Small notes about old things, and the Trip to the North!

Greetings family and friends!

As ever, life is crazy. I only have 11 days left, and I feel like time keeps slipping away from me, but not in that “ack! I’m leaving soon” kind of way… surprisingly, it’s in the “wait, I meant to do things today – why does time conspire against me?” kind of way. It’s basically because there are many other people upon whom my plans depend and they generally refuse to make up their minds ;) This is ok, however, for such is life in Ghana. Also, I am having some “ending consciousness”. I still have plenty of money to survive, but I’ll have to be careful to make it last for everything I *want* it to do. I also know that I need to distribute my contact info to people who are difficult to track. I’m planning my last visits to important places to see important people. That kind of thing.

Some addendums, retractions, etc, followed by some notes on our trip to the North!

-I had written that my mom’s side of the family doesn’t like fish, but Grandma actually does enjoy it. I think my memory was simply overwhelmed by my aunt and Papa’s strong feelings against fish, but Grandma’s probably also partially responsible for my mixed, fickle tastebuds.

-I do also occasionally see men carrying children in Ghana. They’re just much less common than women carrying children… perhaps in the same proportion you would find in the US. When men carry them, though, they never put the babies on their backs. I find it sweet to see them, regardless. The issue is slightly complicated because a man’s children don’t technically belong to his family; because of the matrilineal system, they belong to the mother’s extended family, and the father is technically closer to his sister’s children. A father is responsible for his children’s well-being, but when he dies whatever inheritance he leaves goes back to his extended family rather than his immediate family. This is changing to a degree as a result of modernization and westernization, with both positive and negative effects (as I see it). But at any rate, in Fante (and general Akan) society, children are usually in the care of their mothers until they’re about 5-7, and then the boys go to live with their fathers. They think it’s very important to have both mother and father figures in a child’s life, though occasionally the father figure is an uncle. It’s interesting to me, though, that I’ve met several boys whose fathers died when they were young, who grew up very close to their mothers, and then went to University. Mothers are highly loved and respected in general here, whereas fathers are viewed in a more financially responsible but emotionally distant way, as far as I can tell.

-Other animals in Ghana: there are butterflies here, and they’re beautiful. I think they’ve been having a heyday since the rainy season came, because now there are flowers. I’ve also had a nice time over the past few weeks watching these little birds take baths in a puddle caused by air conditioning condensation at the University. It’s truly a rare source of water out in the open, though I’ll admit it finally felt like “the rainy season” when it rained three times in four days a couple of weeks ago. Running water is still scarce in most of Cape Coast, though.

On our trip up North, I was keeping my eyes open for animals, and saw a few. Though I felt like I saw fewer goats there than in the South, I’m told that the goat stock originates from the North, so they’re both cheaper and better there. (Akwasi bought one at the Burkina Faso border, carried it with us in the van to Bolgatanga, and then had it slaughtered in the market, along with some choice pieces of cow, for his family. That was an experience). I also saw more pigs in the North, and donkeys! The donkeys were plentiful, and half the time I saw them grazing, and the other times they were attached to carts being directed by children along the road. It was neat, especially because I’ve only seen one or two donkeys anywhere in the South. There was even one horse by the crocodile pond in the North. And that said, surprisingly, there are crocodiles. Before coming to Ghana, I had never really thought about crocodiles being in Africa except in Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories. More on crocodiles in a moment.

The first day to the North was spent traveling to get there. We left at about 8:30am, had a sound lunch in Kumasi, stopped briefly at one other place, I think, and then reached where we were staying for the night around 8pm. It was a Catholic Guest house about 30 minutes from Mole National Park.

When we set off for Mole (pronounced “MOH-lay”) the next morning, we passed through two villages/towns. I can’t precisely remember the name of the first one, but I liked it a lot, because it reminded me very much of small towns in North Carolina. In fact, a lot of the North reminded me of home, because it’s more green, and it simply feels more typically rural. It’s funny to me that it’s greener than the South, but also consistently hotter. We didn’t feel too much of the heat, though, because it was overcast throughout our stay. Thank goodness ;)

Mole was awesome. We spent a couple of morning hours there, and went on a small guided hike in which we saw (in this order) monkeys, deer, warthogs, and elephants! Don’t let the order fool you, however, because we saw the elephants while still next to the park buildings. It was very interesting, especially to see monkeys sitting and eating on huge branches that you know are actually tree branches, rather than the concrete fake ones at zoos. It was all beautiful. We even got to see the elephants taking baths! And I will say that though I am tired of seeing carved black elephants (did African carvers ever make their carvings black before there was shoe polish?) African elephants are indeed black while they’re in the water and when they first come out. Otherwise they’re grayish-brown.

Next we went to a village (I believe) called Lalabenga. They claim to have the oldest mosque still standing in Africa, and one of the few to have traditional middle-eastern architecture. The whole village is embarking on a project to improve things around there through tourism and cooperation. They’re trying to better their education, find alternatives for the people who used to hunt in Mole, and get better sources of water for themselves. It’s interesting how they’re transitioning their tourism there. Ask me about that when I get home ;)

The fact of the matter is that most tourism in Ghana feels strange. It’s not the fact-gathering extravaganza that it is in the US and Europe. There’s less substance behind the presentations than there could be, because they’re trying to streamline things for tourists, or simply because not much research has been done about whatever site is being explored. Now, this isn’t entirely bad. For example, at the former slave camp we visited the next day, there weren’t many researched facts presented, but we were basically given the whole oral history of the area, which let us know how the folks there felt about it, interpreted it, and carried the pain of that place with them. That was in Paga, at the border with Burkina Faso, just across from the crocodile pond. Interestingly, without our passports we did walk across the border and back, very briefly experiencing a very small part of a francophone country ;)

