One Love

Another long one. Another Travel Writing piece. Can't wait to share more details. Again, pardon the length.

We walked down the gangway to what we later decided was the bitter odor of elephants and vinegar. The air was thick and humid, and the smell of pollution hung in the deep layer of smog, protecting our skin like an unhealthy version of spray-on Coppertone.
After nine days without land, it was nice to be back on firm ground. But there was little time to enjoy the sights of colorful shipping crates and rusty, old mechanical cranes before the hassling by Ghanaian men and women began. Most carried string bracelets in colors resembling the country’s flag, customizable to say whatever you were in the mood for. A Rastafarian dressed in tattered jeans and a once-white baggy shirt approached me. From what little I could interpret of his quick and choppy English, I soon realized he wanted me to write my name down on the notepad he waved in front of my face. “Welcome to our country! You just write now, I will have ready for you when you come back. Just for you!” By our fifth day in port, most of these locals learned the definition of “No, thank you”, but for the time being, I was the one training this man, and he didn’t catch on very quickly.

My friend and I coached our group not to break stride. Some fell behind and were lost in the dust, while others were rescued by a physical tug of the arm. I noticed as we power walked out of sight of the ship’s safe haven that two men were still with us. Was this how the whole trip would be? I prayed I wouldn’t find the confines of the MV Explorer more inviting than this country I knew nothing about, but at the moment it seemed the ship was pulling ahead in the race. I lowered my guard as one of the two men following us jogged to match my stride. His name was Stephen, and so was his friend’s. He stood as tall as me, if that. His short, wiry hair stood out from his clothing, which looked fresh compared to the other men we had shaken off in port. “Do you know where we can find an ATM?” I asked. If he was going to follow me around, I was going to get some useful information out of him. The Stephens walked us into town, to one of the only ATMs open on a Sunday in Ghana. As I thanked them, they mentioned something about “God’s plan”, which I soon learned was on everyone’s mind here. I realized these men were just interested. They asked questions about America and how we liked being in their country, seemingly anxious in hoping it would measure up. They beamed with pride as I told them truthfully that I thought I liked it, and even if I had already conjugated a negative opinion, I wouldn’t have shared it with them on my worst day. Ghana and I had gotten off on the wrong foot. I cleared my mind and started over.

It seemed to me that there weren’t many tourist attractions here, so my original plan was to get off the ship and meet the locals. Sure, I was proposed to three times by men I had never spoken to, but as we pulled away from our temporary port home and many dancing, genuinely happy people on the dock below, I realized this was a country where the people you met told the story. It wasn’t about what I saw that was amazing, but new friends who made it that way.

There were the taxi drivers. Outside of Takoradi, they didn’t know their way around. To their dismay, we usually attempted to pile five people into a cab, squashing four into the backseat. I watched them struggle internally, money versus authority. Money always won, but sometimes we had one of us disappear in the backseat at a traffic light regulated by the police. We requested to go to what we thought were common places, but noticed most of our cab drivers would yell out the window in their native language, to which the recipient of the question would usually point in different directions, swerving their hand like it was a car driving around a street corner. We learned the skills of bargaining for prices when they tried to charge 50 cedi for a five-minute ride. My strategy was to wander over to an official-looking local and ask how much the price should be, then rejoin my stressed out, haggling group members with money-saving information. We would make the announcement for how much we would pay, and pile into the car whose driver snagged us first.

The Cape Coast Castle and Slave Dungeons brought a variety of hustlers and helpers to the table. We toppled out of the taxi like a Honda Pilot car commercial, finally beginning to appreciate the muggy breeze after sitting on top of each other. Our taxi driver, Ben, pointed us in the direction of what looked like a little shack near the beach for a late lunch, right next to the castle. As we climbed and descended the miniature obstacle course of stairs to get there, children carrying baskets of food on their heads approached us, hands still free enough to grab ours. Two girls, each wearing stained, perhaps second-hand dresses, swung one of my arms in a playful way, as they asked my name and where I was from. They dragged us down to the beach, where an older group of boys had just finished playing soccer. All together we were three girls and two boys, and as these soccer players passed they chose one of us, like men at a bar placing claim on which woman in a group of friends would be their focus for the night.

Mine was named Chris. Sweaty, stuttery, and slightly aggressive, but in a nice way, if there was such a thing. Our conversation could have more appropriately been called an interrogation, but as he asked me questions nervously, he too mentioned God’s plan and that it was fate that we meet. As he wiped large drops of sweat from his forehead and out of his eyes, he spoke sincerely about his dream to attend the University of California. I began to realize he thought I might be his gateway to the United States, and as I wrote down my name for him to look me up on facebook, I hoped he wouldn’t ask anything too impossible.

