A Million Minutes in Africa

After we left the Hans Cottage Botel, we headed north to Kakum National Park. Much of the park is protected rainforest. It’s famous for its canopy walkway.

Forest elephants and colobus monkeys live in Kakum, but they were hiding during our visit. We heard a loud screech, which we thought came from a monkey, but the guide said it was a bird of prey. The only wildlife we actually saw were butterflies and geckos.

Our (mandatory) guide told us a little bit about the trees. He said that the bark from the dahome tree was used to make clothing in the olden days. The bark is beaten until it is soft, like cotton. An Italian man in our group told us that he saw such cloth in Côte d’Ivoire, and that it was pretty. He didn’t speak any English, but he was fluent in French, so Dan, René and I could communicate with him.

To quench their thirst after the forest walk, René, Emily, and the Italian man bought coconuts from the coconut man, who chopped off the tops of the coconuts, inserted straws, and handed them over to drink.

Next stop, Ko-Sa Guesthouse in Ampenyi, a beach town. It’s a German-run place where the clay huts are topped with thatch, vegetarian options abound on the menu, and the sea water rushes into rocky tidal pools just off the beach.

René found barnacles or some such creatures gripping the rocks.

The beach was pleasant for walking and remarkably uncrowded.

The sky really was that color, due to Harmattan, a dry wind that blows sand and dust from the Sahara toward the Gulf of Guinea (the body of water that Ghana borders). The locals don’t like it, but we’re really enjoying the less humid air and cooler temperatures it’s bringing. They say it’s particularly severe this year.

We returned to Ada Foah, the place where we went sailing a while back, on Dec. 29 and 30. We stayed in a house with 2 friends. The house has a little covered deck jutting over the water. Sitting out there was delightful, thanks to the gentle breeze and peaceful surroundings. Here’s what the view looked like:

In the evening we met up with a Fulbright scholar who is studying the leatherback and olive ridley turtles that nest on the beach here. He and his wife led us on a nighttime beach walk. Every night they take such a walk and record any turtle nesting activity they observe. In the previous few weeks they had seen more and more turtles each night, so they were sure we’d see a bunch. After 3 hours of walking we saw a few nests but zero turtles. Maybe next time.

The next day we returned to the beach. There’s a fishing village there.

What a beautiful setting, if you don’t look too closely and can’t see the trash scattered about.

We returned to the hills of Aburi after hearing about Ghana Bike Tours from our friends. We selected one of about a dozen possible rides. Each ride was charted for elevation changes, distance and time required. Our ride was 11.5 km long. It began with a steep downhill plunge – whee! Then we turned onto a singletrack trail, actually a footpath maintained by locals. We went over plenty of rocks and roots as well as a stream. Our guide pointed out some of the plants we passed – corn (called maize here), cassava and cocoa. We passed a few pedestrians who responded warmly to our greetings.

At one point we passed a field that had been burnt to the ground. In the middle of it was a dead vulture tied by its feet, hanging upside down from a post. Our guide said it was a warning to stay away from this place. Okay.

It was hot, hot, hot, and we dripped with sweat as we pedaled uphill. Our guide suggested we take a break at the top.

All in all, it was a nice ride. Next time we’ll go earlier in the morning though, to avoid the worst of the heat.

On Tuesday a container with all of our household effects arrived in our compound. The truck carrying the container could not maneuver the last turn, so the movers had to offload the contents into a smaller van, then drive the van over to our house.

Getting the motorcycle out was the biggest challenge.

Fortunately, the guy in charge was savvy enough to figure out a way.

Now that it’s all in the house, it’s apparent that we have a lot of junk. Hard to believe all that stuff actually fit in our tiny DC apartment. We had gotten used to living without it. Now so much of it seems unnecessary.

Opening the boxes is fun, although the idea of sorting through so many of them is daunting. Things we were thrilled to find: blender, ice cream maker, teapot, new crossword book (thanks, Matt), Sudoku book (sorry, Matt), stereo, novels galore, sewing machine, electric piano, Trader Joe’s ginger granola, tools, and bike parts. Woo-hoo! It must be Hannukah or something.

When you gotta go, you gotta go.  That’s how Ghanaians feel, or at least that’s what we assume from the astounding amount of public urination we’ve witnessed in the past couple of months.