The crocodile pond was a more typical example of what happens at Ghanaian tourist sites. There’s an oral history about how it came to be that crocodiles (which in other places do attack humans, much more than alligators) peacefully live in the village’s main water supply. However, no one told it to us, and when Katie and I hastily tried to read some about it from signs underneath a thatched shelter, we were hurried along. The real event was (after Akwasi agreed to sponsor a few fowls) they coaxed a big, blind crocodile out of the pond with a chicken, then dragged it to where they wanted it, and encouraged us to sit on it (I just touched it’s back and then moved away. We got pictures of Katie and Chantal). They then tossed the chicken to it, and allowed it to go back into the water. The other crocodiles looking for free chickens were rapped on their snouts with sticks, and so sent back into the water. That was the true extent of our experience at the pond, though later Akwasi told us that people fish in that water, and get into it to fill up barrels with water, and that no one ever gets hurt. Mind-boggling ;)

I’m out of time again, but I should be able to post once more before I come home next weekend. I love you all so much! Thanks for reading and caring, and I’ll see you all soon!

love,

Rachel Rose

An up-coming trip to the North, and cooking fiascos :)

Greetings family and friends!

Life is busy, even in Ghana ;) People tell me it’s not, but it’s still complicated to try to be efficient with my resources and time. C’est la vie.

There’s trouble in paradise – I’m having some difficulty with the things that were sewn for me, but hopefully I’ll work that out tomorrow. I also have plenty of money left from my stipend, because I think I’ve been reasonably frugal and I haven’t bought nearly all of my gifts for people yet, but I’m expecting to spend a lot on our trip to the North which will be happening this Thursday. We’ll be staying mainly in Tamale, but also making excursions to see tame crocodiles (at a temple, I believe), and also Mole National Park (pronounced “Molé”) where there are elephants! The North has a vastly different culture from the South, and is renowned for its leatherworking and smocks. It also has a completely different musical tradition from the South. Katie knows much more about it than I do because she’s taken a class on music in Ghana, but apparently even their instruments are different. For example, the xylophone is played in the North, but not the South.

The one other thing I know about traditional music in (perhaps only the South of) Ghana is that women are traditionally not allowed to play drums. Remarkably, a few women still choose to do their music major in drumming at the University of Cape Coast. Also, when we went to the shrine last week, the priestesses were not only encouraging and correcting the children; they would sometimes take the drums in the middle of the performance and play them to teach the children the missing rhythms. So, sometimes this taboo gets broken, whether for education or for self-edification that can never be expressed.

Also, I’m not sure what the word “smock” conjures up for anyone else, but for me it brings an image of a frilly, loose coat for a girl. Perhaps my impression is completely mistaken even in my home context, but anyway, it’s completely wrong for Ghana ;) Apparently smock-dresses are also made for women, but the only ones I’ve seen are these awesome loose sleeveless shirts for men that sort of flare out at the bottom. I love them. If I wore one of the ones I’ve seen, it wouldn’t precisely be modest by home or Ghanaian standards, however, because as I said, they’re very loose. People still tell me they’re good to wear when it’s “cold” however. Naturally, we have vastly different definitions of “cold”. Generally when you’re chilly in Ghana it’s late in the evening, you’re sitting right under a fan, and it’s on too high. But sometimes my sisters wear long-sleeved t-shirts when the wind’s blowing after a rain.

Speaking of rain, yesterday there was a large rainstorm. Akwasi says that they don’t have storms with “high wind” here, but again, it’s a relative thing. Their storms can flood a lot, and bring down big branches of trees (and trees themselves, Katie tells me) like a bad ice storm in the southern US, but just from the wind and rain. But then again, they don’t get hurricanes or tornadoes. I suppose there are hazards living everywhere, of different degrees and frequencies. This particular storm, however, made me happy by bringing down a branch behind our back porch, suddenly opening a marvelous view of the lagoon. It’s awesome, and don’t worry, I’ll take a picture :)

Right now the seminary and my house are deathly quiet most of the day while the seminarians take exams. We don’t even talk too loudly because some of them are writing not 25 feet from the house in what’s practically a garage, and our windows don’t shut. So, after the storm yesterday I tried to be very quiet as I prepared four dishes from home for our families here to eat. (Katie and Chantal also prepared food, and we all came together with our families at Chantal’s house that evening). Staying quiet proved easy until my sisters came home, at which point I hadn’t even finished one dish, but fortunately the seminarians finished soon after. And, then, fortunately, my sisters gave me lots of help, which complicated some things and made others easier.

All in all, I made mashed potatoes, cooked apples, fried okra and deviled eggs, and they all turned out fine. Most people liked all of them, except for my sisters who are slightly picky eaters ;) The mashed potatoes turned out precisely as they were supposed to. For the cooked apples, I added too much brown sugar, but they were still ok as a desert-type thing. The fried okra (called okro here) was ok, though I didn’t have corn meal. I ended up using corn flour, and whole eggs, and they were fried in palm oil. They were great when they first came out, though slightly less great after they got cold. (Ah well).

The real show-stoppers, however, were the deviled eggs! At their first introduction, Mother was alarmed by their name. How could I explain that a church dinner would be lacking without deviled eggs? I had thought about this naming issue before, and even imagined that it would cause a stir in my very religious family (though they didn’t seem to care that the cat in Cinderella is named Lucifer). After Mother commented, however, I realized that if I was an anthropologist visiting a culture and they told me they had Satan pancakes, I might wonder at the connection.

Then, of course, I couldn’t find all the right ingredients. Mayonnaise is plentiful in Ghana, but I didn’t find mustard or paprika though people later assured me that they exist. So, I had mayo, some hot ground pepper that was red, salt, and sugar. One of my sisters added too much salt, so that was when the sugar came in, and surprisingly it did even out a little. Katie and I thought they were ok, though they were somewhat different from what we were used to (both in taste and also because the stuff turned out white, for various obvious reasons and also because cooked yolks in Ghana have less yellow color.) Gifty and Lawrence, however, *loved* them. They both ate several, even though Gifty was currently not eating eggs (she doesn’t eat some meat). Even the girls liked the inside stuff.

