Aroma De Christ

Mus's mother's chickens are trying to kill me. They're hardly more than chicks and one just kamikazed at my head. Birds are evil.

In odd morbid news, yesterday Mus and I were waiting at taxi station for my host sister Julie to arrive. When Mus went off to find me some breakfast, I saw a group of people gathered around a building- I figured they were waiting in line to buy something. But Mus soon returned to inform me that they were gathered around a dead body- everyone had thought the person was sleeping, but when someone tried to wake them they wouldn't rouse. Supposedly there was no sign of violence- no cuts or bruises. Later when the crowd dispersed, all I could see was the cardboard they had piled over the body. By the time we left, the police still hadn't arrived.

And speaking of dead bodies, check out this picture Mus took of me and the crazy drunk guy (he's the son of Mus's parents' landlady- I mentioned him a couple times last year, along with his hobby of kicking puppies).He was just brought in,staggering drunk, at 11 am by some other guy, laid on a bench and left there mumbling incoherently. A few minutes ago he rolled off the bench. Mus thought the picture was funny, as if I killed him and then went calmly back to my typing.

And for more photos, here are some links:

If You're Happy and You Know It...

The Sandcastles of Dwarves

I also posted some new videos, so you gotta check them out.

By the way, Aroma De Christ is the a new Christian church that's opened up here in Accra. Just goes to further prove that there's no end to the absurd originality of Ghanaian Christians.

Which brings up an interesting idea- what aroma do you associate with Jesus? I mean, in the literal sense, he probably smelled like BO- same as all desert-dwellers did before the invention of antiperspirant- but what about figuratively?

A Day at the Dentist's...

Friday we returned to Korle Bu hospital for a dental bonanza. I must say, with my paralyzing fear of dentists, I was particularly happy to only be a spectator.

Our first order of business was to take my host sister Julie to the dentist. The last week, half of Mus's tooth fell out (losing teeth is a recurring nightmare of mine, so I was more freaked out than he was.) So we decided to make the trip to the dentist a double feature.

While I waited for them to finish, I did some people-watching. I've often wondered how developmentally disabled people are treated by Ghanaians as a group; I've never really had the opportunity to observe such a situation here. Granted, I've seen how the Mus's family treats Sweet Mother, but that's different since they live together. I've never seen Sweet Mother interact with strangers.

But while waiting at the dentist, I had my opportunity. There was a boy who was maybe 9 or 10 who, I would guess, has down syndrome and probably some sort of physical growth disability too, making it difficult for him to walk. His father was with him, and the dental assistant wanted to take some X rays. The boy was scared and sat down and refused to move. Then, as I watched, his father and the assistant (who was also male) tried to coax him to go to get X rays. I was amazed at the affectionate way the assistant talked to the boy, often stroking his cheek, holding his hand, or patting his head. Then the dentist came out to try and coax the boy, bribing him with toys and stickers and toothbrushes. When that didn't work, a woman who was an administrator for the hospital came and joined the coaxing. They were all very affectionate, smiling fondly at the boy, and very patient; and as far as I could tell, none of them knew the boy well. Another mother, waiting there with her child, even joined in, telling him it wasn't scary and her little girl didn't mind the dentist. Finally, the dental assistant succeeded in convincing the boy to cooperate by promising him a large green drum as a prize, and he and the boy and the father headed off to the x-ray ward, all smiles.

What made this scenario even more interesting is that, in my experience with Ghanaian medical professionals, they generally lack a comforting bedside manner. I've had a few doctors who were good at communicating, but I feel as though I've been mostly roughly handled by the medical community at large. Even when I was watching a hygienist clean Julie's teeth, I felt there was more jabbing and bleeding than I'm used to.

I've heard many reasons for this lack of bedside manner. I think it probably boils down to two things; too many patients seeing too many doctors makes them move quickly and perhaps brusquely, and doctors and nurses here are often frustrated by their small pay. This is also supported by the fact that doctors in private clinics- who are better paid and see much fewer patients- are generally thought to be more gentle.

But that fact made this interaction with the developmentally disabled boy seem even more striking and unique. They were completely patient, indulgent even.

