ALERT- REALLY LONG POST COMING UP- ANYONE WHO ISNT THAT INTERESTED WILL GET SUPER BORED- READ THE BEGINNING AND END FOR SYNOPSIS Ghana. How do I even begin to describe my time there? The first thing I remember thinking was that I recognized the scent. Its amazing to me how fast a smell can take you back in time, and this was definitely one of those times. When I woke up in my cabin the morning that we docked in Takoradi, the smell of Ghana, the smell of smoke from burning fires, red sand and massive amounts of people had permeated the whole interior of the ship. At breakfast, people were constantly asking, Whats that smell? but I knew. I was a little weary about getting off the ship and starting my trip to Accra. I had promised Molly, Kelly, and Jenny a great time- what if something happened? But as soon as we stepped off the gangway all of my worries vanished and I immediately felt like I was at peace. Its strange because when I left Ghana last year I honestly thought I would never be coming back. It was never Ghana or even Western Africa that kept me interested in Africa for so long, it was the WHOLE continent, so when I left Ghana I thought that if I ever got to come back I would want to explore a new country. While that still may be a little true, as our taxi wove through traffic on the way to the bus station I couldnt stop thinking about how it felt like home. Even as far away from Kwamoso as Takoradi is, the people and the shops and the atmosphere felt like home in the same way that driving back to Missouri from Texas does. I hadnt realized it until that moment, but I had missed Ghana. We made it to the bus station and found our way onto the bus bound for Accra. We sat there in high spirits because we had actually managed to navigate a foreign country on our own, just four little blonde girls. After a 4-hour bus drive and an exit into a very busy market, however, we werent as confident. George, a young man that Jenny had made friends with on the bus, quickly realized we werent quite sure where we were supposed to go next and offered to take us there. Sorry maj, but we didnt get a sketchy vibe from him at all and we were at a loss so we took him up on his offer and followed him through the market to the tro station. He ended up being an awesome guy, and he even paid for our tro ride. He spent about 3 hours taking us first to a hotel which ended up being way too nice (and expensive) for us, and when we couldnt stay there he didnt leave us, he simply took us to a store where I could buy a phone to call Dana. Well, the store didnt have the cheap phone I needed, so he took us to the tro station and told me that he would buy me a phone from the local shopkeeper because if I tried the guy would rip me off. At one point he asked me if my friend was white or black. I kind of laughed and asked why he wanted to know, and he informed me that if she was black she could get us a deal at a hotel, but because she was white the hotelkeepers would probably overcharge us. He successfully bought me a phone and since it wasnt charged he called Dana from his phone to tell her where to meet us. He put us on the tro after we took a picture with him and gave him some hugs because we could not convey our gratitude with a simple thank you. We made it to Banku Junction in East Legon (the neighborhood in Accra where Dana lives) and piled off the tro with our huge bags. We were kind of in a daze at that point. We had been traveling all day with a man we met on a bus in Africa and now we were standing at an intersection with no idea where we were, no idea how to get back, and no phone to call anyone- but we werent panicked. We were thrilled, so independent! Pretty soon I saw Dana walking up the road on our right, and I sprinted (with my huge pack on my back) to give her a huge hug. We ended up getting to each other in the middle of the busy street, and cars were whizzing by honking, probably getting a good laugh at the two blonde white girls hugging in the middle of the road. We got back to the other gals and I introduced everyone, and we set off to find a hotel. After a couple tries we finally ended up at the Aristocrat Hotel, right down the road from Danas house. That night we went to dinner with Dana and her roommate Lauren at a place called Chez Afrique, a delicious Ghanaian restaurant where we had rice and beans and plantains with some local beer called Club. It was delicious. Everyone was so relaxed and after a couple beers I was feeling pretty good. It felt like I was in a dream, being in Ghana with some great new friends plus Dana it was unreal. After the restaurant we went to a local spot named Jerrys to meet some of Danas CIEE (her study abroad program) friends. I was feeling pretty good and I ended up making best friends with a Ghanaian named Freddy, but thats another story. Just kidding, theres not another story maj. Some of Danas guy friends were going to another bar to watch the super bowl and I decided to go with them while Molly, Jenny, and Kelly went back to the hotel to go to sleep. The bar was a pretty long drive away, and when we got there it was a little bit of a reverse culture shock because there were SO MANY white people there, eating fries and nachos. It felt like I was back at home, so strange. We left after about an hour because they werent showing the commercials on ESPN (my favorite part) and I went back to the hotel to go to sleep. In the morning the gals left to meet with the doctor from the ship, Dr. Bill, to go to a home for children where they fit them with prosthetics. I waited