So, success! There were some hitches to the evening, but overall it went well, and people were fed. My last requirement is my African Traditional Religion exam tomorrow. Pray for me… ;) Then, it’s off to Tamale! Bright and early at 7am on Thursday in a rented van. It should be fun and interesting, and I’ll be taking pictures.

A couple of random topics for the day:

I don’t think I’ve written on this before, but it’s caused many strange moments during my time here ;) Generally when one beckons in the US, you either move your arm in a scooping sideways or pushing motion, or with your palm face up, you flick your fingers toward you. To wave goodbye, you might wave your hand and/or arm from side to side, or with your palm face out, move your fingers up and down. In Ghana, however, this last gesture is the one that means “come”, and people will sometimes simultaneously say “bra”, which is the word for come. Ninety-five percent of the time, if you (or a Ghanaian) make this gesture to a stranger, they will come. It’s a cultural thing that you come when you’re called. However, sometimes when I’m waving goodbye to people, I forget and make this gesture instead of just waving my hand side-to-side, and then people look at me quite confused, unless they’ve seen me mess up before. So it’s tricky, though not grave and quickly clarified.

As for this issue of being Ghanaian, it’s something that the Ghanaian government makes very difficult for foreigners, even though they’re very welcoming in general. They made something like 40 foreigners Ghanaian citizens this year (this was in the news several months ago). And in truth, it’s rather difficult to do. Ghanaians get very happy when outsiders speak their languages well, but those who do still stand out, especially if they’re white, because there just aren’t that many foreigners around. When the British moved out, they moved out. There are more in Accra than anyplace else, but that’s still not saying too much.

However, there are tons of non-Ghanaian countries, particularly in this year of the Ghanaian Golden Jubilee, that are saying they’re “proud to be Ghanaian” on their commercials. The advertising cycles that have hit hardest while we’re here are for paint (Azar, but now also others), beer (almost all Guinness), and the three major cell phone service providers. I’m told that none of them come from Ghana, but that they all claim it in some fashion or another. It’s just interesting, since I see less and less recently about being proud to be an American. Maybe I will when 2026 rolls around.

Anyway, that’s all for today! :) I love you all! I’ll write again as soon as I can.

Thank you so much for caring!

much love,

Rachel Rose

A Shrine, Sewing, and Body Use in Ghana

Greetings family and friends!

All is well in Ghana :) recent mental projects: coming to terms with the fact that I’m leaving soon, and have very little time left with my family here, and too little time to learn *everything*; coping with not being able to buy presents for *everyone*; forgiving my forgetfulness and strange habits; not worrying about things at home that I can’t help; basically, not worrying about all the things I can’t help ;) That’s the way it goes. I have to accept my human limitations and be grateful for what I can learn, see, do, help, and cope with. Yay for learning :)

I didn’t go to Takoradi this past weekend after all due to miscommunications and people being in alternate locations. It happens sometimes – I’ll just be going this weekend, and I’m sure hitting the club/disco once again ;) I also didn’t go to Praso, the nearby town where some extended family lives and where Planned Parenthood Association of Ghana does some outreach, but I may go there after our trip to the North, depending. My paper that was due on Monday went just fine, and now I’m having this middle-of-the-week chill time that I was rather looking forward to. It’s nice, although naturally more busy than I had planned. I’m also studying during this period and tomorrow I shall spend considerable time in the religious studies department library. Why they can’t put everything in one place I don’t know, but I suppose it doesn’t matter much in the long run.

The real story of my mid-week free period, however, is that I went to a traditional shrine today! It was an amazing experience. I have so much to say, and also so much to ponder. I think it’ll have to wait for the next entry, though, as I need to process more before I simply repeat ;) Suffice it to say that Katie and I got to speak to the administrator of a local shrine (the son of the priest who founded it) and asked him questions for a nearly an hour after witnessing libation prayer at the five individual shrines/altars. We also got to watch the kids and adults who live there, some of whom are priestesses, play drums and dance, experiencing how informal teaching, rehearsal and performance are all interrelated, normal and regular things in this context. We actually got to talk to someone who believes in all the aspects of traditional religion, who could explain to us in his own words (though in English) the mind-frame in which all of this takes place, some of the theology, et cetera. Also, he explained all of the specifics for why certain things are in certain places, how kola nuts actually look and how they can be used for divination, and why certain figures are revered. Ah, I learned sooooo much! I’m so thankful.

Of course, I’m less thrilled about doing my African Traditional Religion exam, but I’ll be as prepared as I can be ;) again, the last two exams & paper have gone just fine, it’s just that the exams from years past match very little with what we’ve been taught in this class, and they basically want us to write 5-paragraph essays through the whole thing, for which I have a slight distaste. I suppose that I should be grateful I was warned about the structure this time ;)

So, let’s see. Thursday is a calm day. On Friday I’ll go to PPAG, hang out with my friend George and then Katie, Chantal and I will go out to dinner with our African Lit professor Naana Jane for some processing/debriefing time, now that we’re definitely ending “school” here and are nearly at the end of our general time in Ghana. Hopefully on Saturday morning I’ll go to Takoradi, then come back on Monday morning, and our Guilford trio will cook American food for our families :) And by American I mean that Katie will probably be making some guacamole, so yeah, it’s our normal crazy cultural mix ;) On Tuesday we’ll all take our Fante exam, on Wednesday I have my African Traditional Religion exam, and on Thursday we begin our trip to the North, either returning on Sunday or Monday. I hope it’s Monday, because the trip involves lots of traveling time, so we might as well see as much as we can while we’re up there. Our Benin trip, which would in theory happen the following weekend, is still up in the air. So in sum, you’ll probably get at least a brief report on all of these things, and also I should be posting on Wednesday again next week. Woot.

