Ghana 5

First of all, the frogs in my house are getting a touch out of control, but I am determined to complain less in this blog. I worry that in highlighting the more extraordinary aspects of my Ghana experience, I may be giving off the impression that life here is far more challenging, or less enjoyable, than it actually is.

So I will get the “bad stuff” out of the way in one paragraph - and it will be vivid! - before moving on to the more glorious aspects of my journey and life here in sub-Saharan Africa.

The frogs continue to be a problem. I see at least two a day, and it’s the suddenness of their appearance that makes me jump. I will creep to the bathroom in the middle of the night, carefully eyeing around corners for a small ribbeting intruder, and just when I think I’m clear… I will sit comfortably on my ivory throne and … hop! yet another frog will join me in the most private of moments.

But I have other tormentors as well. Last night it was a dead cockroach, a few spiders and a large slimy millipede slithering under my table. Two nights ago, in Accra, I was tormented by a single ravished mosquito. Finally, in the dark of the night, I turned on the lights determined to overcome my tormentor. When I finally smacked him, he released a shocking amount of blood, and I returned to the most satisfied state of slumber that I have experienced in a while.

It’s hard to believe I’ve spent so much time traveling, living in nasty youth hostels and sleeping in the wilderness, isn’t it? How have I never identified my fear of bugs, my jumpiness over them, until now? It’s a mystery.


That’s all the gore for today. I am back in Osino after a weekend of utter relaxation and self-care in Accra. I hadn’t been feeling great, but I returned to work this afternoon. My colleagues at the bank greeted me joyfully. However, when I told them that I had spent the weekend in bed, they were unanimously convinced that I was referring to less-pure and more enjoyable things than food poisoning. I explained to them that my boyfriend was back in Israel, but they laughed and nodded as if they were “in on” a secret. A few minutes later, another co-worker asked me if I’d been sure to “treat my boyfriend right and show him the best time in Ghana.” I am amused and somewhat shocked by the blatant sexual discussions at work. There were some more graphic remarks as well which I will pass on writing about.

Ori and I did have an unforgettable, wonderful week. He arrived on Friday evening. We were famished so I whisked him to a “great salad place,” something you can only get in the capital city of Ghana. Having just arrived from Israel, he was far less impressed with the meal than I was. We journeyed through the city, starting at Independence Square. It is a huge empty parade ground marked by a boxy-looking arc-de-triomphe with a huge black star in the center. The square looks over the ocean so we wandered from there to the beach. We saw young teenagers playing soccer and adults and children dancing and drumming along the boardwalk. Locals were swimming, but we were too disgusted by the sewage flowing toward the ocean to want to dive in.

We went out for a fancy Valentine’s Day dinner at a South African place called el Goucho. Ori ordered crocodile tail. It sort of tasted like a cross between chicken and fish. We also had the most amazing frogs legs. Really. Incredible. Which is actually why I think that the frogs in Osino are tormenting me so much. Guilt. Payback. It’s rough.

The next morning we headed north to the Volta Region and to visit the Wli Water Falls near the border with Togo. At the Accra bus station, we were grateful to find a new, air-conditioned tro-tro van headed our way. Still, we had to wait over an hour for it to fill up, and the entire time a loudspeaker screamed from its roof announcing the destination. My head was pounding before we even began the 4-5 hour journey. Once we arrived in the town of Hohoe, we still had to take a 40 minute van ride on a dirt road to arrive to the town of Wli.

But it was worth it!

In Wli, there is a paradise-like inn owned by a German couple. The couple, in their 50s, had set out about 10 years ago to drive from Germany to South Africa. Along the way, they had fallen in love with Wli, bought some land and are now running a clean, efficient get-away overlooking the largest waterfalls (arguably) in West Africa.

We could order simple, delicious food from their menu, but our orders had to be in by the afternoon. We would receive specific meal times: soup at 6:50 if dinner was at 7. We asked once for a 10 minute pause before our dessert. The Ghanaian waiter look slightly frightened, shook his head and said no. Then he said…maybe 2 minutes. It was clear that the Germans were running a tight ship.

