MORE GHANA

Yes indeedy folks, it's still raw and unusual here....

MORE GHANAIAN TIDBITS:
Kumasi and the Ashanti Kingdom
I've left the coast and gotten right to heart of the matter. I'm here in the heartland of the old Asante Kingdom, Kumasi, a city of 1.5 million towards the middle of Ghana. I got a book of folk tales when I was a wee laddy that included an Asante tale, "Kwaku Ananse and the Python". The language and the story shaped my impressions of this region for years. For those who aren't au fait with West African history, the Asante used to be the Big Dawg On The Block, controlling most of Ghana and part of what's now Cote D'Ivoire. Slaves and gold made them rich - they had so much gold just sticking up out of the ground they didn't value it that highly at all, and were happy to sell it off for all sorts of things. The slaves - well, they had plenty of those too because they kept working over their neighbours. The only reason they didn't smack the bejeesus out of the Fante clans along the coast was that the Fante controlled the port trade and the Europeans, then the English, had their back. When the Asante got the irrits with the Fante over something-or-other in the early 1800's, the Brits decided it was Maxim machine-gun time. By the start of the 1900's, the Asante weren't uppity anymore. But they hung on, and they're still a major, major force in Ghanaian domestic affairs, with their own King and system of chiefs etc etc. Very rich culture and traditions.

Seatbelts. Handles. Pray to God.
Once a tro tro starts filling up and looking like it's about to take off (they only start the journey once they're full), a local minister often pops his head in the sliding door and holds a prayer service for the driver and passengers. Everyone puts their heads down and calls out the Amens with hime. Alllllllllllll you need to know about tro tros is right there, baby.

Women's Organizations
You do not mess with the older women in Ghana. As Denzel Washington's character Alonzo in "Training Day" would've said, they runnin's sh*t up in here. Unlike the knitting- and fundraising Women's Auxilliaries in the Western World, Ghanaian Women's Organisations organise and facilitate everything from childcare to civil works. Hell, the national government deals with them DIRECT. R'spec'.

Scars
In my last blog I mentioned the facial scars on some people and that I'd been told they were traveller's scars. Well, apparently, they're really a tribal scar indicating a member of a northern clan who, back in the day, were the Asante's slaves. With the end of slavery, the changing economy and society and modernisation, however, they're now some of the top dogs, and a very proud bunch along with it. Still looks mesmering on some of them, whatever the reason for them.
Slaves
One thing that really becomes clear the more time you spend here is the extent of slavery prior to when Europeans joined in the madness and turned it into an efficient industrial-scale practice. The West African kingdoms and clans all enslaved each other's citizens and sold them to the Muslims that came south across the Sahara for hundreds of years before the Portugese decided to drop by. The Dahomey (from around modern-day Togo, the ones who had standing armies of Amazon female warriors) were particularly bad. The Asante were worse. Even today the north of Ghana is still largely de-populated because of the Asante's shenanigans. Not that that absolves the Europeans and Americans from the responsibility for what they did - god knows the Muslims loved, and still love, their constant supply of slaves - but it's interesting to see the full history of slavery is widely-acknowledged here. Oh yeah, and there's still slaves working on the chocolate plantations here, apparently. Poor families often end up selling their kids to survive. And so it goes.

Asofo Companies
Asofo companies used to operate as military groups raised by each Fante area for defense and law and order. Nowadays they retain their military structure, emblems, flags and totems etc but they take care of the secret societies, initiation rites etc. They can often swing the outcome of a local election and can even 'destool' a local chief. The other thing they do is put on stonking great festivals and often provide much of the entertainment themselves.

The Miasma
Third World cities and air pollution go together like beans and bottom-burps. Add millions of cheap, old, run-down vehicles to easily-accessible leaded petrol - voila. The cities here have some of the worst air pollution I've waded through. Got dizzier than Britney just walking along the main road this morning. Yeesh. That full-flavoured petrol really makes a difference.