Ok, Ghanaian English Time :) Please remember that this doesn’t necessarily apply to all of Ghana, and may only apply to Akan-speaking areas.

First of all, people don’t ever say “pick up”, as in “Go and pick up the phone”, or “I’ll pick you up this afternoon”. They just say “pick”, as in “Go to the taxi station, and I will come pick you”, or “why didn’t you pick my call?”

Next, people often ask you if you’re finished for the day, but they don’t say finished, they say “closed”. “Have you closed for the day?” There’s an exact Fante equivalent, and it’s one of those important cultural questions. There are a lot of words asking about how work is going, and people often tell me to study (“learn”) hard. In Fante, the verb for “to learn” is also used for reading, so you essentially say “I’m going to learn my book” Mokosua buuku.

Also, I was reading this book of theology by a Ghanaian woman, Mercy Amba Oduyoye, and at one point she mentioned that when people were essentially declining your invitation to eat with them (and you must always invite those around you to eat with you) that people would say “my hand is in it”, because usually you’d be eating out of a common bowl, pulling off pieces from the same ball of fufu, etc. Now, having been in Ghana for four months and never learned this (I learned the word for inviting someone early, because I asked) I thought that it was some obscure cultural thing that mostly older people do, or that’s done in the country, because no one ever said it that way to me in English. Whenever I invited someone, they always declined by saying “no, enjoy yourself” or something of the sort – until two days ago, that is, when one of my little sisters suddenly instructed me in the Fante for “my hand is in it”. I could spell how it sounds, but it wouldn’t be correct. But it’s interesting how cultural things like that, to which I’ve been exposed for so long, can still remain partially hidden.

And finally, even though when Ghanaians knock and make a sound to indicate knocking “koh kooh koh” they make three sounds, when Ghanaian children play they don’t say “one, two, three” to start something (for example, jumping rope, or beginning a rhythmic game). They just say “one, two”, and they also generally say them slower than kids in the US “one, two, three”, so maybe it takes up the same amount of time. Maybe they also just need less rhythmic preparation. Who knows? I don’t think it’s because western culture puts more things in threes… if anything we do more in four, which my memories of kid rhymes and games confirm. Ah well :)

And now for random cultural topics: Carrying things on one’s head. Yes, people do that in Ghana. My family doesn’t usually carry water on their heads (though other people do), but they carry big containers full of bread, bundles of laundry, and anything else that’s either big, heavy or unwieldy. As I’ve mentioned, hawkers almost always carry things on their heads, but tons of other people running errands and moving things carry stuff on their heads too. One of the first things I was amazed by upon entering Ghana was the men carrying long boards and metal pipes around the city on their heads. Also, by “long” I don’t mean 8 feet. I mean more like 15-20 feet. Sometimes two people would be carrying such a long thing together, but last Friday I saw a man carrying an entire refrigerator on his head by himself! Also, people carry huge loads of firewood in the country, and anything else you can think of that you would have to carry for a distance. Once I saw a large stack of VCRs on someone’s head. Of course, while most Ghanaians apparently do have better balance than I do, they also have a little help which I have never seen portrayed in movies about Africa (maybe people don’t use it other places?): people generally take a rag, and sort of wind it into a circle, and then put that on their head first, to distribute, steady and slightly cushion the weight of their load, and also perhaps protect their head from hard or spiky pieces.

So, considering all of this, I wonder how much people hurt their backs here. They do of course have to lift these things to put them on and off their heads, but usually when it’s heavy they ask for (and receive) help, from anyone who’s around to give it. So anyway, I wonder how this affects one’s muscles. Ghanaians also generally seem to have good posture, though occasionally really tall people tend to keep their heads bent down, as if they grew too fast. I’ve heard people commenting about this in the US, too.

However, people in Ghana also bend at the waist far more easily than people of their same age in the US. They just sort of swing like a hinge from their waist, and it appears that they bend at a 90 degree angle, though they must stick their bottoms out to a degree to keep from falling over. But anyway, a lot of work in Ghana involves doing this for a long time, partially also because people don’t like to sit on the ground (though small stools are common). So instead, they just bend over to deal with their things, and move stuff (like bread, for instance ;)) around. I can talk about bread because my Mother here makes it, so I get to observe people at work around that. Also, most of the time if/when grass needs to be cut here, people do it with machetes rather than any kind of machine or even scythe. They also sweep with a tied-together handful of reeds, so you have to bend for that. But anyway, when cutting grass for an extended period of time, the men I’ve seen at the University each use a waist-height staff in their left hands to hold the top halves of their bodies as they bend over to cut with their right hands. I find all of this significant because it just goes to show how much the human body can actually do when trained, how “back-breaking work” is rather subjective, and how little we push ourselves in the US. It’s not even necessarily that people here are stronger – merely that they’re spry because they keep themselves spry.

