"My heart's desire"

The evocatively-named kente cloth that we bought at Adanwomanse.

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Native birds and traditional weavers

Yesterday we visited the Bobiri Forest, 30kms from Kumasi, famed for its variety of indigenous butterflies and birds. We set off from the hotel at 7am, hoping to be prompt enough to see the early-rising birds. They proved elusive, but we felt vindicated (i.e. it was not just our lack of expertise) when we came across a troupe of professional birdwatchers (one of whom had been at college with James!) and discovered they hadn't had much luck either. With the benefit of their high-powered binoculars we did see a black dwarf hornbill and a cream dove but nothing close up, except for some amazing butterflies and bugs.

Then we went on to Adanwomase, which is one of the weaving communities famous for producing the Kente cloth which has been worn by local tribespeople for over 200 years. Nowadays most Ghanaians own a few kentes for special occasions, and the each pattern conveys a statement or message, including one which means "Back off, stop acting so jealous!". We had a brilliant guide, himself a weaver (a trade restricted to men), who talked us through the whole process and let us have a go at every step of the weaving process. It seems that foreign females are excluded from the gender restrictions. Naturally we purchased full kente garb, so now we're just looking for some fancy dress party invitations...

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An audience with the king

This morning we went to the Manhyia Palace, the home of Asante Kotokohene, the King of Ashanti: King Osei Tutu II. It's a special day: an "adae" festival, when the King receives his ministers and subjects, and they give him cases of whisky, brandy and other consumables. This time he was also presented with a large and handsome goat, who proceeded to leave a small deposit on the ground. The kids were much amused to see the barefooted dignitaries carelessly walk into it.

All the local chaps wear togas made from kente cloth over their shorts, and sit in strict hierarchy in the inner or outer court. Foreigners are seated in the outer court, and our clicking/ogling was politely and graciously ignored.

In the prelude to the king's arrival various personalities entered the court in a small procession, led by an apparently drunk chap carrying a tray of greenery on his head, whose cohorts were manhandling him to slow him down and prop him up. There was a huge racket of horn blowing, drums, and wailing into microphones. Various other attendants followed, and then the King himself in a colourful kente toga, together with his attendants. He took his place on his stool (throne) and was fanned assiduously as dozens of ministers and others were presented to him. Fascinating! A privilege to watch.

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Dried fish as far as the eye can see

Spent the morning exploring Kumasi's vast open-air market (at 12 hectares, reputedly west Africa's largest). A place of frenetic activity and pungent smells, where the narrow alleyways between rows of stalls serve as non-stop conduits for people rushing past with mountains of goods balanced on their heads. No dawdling here!

Almost everyone was friendly and welcoming, the exception being the stallholders in a small area just outside the market who were aggressive and angry (something spiritual happening?). The labyrinth of alleyways is somewhat bewildering, but far from chaotic - the market has well-defined areas of specialism. A busy acre of dried fish yields to stock cubes and tinned tomatoes, beyond which lie the saucepans and other kitchenware.

A feast for the senses! We were eventually defeated by the baking sun and din, and have sought sanctuary in the nearby Vic Baboo's cafe, for authentic local delights such as Hawaiian pizza and burgers .

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School's out!

Now our school visits have finished, we are kicking back and remembering some contrasts and highlights. Four very different schools, each with their own strengths, and very different levels of facilities.... We have seen:

- brick built classrooms with tiled floors, as against three sided wooden structures with a tin roof, wooden partitions starting two feet off the ground, and chickens wandering between the classrooms (not to mention curious faces peering underneath or over the top);

- proper loos (albeit with no flush and only a short curtain in front and a loo seat whisked out of a cupboard especially for us), contrasted with little huts which we would rather not talk about!;

- big airy rooms where the two-year-olds have plenty of space to march around singing nursery rhymes, and tiny dark rooms with 70 toddlers in each, all made to sit in rows, almost on top of each other, and one teacher doing her best;

- teachers laughing along with the kids and clearly enjoying their job, and teachers looking thoroughly bored or annoyed and using their canes rather too fiercely;

- many "cultural dances" and musical performances put on by the children in the blazing heat, (30 to 35 degrees and very humid; hotter in the classrooms) with two of us joining in, much to everyone's amusement! And some great drama about the power of the cross;

- a school bus with 15 seats holding about 80 frolicking children, sitting three deep on each other's laps and filling the aisle;

- the older girls drawing water from the well to wash up the cooking utensils from lunch (and laughing at one member of our party because she didn't have the right technique for filling the bucket);

- the total conviction with which the children, all of them living difficult lives in a material sense, sang "My God is able and He will see me through....";

- the fear on the children's faces when they thought they might have given a wrong answer in front of their teacher, and the delight on their faces the moment they finished their origami "chatterbox"; and

- kids jumping a mile at J's scary lion roar!.