until Dana came over and then we left with her friend Stephen to go to Kwamoso. We found our way to the right tro stations with no problem, and pretty soon we were up in the Akuapem hills, whizzing by villages that were very familiar to me. When we got to Mamfe, the town closest to Kwamoso, I started getting really nervous. I was freaking out that my family wouldnt recognize me or that they would feel imposed upon that I was just showing up. I wanted to buy some fruit to take to them but there was no one selling it in Mamfe so all I could do was buy some cookies and Fanta at the petrol station and hope that would be enough. I took some pictures with Dana in Mamfe, in front of the bar called Mamas that we always drank at last summer, and then we got on a tro to go to Kwamoso. When we pulled up it felt like I had never left. We walked down the familiar dirt road and soon I was at the gate. I wasnt sure if I should just waltz in so I knocked and shouted, and pretty soon Ma walked out from the main house. Needless to say she was a little shocked when she saw me. As I figured she would, she immediately sat us down at the table and started cooking for us, and pretty soon we were munching on a typical meal from my summer, yam chips and salad with some cream crackers and Fanta. She was the only person home right at that moment, but pretty soon Kwame showed up and was also pretty shocked to see me, but they were both really happy- I could tell from their smiles and little giggles. Kwame and Dana got into an intense game (the name of which I cant remember) and we spent a while just sitting and chatting. I met the volunteers living with them now and talked about the family. Unfortunately no one else was even in Kwamoso that day, but Ma and Kwame were enough. We left Kwamoso about 3 in the afternoon and went to the orphanage in Tingkong that I used to go to, and we played with the kids for a little while. I recognized them but they didnt remember me- its understandable because so many volunteers go through there. The place has changed a lot, the kids didnt have nearly as many toys or clothes as they used to and all the beautiful paintings on the walls are gone, even the sign stating what the building was for. We couldnt stay very long because we had to get back into Accra that night, so we went back to Kwamoso for a quick goodbye. I gave Kwame the phone I had bought only the day before because he had lost his, and when I did that Ma said to me Youre a good sister, a true African woman. I left in a daze, it had all happened so fast and all I wanted to do was stay there and wait for the others to come home but we couldnt. We got back to the hotel in Accra and met the gals then left pretty quickly to get dinner. Dana took us to the night market on the university campus, which was awesome. I had an egg sandwich, which tasted just how I remembered. Dana went home because she had class the next morning and we went back to Jerrys, where we had a beer then went back to the hotel and went to bed. The next morning Dana took us to a place where they dye kente cloth and we got to watch, and then we had to say goodbye. It was so sad ? I was so happy to see her and to be able to share our experiences with each other. Our Ghana experiences are so different from each others, but its cool that we both got to see how the each other lived/is living. After we said goodbye we went to the Accra mall to pick up some essentials, such as peanut butter and headphones, and then had lunch at Chicken Inn. We left the mall and went back to the hotel to pack up and head out. The guy at the front desk of the hotel got us a cab and told him where we wanted to go, but as we arrived at the station we got a little uncomfortable. None of the buses were the big ones that we had taken to get to Accra, and even the cab driver seemed frustrated. He told us that we needed to really watch our bags here, and that he would have taken us to a different station. The way he was acting made us feel like even he was uncomfortable being there, and that set off our alarm bells, so we told him to take us to the other station and that we would pay him more. He took us to a better station after explaining how people there just sit around not working and that he doesnt like it there. On the way there, while we were stopped at a light, I bought a water bottle from a woman on the side of the road. It was 60 pesewas, and I gave her a 1 cedi note. The light turned green before she could get the change out, and she started running to keep up with the car but she couldnt get it out quick enough. We drove off and I honestly wasnt that worried because it was the equivalent of about 15 cents, but when we were stopped at the next red light we were shocked to see her sprint up to the car, panting, complete with water bottles on her head, with my change in her hand. In that one little anecdote is the spirit of most Ghanaians I have encountered. Our cab driver made sure that a bus was leaving soon before we got out and we gave him about triple what we originally agreed on because we were so grateful to him. He was definitely thrilled. We had to wait at the station for a couple hours and while we were there we wandered looking for ice cream and plantain chips, where Jenny and Molly found a newsstand and I bought two magazines, BBC Focus on Africa and African News. When I was buying them the woman at the stand told me Ghana and America are one country, we are one people. I was so taken aback by a stranger telling me something so profound at such a random moment that I