The young girls who were so nice when we first met were now getting anxious. The one in a faded yellow dress was now pulling my arm out of it’s socket, waving around a torn piece of paper so close I had to cross my eyes to read it. On top of the paper was formally written, “Hello. My name is Rebekah. I do not have enough money to buy my books for school. It is my wish to continue my education, and I am hoping you will please donate so I can buy my books. Any money is appreciated. Thank you.” I smiled painfully as I fell for the trap. I told her we would be back out after lunch, and she could talk to me then. We assembled our troops and finally staggered up the steps and through the restaurant. Rusty nails held up knick knacks and dusty artwork in random places on the walls, and newer-looking wood showed where frames once hung, now unable to protect from dirt and sun in its absence. After chicken kabobs and refreshing, familiar cokes, we apprehensively clambered back down the stairs, bracing ourselves for the storm. The girl popped out of nowhere, again. I snatched the paper out of her hand before she could throw something else on me, scribbled down my name, where I was from, and that I was donating one cedi to her “fund”. More kids were accumulating. I thanked her quickly, pulled my friends arm, and booked it to the safety of the castle as a scene from a bad horror movie formed in my head. The lost and confused victims stumbled away, batting back zombies as they attempted to do whatever it is zombies do. We half-sprinted through the group of men barricading the castle entrance with “authentic” souvenirs, bursting past an old woman and her daughter sitting near the bathrooms, who chuckled at what they just witnessed. In the distance, I saw the little girl I had just given money to run up to what I assumed was a type of “boss”, beaming as he rewarded her for bringing back another catch.

I’m not sure if it was just the previous scene we had made outside, but the castle seemed still, quiet, eerie. We breathlessly paid the entrance fee, and walked into a rise of white walls and barred doors. Cannons lined the outermost wall, and the aqua blue ocean met the sky many miles out. The sun, still hazy from the smog, gave the dungeons a barren, desert-like feel. We walked to the wall. Down below, closest to the castle, was something you could almost refer to as a neighborhood. Houses with shaky walls and no roofs or running water stood worn and surviving. Goats nibbled at pieces of dropped food, or maybe dirt, as “clean” clothes hung on the line, swaying to air dry in the wind. Further out on the beach, hundreds of locals swam, fully clothed, in the waves, throwing beach balls, surfing pieces of cardboard, canoeing their half-sunken boats through the water. I watched quietly as some boys played futbol below, half of their field submerged underwater, thick sticks coming out of the sand for goals. Shirts versus skins, it looked like. I turned my attention back to the neighborhood below and noticed a woman pounding some type of dough in a wooden bowl with a tree branch. “Do you know what she is making?” I looked to my right to see a nicely-dressed man smiling lightly and waiting for a reply. His weathered eyes glanced back down, nodding in the direction of the women, now accompanied by a child running circles around her. “She is making foofoo, one of the traditional dishes of Ghana. It is a type of bread, mixed as you see her doing, with plantains and water.” I nodded in understanding. His name was Laurent. He was solemn in his words and actions, and I had a feeling it was because of where we were. His ancestors were held in these dungeons long ago, and, as I noticed with many other locals in the area, as we took pictures and skipped from room to room, they kept to themselves, looking out across the ocean, appreciating their freedom. We talked until my group wanted to move on. He said the beach party I was witnessing below appeared every Sunday. People gathered to celebrate the day made for God, socializing and genuinely happy. We thought these shacks they lived in were horrific, unimaginable. But they were completely satisfied, maybe even better off. It was all they knew, and their appreciation for what they had made their lives something to admire.