So many experiences, all crammed into seven days of school visits! We are a bit tired but it was a privilege to meet the visionary and determined owners of the schools, who battled so hard to get their schools started, and are still battling, in faith, to continue and expand them. They speak in glowing terms of the support they are receiving (both loans and business training) from Opportunity International and Sinapi Aba Trust.

We were very grateful to be able to contribute all the books donated by friends in the UK, which were enthusiastically received. Since the children previously had little but the basic state text book, it's great to be able to picture them immersed in those books in the months and years to come, gaining a new window on the world beyond their school gate.

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"Who's the King of the Jungle?"

Whew! Today we finished our second day at LifeGate International Learning Centre, in Abuakwa, 10kms west of Kumasi. This was our fourth and final school, a wonderful and quite established place run by a chap called Joseph (the other three were all owned and run by pioneering ladies). Once again, the children were great fun when they got over their initial shyness and today's classes were especially keen to learn the song they had heard echoing through the other classrooms yesterday: "Who's the King of the Jungle?" ( Answer: Jesus, rather than the lion, but you have to hear the whole thing, really....)

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Ghanaian Food: The Verdict

Whilst some of us have managed to stick largely to spaghetti bolognese, burgers, pizza and chips during our stay so far, MAMOOPIFT (Most Adventurous Member Of Our Party In Food Terms, or MAM for short) is happy to give you a full report on the local cuisine......

Fried Chicken with Jollof Rice (pictured) - chicken is usually tender and spicy; jollof rice is fried in red palm oil and mixed with vegetables, varying from bland to very spicy. Served with Shito sauce (pronounced sheeto!) which is also spicy. All very tasty except perhaps for the accompanying lettuce with mayo and cold baked beans on top.

Kele Wele - pronounced Kelly Welly - chunks of deep fried plantain ( MAM usually hates bananas but these taste like sweet potato) liberally seasoned with ginger, pepper and salt. Not the healthiest maybe, but definitely one to polish off ....

Red Red - yummy, spicy bean stew served with fried plantain and "gari", which is powdered yam or cassava. Presumably gari is eaten for its nutritional value as it looks and tastes like sand. The stew is like chilli con carne but the tiny meat and fish bones are a bit disconcerting.

Grilled telapia and banku - the whole fish, with a delicious garlic, lime, chilli and ginger coating. Banku is great mounds of fermented maize and cassava stodge. MAM found that eating this the traditional way (with the right hand, no cutlery), was a great way to deal with all the fish bones.

Groundnut soup - oily and very spicy, this was not a favourite. Compounded by lots of old bony bits of chicken and an overpowering peanut flavour.

The most well-known Ghanaian dish is fufu. This is a very gelatinous substance made of pounded cassava, yam which is then sunk to the bottom of some soup. Eaten by rolling a small piece into a ball with the right hand, it is not chewed, but swallowed straight down, while the soup is drunk from the bowl. So heavy is this dish that most men wouldn't consider eating it after 2pm. MAM would add that eating Red Red or Kele Wele for an evening meal is not particularly conducive to a good night's sleep either!

The gourmet adventure continues.......
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Chatterboxes at Baah Memorial School, Kumasi

We left Elmina yesterday, and visited the Kakum rainforest (interesting, but could have been much better with proper guides) en route to Kumasi, Ghana's second city. It's a more densely commercial place than the uncontained urban/shantytown sprawl of Accra, and is surrounded by lush tropical woodland.