And while we’re talking about bodies, I’ll comment on weight :) In Ghana, there are very few people who are really obese, but there are lots of people who are my weight and heavier. The difference is that they’re all older women. In Ghana, it’s expected that as you age, you might also grow in weight. So since I’m overweight for my age in Ghana, people think I’m older than I actually am by say, six or seven years. This is partially also why they all think I should be married by now ;)

Also, it’s common to see girls younger than me with babies, usually on their backs. Motherhood is extremely important in Ghana, and society does what it can to make sure that mothers and pregnant women are comfortable and well-appreciated. In official, salaried jobs there’s a much longer maternity leave than in most western countries. There are even all kinds of cultural jokes and nicknames that you’re supposed to give pregnant women to make them happy. But anyway, lots of these women with young children work, but need to keep their babies with them. Strollers aren’t really used in Ghana, and if you have to work, you need your hands and arms, so it’s usually inconvenient. So instead, women carry children strapped to their backs by a large piece of cloth. Their little legs get straddled over your hips, and when they’re old enough they can even climb on and hang on until you get the cloth in place, or even just for piggy-back rides. You’ll notice that this arrangement doesn’t interfere with carrying things on your head either, so even with two burdens, your hands are still free. Children can fall asleep comfortably while on their mothers’ backs, and it also seems to be a comforting thing: if a baby won’t calm down, you can try putting them on your back and bouncing with them for a while that way. The cloth generally comes up to the mid-back of the baby for those old enough to be staying awake, & more accustomed to holding their own balance, but for little babies it goes right up to their necks, and so some sleeping babies look kind of bizarre to my American eyes, with their heads lolling back at odd angles. Katie and I agree that we’ve always been taught to support little babies’ heads, but that doesn’t seem to be a concern in this case, and it seems that all the Ghanaian adults we know have turned out ok ;) And you may be sure they were *all* carried that way. I’ve only seen one mother with a front-carrier thing.

Final interesting tidbit of the day: Mother and I finally went to visit a seamstress she knows, and I’ll be getting 3 tops and 3 bottoms (1 skirt, two pants), and a dress made by Monday! Not quite all of this is for me (one shirt and one shirt/pants set are for friends) but in any case, I’m extremely excited. Also, between the cost of the fabric, the cost of lining for some of these, and the cost of paying the seamstress, all of this has come out to $55. Isn’t that insane? Of course, such money goes a lot farther in Ghana, but still, four outfits that are *made* for the person who will be wearing them. I mean, I knew that’s how it would be, but I’m still amazed. Mother also bought some fabric and ordered another outfit for me on the spot, which she wanted me to wear to church when I came home – so Bethel and Centenary, you have something else to look forward to ;)

Anyway, that’s about it for now :) goodness knows what I’ll do with the rest of today, but it’s about 2 o’clock and I need to get some food into me. Watermelon just came into season! We’ll see what else I can scrounge around town.

Thanks for continuing to read all of this, or even just for checking in occasionally. Thanks for caring :)

Miss you all!

love,

Rachel Rose

As usual, some reflections ;)

Greetings family and friends!

These things which you hopefully see at the top of this post are my boubou/patapata African dress that I got in Takoradi and a FanYogo Maxi, which will be commented upon later in this post :) The "maxi" only implies that it's the bigger of two sizes. It's frozen yogurt in a packet :)

I have now completed two exams, and they both went well! (Rel 430: Jesus in the African Context & Rel 329: Muslim Ethics). I’ve enjoyed both of these classes for different reasons, and learned much in each. Woot!

However, while my time in Ghana has significantly altered my perspective(s) in many ways (yay for thinking more deeply and broadly!) in some unfortunate ways I haven’t changed a bit ;) For example: I have been “preparing for my exams” for about a week now, maybe longer depending on how you look at it. Instead of finishing the paper I am working on this today, I spent a good fraction of that time reading two novels and a memoir on growing up on welfare. In its own way, it was awesome. Now I just have to finish a paper ;)

To be fair, though I’d really like to finish this paper today, it’s not due until Monday. Also, Ghana has at least temporarily convinced me that assignments need to be printed two days before they’re due, rather than two minutes, as has occasionally happened at Guilford. Furthermore, this time I learned something without ever even coming close to having a connected bad experience with it… in other words, in Ghana I have never been dangerously close to my deadline. Bizarre ;) This may perhaps also be blamed on a significant decrease in my volume of work, not that I’m complaining. Even here, time seems to evaporate just when you need it.

Another lesson I was actually hoping to learn was: how to reach some sort of compromise with my skin. Now, I don’t mean compromising the status of my skin – I mean reasoning with my skin as if it could independently bargain with me. The bargain I wished to strike was this: if I put on copious amounts of sunblock for all major outings and otherwise jumped from shadow to shadow without sunblock on schooldays, the least my skin could do in Ghana is maintain that rosy color that on other people would be blinding white but on me is a tan. But no, this was not to be. My skin reminded me that I am about the fourth palest person I have ever met, and that therefore it does not work like a normal person’s. Some stories:

After about a month here, I stopped wearing sunblock to school for a while. A dangerous idea, I know, but I was getting tired of feeling so sticky and dirty, so I stopped. One day, I went to class, as usual, and during my free time sat in deep shade, as usual. And do you know what? I got sunburned. It’s amazing what the ambient light from equator sunshine can do. This was when I *thought* I had established a “base tan”.

Then, on my most recent trip to Takoradi, I had no idea what I would be doing on the day I traveled there beyond the tro-tro (minibus) trip, so I put sunblock on my face and neck. Smart, right? I thought so. We ended up spending the afternoon driving around Takoradi with Mr. Cromwell, the Laryea’s family friend. We made various stops and visits, but anyway, I was apparently in the front passenger seat (with the window down but my arm *inside* the door) long enough for my right arm, and only my right arm, to get sunburned. Amazing.

My most recent story involves our trip to Winneba this past weekend, which I’m not sure I mentioned beforehand. We went to see the Aboakyir (pronounced ah-boAH-cheer) festival there. During this festival, usually two sets of hunters go out to try to catch a deer (/antelope?) for the sacrifice. These deer are little – roughly the size of a newborn fawn of US deer. And also, I do mean “catch”. They have to bring in a live one, which, granted, is not usually how they’re hunted.