The spot was spectacular. There was lush jungle foliage, pineapples, bananas and "pawpaw" (papaya) growing on the property. Chickens and small goats wandered by, and the innkeepers kept a parrot as well. One of the trees would shed white snow-like fuzz in the wind and blanket the skies with beautiful flurries that glinted in the sun. We didn’t want to ever leave.

I felt a bit sick on Saturday night, but we managed to hike about 2 hours up to the falls on Sunday. It was a spectacular hike, with animals, insects, plants and hundreds of butterflies providing endless entertainment along the way.

At the base of the hike some wood sculptors were selling their wares to the tourist crowd. In addition to the traditional statues depicting lovers, masks and animals, there was also a huge collection of large wooden penises. Each sculptor told us the same thing: For AIDS demonstrations. I was tempted to buy one for my father – who is a urologist.

We left Wli on Monday morning and were sad to leave. Ori was feeling sick and had a fever so the long journey to my village was torture for him. We finally made it in the afternoon and he relaxed at home while I headed off to the bank.

During the course of the week, Ori had a great time interacting and meeting with villagers. He always had a camera in hand, so children would surround him, eager to have their picture taken and then to see the image on the digital screen. Around 2pm, when school lets out, throngs of children in their matching uniforms would literally follow us down the streets. I would glance back at Ori and laugh – he looked like the Pied Piper or the character in West Side Story leading the Jets gang through a New York City alley.

While I was working in various bank branches, Ori made plenty of friends around the village. He spent one whole afternoon talking with a storekeeper about politics, music, religion and the role of women.

Ghanaians are proud to describe themselves as “very curious” – to the point of being slightly nosy – but it makes for great conversation. This, and the impression I have that no one is ever in a rush, means that it is easy to find yourself in long conversations with people about all sorts of issues. I am often impressed by how much they know about Israel – Hamas, Netanyahu and Livni are well known names to many people I have spoken with. I also enjoy the ease with which I can ask people questions about race and their perception of whites, Africa or the “western world.”

My neighbor and I have discussed how Ghana has so much going for it – a port, natural resources including gold, oil, and some diamonds. There is plenty of water and fertile ground. There’s democracy, peace and a literate population. He lamented that in spite of all these great things, Ghana is still not living up to its potential. Why, he asked, (as I have as well) are so many people in Ghana living without running water, electricity, and roads? Why is malaria so rampant?

Last weekend I was resting in Accra for three days, worried I had caught malaria. My upset stomach and total loss of appetite were not eased by the fact that both water and power were turned off all day on Saturday. My friend explained that this is fairly normal. The political parties control the water/power and they ration it regularly. Before the elections that were held a few months ago, there was constant power and water. People had hoped that with the new government, there would be fewer outages, but apparently that is not to be the case. I couldn’t help but think that despite the unbearable heat and our being forced to flush the toilet with buckets of water, the “rationing” was an environmental blessing. I tried to imagine New York City having similar blackouts on a weekly basis.



Holy crap. Just now. I mean, really, just now, as I am sitting here writing this, one of the agents I work with came running into the room crying. What’s wrong? I asked. Through her tears she managed to tell me there had been an accident. “Go and see,” she said, which is apparently what everyone in town does when such a thing happens. All of Osino is now gathered along the roadside staring at the scene of the accident. It took me a while to figure out what had happened but people kept pointing at an object in the road and saying, “the leg! the flesh!” and I finally realized that the amorphous brown and red object in the road was part of a man’s leg.

Now, about 20 minutes into this tragedy, there are no police, and no ambulance. And no one knows anything; the community is just standing along the street crying and shouting as traffic buzzes by in the rain occasionally mowing over the severed body parts.

Here is the story that I have so far. A bus was heading south going about 60 miles an hour and hit a private passenger car. The body parts belong to a passenger from that car. The bus drove off, very fast. Oh! Sirens! Just now. Anyway…that is all I know. Ill be back. The police just arrived. I also saw an ambulance and a hearse. The crumpled remnants of a car door are lying by the road side. No one knows how the man is. No one knows if he is alive. But the saga continues, everyone is watching. Waiting.