Today we met with the Sinapi Aba schools microfinance co-ordinator, and spent the day with him at the Baah Memorial School, in a peri-urban developing district named Apaaso, some 30mins south of the city. Baah is owned and run by Lily, a pioneering woman with a passion for education that began to manifest itself when she started up with just a few pupils in her living-room: a story somewhat similar to Desmercy and Samrit Academy in Ashaiman/Accra (see earlier posts). Now she has more than two hundred children on a small site on the edge of the district, from ages 3 (nursery) to 15 (junior high).

We spent a fun day with the nursery and classes 1 through 5, reading to them, singing, telling the time and making paper "chatterboxes" (see pic). We return there tomorrow for more time with other nursery classes and years 6 to 8, before visiting another local school on Thursday and Friday.

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The slave forts

Elmina is a picturesque fishing village on the coast, west of Accra. The busy and colourful fish market can be smelled from a few streets away. An intimidating place, full of locals unloading fish from the boats, chopping up and gutting anything from massive yellow fin tuna to the small tilapia fish, which is a local speciality served with a polenta called banku. No pictures I'm afraid as they are all on the camera (rather than the Blackberry).

We went on to visit the Fort St George, the oldest colonial structure in sub-Saharan Africa. Built by the Portugese in 1482, seized by the Dutch in 1637, and sold to the British in 1872. The fort is one of the infamous Ghana "slave castles", where thousands of slaves, captured in tribal wars, were brought to be shipped off to the New World. It was a harrowing place with terrible dungeons. We tried lifting the 25kg cannonball which was chained to each slave's ankle and it felt incredibly heavy. If one of them dropped it, he or she would be punished by 40 lashes. We saw The Gate of No Return through which the slaves were flung down onto waiting ships. Many thousands would not survive the journey, as conditions were so bad.

The plaque in the photo is on the wall of the courtyard. Sadly, it ignores all the human trafficking which continues around the world today.....

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Bird report

Rs post

During this holiday, I have seen many birds and I am in paradise! Here is my list:
(These are ALL wild)

Accra:
Small cute black birds
Black and white wagtail

El Mina:
Black and white weavers
Yellow and black weavers
A type of fisher
Vulture
White collared crowthing

Fosu:
Yellow weavers
Black hornbill

(None of these birds came from the Kakum national "bird park")

The weavers were VERY interesting to watch. some species traveled in tiny weeny flocks making a racket were as some were quiet and were focused on their nest. Sometimes they clustered in one tree or sometimes they were spread out on three trees. Some were building their nests and others were fetching food.

You could tell if the nest was new because of its colour.

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Hair do

This is a shop in EL MINA town that R happened to spot.

C's post
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On the beach

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On the coast at Elmina for the Easter weekend

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Faith and celebration!

Tomorrow is Good Friday and we're told it will be a quiet day and everyone will be wearing black to remember Christ's death. On Saturday from 9pm huge numbers will gather in churches to pray the whole night through. On Easter Sunday morning from 5am the churches empty into the streets, which become filled with processions of joyful people bearing candles, celebrating the resurrection. Our driver, Happy (sic), was beaming as he described how wonderful it is. Easter is a bigger celebration in Ghana than Christmas.

We'll see how much of that we notice in Elmina Bay Resort on the coast where we're headed to now - possibly not much!. But what an encouragement to us in how we approach Easter ourselves.

We have been amazed at how much evidence of Christian faith there is on the streets. Posters everywhere for Christian meetings, or encouraging people to fast during Lent, headlines in the paper today referring to Easter and articles inside about the price Jesus paid for us on the cross.

Most small businesses have faith related names like God First Cosmetics (or even, as we read in the guide book, Consuming Fire Fast Food!). Cars and trucks frequently have stick-on letters in their back windows saying "If God say yes, who can say no?" or similar.

Likewise, in both schools we visited in Accra, praising God was a big part of their day, in song and in prayer. At Samrit Academy, when someone enters the classroom and greets the children, asking how they are, they all stand up and say together "We are fine, blessed and highly favoured! How are you?". Strange to our ears, and said by rote, but nevertheless a great perspective to have on life. It is apparent that some of the teachers really love God and follow Him. However, for us it was upsetting to see some of the male teachers using a light cane on the children as a crowd control technique. This is standard practice in every Ghanaian school, apparently.