So, usually the two teams race to see who can bring in a deer first. This year only the white group went, owing to some political tensions the red group was having with the chief. They leave for the forest at dawn, and so our group was slightly nervous that we would get there at 8:30 or 9:00am, though it turns out we didn’t miss anything. In fact, the deer did not come until about 10:15 or so. There were many preliminary rituals (along with much rejoicing and running about), and then the president spoke along with some other folks. This is technically the second time I’ve seen the President of Ghana, John A. Kufour, but the first time at Independence Square for the 50^th Anniversary celebration didn’t really count, because he was much too far away. This time he passed within 20 feet of me, which I thought was neat. During his speech, though, I finally started getting antsy from standing in a small crowd for hours, and therefore had to break away. He was speaking in a Ghanaian language (probably Akan), so I wasn’t understanding him anyway, except for occasional murmurs of “50^th Anniversary” and such. Ah, presidents all do the same thing ;)

But anyway, the funny part of this story is that I had put on my SPF 45 ultra-sweatproof-and-waterproof sunblock at 7am. Then, at 9am, I reapplied. By 11am, my face was sunburned. Go figure. I did not, however, get further sunburned that day, which was just as well since it was stressful ;)

Katie, Chantal and I spent lunch in the shade in a place with music that was too loud, so we didn’t talk. There was a moment of discomfort and then enlivening argument as a boy came to our table at the end of it all. He was trying to pick up a date for the afternoon, but in doing so woke my mind up from its siesta. I found myself good-naturedly arguing with him over the cultural relatively and general subjectivity of the response “I’m fine” until he left. After that I felt ready to encounter the world until I met completely incongruous people begging for water and then saw multiple block-length lines of people dancing with their hips locked on the person in front of them. Joining this procession without joining the lines added a whole new dimension to the issue, and by the evening I was really tired. Also, I forgot my camera this day, but Katie and Chantal got lots of good pictures, and all of Katie’s end up on my computer, so at the very least you can see them when I get back ;)

Speaking of which, I have a slight fear which may be irrational. Certainly there’s a logical side of my brain which says “surely not”, but my eyes keep feeding me contrary information: I’m slightly afraid that small ants now live in my laptop. They’re always crawling in and around it, even just a minute after I open it. Of course, there are ants everywhere in Ghana, and particularly in my house. Hopefully I won’t import them to the United States, but as far as I can tell they’re just annoying ants. I hope they aren’t one of the things that occasionally bites me. I’m not convinced that all of my bites are mosquitos, but I never see anything that bites me, so I don’t know.

Anyway, on to some Ghanaian culture for the week. It’s time to talk about getting people’s attention. If you’re in the house with your family, this can be a trifle strange… my family tends to yell “Rachel! …Rachel! …Rachel!” no matter how much I say “I’m coming!” in the middle ;) But outside of the house, people will only call your name if you’re close. If you’re far away and they’re trying to get your attention, they won’t raise their voices. Instead they’ll “hiss”. Phonetically, it’s “Tssssss”. There’s tons of hissing going on at the University of Cape Coast all day, and whenever you hear it you just have to turn around and see if someone’s trying to catch your eye. They just don’t yell.

Hissing is also occasionally useful for getting a taxi driver’s attention in town, where it’s crowded, or just across the classroom to get someone to pass along a sign-in sheet. In that sense it’s like “hey”.

Sometimes you’ll hear people hissing in the street to call your attention to what they’re selling, especially if they’re a hawker of some sort. Some people instead use this sucking/kissing sound which apparently has no negative connotations for people. It’s just to alert you to their presence and call your attention. I hear men do it more often, but that might just be coincidental.

The one other common attention-grabbing sound is the honk of the Fan Milk horns. Fan Milk is sold in some stores that have refrigeration/freezers, but it’s mostly sold from specially equipped bicycles and carts with coolers. They're all over the place, and if you're really craving yogurt there are a few places where they tend to rest, or otherwise you can be patient for a few minutes and wait for a bike to pass you by. Hawkers also sell it out of these insanely huge boxes that they carry on their heads... so you know, almost all hawkers carry things on their heads. Everything the sell is meant to be sold frozen: “yogurt”, ice cream, chocolate milk, and tampico, which is this awesome citris drink which doesn’t have to be refrigerated at all. The yogurt is in quotes because it tastes like no yogurt I’ve ever had, but I’m ok with it. Sometimes I even crave it. The chocolate milk is very chocolately and not so sweet, as opposed to the vanilla ice cream which is awesome but rarely very solid. They all come in little plastic packets as shown above, roughly the size of a Ghanaian bill (I’ve recently realized that dollars feel so small in comparison. It’s weird). So, as with sachet water, you simply tear a corner with your teeth, and then eat/suck it out. Unlike most things sold on the street, it’s definitely standardized, and always yummy.

This is not at all to say that I disapprove of street food (not to be confused with chop bar food. Chop bars are cheap places that only serve one kind of local food). I get street food often, because it’s tasty and cheap. I still need to get some corn on the cob, but that will happen one day soon. But anyway, in Abura for instance, if you look around you can get: Accra (Ga) kenkey (Nkran dokon), Fante kenkey (dokon?), banku, various other preparations of corn meal, fish, pepper, boiled eggs, bananas, pineapple, mango (in the peak of its season a few weeks ago), roasted plantain, peanuts (aka, groundnuts), meat pies, and spring rolls, of all things.

*Ahem* ;) Apologies in advance to Candace and Mommy and any other vegans/vegetarians in advance for the next two paragraphs. They talk a lot about eating meat. Feel free to skip them.