Kakum National Park brought us to Doris, a heavy-set, middle-aged woman dressed in a park ranger uniform. Her big black boots and camo-style jumpsuit gave more of a military impression, especially when she failed to greet the group she would be watching over for the next two hours. We hiked behind her up the winding path and past the rest stations, into the rainforest. Intimidated, we took a step back as she reached the top and turned around to face us next to a sign that read “Canopy Trail”. Her hard face relaxed, and a smile spread across a set of almost straight, yellow teeth. “Okay.” She said with the breath she had left. “Now that we’ve made it through the hardest part of the trek, I’d like to welcome you to Kakum National Park”. She gave us facts about the park, warning to keep an eye out for elephants (Really? In this?), mongoose, and other wildlife as we got deeper into the forest. As her hard façade faded away, a much kinder Doris emerged. She walked and laughed with us, putting up with the stereotypical class clown who verbally harassed her in a joking way, answering any questions we had. She took us to a set of seven rope bridges, strung high above the green, lush treetops. My first step onto the small wooden platform was greeted with a loud CRACK. I quickly retracted my foot and stared wide-eyed at Doris. She smiled understandingly. “These bridges will make many noises as you walk, but I assure you that no one has ever fallen to their death.” Great, Doris, very reassuring. I turned around again, inhaled, and took a step out. Strong, just as Doris had said. The fifteen-member group trekked across the treetop canopy, snapping pictures, the boys rocking the bridge back and forth violently to the sound of the girls’ screams. Doris was waiting for us when we came back around, still laughing from our lack of coordination and fascination with the forest playground. We continued past trees and bushes new to our eyes, with Doris explaining their medical remedies and everyday uses to the people of Ghana. As we finished our tour, we thanked her for her time and she thanked us for letting her come. It was actually required that she babysit us, if you will, but we enjoyed her company just as well.

One of the later days of our trip was spent taking a “tourist bus”, as the men at the bus station referred to it, four hours east to Accra. Though running on three hours of sleep from the night before, I couldn’t shut my eyes. I was fascinated with what lay beyond the bus windows. Men and women balanced everything from small bowls to giant rugs to generators on their heads. They walked in perfect rhythm and with a swaying posture showing obvious experience, some holding the hands of their children as they walked. They sold everything from bags of water to plantain chips to household items like combs and toothbrushes. We passed through many security checkpoints, where scattered and serious military men with AK47s strung over their shoulders peered through the windows at us when we stopped. We didn’t know the reason for these checkpoints, and were especially terrified of them after our first encounter. My roommate, sitting behind me, was taking pictures out the window as we crawled through security. All of a sudden, one of the soldiers was at the window, his blue-styled camo sleeve snatching at Jenn’s camera. “You are not allowed to take pictures!”, He said angrily as he snatched again. “You must ask permission to take pictures of people! It is impolite! And you may not take pictures of government buildings! It is forbidden!” The man was very worked up, and we were all terrified to say the least. After some more quarreling and a threat from the soldier to “get his master and have her beaten”, Jenn had convinced the man she had not taken any pictures and would put her camera away immediately. The driver, who had gotten out of the car to talk to another security officer, climbed back in and shut the door. We continued the next couple minutes in silence, but this was one of those stories to laugh about later.

We passed more people as we drove, some thrusting their items into the windows. “One cedi!”, they would exclaim as the bus began to drive again. Their sales pitches were quality. A rugged man with shirt made up of more holes than clothing stuck his fistful of tools into the window of our taxi, along with his very strong odor. “Screwdrivers!” was all he could muster out. Another man with long, straggly hair carrying a giant poster of the alphabet, letters assigned to pictures, shouted, “A for Apple!” How could we resist?

The best Ghanaians we met were family friends of our friends. The two men were both named Eric, and were therefore referred to as “the Erics” for the duration of our time in Accra. They were generous, negotiating with taxi drivers for us, finding us buses for transportation, telling us where we could go to eat. They found a hotel for our group to stay in that was safe and clean. At night we traded dance moves in the hotel lobby and socialized. Michael, their younger brother and a student at the University of Cape Coast, was my friend for the night. Well dressed and even better spoken, Michael had lived in England for four years earlier in his life. He told me of the ways of school, society, and life in general. He had traveled to many countries, and although I could tell almost immediately he was much better off in this country than many other families, he did not show it. His humble attitude and willingness to accept and talk to anyone gave me great respect for him. I spent forty-five minutes explaining American football to him with no progression, and we talked premiere league soccer until late in the night, when the alcoholics of the trip had finally passed out.

I learned from my time in Ghana that first impressions shouldn’t last. Terrified when first getting off the ship led to an assumption that all of Ghana was out to get us. It was when we strayed off the tourist path that we got to meet the real people. They were friendly and loving. They were as curious to learn about us as we were to learn about them. Most of all, they taught me that life could still be good with nothing. We came back covered in red dirt and grim every night to the comfort of a shower and warm, safe bed. They did what they could to get by, but understood by looking around that they could appreciate relationships with God and each other instead of the materials of life. They taught me more than just social skills and how to say “No, thank you.” We learned, as one child said to me on the street, “one love”.