Dessert Storm

Sometimes I forget that I am spending a year in Ghana, far removed from friends and family. With reliable (relatively speaking) internet access, it is easy to stay virtually connected. Other times I realize that the Atlantic Ocean is slightly more imposing than, say, London Bridge.

In early August, my mother put together a thoughtful care package to ship abroad. Included in the package were some freshly baked homemade brownies. Well, I’ve concluded that there’s a bottleneck somewhere in the process. Intercontinental mail has redefined my definition of snail mail. Approximately three months later, I am still awaiting the arrival of this package. But who’s counting?

As September came to a close, my mother emailed me (e > snail) a note of apology, and informed me that she had learned from her mistakes. Included in this email was a link to a 26-page Department of Defense recipe for brownies and a quip about how she should have followed this recipe instead. The benefit of these brownies – a three year lifespan, which coincidentally, is about the average lifespan of a snail.

This story supports the following conclusions:

A. The Bermuda triangle is real.

B. Snails make better escargot.

C. The Federal government spent approximately the same on Dessert Storm as it did on Desert Storm.

Anyway, I can’t wait to sink my teeth into those freshly baked brownies when they finally arrive!

The Curious Incident of the Travelling Church in the Nighttime

Just when I think all of the stars are aligned against me, I come to realize that there are more stars. Such is case when it comes to the curious incident of the travelling church in the nighttime. I already assumed the variables, to include the variable time, were optimized to maximize my disfavor. But this assumption was grounded on the assumption that time was constrained by the human compulsion for sleep.

Contrary to my original belief, I’ve learned that time is neither uniform nor discrete. It is not uniform because I value certain time (e.g., night-time) more than other time. And it is not discrete because there are certain periods where time is no longer black and white, but rather gray. Were you at that fraternity party until late last night or early this morning? Gray.

Well, the tree came crashing through my window during a gray period late last night or early this morning. The travelling church was back with a vengeance, commencing worship in the middle of the night. Literally, the middle of the night?! The upside was that the travelling church heeded my advice and abandoned the camouflage tent. The downside was the congregation failed to eliminate the underlying visibility problem. My next recommendation: God could probably see you better in the daylight instead of beneath the stars, which you may notice, are now all aligned.

London Bridge

When compiling a list of important travel accessories, one cannot afford to overlook the omniscient travel guide book. So before I left America and all of her great qualities (to include, as I’ve discovered, but not limited to: wine and cheese, quiet time, the GOP) I decided to invest in the gift of knowledge, purchasing the Bradt Ghana travel guide.

Through trial and error I have come to learn that on (nearly every) occasion the narrative of the guidebook is telling only part of the story. It’s as if the author thought it would be clever to withhold information so the reader could experience Ghana in an entirely different way. For example, Bradt informed me that it would cost $5 to participate in the Canopy Walk at Kakum National Park. Bradt forgot to mention the one that precedes the five. $15 and empty pockets later, my cohort and I learned the art of hitch-hiking to the local Barclays ATM.

So when, on a weekend excursion, I read that we were close to London Bridge, I couldn’t resist suggesting a visit. Bradt described the bridge as a rather odd and unimposing little bridge dating to the late 19^th century and appropriately garnished with painted United Jacks and the like – it’s worth crossing if only to have a fruit juice at Baab’s juices. After some discussion as to whether or not the walk in the heat was worth the fruit juice at the end of the bridge, we agreed to take our chances.

Unimposing it was. I didn’t realize I had crossed the bridge until I found myself outside of Baab’s juices (closed for the day). Turning around, I realized that the gutter I had stepped across was, in fact, London Bridge. I can only wonder if the reason Baab’s juices was closed on such a warm afternoon was due to juice junkie’s unwillingness to cross the unimposing little bridge.

Faith

On my walk back from the gym one afternoon, I received a brochure from the Glory Gate Chapel informing me that God loves me big time. I was advised to look for a Bible believing Church and this would be the first step of my super Acceptance of His Super Love.