Ghana 1

Written on or about Jan. 25, 2009

I arrived in Ghana about 5 hours ago and already so much as happened. My flight from Frankfurt stopped first in Nigeria, to drop off most of the passengers. I wasn’t aware of the pit stop beforehand, but it gave me a chance to see the landscape in daylight. The runway was surrounded by green – a small paved strip lined with umbrella like trees. The air was thick with very low visibility, as if covered by a fog. As we approached the runway, I saw scattered yellow lights and what appeared to be small fires burning here and there amidst the jungle.

After about an hour to refuel, we continued on a very short flight to Ghana. As we passed through the doorway and out onto the stairs of the aircraft, I was struck with the thick nighttime heat. (I later learned that this week has been a particularly cool one.) I made it through customs, passport control, baggage claim and emerged tentatively from the airport into the eager throngs beyond the airport entrance. There was a din of collective name calling and countless signs, but eventually I saw a white face in the crowd and heard her calling my name. My boss had a taxi waiting for us and as we toured the Accra evening streets, she and I played a bit of Jewish geography and reminisced about Cortelyou Road in Brooklyn. She told me the plan for the weekend and even surprised me with the wonderful gift of a SIM card and minutes! She also told me that one of her friends in the ex-pat community was hosting a party tonight, and that we were welcome to come.

I couldn’t see much at night, but I did notice the ubiquitous construction. On every street there were half built houses – huge ones. Apparently, people here will build homes little by little – the foundation one year, the walls the next. Even on this wealthy side of town (or perhaps especially) this phenomenon was clearly visible. We found my hotel, not far from the airport, and were both impressed by the A/C, cable TV and hot water (which I still think isn’t true…). It’s a simple motel room, but the bed is comfortable and the mosquitoes limited.

Accra has a din, a sound track. You can hear the airplanes as they head to and from the city, and everyone knows the daily flight schedules. Amidst the roar of the engines, someone here can identify “Delta” or “Ethiopian Airlines.” You can easily tell when people are coming to town, or when your friend has arrived from afar. I am not sure if this airplane-identification is an ex-pat pastime, or if the locals also play along. In addition to the airplanes, there is always some sort of music playing; sometimes American rap songs, sometimes West African hits. Apparently, much of the music comes from the Ivory Coast which is known to be a cultural hub for the region.

I rested for half an hour in my room, and then we left for the party. My boss left telling me, very nonchalantly, that she didn’t want to stay long because she had been sick last week and wanted to get rest. She described this in about the same tone and level of concern that someone would use to discuss a cold.
“Sick with what?” I asked.
Malaria and Typhoid.
Oh. Right… She told me they were very treatable (she was cured!) and that she hadn’t missed any work. She’d felt a bit sick, gone to the doctor and taken some medicine. Now she’s fine. Ok… I took a deep breath and tried to match her easygoing approach.

We’re staying in the eastern, wealthy part of the town. The neighborhood where the party was is even wealthier – huge mansions surrounded by high fences. We hopped in a cab that costs a dollar or two to get almost anywhere, and arrived at a dead end street. The house had a gate and several guards standing out front. Inside the huge home were marble floors, art on the walls, large, open rooms. Not your typical bachelor pad, but the inhabitant is a young European making a killing here in Ghana. Not sure what business… There was catered food – meatballs, potato salad, kebabs grilled up fresh all night. There was a table cluttered with various juices, wine and liquors – and a large bin of sangria. Around midnight, a DJ arrived, and rumor had it that later on there would be a band and yes, prostitutes or at least some “questionable” local women. People ran in and out of the swimming pool, jumping with fanfare and splashing the other guests.

It was a curious party – part high school house party, part college-drinking binge until you noticed the crowd. Despite all the hired help, it had a very casual, young feel. But the guests were all in their twenties and thirties, and only a few were drinking in excess. Mostly, people chatted in small groups, mingling and flirting. The crowd was filled with young singles, brought to Ghana by the hope of adventure, or charity, world-changing, money-making and more. The culture had an impulsive feel to it, as if Ghana for ex-pats is a place where actions have few consequences and love lasts only one night.

