard, experienced plenty of unexpected challenges and played an unreasonable amount of Perudo in the evenings.

They are all now officially recognised as Friends of Frankadua.

Our aim was to complete Project Retca: a new library and computer laboratory that would give the children access to books, technology and a dedicated environment in which to learn. It was a significant undertaking, particularly in a rural community where sourcing materials, transporting supplies and managing a construction budget were rarely straightforward.

Almost everything had to be paid for in cash. On one occasion, we needed to purchase timber and corrugated iron for the roof. We visited the bank to withdraw the money, only to be informed that it had run out of cash. This was slightly inconvenient for a bank, but we assumed we could simply try another one.

The second bank had also run out of money.

It was one of those moments where you had to laugh, largely because there wasn’t much else we could do. Eventually, we managed to get the cash together and purchase the materials, but it demonstrated how tasks that would be relatively simple at home could become an entire day’s work in Ghana.

The financial situation was made even more difficult by the extraordinary rate of inflation. Inflation in Ghana was reportedly around 95% at the time, which meant prices were constantly changing. A budget created at the beginning of the week could already be out of date by the time we needed to purchase the materials.

We were therefore constantly rebudgeting the project, adjusting our plans and working out how to make the available funds stretch further. Every bag of cement, piece of timber and sheet of corrugated iron had to be carefully considered. It was a challenging environment in which to complete a construction project, but the team continued finding ways to move things forward.

The days were long and physically demanding. Everybody worked hard, both alongside one another and with members of the local community. There was a genuine sense that we were building something together rather than simply arriving with a finished solution. Mixing cement by hand was unanimously considered the most difficult ask. Shovelling the hardcore, cement mix and water into a pile and then carrying that mixture by wheelbarrow to our library over and over again, is something I would happily not do again.

There were also moments during the trip which were much harder to process.

On one occasion, I witnessed a child being publicly beaten. I intervened and stopped it, but afterwards I questioned my actions for quite some time. I knew that I had entered another community with different cultural practices and attitudes towards discipline, and I was conscious of the dangers of arriving from England and assuming that my own perspective was automatically superior.

At the same time, standing by and watching a child being hurt did not feel like something I could justify. I still found myself wondering whether I had handled the situation correctly, whether intervening would cause further problems for the child and where the line should be drawn when working within another culture.

There was no neat conclusion to that experience. It was simply one of the moments that reminded me that international charity work can involve difficult moral questions. Respecting another culture is important, but that does not always mean remaining silent when something feels fundamentally wrong.

Away from the building work, we also found time to become temporary members of Shark Football Club. Shark had welcomed me during my first visit to Frankadua, and this time Tom, Oli and I were given the opportunity to play for Shark FC in a proper match.

The temperature was around 35 degrees, which may have contributed to Oli’s appearance lasting approximately 18 minutes. Tom wisely camped out at left-back, conserving energy wherever possible. I played further forward and managed to miss from about a yard out—not once, but twice.

I’d like to say the pitch was responsible, but that would probably be unfair on the pitch.

The football was another example of how quickly we felt part of the community. Shark FC was about much more than football. It brought people together and gave young players of different ages somewhere to belong. Being invited to play was a privilege, even if our performances did very little to improve the standard of the team.

Despite the various setbacks, shortages and constantly changing costs, we eventually completed the library and computer laboratory.

Seeing the finished building was an incredibly proud moment. The new library provided the students and teachers with access to a collection of books covering different subjects and interests. For a school where four or five children had previously shared a single textbook, having a dedicated library represented a huge step forward.

Alongside it, the computer laboratory gave the children access to technology and the opportunity to begin developing their digital skills. Computing could now become something they experienced for themselves, rather than a subject taught entirely through explanations on a whiteboard.

Together, the two facilities created a learning environment where books and traditional education could sit alongside modern technology. More importantly, they gave the children somewhere they could explore, practise and learn independently.

Once the work was finished, the local community helped us celebrate by slaughtering and preparing a chicken, which we then ate together inside the new library. It was certainly a memorable way to mark the completion of the project.

I’m not entirely sure Tom and Mossy needed to witness every stage of the preparation process, and I suspect neither of them has looked at chicken in quite the same way since.

As we sat together eating in the building we had spent weeks working on, there was a real feeling of achievement. The library was no longer an idea discussed during my previous visit. It was standing, completed and ready to be used by the children of Retca School.

Project Retca was building a great space, but the trip became about much more than the building itself. It was about adapting when the banks ran out of money, rebudgeting as prices changed, working alongside the community and learning how complicated it can be to help responsibly in a culture different from your own.

It was also about friendship. Oli, Tom, Phil and Mark committed their time, energy and money to making the project possible. We worked hard, laughed a lot and probably played enough Perudo to last a lifetime.

They arrived in Frankadua as volunteers, but they left as friends of the community—and as an important part of the story of Village Projects Foundation.

The library and computer laboratory will hopefully serve generations of children at Retca School. For us, however, Project Retca also strengthened a relationship with Frankadua that had only begun seven months earlier.

We knew we would be returning again.