NEW YEAR!!!

The time around Christmas and New Year were full of relaxation and good vibes!

I spent the Christmas days in Wa with Evelyn, Alex and Alice and 30 degrees with some wind and dust. Since Wa has a high Muslim population and many people that don't have extra pennies to spent, there was no Christmas decoration and not really a sense of Christmas in the air. 
However, I was thankful that we had a small (plastic) tree in our house and Christmas music was playing. This way I did have my moments.
The 24th is not really a celebrated day around here and I even went to work. In the evening we went to midnight service at Cathedral, afterwards we went home and drank some incredibly sweet red wine, exchanged presents (we did Secret Santa) and went to sleep. It was really great to only buy one gift and receive something small in exchange. Christmas for the first time was not about shopping and big and expensive gifts.
The 25th and 26th were the days of the main celebration where I would go around town and visit people. Many prepared drinks and food at home to be able to receive visitors at any time of the day. So I went, sat, talked, drank....

Sitting with wine after church

In the evening of the 27th I got on the bus to Accra. The next morning I met the other 5 volunteers that came with the same German organization "Eine Welt Netz NRW" to Ghana. This was the first time in 4 months since I left the plane that I got to see them again. The six of us had the whole next week to spent with each other. 
We got on a tro-tro direction BEACH!
We had a great week in Cape 3 Points, the most beautiful place I have seen in Ghana, so far. 
We stayed at Escape 3 Points, an Eco-lodge, that was like an Oasis. It is beach front, all is made of bamboo and wood, there is a beach bar, a clean beach, no plastic bags in the water. And if they hadn't stolen a camera from one of our group members it would have been perfect. Well, I have to admit that it was a "white people's bubble", away from the real Ghana. To get in touch with the real world we walked to the fishing village next to us and met some wonderful people who proudly showed us around and let us feel the Ghanaian hospitality. 
One of the best moments was when we met young Lydia. She asked us if we could help her carry her plantains to her village. We agreed and ended up walking an hour through thick vegetation where nobody would have expected to find a village. In the end we came to a fishing village where incredible excitement broke loose the moment we entered. 20 children were running and shouting in joy around us, everybody greeted us and welcomed us, we were shown around and because it was getting dark they even escorted us halfway back to make sure that we get home safely. This is one of those Ghana moments that stick!

in the tro-tro

our dorm (Jorinde and Babette)

the restaurant at escape 3 points lodge (and Paul)

Escape 3 points lodge

escape three points lodge

New Year's Eve was also of a special kind. We were asked to bring white cloths and everybody did. Dressed in white we were served wine and enjoyed an amazing 4 course dinner. Afterwards there was a band playing at the beach bar and we got to listen to surf style jack johnson music until midnight. At midnight there was even a small firework on the beach. 

Lennart and beautiful Jacob the Angel on New Year's

With a bit of a headache we went the next day to see the real Cape of Cape Three Points. The view was a real New Year's present.

Lighthouse at the Cape

At Cape Three Points

At Cape Three Points

At Cape Three Points

In the area we also visited the Trinity Yard School which is a school for some 15 Ghanaian students, run by US American volunteers, where math and English skills are improved and they learn the traditional Kente Weaving and Batik. Those must be the luckiest students of all Ghana. The school is ocean front, build out of wood, has a beautiful library and is a perfect place to find your peace of mind. 

Kente weaving at Trinity Yards School

A peace of Kente cloth

Library at Trinity Yards School

View from the library

View from the terrace at the library

I had to leave a day early because I had to take care of immigration stuff in Accra. And wooop wooop, I am finally a legal resident of Ghana for one year.
Instead of going back to Wa I decided to meet a friend at Kokrobite Beach for another two nights. This was the total contrast. We stayed at Big Milleys Backyard and I got to experience real Rastafarian culture. Cabooooom. Reggae music everywhere, people of all ages with big ass dread locks (I don't know if the kids or the elderly with dreads fascinated me more). People smoking, dancing, enjoying everywhere. This blended with the local fishermen who had a totally different lifestyle. But there was this deep respect from all sides that made everybody just live together in peace without any reason for complains. 
This is a lesson I have learnt in Wa and again around here. People respect each other, no matter who you pray to. Ghana people have a kind of peace of mind that I have not experienced in Germany. 
Unfortunately I didn't take pictures as it was safer to keep my valuables locked for several reasons =) Please do google Kokrobite and Big Millys to get an impression. 

Of Weddings and Funerals

Both are major cultural celebrations in Ghana and I have been lucky to get the possibility to attend both.