And another funny thing happened while I waited. I was listening to my discman and drowsing on and off when I saw a man, about my age, walk in. He smiled and pointed at the seat next to me and mumbled something quietly. I nodded and he sat next to me and started reading the paper that was lying there. I turned, laying my head on the back of the bench again, to go back to drowsing and listening to the soundtrack to “Wicked.” But I kept hearing him shifting and clearing his throat behind me. I turned to glance at him, and he was quiet for awhile.

Then I felt him tap my elbow. I turned to him, taking out one of my headphones. “Uhhh, I just wanted to, umm, tell you that my name is Kwesi and I am a Ghanaian,” he stammered. He was physically shaking.

“Hi, nice to meet you,” I said smiling, but not offering more since I didn't really want to have a conversation. I didn't sleep well the night before and I just wanted to close my eyes.

“And what about you?”

“My name is Jessica.”

“And you're from?”

“America.”

“Oh, okay.” He seemed to either get the hint or lose his nerve. “Well, I, uh, I just wanted... wanted to tell you that...” he trailed off weakly.

A few minutes later Mus returned, sporting a puffy cheek where his half of a tooth had been. I started fussing over him, my hand on his shoulder. A moment later, the guy sitting on the other side of me stood up, set down the paper and mumbled a thanks (I think he thought the newspaper was mine, but it wasn't) and quickly left, making it quite clear that he actually had no business in the dentist's waiting room and had just come in because he had seen me sitting there.

Moosty had a Little Lamb...

Meet the newest member of our household in Obo. Auntie Kissiwa bought him awhile ago, but apparently his previous owner couldn't keep him anymore, so he's been sent to live with us.

Mus and I feel really bad for him, actually. It seems that at his last house, he was treated like a beloved pet. He loves people, and will follow you around wherever you go, and rub up against you legs like a cat. Unfortunately, Auntie Kissiwa doesn't see him as a pet but as lunch, and she keeps him tethered in the corner so he can't eat her plants. This leaves the goat feeling terribly lonely, and he bleats piteously all day long, only stopping when someone's petting him.

The dog, Yennka, is also terribly lonely and thinks the goat is the answer to her prayers. She definitely doesn't see the goat as food; this dog is so domesticated that she literally doesn't recognize raw meat as food. But she thinks that she and the goat should be playmates, and she's doing her darnedest to make friends. I don't think that she has a firm grasp of the cultural differences between her and the goat, however. She jumps about, butt in the air, tail-wagging, and thinks the goat's furious attempts to head-butt her is all part of the game. And then she approaches the goat, all friendly-like, for some social-grooming and is confused when the goat again tries to head-butt her. Doesn't he understand that the games over and it's time to cuddle? I'm pretty sure Yennka thinks the goat is a socially-retarded dog, but figures a dumb friend is still better than no friend at all.

And now the goat and dog are in competition for attention. The other day, Mus took pity on the bored goat and took him for a walk on his rope tether. The goat gladly followed once he figured out what was going on, but the dog was determined not to be left behind. So the walk consisted of Mus, the goat, and the dog. The dog was always trying to lick the goat, so the goat would circle Mus or any other human to try and get away from Yennka, and the end result was everyone getting tied up in the knots while the animals played “Here we go round the Mulberry Bush.”

Heart Day Hilarity

A couple of weeks ago, Mus and I stopped in at a Chinese Restaurant near his parent's house to take a look at the menu. We were looking for some place low-key and inexpensive for a meal of take-out. It was immediately clear to us that we had the wrong place. The cheapest things on the menu was a plate of plain white rice for $3.

It was a bit awkward, since it was obvious that we were there only prospective customers that night and the wait staff was really eager to help us. Being heartless as I am, I felt no remorse- it's not like we were seated at a table or anything, we were just standing by the host to look at the menu. But Mus, the old softy, felt bad, so he bought an ice cream bar and we headed off to a restaurant a few blocks away where we got a huge plate of fried rice and fried chicken for the same $3.

But we filed the more expensive restaurant away as a place to go on a special occasion. That special occasion, as you might have guessed, came around on February 14th.

