Friday was HRAC’s office away day – an opportunity for all the staff to
get together for team building activities and discuss the future direction of the
organisation. In reality, much more fun was had than work. That’s probably no
surprise given that the venue for our teambuilding was Tills Beach in
Gomoa-Fetteh, about an hour and a half’s drive west of Accra:*
The beach is pretty spectacular and we spent the morning eating almonds
and coconuts straight from the tree and messing around on the beach, before all
sitting down together for lunch. I had my first experience of banku. Banku is a
sort of dumping made from fermented maize, eaten with a variety of sauces. It
as an overpowering fermented-sour taste that, I’m afraid, is not entirely to my
taste. I washed it down with a delicious fresh coconut.
During the afternoon we split into teams and worked together on team
building activities, including building very unsuccessful miniature structures
from pieces of paper. It’s a good thing we’re human rights specialists and not
required to involve ourselves in artistic or structural endeavours:
We also discussed how the organisation can function better. Lots of ideas
came out, including fostering more collaborative work between permanent staff
and volunteers, and allocating people to specific projects for the duration of
their time at HRAC, in order to develop skills and really make good use of
people’s time. There were also concerns voiced that once volunteers leave, the
work they have done also disappears, and that it was important to develop a way
of ensuring the sustainability of work carried out.
*Visitors should be advised that there are strong rip tides here. Ask
local advice before swimming
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