Last weekend I went to my first Ghanaian wedding. Or it was rather the blessing at church that we were invited to. Blessings take place on Saturdays. This seems to be the rule. The big cathedral was full of people. Everything had to follow an order. After the priest gave an introduction and read from the bible, the crowd was singing and dancing and screaming to give their blessings and best wishes to the couple. Afterwards the priest gave a speech about marriage, more singing and dancing and three hours later the crowd moved to another location where we were provided with drinks and food. At 6 o’clock in the evening we went home and the celebration was over. The next day was Sunday and regular church day. The newlyweds were now introduced to the whole parish and are officially married.

FUNERAL: 24 hours of goosebumps

Let me tell you about my 12 hours of goosebumps! This is a story I always wanted to share but just never found the time to do so. 

A couple of weeks back Evelyn and I were invited by a friend to the funeral of his father -  to one of the biggest funerals of the year. It was announced on the radio and even television. Sir Patrick Dery an important figure for the Upper West, died a few months ago and was now to be buried. 

Thousands of people came to Nandom, the village where he resided. People did not come to mourn his death. Not at all! They came to celebrate his life! This man died old. In Ghana this is a privilege and there are no words that describe this festival. The family did a great job. 

As the tradition asks, the body was preserved and put 2 meters high on a kind of throne in his most beautiful traditional wear. The whole day and the whole night groups of traditional dancers came from all the villages to pay their tribute to this man by dancing in front of his body. The show was unbelievable. From far one would hear the deep roaring sound of drums coming closer. It was a group of dancers making their way to the "throne". When the drums of one group were softening, the next group could already be heard, approaching from far away. Those traditional groups were all people that were friends of Patrick Dery and for this special day made a performance. Usually they are probably farmers, today they were war dancers!   Also single people would dance in front of the body, scream out in joy and celebrate. So much joy and emotion as I have never ever experienced before. 

Another part of the tradition is that the family designs a funeral cloth that carries the face and age of the decedent. This way everybody will know who belongs to the family and who is friends and visitor. 

The next day the Bishop came for the official ceremony. The body has been put into the coffin and placed in the middle of the enormous field where people had been celebrating the last 24 hours. Around the coffin table and chairs were arranged for the priests and the Bishop. Everybody was seated properly underneath "tents" in a square surrounding the central scene with the Bishop. Some dancers were still around. Before the Bishop started the crowd was startled by a shocking traditional ceremony. One of the group of war dancers was making a last round and was holding an alive dog. They cut the throat and drank the blood. Even the people sitting next to me were shocked and doubted that deceased would have appreciated this gesture very much. 
Then the ceremony started and we rushed away to get home early and not get stuck in the dust from all the other cars making their way home. We stopped at the family house to say goodbye and I am deeply thankful that I was allowed to be part of this celebration.

Road to Nandom

Family wearing the funeral cloth, with the print of the decedent

Funeral Cloth

War dancers performing....special performance of people who have regular lives on other days =)

war dancers dancing as a last honor to the deceased

A woman dancing to the drums to pay her last respects to Sir Patrick Dery

another group of war dancers

Ghanaian xylophone - traditional church and funeral instrument! awesome sound

Travelling to Volta Region

More Travelling

It has been busy busy busy around here. No time to update this Blog. Sorry! But I have a lot of new stories to tell you. I don’t even know where to start.

First of all, I managed to defend my Master’s Thesis with my school in Berlin from Ghana. Thanks to Skype I can call myself Master of Arts! The same day I had the exam I went on the evening bus to Accra and started a great trip. 7 days I travelled Ghana with two friends and got to see some great areas of the country.

First, we spent some days at Coco Beach close to Accra. The beach was beautiful but as many beaches here, quite polluted. You jump into the water and easily have a plastic bag sticking to your body. On one of our visits to Accra we had the chance to watch part of the show of Reinhard Bonnke’s evangelist crusade (please google this guy!). Many many people gathered on Accra’s independence square to sing, dance and celebrate with this man. Religion again proved to be the central part of life of people in Ghana. It never stops to impress me how people believe and trust in God. It creates an amazing energy!

At Coco Beach we also had our first encounter with the local police, which was not our last. Randomly, a group of policemen jumped off the back of a pickup truck. All of them had big guns and two walked right towards us, quite aggressively. They accused us of having smoked weed on the beach and they were sure that they saw us throw away a joint. This happened when we actually only had entered the beach for 10 seconds and turned around because we wanted to offload some things at the hotel first. Suddenly, those men stand in front of us, grabbing and smelling our hands and treating us in the most unfriendly way. We decided to just start walking and surprisingly they did not follow us. 