Now this restaurant had special significance to us for a very strange reason. You see, last year when I took a Twi course, my teacher actually lived in the building that is now the Chinese restaurant; of course, at the point in time, the building was a house. We went to visit her a couple of times last year before her mom sold the house to this Chinese couple. So the whole situation was a bit curious anyway, since we were sitting in the same place we'd sat less than a year ago, only then it was my friend's living room.

The restaurant itself is trying hard to be classy. They have these lit fountains in the front courtyard, and a security man who opens the car door for you and calls a taxi for you. The place was well-built and decorated with beautiful Chinese lanterns, but the cheap and dusty fake flowers, the garish flashing Christmas lights, and the leftover Christmas decorations of cheap wreathes and garlands add just the tacky touch needed to negate the classy stuff.

The waiters were also hilarious. Obviously, the owners attempted to train the waiters to be as professional at least as American waiters. The waiters, however, were so inexperienced and confused that, try as they did, they resembled a comedy act more than a wait staff. The first waiter to attend to us was so nervous, he kept stuttering and misunderstanding our questions. Then, finally, when he understood that we were inquiring about the different kinds of juices, he rushed off while I was in the middle of making my order. A few minutes later he returned with so many boxes of juice stacked on his tray that he couldn't hardly see to walk; he brought us one of every kind of juice instead of just bringing us a list.

Then the second waiter came with hot, moist towels. He handed them to us with tongs, and then started pouring the juice in our cups, all the while holding his left arm pinioned behind his back, like a fancy French waiter. But there was this very awkward moment when he realized that we were done with the towels and waiting to hand them back, but he was still in the process of pouring the juice. So he set down the juice and took Mus's towel from him, but that didn't seem right to him because I was waiting for my juice, so he threw the towel on the table, picked up the juice and started pouring again, his arm still pinned to his back. But as he poured my juice, he kept glancing nervously at my towel in my hands, wondering if he should have taken that. He was so preoccupied about the towel that he started shaking and dribbled juice on the tablecloth.

But the highlight of the evening came with the entrees. Mus and I both ordered chicken dishes, andMu asked me if they came with rice. I told him they did, because in America all Chinese food comes with rice- and they wouldn't charge $7 for a few pieces of chicken.

Well, of course, I was wrong. $7 actually did buy us a tiny plate of chicken and vegetables. So we ordered a separate plate of rice- and the $3 plate of rice also bought us a tiny pretentious portion. The food however, tasted good so we forgot about the expense.

That is until I started finding seafood on my plate. The first bite was a shellfish- crab or prawns or something- which I like, so I didn't mind. Then another bite of chicken. Then, a piece of something very fishy- I think it was probably octopus- which I definitely do not like. So we called the waiter and informed him that there was seafood in my dish and I had ordered chicken. Now if I was eating cheap Chinese takeout in America, yeah, I would accept that I shouldn't ask what's in the food. But paying $10 for a cup of rice and a small bowl of chicken- well, I'm sorry, but then I expect my chicken to be made of chicken. We were very nice and polite, and the waiter went back to the kitchen, surprisingly without taking my plate with him.

A few minutes later, he returned to the table with a message from the cook, telling me that I was actually eating chicken. I again informed him that while I understand that the cook intended forit tobe chicken, a mistake was made as there was something that wasn't chicken inside my food. He again went to the kitchen and returned with the same message, “It's chicken.” All this time, neither the waiter nor the chef has looked at my food- it's just sat unobserved at the table. And I repeated a final time, “There's something fishy in my chicken.” And the waiter- who by this time was sweating profusely- returned again with the message that the chef is certain it's chicken.

Then the bill came, along with some free fruit salad (which was full of unripened fruit). I'm not sure if the fruit salad was part of the service or meant to make up for the fishy chicken incident. The waiter was so nervous that he didn't even stop to deliver it- he just dropped it on the table as he walked by and rushed away.

A close look at the bill showed that they undercharged us for the juice. Needless to say, we didn't correct the mistake, and we didn't leave a tip.

