Ghana

GHANA

I went into Ghana with no plans whatsoever. This was probably not the smartest move, as I learned later that this is the hardest country to navigate independently, but I was tired of the usual, rigid over-planning. After having itineraries every single day in South Africa, I wanted to spend my time in Ghana on a whim.

TAKORADI

My first port in Ghana was Takoradi, the western region’s largest city. My first day was far more productive than I had anticipated. Most of my friends had paid for SAS programs like homestays and slave castle tours, but they didn’t begin until the second day in port, so I was happy to have a solid group to travel with on day one.

We shuttled to the main port gates where we found a flock of taxi drivers. With so many men vying for our business, we chose the two drivers who gave us the lowest prices and hopped into their taxis to escape the chaos of the swarm.

Our first destination was Kakum National Park, a beautiful conservatory that housed the famous canopy walkways SAS frequently advertised. It was hot as hell outside, and I dreaded the buggy humidity that would only worsen as we drove into the jungle. Our taxis didn’t use air conditioning either, so we cruised with our windows down, our bodies hanging halfway out of the car.

My driver was named Yeboah, but his English name was Isaac, and he and I got to talking as soon as I sat down in the front seat. He was a sweet-faced man with the funniest laugh I have ever heard and a voice that switched tones without warning. I would ask him a question and he would repeat with a high-pitched squeak, then go on to answer it in a completely normal manner. I didn’t know if he was trying to be funny or if it was just a strange personality trait, but I laughed hard every time he did it.

Isaac would pull up next to the other driver who was carrying the rest of my friends and shout to him in a language I couldn’t understand, then the two would yell nonsense back and forth and laugh hysterically out the window. My friends and I were very confused by this communication, so we just laughed along with them.

The drive was longer than expected, about two and a half hours, but it passed quickly as I watched the intriguing scenes go by. Everywhere I looked, there were pygmy goats frolicking along the roadsides. They ran around in drainage ditches and steep inclines and shopping stalls and village hut doorways. There was not a single space they could not be found.

In addition to the goats, the people were fascinating. Some appeared fairly well-off, wearing dressy outfits even in the blistering heat of the mud-hut villages. Then some were incredibly poor, barefoot and covered in rags that barely sufficed as clothing. Most of the children were completely naked as they played in the streets. Nearly everyone looked happy, smiling and waving as we passed in our taxis. 

Kakum was a bit underwhelming. After such a long drive, we expected to be able to enjoy the park for a while, taking our time on the canopy walk and exploring the grounds. However, the canopy walk was about all there was to do there, and it only took a total of 30 minutes to complete. It was a beautiful experience to walk through the tree tops, and I can’t say that that is something I could expect to do anywhere else, so I certainly don not regret making the trip. However, it was simply not as stimulating as I had predicted.

After our brief time at Kakum, we hit the road again, this time headed for Elmina to visit the famous slave castle. 

ELMINA

When we arrived at Elmina Castle, a group of young men came up to our taxis. Before I even got out of the car, they were shaking my hand through the window, asking my name and where I’m from and how to spell out all of my answers, and then they ran off. Overwhelmed by their immediate friendliness, I didn’t understand at first what they were up to. Then, on the way up to the gates of the castle, my new friends ran back to me with shells and bracelets with my name all over them. 

To Betty, our American friend, love from Ghana, read the shell, and the bracelet was woven with Ghanaian colors. These gifts were free, they told me, but they needed a donation for their school. Somehow I think that crosses out the notion of “free”, but I didn’t know how to say no, so I gave them a bit of money. They still wouldn’t leave me alone, asking for more, and it wasn’t until Isaac plowed through the crowd and dragged me into the castle that I was able to get away from them. 

Elmina Castle was an ominous place. The moment I stepped into the main courtyard, I could just feelthat terrible things had happened there, and I was eager to discover just what had occurred in its 500+ years of existence.

A magazine photoshoot was occurring on the grounds when we arrived, and even though we weren’t supposed to take photos of the event, I couldn’t help but sneak a quick shot from a distant balcony. The models looked stunning, and I could have watched the shoot all day.

My guide started the tour in the women’s dungeons. There he told us about how the Portuguese had built the castle as a place to store traded goods in the late 1400s. In approximately 1500, they transformed the building into a slave castle, turning the lower-level storage rooms into dungeons.