There were Europeans, Americans, Australians, Senegalese, Ivorians. Here, in one yard, was a collection of people who shared only their foreigness, if not their values. There were World Bank employees, mingling with staff from several NGOs. There were a lot of people working in shipping, and others making big cash in short term stints in Africa working for foreign companies. Ghana has one of the strongest markets in the world, and the country just recently found oil. It’s the hub of West Africa for foreign diplomats and there are endless ways to take advantage of its resources and potential for the foreign entrepreneur. I spent the night speaking in French, happy that I had not totally forgotten the language although each time I wanted to say the French word for “but,” I said it in Hebrew. I made a few friends, got invited to go to the beach today and for a moment felt sad that I didn’t have more time to spend in Accra with my new ex-pat community.

I introduced myself as being from Israel, mostly because I hope that if people enjoy my company, maybe they will improve in some small way how they think about the country. There are about 60 Israelis living in Accra and most of the people at this party had not met very many. (One guy told me proudly that he once knew some Jewish people in France who had moved to Israel.) People asked me a lot about the war and the Americans were curious about the upcoming elections. People listened and I didn’t feel attacked, but clearly the sentiment was against the recent events in Gaza. One man described to me in detail the length that his shipping company goes to ensure that their boats and cargo never go to an Israeli port. He told me they will travel all through the Mediterranean, with the sole exception of Israel.

Around 1AM (GMT), we headed home, although the party was going strong. The night air was blanketed with sand from the Sahara; apparently the air here will remain dry, dusty and hazy until the rains of late March wash it away.

Ghana  Part 4

A few anecdotes from yesterday. I love how every moment here is filled with surprises. Amidst what may seem like the most boring town, where on weekends I have spent hours playing Chutes and Ladders, there are tiny moments of fascination that make this experience so fulfilling for me. This morning, for example, I woke up to another breathtaking sunrise. The air is thick and misty and the large trees are silhouetted in the fog by the rising sun behind them. I opened my gate to a family of snails, nearly the size of hand, making their way across my path. Do snails live in families?

Last night, O, my neighbor, came over just to say hi. Suddenly, she squealed with excitement at the trees in my yard. Somehow, ridiculously, we had all failed to notice the hundreds of ripe plantains dangling mere feet from my door. She ran to get a machete, and before I could stop her, she had literally hacked down an entire tree in order to get to the high growing fruit. The huge bunches of plantains were laid out on the ground and the ripest ones were fried up immediately for a delicious dinner. O. also managed to chop down a few pawpaws (papaya) for dessert. Usually, I am not so keen on this fruit, but I loved the not-quite-ripe sweet crunch of the ones growing in my yard.

During dinner, I talked a bit with my neighbor R. about his work as a teacher. He told me there are 50 or 60 students in each of his high school classes so I asked him if discipline is difficult. R. is a small man who looks almost like a teenager. I have found him to be gentle, intelligent and the most intellectual person I have met in a while, in Ghana or otherwise.

He told me that discipline is maintained through the caning of students with a sort of bamboo or wicker rod. He complained that he has to thrash the students although he hates doing so, because of the ineffective headmaster of his school. He prefers the less violent method of having the teenagers kneel in front of the classroom when they misbehave. It has to be mentioned that one of his students is my small boy. In spite of the fact that we all spend time together nearly every evening, R. has still on occasion thrashed P. (my small boy) during the school day.

If students resist the punishment, they receive it on their backs, instead of their hands. A typical punishment might be 3-5 whips of the cane. R. told me that he once had to cane his entire class of 50, and that the process was exhausting. But the children he are stubborn, he explained, so I have to do it even though I don’t like to.


Evenings here are creepy. The house sits on a major road connecting Accra (Ghana’s capital) to the Northern part of the country and Burkina Faso. Cars and trucks roar by all night bringing people and goods to all the villages and towns along this north-south route. The house is set back from the road, but there is a constant din of traffic, ceiling fans and a choir of frogs who live outside my bedroom. Lizards scurry on the metal roof; the silence of the countryside I anticipated was as false a hope as clean air around here. With the constant music playing, and bonfires of garbage blazing, Ghana is not the peaceful refuge that I imagined. The tranquility manifests itself in different ways – through the patience of the people here and the lack of rush and business.