Hellooo, Mr.Pottery Class!

Check out my latest video...

Hold My Belly!

More Photos for Y'all

Arizona Part 3

Hold My Belly

*Hold my belly is a Nigerian phrase equivalent to the phrase coined by Opus the Penguin, "Let's play Snuggle Bunnies."

Minutia Update

Well, the African Cup of Nations is over. Ghana took third place, which was a bit of a disappointment, but they beat their arch-rivals of Nigeria, and honestly, I don't know if the celebrating could have been any more raucous even if they had won the cup. Egypt took the cup home, with Cameroon coming in second.

We tried to go to a game, but it was a bit ridiculous. Unfortunately, as soon as tickets for a match go on sale, scalpers go and buy thousands of tickets, creating a “shortage” so they can hike the prices way up. Most Ghanaians can't afford the high ticket prices of the scalpers, so the end result is that you have to locate a scalper and pay up to $100 for a ticket (which is insane, because the tickets are $4 when you buy them from an authorized dealer). Since most people won't pay that money, the stadium was always half empty, even though lots of people would have spent the $4 to go see the match if they could get a ticket. Such a shame.

In other news, the harmattan appears to be over, which makes me want to cry. Temperatures are rising, along with humidity levels. I'm just so grateful I'm not in Accra where it's three times as bad. We get a brief rain shower every other day or so, which helps keep the temps, if not the humidity, down to a reasonable level.

The moist air has brought the snails out of hibernation, and my oh my- they are feeling frisky. Soon our garden will ring with the pitter-patter of little.... er, snails. Or something.

Other than that, not much is new. Mus and I will be heading to Accra on Wednesday for Valentine's Day and to take my host sister Julie to the dentist. We've been in Obo for three weeks straight now- a new record for us- and it's been wonderful and relaxing, but I'm ready for a small change of scenery.

The Footsteps of a Waterfall

The adventure started early in the morning. Mus and I woke up at 5 am to get dressed and eat breakfast- eggs with spicy peanut pepper, our usual pre-hiking meal. We headed over to meet Mr. Ampadu, and the three of us were in a taxi, on our way by 6:30am.

Our objective was to check out this beautiful and impressive, yet relatively unvisited, waterfall in a remote village up here in the mountains. Our first two taxis (which we use like buses here, meaning they have a fixed route and don't take us straight to our destination) took us through familiar territory- paved roads (albeit poorly maintained) and decent-sized villages. At the last village, we entered what Mus calls a “bush taxi.” Bush taxis (or buses, for that matter) are essentially frames bought from what Americans refer to as a “chop-shop,” often times patched with scraps of metal. Then they take some old, shredded seats that often don't fit in the ride properly, and four tires that are “donuts”to complete the illusion of a working car. The operators of bush rides also have a very different philosophy than the operators of other rides; in their minds, a bush taxi is never full. There's always a way to fit one more person in the ride. Or if not in the ride, per se, then at least on top of it.

So seven people climbed into a bush taxi with 5 seats. In this particular ride, the seats were not bolted to the floor properly, gasoline fumes filled the car, and the leftover upholstery of the ceiling hung down to get caught in my hair. The road was more of a 4 x 4 trail, and the car had very little in terms of shocks, leaving me feeling very carsick by the time we pulled into the village one hour later.

But thankfully, we had arrived. Once out of the taxi, Mr. Ampadu met someone he knew. We were informed that the waterfall was currently dry due to the harmattan, and also that an obruni had “discovered” the waterfall and encouraged the residents to clear the area and set up a committee to capitalize on their “tourist attraction.” He tried to help them set up an event for publicity with a live band in front of the waterfall over Christmas; unfortunately, the event never came off. Rumor in the village is that he was in a car accident.

As for these grand plans, the site is nice, but the location is so remote and the journey so arduous, I can't imagine many tourists making the trip. And I have no idea who they were thinking would attend this live band function. In fact, we were the first visitors to come see the waterfalls for several months. The villagers optimistically took our visit as a sign that more tourists were on the way, and that the obruni's was working. But we only came because Mr. Ampadu had friends in the village; I don't think we are indicative of most obruni tourists.