wasnt really able to respond other than to say thank you, but it was such a wrap-up moment of all the interactions Ive had with people in Ghana both times Ive been here. We got back to Takoradi pretty wiped out and overwhelmed, but we decided to go out anyway because we couldnt bring ourselves to just sit on the boat all night. Right across from the boat there was a duty free shop, and some SAS kids had turned it into a bar by buying alcohol bottles and sitting outside, so there were lots of kids hanging out there. We stayed for a while but there werent really any locals there and, having had the experiences and interactions that we did with Ghanaians in Accra, we wanted more of a local scene. When we left there a guy named Baba who was selling stuff at the little market by the boat decided to walk with us. We were with a huge group of girls and he said he didnt want us to be unsafe so he would be our escort all night. We went to a bar called Oceans and sat with some local rasta guys talking all night, it was really cool. Baba wanted to dance, and he came over and told me to please make sure I told him when we wanted to leave because he didnt want us to leave without him and get into trouble, and I promised I would. After he was finished dancing Baba sat with me a lot of the night and was just obsessed with the fact that I said I had lived in Ghana before and that I wanted to come back for an extended amount of time. He told me that most people he knows want to get out of Ghana, not come live in Ghana, and he spent a lot of time telling me how much that meant to his people. He explained to me that Ghana loves America, and that the people want us to feel comfortable and accepted there. He said that all Ghanaians would defend a white even if it was a black doing something wrong. I definitely knew what he meant, from my time there in the summer and this time. We were constantly taken care of by random people who had no other incentive to help us other than out of the goodness of their hearts. I know what youre probably thinking (especially any adults who are reading this), but I can usually tell when someone is being sketchy. Im not trying to say that there are no people in Ghana with bad intentions, but most everyone I have ever met there has been nothing but kind. The next morning Molly, Kelly and I headed out kind of late to go to a beach called Busua beach. The security guard at the port got us a driver who was going to stay with us all day and bartered the price down, and we headed out. The beach was about 40 minutes from Takoradi, and it was beautiful. There were a ton of SAS kids a little way down the beach, but all 3 of us were more interested in being away from them so we stayed at the resort and ate lunch then took a little walk. We walked into this little fishing village situated on the beach where a little stream flows into the ocean. It was beautiful, but slightly marred by the dead dog on the sand that vultures were picking at. The local kids were playing soccer only a little way from it, but they didnt seem to notice it. Its not part of their culture to see dogs or cats as pets the way we do, so I guess we cant blame them. After our walk we swam in the ocean, which felt like bath water, and then passed out on our beach chairs. We left about 5 pm and told our driver we wanted to get fruit before he dropped us off, so he took us to a little stand he knew of. The man there fell in love with Kelly and called her his wife, which was funny, but they had a huge assortment of fruit so we bought TONS. When we got back to the ship we sat on the ground outside just stuffing our faces with it since we couldnt take it on with us. Our tummies were hurting and our hands were disgusting but it was worth it. We went out to Ocean bar again that night but it wasnt that fun, because all the people who wanted to sell us stuff figured out that thats where SAS kids were going so there were hoards of them there. We ended up staying about 20 minutes, after watching a guy EAT A GLASS BOTTLE FOR 5 CEDIS. It was crazy, and I was talking to another Ghanaian while we were watching and he said hes seen the guy do it before and yes, it was really painful. Ouch. We went home and passed out, only to wake up really early and get on a bus to go to the Nzulezo Water Village. It was a 2-hour bus ride and then an hour canoe ride in the rain, but it was Molly, Jenna, Margaret and I so it was a good group of gals on our canoe. We had a lot of fun, but since we were short on time and had to make it back to the boat before it left us we only stayed at the village for like 20 minutes. We had lunch and looked at an old British fort then came back on the ship, showered, and had dinner. Then we passed out after an exhausting, intense, wonderful 5 days in Ghana. I think Ive already stated it enough, and anyone who has read this whole super long post will grasp that Im obsessed with it here. I love Ghana. One of the alumni of SAS who is on our voyage, Andrew Briggs, had a really profound statement that I think applies here. He, like me, was interested in doing service work after college but wasnt quite sure where he wanted to invest himself. He said that he had asked himself With what community do I want to walk with for the rest of my life? and that when he found it in northern Uganda, he knew. Immediately when I stepped off the boat in Ghana, even while being proposed to and pestered to buy things within 5 minutes, I felt completely sure that this place- these people, this country- is the community that I want to walk with.