The dungeons we visited were no bigger than college classrooms, and my guide told me that 100-150 slaves were kept in those rooms for three to four months before being shipped elsewhere in Africa. The space was so cramped that the slaves had to sleep standing up and go to the bathroom where they stood. The ventilation was so bad that many of them died from poor air quality.

I simply cannot comprehend how anybody could survive such horrible living conditions, and the tour opened my eyes to the terror so many Africans endured for hundreds of years. From 1500 to the abolition of slavery in 1928, Elmina Castle housed thousands of slaves and was one of the largest slave trade outlets in West Africa.

I have learned about the Atlantic Slave Trade in history lessons throughout my life, but to actually stand in a place that played such a huge role in the trade was entirely different from reading about it in a textbook. I will never forget the chilling feeling that Elmina Castle gave me.

On the way home from Elmina, we spotted our friend, Willy, and her group by the side of the road next to a broken-down taxi. Both of our cars pulled over, and our drivers attempted to fix whatever was wrong with the vehicle.

After about 40 minutes of waiting, the taxi finally revived, and our newly formed caravan set out once more. Unfortunately, Willy’s taxi broke down five more times before reaching the ship. Yes, five. A drive that was supposed to take an hour ended up taking two and a half hours. Nevertheless, we all made it back safely long after dark and headed to bed early. Despite the car troubles, it was a wonderful day.

The next day, I returned to Elmina Castle with my two friends, Shanaea and Dono, who had not yet been and had no other plans like me. This time, we had a driver named Daniel, a young contractor in business school who told me his life goal was to make it to New York City. He was not as loud and vibrant as Isaac, but our conversations were far more in-depth and meaningful than the day before, and I loved talking to him about his life. 

After seeing the castle again, we told Daniel we wanted an authentic Ghanaian lunch. He took us to a resort nearby called Cocoa Beach, which had great reviews. The place was stunning, the rocky beach lined with ready-to-be-picked coconut palms and no other tourists in sight. 

We ordered Red Red, a traditional dish consisting of beans, rice, spices, chopped vegetables, and a side of grilled plantains, all washed down with a freshly cracked coconut filled with rum. It was one of the best meals I had had on the entire voyage, and possibly my life. Thinking about it makes me sad because I don’t know that I will be able to find anything as delicious when I return to Arizona.

After the satisfying meal and some time to enjoy the beautiful beach, we headed home. On the way back, I jokingly told Daniel that I wanted to hold one of the roadside goats because I thought they were so cute. He took me seriously and, without warning, he veered off into a strange neighborhood where we pulled over by a small collection of huts.

“I’m going to catch one for you,” he told me. Unsure of what to do with myself, I got out of the car while Daniel disappeared around a corner. Shanaea, Dono and I tried to talk to some of the villagers there, the children wildly interested in our cameras. 

Moments later, I heard a commotion and then a terrible wail from behind me. The sound came from the tiny goat in Daniel’s arms, looking dejected and very nearly dead. 

“Take it,” Daniel said, then thrust it forward into my arms. The goat wailed again, this time right in my ear, and I had absolutely no idea what to do with this little creature, wide-eyed and buck-toothed in my arms. The village people gathered around and laughed, probably making fun of how ridiculous this stupid American girl was coming into their backyards to get a photo with a baby goat.

I had had my fill of holding the goat after about 30 seconds, so I handed him back to Daniel, who then tossed the little thing back onto the ground like a ragdoll. The goat pranced off like nothing had happened and returned to his spot in the garden beside the house. I waved goodbye to the newly gathered crowd, and we continued back to the ship where my day came to a close. I will never forget that goat, but I no longer have any desire to hold one ever again.

The next day, my friends Kacie and Robin agreed to go surfing with me. We had heard of a beautiful place called Busua Beach that apparently was great for beginners, so we set out for it that morning. On the way out, we ran into three other girls I didn’t know who wanted to come with us, so the six of us got two taxis to the beach.

I spotted Isaac by the port gates and enthusiastically waved him over, asking him if he’d like to drive us again. He hugged me tightly, laughed like a maniac, then ran to his car without another word. I took that as a yes, and away we went.

Busua was indeed a beautiful beach, and the weather was substantially cooler there than it was in Takoradi. We rented our boards at a Rasta-painted hut by the water, then took off into the ocean.

