About

My story starts with my educational journey. Interestingly, looking back at my life, I realize that each stage towards my career path was rife with multiple options. As a child, I wanted to be a pediatrician. I always said I loved kids but I was a child then so who knows, maybe my mates were just amusing. However, I did keep the mission of ‘saving the world’ at heart with wide-eyed optimism. At one point, although I doubt I vocalized these thoughts to my parents, I wanted to be a police officer and work for the LAPD- yep, somewhere in Ghana, Tema to be precise, I was dreaming of being in a police workforce in a city I knew nothing about because I loved action movies. I guess I never felt the need to vocalize this because I knew it wasn’t happening. Not Esther Annan, born to Mr and Mrs Annan. Growing up, my family held morning devotions and sometimes, we had extended sessions, where dad would instill in us lessons that no teacher in a formal educational system would teach- practical life lessons. He would always mention that what he was interested in giving us was something no one would be able to take away; education. While this was mostly in reference to formal education, I keep realizing how invaluable it is to learn about anything and every discipline. In Ghana, there were, seemingly, just few job prospects that afforded financial security and I’ve never met a better planner than my dad. The idea of pursuing medicine was not hard to conceive. My strengths were skewed. Where my interests where, my grades followed. I loved the sciences in general; math and science were my forte. Overall, I only had to read a week or two before exams to excel in these two subject areas. However, courses that required memorization would be a more unforgiving. I would still manage to be in the top 3 of class through high school , so I was generally content. After my brother successfully jumped the final level of senior high into University, my family devised a plan for me to jump two levels. What would generally be a break between junior high and senior high was an intense period of studying. I enrolled with students attending remedial classes to resit the West African Secondary School Exam (WASSCE- similar to a college entrance exam) and after my first year of senior high, we convinced my school headmaster to allow me to sit for their school WASSCE. While the remedial classes were helpful, the teachers I shall forever be indebted to are those from my family. Daddy and my brother ensured that my core and elective math were on point. I still remember my dad waking me up to study and going through solutions of sample exams with me. He was also in charge of physics- although physics was never truly my stronghold; after all, the crab does not give birth to a bird (Ghanaian Proverb- I am just a chip of the old block). One of my sisters was my English/Literature source, the other, my biology consultant and mummy- she played such an important role supporting this ambition and ensuring my belly was never famished no matter how picky I was (and it seems, I will forever unashamedly be).

At the beginning of my second year in high school. I had results from my first exam. I faced two choices. Enter college and pursue biological science and switch to medicine the following year or go through second year of high school and go with the second results. Mmm, no brainer- University it was. I had made a double leap and I’d never felt more accomplished. Although I would still end up pursing medicine with the second exam (after almost switching to computer science- a story for another day), for me, to do what no one had ever done before was an achievement. I felt unique. This feeling didn’t last long after enrolling in med school the next year. The issue wasn’t that everybody was smart. The issue was that for a while, I hadn’t realized that my style of learning in primary school/junior high was the bare minimum. I had considered those 6 years the most challenging years yet. Each academic year, I was miles away from home. For someone who always relied on mummy’s scrumptious recipes, with no competing taste on the market, I was screwed. I did not learn to cook out of passion. I had to learn to cook for survival; for my palate and pocket and now I am thankful for this as it has evolved into a desire to explore more recipes from different cultures (also another lengthy story for another day). My experiences in med school could take another paragraph so I will skip to my sudden interest in public health.

After working for approximately 3 years as a clinician, I was done. Not because the joy after seeing someone recover had dwindled- for each one that didn’t and for gaps that I would attribute to systemic issues, it became hard for me to enjoy what I was doing. So, on to save not just one, but a population at a time through research, health management and policy making/implementation. At NYU, I fell in love with epidemiology. Alas! I could apply all the science and math I loved so well. So here we are, still pursing a the dream of making an impact in the healthcare space through research, and attempting to bridge the gap between research and policy/implementation/programa.

So how does this fit into this blogging interest of mine? I still believe I am a long way from fully achieving my potential but I believe life lessons have been crucial in getting me where I am and where I see myself going. When I was a child, I hangout mostly at home, school and in church (frankly, I can’t say this has changed much); ofcourse, replacing school with work more accurately gives a representative picture of my top three places I spend time and acquire my circle of influence. The lessons I learned from home and church are what have formulated my values. These values are what I apply to individual relationships, form my work ethics, and help me build communities in whichever creative space I find myself. I think that while there is seemingly a wealth of information online, some are partly regurgitations of what people would like to see. My hope is to share my story, which obviously is only mine, and the lessons that have come along with it.

In Ghana, you’d grow up feeling everyone had your back because people are just blunt (if you know me personally- helleeerr- we say it as it comes). But I am learning each day to talk and write more through love (as you’ll find me define in a couple of blog posts) and to help hold people accountable even if I have nothing to benefit from it.

So in sum, what I hope to achieve through this website, is to build an interactive online community of people who are willing to learn and grow, track their milestones and jump through life’s hurdles for a softer landing on each individual’s unique track.