Here today Ghana Tomorrow

I have been bitten by the African Bug. And I am not referring to all the flea bites on the backs of my calves. Ghana now holds a piece of my heart in its hands. I know that I will return again one day to the beautiful country of jungles and broken highways. The Ghanaian people are of the most beautiful race I have ever been graced to meet. They are wise, kind, and above all else gentle. Every person I met touched me in a significant way.
My first thought as I pulled out of the port gates in the maroon shuttle overcrowded with SAS students was “THIS IS AFRICA.” As we exited the highly secured entrance to the Tema port, our small shuttle of 15 students immediately became the minority. A feeling that I have personally never truly experienced on the scale I did that day. At first, I have to admit that I was uncomfortable, this feeling quickly wore off since practically everyone spoke English and everyone was so warm and friendly.
After bargaining with a taxi driver, Sarah, Stephanie, and I headed toward Accra with no idea what the $10, 40 minute ride had in store for us. For all of you believers out there that think LA rush hour traffic is bad, or that NYC cab drivers are crazy, Ghana is NOT the place for you. There are NO rules. I never realized the luxury of painted lines and streetlights. We had our driver drop us at the “Cultural Center” aka tourist market, where Ghanaians make as much off of tourists as they can by hawking goods made mostly by the Asante people of the northern rural areas and Volta region. I didn’t buy much, but I learned the proper way to play Mancala, not to trust all people claiming to be Rastafarians, even if they seem really cool, and that it is okay and rather easy to say no to vendors.
We didn’t stick around too long since we had plans on attending a welcome reception by a Ghanaian university. The students were so friendly, most of them seemed to want to travel, earn their graduate degrees, start a business, then return to Ghana and invest their time and efforts in propelling the country into first world status. I found this theme fairly popular among the people I met. Most were interested in seeing other places but it seemed all Ghanaians shared a certain love for their country that is unmatched by any nationality I have met before.
I ended up going out with a few of the Ghanaian students afterwards. Since I was tired, and have decided not to participate in drinking while on this voyage, it was a little lame. We went to this place called Purple Pub, where a drink consisting of 3 shots gin and ½ shot of lime was immediately placed in my hand, um no thankyou.
It was an odd juxtaposition, all of the students had very high tech cell phones, yet we were in the middle of one of the most poverty-stricken areas I have witnessed.
Of the many experiences that I encountered in Ghana, by far the most striking was the overnight trip to the Volta Region of the country. Volta is located in the Southwest corner of Ghana bordering the country of Togo. While in Volta, I was privileged to peak Mt. Afadjato-the highest mountain, swim at the base of the Wli Waterfall-the tallest in the country, feed the endangered Mona Monkey of the village of Tafi, meet a school full of Ghanaian children, stay in the Chances Hotel that Obama graced, and even learn a song in one of the many local dialects of Ewe.
For my final night in Ghana, Andy and I ventured out in Tema. We had heard of other students enjoying their time there the previous nights so thought we would stay close since it was a 5-minute taxi drive. Once we were there we quickly realized we were the only white people, and this was a locals area. We didn’t see any other SASers and felt pretty safe…at first. Then we made friends with this guy that was selling bootleg dvds and he took it upon himself to “show us around.” He took us down this dark alley and started leading us across a dark futbol field. I quickly found myself in the situation my parents had warned me about. Andy and I exchanged uncomfortable expressions and turned things around. We got back to the main street, certain we had just barely avoided a bad situation.
That’s when we saw the only other white person I saw in all of Ghana. Naturally, we approached him and learned he was from London and had recently married Amina, the sweetest Ghanaian woman ever. She immediately took us under her wing and invited us to her house. It was a single room, with no electricity, very dark. There were a series of locks on her door and everything inside was locked in suitcases. Amina showed us wedding pictures and gave me a Ghana t-shirt. She was waiting for her marriage visa’s from the UK to be processed so that they could move back to London.
Amina kept buying us traditional Ghanaian food. We tried grilled liver, this porridge stuff that was served in a plastic bag that you bit the corner off and sucked out the goo, fresh sugar cane, and coconut juice. MMMMM. We were eating all the foods we advised not to but, I just couldn’t say no to her. I regretted this decision later when I was sick in bed for two days. Anyway, Amina was so worried about us because apparently we had wandered into the cocaine district when she found us. It was common for white people to be taken advantage of and even fall victim of crime. She wouldn’t let us leave without her setting up a cab driver back to the ship for us. I am really glad that we happened to run into her.