Accra Independence Square (1957 Ghana achieved independence from England)

Coco Beach near Accra

Coco Beach near Accra

The next day we rented a car and started our trip to the Volta Region. Our next stop was Akosombo. We got there alright but if anyone ever decides to take the road through Tema, be aware of the roundabout! We seriously spent about 2 hours taking wrong exits, trying to get back to the roundabout, taking another wrong exit. This roundabout is huge and busy and does not have signboards that are understandable in any way. Two hours, seriously!!! In the evening we arrived at the wonderfully situated Lodge in Akosombo. The place was water front to Lake Volta, with a pool and just very well maintained. Unfortunately, there were also monkeys and other animals suffering in tiny cages.

Because the place has Indian management I especially enjoyed Indian food – a nice change of diet! 

View form Akosombo Continental

View from Akosombo Continental

Bored resident at Akosombo Continental 

The next day we went to see the Akosombo dam. You have to go to the tourist office and are only allowed to go with a guide. If you paid attention during physics classes in 7^th grade, don’t expect to learn much but the view up there is amazing. I think this was the most beautiful sight I have experienced in Ghana, so far. Afterwards, we decided to cruise the area for a bit and again I was impressed by Nature. Since the Upper West, where I live, is just dry and dusty I was so happy about all the rich and green nature. Also this part of the country is very well developed due to Lake Volta, being the biggest artificial lake of the world, and a great producer of electricity that is even exported to the neighboring countries. This produces jobs and infrastructure, which leads to wealth for this region. I highly enjoyed this stretch of the country, the small, clean and green villages with very friendly people. 

Akosombo Dam

View on top of Akosombo Dam

The next day we started another exciting part of the trip. It was exciting in many ways as we had incredible ups and downs. Everything started out so good and then became a living hell. We wanted to go deeper into the region and visit a waterfall and afterwards drive all the way down to the coast. So we made our way to Amedzofe. The road led us into the Eastern Highlands. As we were gaining height the view became more beautiful with every minute. Once we got to Amedzofe it was just amazing. I never expected to see a mountain like scenery mixed with tropical vegetation. Amedzofe lays at some 600 meters altitude. We went to see the waterfalls, which were only a 45 minutes easy hike. The waterfall was nice but unfortunately a heavy rain caught us by surprise and we had to hurry back.

Road to Amedzofe

Road to Amedzofe

Hike to Amedzofe

Amedzofe Falls

So our journey to the coast began. We stopped in Ho for supper, got a good stock of chocolates at the gas station and off we went in high spirits. There was only one thing that we didn’t consider. As soon as it gets dark the police barriers are up and every 10 minutes we got stopped by policemen. They are supposed to be looking for armed robbers and check on the trucks at night. However, we were easy meat. While the trucks were allowed to pass we were chopped into pieces. Every single barrier wanted something else. I had to show all of my papers, the car was checked in detail and every time another lie plopped up. Suddenly, the international driver’s license is not valid in Ghana. In Ghana you need a local one and what not. It was quite clear that the policemen were hoping to get some money from us because we wouldn't want to put up with the show. However, we were patient, played the game, talked and talked and did not pay a single bribe. The barriers took in total something like 2 hours. This was a horrible experience and for the first time I was deeply frustrated by a serious drawback of Ghana. I have heard many of the locals complain about how the policemen are after bribes. Now I got to experience it myself . The highlight of the trip though was a truck passing another truck on the opposing lane in the middle of the night, not paying attention to us and not slowing down when it saw us coming. We had to slam on the brakes and leave the road. Otherwise, the truck would have run us over. Thanks to the best driver in the world we survived safely. Close to a mental breakdown we got to Cape Coast early in the morning without having slept at all. The next two days we spent at Oasis Beach Resort, recovering from the stress – the place where I had also ended my last travels. Thanks to Alex & Christian this adventure has been made possible. 

Some Travel Stories

The last two weeks have been quite exciting. I have met some volunteers from the American Peace Corps who live in villages outside of Wa. Even though the amount of work does not allow me to socialize very much, it is nice to know that there are people around. One Sunday afternoon we met and went for some drinks in Wa and it was great to just hang out and hear other stories from Ghana. Since the Peace Corps volunteers stay for 2 years most of them have been here for a while and it was good to see how well they cope since I have to admit that I am still struggling with adapting to my new life.

But some new impressions also helped to get some energy. Evelyn and I went to Accra to apply for my working permit, which I need in order to get a resident permit. I was impressed because the Immigration Service was run by military staff that looked quite scary and I felt slightly intimidated. That night I checked in at a hostel because I was gonna meet a friend from Germany who was by coincidence passing by. 4 days with a friend was just what I needed. The night Lena came we heard about a Reggae party at the Accra beach and got a little taste of the Rastafarian culture of Ghana, which I have not gotten in touch with so far. After only seeing Wa, where life is not easy for most of the people it came like a shock to me to see everyone smoking cigarettes, drinking too much and not worrying about anything.