In addition to the hustle and bustle beyond my walls, there is plenty hubbub within. At night, the cockroaches come around, giant fast critters eager to overtake every dark, dank corner of my abode. There are grasshoppers too, and large spiders scurrying on the walls. It’s enough to make me nauseous, and the catalyst for my new purchase of a mosquito net – a wall between me and the nighttime visitors that terrorize my dreams.


This week, I spent my first Shabbat in Osino, in my house. It coincided with my first night alone in my new surroundings. A friend of mine from Hebrew University packed me a wonderful Sabbath kit, complete with candles for each week and 6 small gifts to create a festive mood. Her first present was a mini Kiddush cup, perfect for holding the sanctified Fanta-wine. I did Kiddush on the phone with my mom, and enjoyed a meal of sweet, sugar bread, pasta and tomato sauce. I cranked up the electric fence and settled in to bed with a movie.

The morning began with a phone call from my small boy who was on his way over to help with the laundry and cleaning. I told him not to touch anything, and ran to turn off the electric current surrounding the house. He was a bit shook up when I found him outside the gate, but I assured him that it was safe to enter. He told me had nearly come straight over without calling first and was grateful to god that he had opted for calling!

We spent Saturday assembling the mosquito net and cleaning the house. P. is good company and I enjoyed talking with him. After noon, we walked to town where passersby greeted us and asked if we were getting married. He laughed at them, inquiring, “Do you remember me having a wedding?” It was a silly question, brought on by fascination with my whiteness more than a true belief that we were actually a married couple.

P. invited himself over for dinner. Apparently, in Ghana it is much more appropriate to invite oneself over to someone's house, rather than to invite guests to your own. Thus, I am more likely to have guests come here than I am to receive invitations to their homes, unless I ask myself to come inside. In town we picked up ingredients for dinner – sweet plantains, tomatoes, cabbage and chicken. The meat here is sold at “Cold Store” stands, some of the stores featuring refrigeration. The storekeeper reached into her freezer with bare hands and pulled out a ¼ chicken from within the stacks of damp and soiled cardboard boxes. She then proceeded to hack apart the thigh and drumstick with a machete, before tossing my dinner into a plastic bag. With her same bare hands, she gave me change. Our whole chicken dinner cost around three dollars and easily fed five.

We began preparing the food at five o’clock, with O. from next door teaching me to cook. There were many steps involved; we pre-boiled the vegetables and chicken before frying them all separately. There is pepe pepper to grind with a mortar and pestle, rice to cook, vegetables to wash and clean for dirt and bugs. We didn’t eat until eight, but the food was great and the spiciness within reason. The chicken was hard for me to eat. I couldn’t tell what was flesh , bone or fat and I picked gingerly at the hacked chunks of poultry. The others ate it all, leaving only small pieces of bone on the side of their plates.

After dinner, two of the neighbors asked me about the recent war in Israel. They know about Hamas, but had not heard of the rocket attacks on S’derot or of Gilad Shalit. I filled them in as well as I could and then we changed subjects to music and dance.

O. played mp3s on her cell phone while P. danced in the hallway. They sang a Ghanaian hit for me that sings the praises of Barack Obama. Most of Africa is extremely excited about the new American president!

They left around 10, and then I went to bed where I crashed promptly onto the floor when my bed slats had come loose. Annoyed, I made another bed, disappointed that I could not try out the new mosquito net. I watched the rest of my movie and fell asleep.

Today most people are at church and shops are closed. I was going to go on a hike, but prefer to relax, read my book and catch up on writing. Tomorrow and this week will be full of travels and adventure.

Just now, I was cleaning my floors, collecting water from the faucet outside my door. I noticed the lizards running around furiously, brushing up against trees and frantically headed in every direction. Split seconds later, 5 large drops fell on my face, followed by a fury of angry rain spilling from the sky. The sun was gone in an instant, replaced by torrents of rain banging on the roof creating thunder in the house. I dropped the bucket and mop and ran for cover. I thought it didn’t rain here during the dry season, but it appears I had been misinformed.