I actually like most of these quite a bit, but I have reservations about meat pies. The crust is generally a bit too thick and dry for me to handle, and the “meat” is usually beef pate, which I find gross. Sometimes, though, they also have cooked cabbage inside, which is yummy, and sometimes they have a different kind of crust which is much better. Also, once in a blue moon you can find pigs in a blanket here, which are also called meat pies. But anyway, I unfortunately trust them even less. Exposed meat just doesn’t inspire my confidence ;)

Speaking of meat, though, most of what I eat here is fish and chicken. Occasionally there’s beef, and I think I’ve once or twice had goat and pork. Beef, goat and pork are sometimes all referred to as “meat”, whereas fish and chicken are always specified. But anyway, I can’t remember whether I’ve commented upon this before, but sometimes I love the fish here… it’s yummy, and scrumptious, apart from the bone issue. But sometimes, even mid-fish, I suddenly feel like a Horak, my mother’s side of the family that doesn’t like fish, and then I don’t want to eat it anymore. It simply tastes too fishy ;) Also, it’s somewhat disconcerting for people to say “hey, here’s your fish”. And I know that this is really no different from killing another animal, except that this entire fish had to die to feed only me, and so we have this strange, very personal relationship in which I go off to eat my fish.

Anyway, one day there will be a more complete report on food in Ghana ;) it’s coming. I know I only have four weeks or so left… it’s a tricky time. So far there are plans to visit Takoradi again this weekend and maybe Praaso next weekend to stay with some of my family's family. But anyway, I’ll do my best to keep you posted. So far, I’m doing ok. I know I’ll miss Ghana, but I am still looking forward to coming home.

Thanks for continuing to think of me, for all the nice emails and comments :) Overall, thanks for caring. Be well!

lots of love,

Rachel Rose

Africa, ATR, and other neat things

Greetings family and friends!

I miss you. I’m coming to terms with the fact that I miss you, however, and have decided that this in no way diminishes how much I appreciate this experience, just as the value of this experience in no way diminishes how much I miss you. Sometimes it’s hard for me to reconcile both of these things in my head, but it’s ok, I’m learning ;)

Things going on: exams are starting, but my personal exams don’t start till May 9^th. To fill this new huge amount of time that I will (in theory) have from now until I leave, I have these things to do: study, finish a couple of papers, learn about the subtleties of parking at Emory, carve a block of wood, travel, read a few books, and have talks with a surprising number of people who keep saying “we should make time to talk”. Tada! :) That time has arrived.

I’ve actually had a few such talks already, and they’re quite interesting. Not precisely relaxing, I’d say, but rather stimulating. I always learn a lot, regardless of whether I’m doing most of the explaining or most of the listening. Thus far I’ve had talks with David, Obed, Ocansey, Dominic, and Obri. The first two are boys I know from UCC, and the latter three are seminarians. Things we’ve talked about: African Traditional Religion, how ATR relates to Christianity,

You’ll notice that all the people I’ve had these talks with so far have been men, and there are many complicated and perhaps unknown reasons for that. Giftie’s theory is that women simply have less time to hang out and make new friends, because they have more responsibilities in their home lives. Also, there are more men than women at UCC, though I think that all of my classes are roughly even in terms of gender. The seminary won’t have women until next year. Finally, lots of guys talk to me hoping to date me. I try to avoid such friendships-hoping-to-be-dates, but occasionally I fail. At any rate, I don’t date anyone here, and just constantly hope that such friendships don’t become awkward, since they rarely just dissolve ;)

A brief word on friendships in Ghana: traders will say all the time (in Fante), “I’ll call myself your friend”, and it’s not precisely something you can politely say no to. And why would you? Except for then they say “take me to America”, half-jokingly, and unfortunately I still haven’t figured out how to say “I can’t” in Fante. I do know how to say “no/ I refute the statement that you just made”, but that doesn’t precisely fit in this circumstances. Friendship in Ghana will also occasionally subject you to phrases like “you are not a good friend”, which is a positively depressing thing to hear. However, it occasionally follows arguments like, “you were sick and you didn’t call me?! Not having my phone number is no excuse. I would have visited you. You are not a good friend.” I’m betting that this phrase has an exact equivalent in Fante. But anyway, speaking of visiting sick people, it’s very important here. Nevermind that while I was sick with malaria I was either sleeping or truly ill- when I got back to school everyone who had known I was sick professed that they had wanted to visit me, but lacked knowledge of where I live. This visibly caused them some degree of distress, so if I get sick again I’ll know to better announce it ;).

Now then, as for the topic of Appreciating the Taste of Your Own Teeth vs. Congratulating Mediocrity: this is actually a discussion that arrived in my mind a month or two ago, just from hearing various Ghanaians comment on the “state of affairs” from different perspectives. You see, there’s an Akan/Fante proverb (which I unfortunately forgot to look up for it’s precise wording) that’s about appreciating the taste of your own teeth: that you should appreciate them, because it’s all you have, and all you ever will have. You should learn to like their taste, or you’ll just live dissatisfied. This proverb is said to people who are having trouble particularly with their families, because especially here there’s no real way to escape your relatives. They’re the people who always have tabs on you, and who you will one day need to depend upon. You’d better strive to make things sweet between you.

However, when we first discussed the proverb in my Fante class, the metaphor was extended to the way that Ghanaians feel about Ghana. So many young people here want to leave, thinking that things are “better” elsewhere. Of course, this is entirely debatable based upon your standards of “better”, and I bring this up often, but the fact remains that many people are dissatisfied. They are frustrated with the state of the utilities, with the state of technology, with the limited availability of luxury items, with the lower salaries- all these things, and so sometimes people complain publicly. The proverbs argument is this: it’s all we have. Sure, it’s not perfect. It’s unclean, it’s occasionally crooked, but these are the teeth we have to work with. How can you be ashamed of something so much a part of you as your teeth?