So, when one of my Ghanaian friends invited me to attend a church service with him, I quickly jumped at the opportunity. I knew I would be in for a cultural treat.

We would set off for church at 7:30am…early, yes, but very manageable since the travelling church that was once outside my room has decided to take up permanent residence and commences service at 6:30am.

Well, unbeknownst to me, new worshipers are invited to sit in the front row of the congregation. While I suspect it’s an attempt to bring me closer to God, I could think of a few additional reasons, (a) to make sure that I don’t fall asleep in the back of the congregation and (b) to transform me into a public spectacle since I can no longer rely on cues from my neighbor as to when I should sit and stand.

The church conformed to my preconceptions surrounding African traditions often associated with charismatic churches: the preacher’s tittup across the stage, the praise Gods, and the worship songs and hymns. I did not, however, anticipate playing such an important role in the service. Maybe because I was a first-timer or maybe because I was the only obruni in attendance, the preacher made a point to make me a focal point of his stories.

My favorite (or most terrifying) story was one he told about me and my wife. Even though I know she loved me, when my wife was about to deliver my baby, she was out of her mind and told me that I was despicable. Somehow this story was tied to the seasons, but I guess I was so distraught with my wife finding me despicable that I failed to grasp the connection of the seasons.

I suppose I didn’t mind being front and center. I mean, after all, if I hadn’t been there, how would I have ever found out that my wife was having a baby? Who knew? God works in mysterious ways.

Grocery Games

One thing I have yet to fully grasp is the local flavor for pricing products. I do most of my grocery shopping at the local MaxMart, located just down the street from where I teach. And a month and a half into my residence in Accra, I have yet to comprehensively understand how goods are priced.

One thing I have picked up on – the use of discount pricing is rather popular for items that are overstocked and also that are going to expire yesterday. Actually, the MaxMart must have just hired a local marketing director, because just last week, they introduced a campaign where, if a consumer spends 40 cedis (the local currency) in a single purchase, the lucky consumer is shuffled to the wheel. The wheel, much akin to “The Big Wheel” on The Price is Right, is spun amidst bated breath as fellow shoppers wait to see which expired perishable is selected among the farrago of provisions. Speaking from experience, my colleagues and I have changed our consumer behavior. Instead of making separate purchases, we now pool our purchases to see which day-too-old crème cookie we can walk away with.

But my favorite game to play at the grocery store is actually what I’ve come to call the “Scavenger Hunt.” It’s not a well advertised game, but it’s a game in which the consumer scavenges around for the best price-volume ratio. Sometimes I even wonder if MaxMart has a random number generator used to assign prices to the products. For example, a basic can of Heinz Baked Beans can sell for as cheap as 1 cedi. Directly next to the Heinz Baked Beans sits a can of Heinz (same brand, same volume) Pork Baked Beans selling for 10 cedis. What?

The other day, I walked in to quench my thirst and buy a Coca-Cola. I had four options as diagramed below where price (in cedis) is the unit of measurement:

Scavenger hunt success. I’ll take the larger volume for the cheaper price with the pre-chilled convenience, thank you. I’m already enjoying the weekly scavenger hunts. I can’t wait to see what type of hunt MaxMart rolls out for Easter!

Coasting through the Cape

With Eid Ul Fitr and the complimentary bank holiday, I was presented with a three day weekend for the first time since arriving in Ghana. So what better way to spend it than to travel to the (in)famous Cape Coast. Famously known as the home to Kofi Annan, and the ancestral home to Michelle Obama, it also boasts the Cape Coast Castle, infamously known for being a critical trading center during the slave trade.

The Fellows and I set off for Cape Coast on Friday, at sunrise, with the notion that the intercity bus ride would afford us a few additional hours of sleep. What we did not anticipate was the Ghanaian approach to mass transit. After paying our fare and boarding the bus, we took our seats and shut our eyes, only to be awakened (or Awakened, depending on how one looks at it) by a traveling preacher.