We also soon found that the village has some issues to iron out amongst themselves. The man who informed us about the obruni's plans for the site was the secretary of the committee set up to turn the site into a tourist attraction. We paid him about $4,and then he asked a couple of kids to guide us to the falls. We were only there a few minutes when 3men came up to us, demanding their share of the money. We informed them that we had already paid and they should take the issue up with the secretary. Even though they accepted this explanation, they still went on and on about how they had cleared the site, and they were getting cut out of the money. A little while later when they went to find the secretary, they found that he had taken the next taxi out of town, presumably to spend the fee we paid him.

The tour with the kids continued. We started by going to where the bottom of the waterfall should be, had there been any water. Then we climbed up to the top where the water falls from. The rocks and trees were very beautiful. At one point during the tour, when we were all kind of wandering about exploring on out own, we heard a loud splash. I turned to see one of the kids- who couldn't have been more than 5 or 6- pulled his hand out of a pool of water, his hand clutching tightly to a crab, and the crab in turn with a firm grip on the poor kid's finger. It was difficult to say who had who, really, until the kid pulled the crab off his finger and held the crab tightly so he couldn't be pinched again. Turns out, while Mus and I had been taking photos,these kids tracked a crab and the little kid nabbed the crab his first try. Anyone who's seen a crustacean underwater knows that you gotta be really fast to do that. So the kid took the crab home for lunch.

After the tour we met some of the village elders at the one drinking bar in town (I had a warm Coke since they have no electricity in the village). The bar is owned by Mr. Ampadu's good friend, who's the fetish priest who takes care of all the spiritual aspects of the waterfall. The village elders (of whom the priest was a part), the three angry men who'd cleared the site, Mus, and Mr. Ampadu had a long and animated discussion about how the waterfalls should be run, and who should get the money. One cultural difference that really struck me during this discussion is how expressive Ghanaians are, or, perhaps how restrained and stoic Americans are in their interactions. For example,as a visitor, I've often been greeted with joyful shouting, dancing clapping, and even impromptu songs. And that has nothing to do with beinga forgeiner- that's simply how many Ghanaians received visitors. Similarly, in debates, voices are raised, hands gesticulate wildly; to a Westerner, it seems like violence is about to erupt. While I watched their discussion (during which the priest waved his toothbrush threateningly at people and pounded it on the table for emphasis), occasionally one of the participants would stop, smile at me, and say, “Don't be concerned. We're just discussing how to run this business. Don't worry.” Of course, by now I understand enough that I know that things aren't as heated as they seem.

Of course, none of the conversation was in English, and I soon grew bored. Lucky for me, two of the chubbiest puppies I've ever seen came waddling out of the house to entertain me. I also noticed that all the goats in the village were a peculiar shade of black that looked navy blue in the sunlight, and I was amused by the blue goats (unfortunately, they didn't turn out so good on film, so you'll have to take my word for it). The discussion ended with Mus pointing out to everyone that if they continue with this confusion and borderline harassment of visitors, that no one will ever come and the project will never work. This they agreed about, and in the end they all agreed that the secretary must be brought to book and everyone departed with smiles.

Next Mus and Mr. Ampadu and I headed off to this beautiful stone bridge to wait for the next car to come to town. By then I was completely out of disk space, so I no longer had my camera to entertain me. We sat there for two hours before we saw a vehicle. When a bus finally came, it was so old and rickety I swear you could get tetanus just from looking at it. We had traveled for about an hour, when we blew a tire. I was not surprised in the least by this, since the driver had crammed almost twice as many people in the bus as he should have, and he was driving on four donut tires. In fact , the only surprising thing about the situation was that the bus had a spare tire, and 20 min. later we were on our way again.

In all, what was a one hour journey in turned out to be a 2 hour journey back. We found our way back onto a paved road right before it started raining, which was a huge relief since the rain would turn the rugged trail into mud, making the road impassable for who knows how long. We arrived home covered from head to toe with a thick coating of dust from the gravel roads (including nostrils and mouth).

Anyway, I got some great pictures. Check them out.