The next day we explored the capital of Ghana together. Puhhh compared to my town Wa the capital is a little shock. Soooo many people, everyone is trying to talk to you and wants to sell you something. We were brave enough to throw ourselves into the Makola market. That was the craziest market ever. Cars, motorbikes, people trying to push through 500 little booths. The smell of fish, urine, food mixing and the eye constantly busy with things like huge snails being sold, crabs, colorful cloths …

Afterwards we rewarded ourselves with a drink in a beach bar as Accra has a sea front. In the afternoon we went to see the national museum. How do I describe it carefully? A lot of dust and many different stories about the Ghanaian culture and history being told at the same time mainly through reading boards rather than objects. However, I was able to learn quite a bit about the slave trade, a topic that I haven’t really studied so far.

The next day we went to Cape Coast, without knowing what bus to take when, and where to stay. That is the best way to travel! Everything worked out perfectly fine. We got on a Tro-tro, which took us to Cape Coast within less than 3 hours. We went for the Oasis Beach Resort, which is a nice hostel with a beach front. The room was awesome, the place was awesome and I got two days without any worries. Especially the beach pigs enlighted my days.

After arriving we went to see Cape Coast Castle and learned even more about the Slave 
Trade. The Castle was a place where the British would bring the slaves before they were shipped to the Americas or the Carabbean. The Castel is just on the Beach of Cape Coast and the village is on both sides of it. In front of the Castle many fishermen have their boats laying nowadays.

Even though Cape Coast was without electricity the first night we had a good time. We met Henrietta, a powerful local lady running Chics Hebs, a restaurant I can only recommend because this woman is the best. Without electricity she cooked great food and she was just pure positive vibes. A group of European students joint us, who are currently studying for a semester in Cape Coast. Back at our Hostel a Reggae party was waiting for us. Cape Coast seems to be the volunteers’ retreat as the hostel was crowded with volunteers. 

The next day Lena and I went to Kakum Nationalpark for a canopy walk. It was extremely overprized and the park was crowded. At the entrance we were told that we shouldn’t expect to see anything, which seemed blank but honest. But as it was raining like hell it added some fun to it. On our way back we stopped at Hans Cottage Botel - another crazy place. It is a hotel, combined with a restaurant AND a pond with many many crocodiles inside, which were moving around quite freely. We had a coffee, watching the crocodiles and after went back to the Oasis Beach resort.

The next day we went back to Accra where I probably committed a sin. Lena and I went to the Koala supermarket in the part of town where all the expatriates live. An incredibly overprized supermarket which offers imported food. I bought dark bread, cheese and chocolate….you don’t want to know how much I paid…but it was worth it. There was not a single local inside but only expats and tourists. Feels wrong but still I am sure I will be back. In Osu,the expat part of Accra, life is different. Nice houses, expensive restaurants with international food. The expats have created a little paradise for themselves, away from real life in Ghana. 

In the evening Lena got on a Taxi to the airport and I got on a Taxi to O&A station where I met my boss Evelyn and we got on the bus back to Wa.

The next week Evelyn went to a trade fair in Burkina Faso and I was alone with the workers at the office. I had to take care of daily business and the first time I really experienced what work is like in Ghana. Things tend to be more chaotic than I am used to from Germany. Polychronic work (doing multiple things at the same time) kind of overwhelmed me. The moment you do something, you are asked to do 5 other things, your name is called every minute and I didn’t know what to do first. I have noticed that work attitude before, but now I was living it. I dropped dead at night and I am amazed by how Evelyn manages this every day.

Now, this week also a life changing event took place: I bought a bicycle! Her name is Carry and we will be best friends!

I got to leave Wa again because I visited one of the volunteers I have met. His village Poyentanga is only a 30 minute tro-tro ride away. They had market day and it was nice to escape to village life. We sat in one of the booths on the market and drank Pito, a locally brewed beer, which has a very distinct taste. It is quite strong and sour. You have to try hard to like it but you know, at some point you just do like it! The big steaming pots are Pito being brewed (the pic was actually taken in Wa in the back of a house). The tro-tro back to Wa was great. The people who sold their things on the market went back to Wa and all their goods were tied on the tro-tro. Even a goat was tied on top.

Ha! Today I snapped Fivel or one of his family members. I am sure now, that we have at least three, but probably many more sharing the house with us.