After practicing in South Africa, I thought my surf skills might have improved in the Ghanaian waters, but I was wrong. Wave after wave, I wiped out, somersaulting underwater every time my board nose-dived into the crashing surf. 

At one point, I wiped out with a massive wave, and when I came back up for air, I turned around to see that an even bigger wave was upon me, this time carrying my board over its crest. The edge of my board came down hard on the back of my head, and I lost my vision for a second or two before regaining very grainy sight. I simply think I am not meant to surf.

I dragged myself back to the beach, my head throbbing violently and my vision still hazy. There I rested for a bit before heading back out to the water (which was probably not the smartest decision now that I think about it). 

Before I turned my board back in, a naked little girl appeared out of nowhere and decided to hang out with us. She took a particular liking to me (or hatred?) and started throwing handfuls of mud at me, shrieking merrily with ever handful she launched my way. At first it was funny, but this continued for the better part of an hour, and every time I washed the mud off in the ocean, she would return and start her attack again. 

Finally, the little one stopped chasing me and instead sat on my surfboard, smiling and flailing her body around like a lunatic. She was too cute to reprimand, so I let her do her thing while I sat there somewhat awkwardly (what are you supposed to do around a strange, naked child?).

My friends and I decided to call it a day after a few hours of surfing. We were all visibly sunburnt, and the ocean had beaten all the energy out of us. My head still ached, so I returned my board, said goodbye to my menacing little friend, and returned to Isaac, who had been patiently waiting for us in the shade of a palm tree. 

On the way to Isaac, I noticed a naked man squatting on the beach in the direction we were heading. I thought this was odd but disregarded him and kept walking. As we passed him, my friend shouted at me to look out and pointed at the sand near my feet.

This man was pooping in plain sight of the whole beach and had left a trail of brown behind him, a path I very nearly stepped in. When I turned to the man, I observed the full sight of him relieving himself. I have seen a lot of things in my life, but that was a horror I never expected to witness. Some things you can never unsee.

We got back to the ship mid-afternoon because we were sailing to Tema, Ghana that evening, so we were required to get back onboard before 6 p.m. When I said goodbye to Isaac, he hugged me tightly and nuzzled my neck like a child, looking like he was about to break down in tears. I already miss that sweet man, and if I ever return to Ghana, there is no doubt that we will see each other again.

The next morning, I woke up in Tema and caught the first shuttle to Accra, the capital of Ghana, with Shanaea, Dono and Riley. A drive that was supposed to take 45 minutes ended up taking two hours because of the horrendous traffic, but I didn’t mind. I’ve grown to love long bus rides where I can put on my headphones and watch the world go by like a handsome montage.

Accra was vastly different from Takoradi, with actual office buildings and paved streets with stoplights and crosswalks. However, I still noticed how many people freely relieved themselves in public. On my walk from the shuttle to a coffee shop, a little girl squatted directly in my path, paying no mind to the pedestrians and cars passing by her. A few seconds later, I saw two old men having a heated conversation while facing the street and peeing on the sidewalk. I’m not sure if this is a common theme among Ghanaians or if I was just hanging out in odd areas, but I find it unusual that anyone would be comfortable going to the bathroom in plain sight of the world, no matter their cultural background. Or maybe the average Ghanaian would think I’m the one who is strange for feeling that way. Who knows?

I spent that day and the next not doing anything particularly exciting – mostly eating at obscure cafes and drinking subpar coffee – but I thoroughly enjoyed this period of relaxation. After my constant action in South Africa and bout of sickness on the ship, I greatly appreciated being able to do my own thing on my own time without a care for deadlines or itineraries. The only thing I would have done differently would have been to do a homestay with a local family so I could really experience and relate to a day-in-the-life of a Ghanaian.

Ghana was one of my favorite countries on the voyage. I know I have said that about nearly every stop so far, but this one was different. The people were probably the nicest I will ever meet, and their happiness inspired me. From Isaac and Daniel to the little girl I met while surfing, their brief presence in my life brought me so much joy. 

Seeing how little these people had made me realize that I don’t need so many of the material things I used to prioritize back home. Happiness comes from surrounding yourself with good people and doing the things that push you to grow. My trip to Ghana humbled me and opened my eyes to this truth, and that is a lesson that will stick with me for years to come.