In the US, people usually seek discreet places, behind a tree or shrub, say, when a restroom is nowhere near.  In other countries we’ve seen a little less discretion — sometimes a truck driver would just stand at the side of the road, turn away, and go.

In Ghana they don’t even bother turning around.  They face the road while urinating.  Why?  Is it to give all the passersby a better view?  Do they think they’re less likely to be hit by a passing car?

It happens all over — on country roads, city streets, residential areas, beaches.  We went for a walk on the beach at Prampram on Saturday.  Part of it appears to be a public toilet.  Charming.

Initially we thought it was only men who engaged in this behavior.  Wrong.  Last weekend we saw a woman in a nice dress, standing near a bus stop with lots of other people nearby,  standing with her legs straddled and a stream of liquid falling out.  She also appeared to be holding her underwear to one side to keep it out of the way.  No private parts showed, but yikes.

A couple weeks ago, I began volunteering at the Kathy Knowles Community Library, which is one of the libraries run by the Osu Children’s Library Fund. [Thanks to Heather, former intern at my former workplace, for telling me about it.]

The library is housed in a converted shipping container!

I was interested in librarian tasks, but what they needed was a literacy teacher, so that’s what I am. There are three classes: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. I am teaching the advanced class. Advanced in this case means they can read basic texts haltingly. Their writing is not as strong as their reading, and spelling is hardest of all for them. The beginners are learning the alphabet — the sound each letter makes and how to hold a pencil and write the letters. The intermediate students are learning to combine letters to sound out syllables and begin to read words.

The students in my class seem to be either in their late teens or early twenties for the most part, although one woman looks to be in her 50s.

I’m not sure why these students are just learning to read, if they ever went to school or weren’t able to for some reason. Anyway, it’s great that they are taking advantage of these free literacy classes to learn. They are all very nice and enthusiastic.

Dan writes-
So, what is there to do in Accra on weekends? I am sure there is plenty, but since we are newly-wheeled, it seems like it’s time to look around outside of the city. I saw a little ad for the Accra-Tema Yacht Club and I wanted to check it out. Yes, a yacht club. White pants, blue blazers, and lots of blonde people named Biff and Muffy who don’t move their mouths a lot when they speak. Not exactly my scene, but it sounded more interesting than watching tv. In our house, we get the Armed Forces Network. This is a few channels that get beamed to various US military vortexes, vortices? Since it is some kind of cable deal for the military folk, it is blessedly free of commercials! What a concept. We have not seen an ad for Prilosec, Lipitor, Lunestra, Skeletor, Gomora, or any of the rest of the magic pills that made me feel like I needed some kind of medication for something. Lucky for me, I got issued a nice bottle full of anti-malarial pills that make me wonder how bad actually getting malaria could be.In spite of the nausea I have been enjoying from taking anti-malarial pills, I wanted to get my expanding arse off the La-Z-Boy and go for a mini adventure. If you have never known the joys of a reclining chair, be careful. When we first opened the door to our new digs, there it was, right in our living room full of wall-to-wall faux marble tile. I like to think of it as our own little Italian hotel room. If you have ever had the pleasure to visit Italy, you may have noticed a liberal use of marble and tiles. At least that is the case in hotel rooms for “cost sensitive” travelers. Easier to hose them down perhaps, something akin to the back seat of a cop car with the metal plate floor and seat- not that I have been in the back of one. Just saw it from the street. Honest.

The problem with reclining chairs is that as soon as you pull that lever on the right side and lean back, it is ever so difficult to get vertical again. The chair has attacked you on two fronts (instead of commercials, Armed Forces Network has lots of spots about military lingo, life in the military, the history of the military, “why I serve in the military”, the weather at military bases, and other soldier stuff). First, it is actually quite a pleasure to have my feet elevated as I view the tv through my insteps. If I am tired, I can fall asleep in short order. How did I go for decades without appreciating this? Yes, this latest adventure is all about experiencing new things and living life on the edge. The other way this overstuffed, corduroy-clad devil keeeps you stuck is by not having a lever to un-recline the chair. To get out, you have to get some momentum going with your upper body while punching your legs down to push down on the pop-up ottoman part of the chair. Perhaps you scoff at my increasing decrepitude, but I am thinking that getting out of the chair a few times a day could qualify as an exercise regime. At least, that is how it feels for me when on anti-malarials. At least one person was telling me that malaria “is not so bad.” She has never had it, so I guess I shouldn’t give her opinion too much credence.