The counterargument came up in another class, where a professor was talking about how much people have to put up with here. Ghanaians truly laud sacrifice, and in official events when things go wrong, people often say, “well, you know, we are a developing country.” But, Professor Anum asked, couldn’t Ghana do better? Couldn’t we all do better? When we say “well, this is what we have to work with”, are we not settling? Are we not in fact giving people excuses for sub-par work? Somewhere in the midst of these arguments, there’s an intention-filled balance that needs to be found. Something that’s more about being than seeming, and about accepting the facts without congratulating unnecessary mediocrity. I think it’s an issue everywhere, but Ghanaians are particularly hop-scotching this issue at the moment.

Now then, putting all of that behind us, there’s something that Ghanaians are dying to tell the world which I feel I should pass along. I’ve had several conversations concerning this at the University, and witnessed many more references to it elsewhere: Ghanaians want the world to know that not all of Africa is a wreck. Not all of it is war-torn, lawless, completely ridden with corruption, or anything of the sort. Not all of Africa is lost to AIDS, nor starvation. They feel like the world’s media paints all of Africa black (this in their own words) and that it’s not fair – Ghana has been basically peaceful since before its independence. It currently has a working democracy, schools, medical systems, and all kinds of good working culture. Knowing that so many people think of ill of Africa, or even pity Africa, hurts Ghanaians.

Of course, they’re a mixed group. Some of them are happy that the colonizers came because they brought Christianity. Some are angry that the government tries so hard to attract foreign aid when they could be focusing upon their own assets. Some were happy that the government spent so much money to buy new cars for chauffeuring diplomats at the anniversary celebration, because it made Ghana look affluent. All of these people, though, wish that the world wouldn’t look at Africa as “all bad”.

Interesting tidbit: in most of the graphic representations (relief sculpture, drawings) of the continent of Africa, you only see the mainland. It’s the same for Chantal’s Africa necklace, and most such things that you’ll find here. You may be surprised to know that it’s hard to find trinkets and knick-knacks in most of Ghana. But anyway, when Akwasi was looking at Chantal’s necklace, he said “that’s not Africa! Where’s Madagascar?” The island was missing from it’s place beside the continent, and therefore for Akwasi, it wasn’t a good/complete picture of Africa, and he said so right off the bat. I wonder how many people from the US would automatically say the same thing about a US map lacking Hawaii & Alaska?

Speaking of which, when my host parents went to the US a few months ago, not only did they bring back a load of Disney movies, but they also brought back a US map puzzle. Not a jigsaw, but a jigsaw puzzle that might put 3-5 states together per piece. Odd as it is to have in the house, this puzzle has been extremely handy whenever I’m trying to explain things about home, like how far apart things are, climate, where my family has lived and migrated, and population density. I have Eric Mortensen to thank for my new appreciation of geography as an awesome thing that affects the rest of existence. Yay ;)

And now for some brief commentary on African Traditional Religion and how it relates to Christianity here. (By the by, I now have some understanding of Muslim ethics from my class, which I very much enjoyed, but am in no position to comment upon how Islam has interacted with ATR). So, strangely, even though there are plenty of ATR practitioners around, I mostly learn about it from Christians. Even my ATR professor is a Christian (a Methodist). Here are the things that most of them want to impress upon me:

1) Hierarchy. In African Traditional Religion, there’s the Supreme Being, aka God, Nyame (Get Satisfied), Ewuradze (Almighty), but even though God is always considered, always in the back of people’s minds, and always a part of their speech patterns and vocabulary, God is very far away. So many legends and folktales describe God as being up in the sky, distant. It’s not necessarily that God is uncaring, but who is clean enough or important enough to ask for the attention of God? So, as intermediaries to take care of small matters and bring big matters farther forward, God created smaller gods. People can appeal to smaller gods, and if they have sufficient authority and are sufficiently appeased, they will help. There are hierarchies within the gods, however, and if one god isn’t working for you, you can try a more powerful one. It doesn’t even have to be a local god, but can be a famed one from another region. All of them, however, work for and only with the authority of the Supreme Being. Evil and/or self-serving forces of varying powers can also work against you, however, and charms and ancestors also somehow fit into the hierarchies of good things, depending on one’s culture. People consider these hierarchies to be very neat, handy established things: a brilliant, elegant system, if you will, though from the outside (and perhaps having far too little information) it doesn’t look that way at all too me ;) But the hierarchy is highlighted in people’s minds.

2) Fear and discipline. Ghanaians also want me to understand the fear and discipline that was inherent in ATR practitioners. You see, if you committed a taboo or a crime in traditional society, it was believed that your own god would strike you dead. There were harsh punishments for everything, and certain desecrations (cutting down certain trees, for instance) were unthinkable because they were also spiritual beings. Many Ghanaians lament the fact that Christianity carries no such immediate punishment for crimes, and they attribute modern lawlessness and lack of decency to the loss of ATR in people’s lives. People in traditional societies also practiced divination more, and so people believed that if they did anything wrong, they would certainly be found out. A Catholic friend of mine here even thinks of fear as the primary reason why he’s a Christian – he does good for fear of not going to Heaven – but I don’t think this is the case for everyone.
3) That it really works. Many Ghanaian Christians have stressed to me that they believe that African Traditional Religion is true, and that it works. Even though they’re Christians and are prohibited from doing certain things, there are also certain things they can’t deny. When people don’t get cut by machetes, when people get unexpectedly healed, when people know things they shouldn’t – Ghanaians believe that they witness these things regularly, and they stress to me that they know I don’t understand, that I can’t quite believe, but that it’s real. Witches, evil eyes… these terms are technically European, but they’re used here to explain to me many strange things. And Ghanaians believe in both the good and the evil forces. It’s really interesting.

Ah, I would love to write more, but I am out of time! The power, and therefore the internet, are both about to go out, and I couldn’t write this one too far in advance ;) Forgive the shoddy writing.

I love you all! Thank you for caring! Happy graduation, Guilford friends and all other friends in my year. Be well, everyone, and I pray you hold each other up.

With very much love,

Rachel Rose