We told some of the older pupils that in England few people recognise Jesus as Lord, indeed you can be thought stupid for having faith, and they found that difficult to comprehend. We too find it difficult to comprehend what it would be like to live in a country where faith in God's power and recognition of our need of a saviour is as natural as breathing.

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Inspired driving

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People Carrying Weird Things On Their Heads

Rs post

During our stay in Accra we have seen people carrying and selling weird things on their heads. Here is the list:

Kitchen clocks
Sewing machines
Glass cupboards containing pastries or doughnuts
Stack of suitcases
Plate of whole smoked tuna fish
Six cereal bowls
Huge stack of buckets

At traffic lights hawkers walk up and down next to the cars selling:

Tummy trimmers
Clocks
Snacks such as plantains, oranges, grapes,
nuts, watermelon
Briefcases
Watches
Remote controls for TVs
Fabric with local designs
Water in small plastic bags to drink straight from the bag by cutting off the corner
Loaves of bread
Belts
T-shirts
Hosepipes

I will up date you on any more that we see because we have 4 hours to go! ( We are travelling To El INA)
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Visiting Samrit Academy

Just round the corner from Desmercy there is another school called Samrit Academy. Samrit was named after the owners Sam and Rita. We had about 30 mins with each class, 8 in all. They also made 2 posters for us and a few girls made a letter/picture for me! We saw another dance with the words I Have Decided To Follow Jesus! It was lovely!

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What time is it?

On the way back from a busy second day at Desmercy School. We spent half an hour with each class, doing some counting games, geography, reading and singing. Yes, we inflicted some badly-sung Brit (well, Aussie, in fact) tunes on the poor unfortunates. They reciprocated with beautifully sung local gospel songs.

Football and thumb-wrestling at the lunchtime break, and some telling-the-time activities (see pic). Then more time with the classes, some dancing (not by us, thank goodness) and a ceremony to present the books we'd shipped over. We then bade farewell to Mercy and her delightful school. Tomorrow we visit another primary school in the same area. Little do they know what dreadful singing awaits!

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Mercy (proprietor) addressing her school

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Rat Catchers

While in a traffic queue, a member of our party shouted "Rats"! everyone dashed to the car window and sure enough a man on the pavement was holding 2 rats on a hook. They had been dead for a long time because they were frozen stiff and flies were circling them! After contemplating the idea that he was selling them for dinner, we thought it was more likely he was showing the results of his rat trap.

(R's post)
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Some chatty members of class 4 at Desmercy School

Today we visited one of the schools with which Opportunity International works: Desmercy School, north of Ashaiman and an hour to the northeast of Accra. The school was set up five years ago by a local lady named Mercy, initially in her home but subsequently on rented land in a new development area near Ashaiman. Her first ever class is now in year 4, and the school numbers some 250 pupils in six classes, from kindergarten to age 14. Mercy now has twelve teachers working with her, and has created a thriving educational environment. The pupils were lively and attentive, and plainly love the time they spend there. One of the classes put on a well-executed dance routine for us (see pic above) despite adversity in the form of a power cut which knocked out the school's stereo. In the afternoon we spent some time with the kindergarten, singing "ten blue bottles", and we plan to do more with the older classes when we return tomorrow. One more brief update - the boxes of children's books have been released from customs. Excellent news! We will sort them tonight and take a selection to Desmercy tomorrow.

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Dancing at Desmercy School

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Sunday afternoon in the pool

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Sunday

Just been to a wonderful Palm Sunday service at the Osu Presbyterian Church. An uplifting sermon, and gospel praise from two terrific choirs and a congregation in celebratory spirit. The heat (33C) and early start (5.30am) have been a bit tough, so we're heading back to the hotel for some breakfast and a kip.

The rest of the day will be spent preparing for our visit tomorrow to Desmercy School, about two hours north-east of Accra. Gabriel, the Opportunity Int'l guy who liaises with the school, tells us that the school is busy with exams the week after we visit - even the three-year-olds! - but that we should be able to spend some time with some of the classes on Mon and Weds. On Tues we'll go to Samrit Academy, another nearby school that OI works with. At each place we'll plan material for an hour or so with the older pupils (11-15yrs) and separately with the middle crew (7-10) and the juniors (4-7), and some games to play outside in the break. Gabriel tells us that they will put on some dance and singing for us. Sounds fun!

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