I had nothing planned for our first day in Ghana, no plans always means there is adventure to come. A group of San Diego guys and I ventured into Accra to meet up with Charlie's friend who was studying abroad at the University of Legon. We met her outside of Frankie’s a restaurant where we ate something that we called an African Burrito and had the local brew, Star. As we walked away, vendors shouted my name. I had introduced myself to one vendor and now it seemed the whole community knew that the girl in the neon shirt was Kate and she had already bought a bracelet.
The six of us crammed into a ‘trotro, a van outfitted to hold maybe twelve people that often carried up to twenty five. How this works: the ‘mate’ hangs his head out the window when coming up to a stop and repeatedly calls out the trotro’s destination. You negotiate a price (usually 30 pents for a 10min drive- this is about 20 cents USD). Then you cram yourself wherever you can and hope you can figure out when to get off. This alone is probably a reason that SAS warned us not to use this form of transportation, if we had not been with someone that was used to this, there is no way we would have gotten on the right trotro, gotten a decent price, or been able to understand the mate calling off destinations. On one of these trotro rides out of the city, I played the ‘do you know..’ game with Kaylie who goes to Santa Clara. Lo and behold, she is one of Emily’s housemates next semester! It is a small world after all.
We went to a market that was a distance away from the city. The market was busy at 1500 when most locals were going about buying their dinner. Outside the market square there was a dance off to some American music. Once inside it was as if I had stepped into a national geographic documentary. There were storefronts everywhere in no apparent pattern. Kaylie told me that these storefronts were also their homes. That the bench the woman sat on and sold crabs was also her bed. There was a stench of the sea creatures being sold: every sort of fish, dried eel, live crabs, large snails, and pretty much anything from the sea that one could ascertain was also being sold. This was the case for many of the businesses and vendors; there was no limitation of the definition of a good. Some clothing stores sold new African cloth; some sold Salvation Army underwear and shirts. Some children sold beads; others were calling off prices for their rat hanging from a string. We bought pineapple for one cedi (about 80cents) this pineapple was by no exaggeration the most scrumptious piece of fruit I have ever tasted. It seemingly melted in my mouth and emitted sweet flavors, no hint of sourness.
We split up at one point and had the hardest time reconvening. We powered through the market looking for our lost friends. The locals called us ‘brouneys’ (white people). We looked pretty ridiculous walking around in circles trying to find our way out. I was struck by the reaction of the children to our presence. One boy cried and his mother explained he had never seen our kind. Other kids came up and touched us or wanted a hug. As we traveled around the country we were often looked at in awe. In the United States, we know of different cultures and people because of media, school, and books. This is not the case in Ghana.
We safely made it back to Accra. Here I met up with another group of SAS students, we went exploring for a place to eat. The group stopped in front of a fast-food type location selling pizza and burgers. I was in the mood for some local food, three of us went exploring. Andy had befriended a local vendor, Albert. We asked him to lead the way to a chop bar. We followed him without question down unlit roads and past huts. Once again, I found myself in a part of town where I would normally lock my windows. Albert took us to a chop bar where Anthony Bourdain ate on his travel channel show, how exciting! Except, to our dismay it was very Westernized and expensive. We decided upon a Chinese restaurant (there were several of these in the area for some reason). Albert joined us for dinner. Through our conversation I learned a lot about his generation in this country. Albert worked selling bracelets on the street in Accra. However, he lived about four hours away. He had graduated high school and loved American rap music. We asked him if he would come to America to study. He said he would love to study at Lincoln University because it is home to W.E.B. Dubois, an American civil rights activist who eventually was naturalized as a Ghanaian citizen in the 1960s. I was impressed.
Andy and Albert
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