This weekend was one of the first in a while that anti-malarial pills have not kept me firmly glued in place in a crabby stupor. We hopped into our overkill SUV and drove along the main road heading east out of Accra. After about an hour-and-a-half we arrived in the town of Ada Foah. After driving around in circles a bit, and then driving through what felt like someone’s living room, we finally found the Yacht Club. I say “yacht club” in a very loose sense. Not a single yacht. No white shoes within hundreds, perhaps thousands of miles.

For some reason I have always loved junkyards. I think they demonstrate how unproductive it is to covet worldly possessions. Think of the millions of hard-earned dollars that were scrimped together to pay for the shiny metal and steel sitting on the showroom floors. Now, all of those crumbly hulks of steel are picked over for their parts and are often worth less than nothing as a whole. People sometimes pay to have their car towed away. The paint gets so dull that upright citizens would not be caught cruising in a shabby Chevy. Look at the people, usually the young-uns, gush about their new rides on Pimp My Ride (yeah, it is one of my favorite shows, at least conceptually). They scream about how their lives are going to be so much better now that they got a ‘sick ride’ that is painted up nice and has chrome wheels. I am not sure why I like the show so much- maybe it is a graphic portrayal about what is wrong, and what is right in our country, or even our world? Wrong- a new ride, as far as I know, will not change your life so much that you should be jumping up and down and screaming like you are on fire. Right- sometimes you can change your life dramatically and maybe the catalyst is something as tangible as a fetishized object. Don’t get me wrong. I like cars. I like driving a little more than most people. I am constantly amazed that cars can propel us forward without going up in a ball of flames. It’s just that cars are in a constant state of decay. Contrary to the ads, they are not an investment. They are an expense. The more time passes, the closer the car gets to the junkyard. Drive it, it gets used up. Let it sit, it rots. The best you can do is delay its pasture days by taking decent care of it. The junkyard is a reminder of the inevitable. It reminds me to get out and do things like take a nice drive. Take a little sail.

The guys sitting around in the shade among some of the more rotten hulls dragged a little Laser sailboat to the water for us. It was a sleek inverted bathtub of a vessel.

Not exactly spacious for three people, but hey, we’re friends. We quickly got underway thanks to a confident wind that blew in exactly the direction for us to slide down the Volta River. Towards the ocean. The Atlantic Ocean.

more to come when I get some more free time–

Here are some sights we saw on the way back from Aburi. First, a rustic gas station. That reddish-orange stuff in the glass container at the top of the post is gas. Perhaps the car in the background actually used some of that gas.

This big square thing is the storage tank for the gas.

Further down the road, we saw this political mural on the side of a building. It’s a picture of President Kufuor. Interesting motto.

On Sunday we visited Aburi Botanical Gardens, located about 35 km north of Accra. What a difference 35 km can make. It was noticeably cooler, the landscape was hilly rather than flat like Accra, and the air was clearer. There was also far less traffic.

The gardens themselves are divided into lawns with paths leading to each. Many of the trees, brought in from the far reaches of the British Empire in the late 19th century, are labeled with their scientific name, common name and uses. It was a real treat to go for a walk under tall, shady trees.

For some reason, there is a broken down helicopter in the gardens. Dan and David enjoyed climbing around in it. Despite appearances, they are not injured in any way.

Near Aburi is the town of Mampong, where we visited Tetteh Quarshie’s farm. Tetteh Quarshie was the man who brought cocoa to the Gold Coast (now known as Ghana) back in the 1870s. Now Ghana is the second largest exporter of cocoa in the world (behind Côte d’Ivoire). Chances are that some of the delicious chocolate treats you enjoy originated in Ghana.

We had never seen cocoa fruits before and were surprised to see the way they grow right out of the tree trunk.

The fruit is cut open, and the seeds are removed and dried for 10 days. Then the seeds are ready to be ground and made into chocolate. We tasted some of the dried beans. Of course they are not chocolate – no sugar in them – but the taste of cocoa is unmistakable.

The caretaker and his daughter explained all this to us. Some cocoa beans are drying on the table in the photo above.

Here we are next to one of the original trees, supposedly. Funny how it’s so skinny after over 100 years.