Since he was preaching in Twi, the local dialect, a language for which I can cogently only decipher select phrases such as what’s up? and thank you, my initial inclination was to believe that mayhap he was giving us a safety presentation. As it turns out, he was simply preaching. Defeated in my attempt to nap, the rest of the bus attentively hung to his every word, laughed at his jokes (which I came to find out later from our Ghanaian colleague, were using us as the punch line!), and even worshiped together in song. The sermon concluded near the end of our transport, where the preacher pulled out some over-the-counter anti-inflammatory drugs and peddled them off to the eager consumer. By the time I stepped off the bus, I was not only exhausted but was entirely disillusioned by this exploitation of religion for personal financial advancement. Ironically, the anti-inflammatory drugs might have served me well right about then.

Between stops at some seaside resorts and a side-excursion to Kakum National Park for an adventurous canopy walk, stories for another time and place (place being defined as stationary, not transitory) we soon again found ourselves in need of transportation. Having spent the better part of an hour waiting for hauling, we befriended a local university’s campus Christians who happened to have a chartered bus and happened to be travelling in our same direction. They generously opened their bus doors and allowed us to stand in the aisle. After a quick opening prayer, we (we being loosely defined) proceeded to worship using a video that spliced together various hymns recorded in the 1980s. The only one I recognized was You Raise Me Up, to which I had difficulty relating after my first church-on-the-go.

One thing is certain; my weekend in and around Cape Coast raised my understanding of travelling church to a whole new level.

If a Tree Falls in the Woods

Before I left for Ghana, my Staff Manual specifically stated “There is less of a concept in Ghana that the noise someone makes, at any hour, intrudes on someone else’s privacy.” It went on for a few paragraphs, which I wrote off as a mere jeremiad – after all, I survived living in an American university setting. Well, it didn’t take me long to realize that I had underestimated the Ghanaian decibels and overestimated my numbness to my surroundings.

As it turns out, it is socially acceptable (heaven knows why) to make a ruckus at any time of day. A hypothetical example: Everyone is sleeping in our hostel because it is hypothetically 1am and you are watching the sports highlights in the TV room. You find out that your favorite team won the game. It is entirely acceptable for you to make merry down the entire hall to ensure everyone else is immediately aware of your team’s victory.

For the most part, the human body adjusts. I don’t know the science behind it, but my subconscious has learned to treat some audible stimuli as white noise, like the blind roosters who don’t realize that it’s only 3am. There are a few exceptions to this policy.

For the first few weeks, I swear someone had set up a theater stage right outside my window. In ten minute intervals, a throng of Ghanaians would be cheering and clapping for the performance that just ended. I guess I can’t complain since they had the decency to provide me a courtesy balcony seat that normally demands a premium price. Thankfully, I have not been invited back in a few weeks, and am hopeful that it was more of a traveling act than an established venue.

Then there are the morning buses. The buses are the primary transportation to and from schools, churches, magic shows, basically anything. Best practice is to quite literally sit upon the horn until you are guaranteed that everyone in Western Africa is aware of your arrival. My hypothesis is that the horn serves as a final alarm clock if you have (heaven knows how) accidentally slept through morning speakers blasting Michael Jackson or Alan Jackson.

And just when I thought I had seen (or rather heard) it all. This morning the local Ghanaians literally erected a church right outside my window. Commencing at 6:30am, nothing shy of 100 Ghanaians joined in worship and praise, attempting to collectively reach the ears of the heavens. And in true Ghanaian tradition, the worship portion of the service lasted until after 9am, when I finally left my hostel. On my way out, I couldn’t help but notice that the devotees all stood beneath a large camouflage tent. No wonder the parish was singing so loudly; they were simply trying to get God’s attention, and seeing as God couldn’t see them beneath the camouflage, they were making a solid appeal to His other senses.

I’m not sure if my life is The Truman Show, but I’m fairly certain that if a tree were to fall in the woods here, first, the woods and woodpeckers would be transported right outside my window, second, chainsaws would be responsible for the fall, and third, just to be sure, it would come crashing through my window.