Kejetia Markets
Went to the biggest market in West Africa yesterday under a baking hot sun. Great Odin's raven. It was full-on at 7am. And then it doubled. And doubled again. Dirty, chock-a-block full, vast, cacophonous, steaming and thoroughly West African. After 2 hours I was in sensory overload. People paid more attention to me than the goods on offer. My hands were petrie dishes after approximately 15,000 handshakes and high-fives. A huge older lady virtually yanked me off my feet as I walked past her spot and flat out refused to let my arm go until I'd perused her wares. Why she thought I'd want a jumbo pack of nappies for 50 pesewas I have no idea, but I wasn't arguing with her - she had a grip like a crocodile and a voice like a Boeing. I didn't see one stallholder who didn't call out to me. Tellingly, most of 'em called me "Dollah, dollah". Most of the attention seemed to be making fun of me (to be expected), but strangely enough none of it was intimidating. Laugh along, you'll be sweet.

Firm, Yet Soft and Squishy
Finally, the Travel Gods have smiled upon me. A developing country that doesn't believe mattresses should be hard enough to blacksmith on. Honestly, how hard is it to make mattresses that actually give under a human's body weight? Sri Lanka and every Asian country I've been to, I'm talking to you. Ghana - I could kiss you.

The Nosh
If you ever come to Ghana, you'd better have an addiction to rice, maize, chicken and tilapia. 'Coz you ain't gettin' much else. Oh, you can get mangoes and avocadoes the size of a Christmas ham everywhere too, but for actual meals, lets just say Ghanaian's creativity gets put into their kente cloth weaving and not their nosh. One more thing - they have a slimey red spicy sauce here (the name of which now escapes me) which really is a slime. I tried it. Can still feel it going down the gullet in strings. Dry heaves only seconds away.

Winking
Becoming second nature to me, what with having to say hello constantly every single time I raise my eyes from the ground. May get me into trouble when I get home. Don't think Shazza from Inala would take to kindly to it. Nor Bazza, for that matter.

Tunes
Seemingly everywhere you go there's music playing. LOUD. In public. So loud that the speakers are crackling and distorting. Huge dusty old speakers out the front of shops, blasting out tunes that can be heard across three or four blocks. Get a few of these going and you can imagine what the atmosphere is like. Most of it is highlife music, the relentlessy-cheerful, upbeat, bouncy local speciality. And there's a lot of American hip-hop as well. But strangely, no Snoop. I asked around. S-to-tha-Dizzle don't go NO love from the bruthas and sistahs in da GC, no'm'sayin'?

Smoking
Again, another point of difference between Ghana and other developing countries is that not a lot of Ghanaians smoke. Well, not cigarettes anyway. Makes a nice change when you've gotta spend hours with them on a bus and you don't disembark feeling like you've been fumigated.

Rainforest?
Disappointingly, I've not had the chance to see much in the way of virgin rainforest on this trip, because it's mostly farms and scattered patches of bitsy jungle here and there in the areas I've been to. Hoping to rectify that and satisfy my Conrad/Kurtz itch by hitting Kakum National Park, one of Ghana's must-see's.

Aaaaaaand finally, another story from the Twilight Zone that is my life sometimes (note: in no way is this intended to make me look like Da Man - I just gotta tell this story because it's too weird not to):

FRIDAY NIGHT IN KUMASI - A LATE NIGHT VISITOR

8:00pm
The taxi rolls up to the Vienna City Restaurant Deposits me and my market-dusty clothes and my sling bag in the driveway. Out of the city centre, leafy, less-urban area. From outside, the place looks like one of those highway hotel-motels from a David Lynch film. Neon lights over a doorway inside the gate. Two behemoths sit at a table to the left of the door. Bouncers? Sh*t. I'd asked the desk guy at my hostel in the city for somewhere to watch CNN while I eat. I was craving a bit of connection to the outside world. Maybe catch up on the latest Swine Flu box scores. He must've thought I said I wanted to see .... something rhyming with N-N? Who knows. TIA. You're here now, just go in and eat. One of the bouncers stands up, lazily beckons me in while opening the door. Elephantine. All he's missing is two tusks, a trunk and some flappy ears.

Lots of low-level neon nightclub lighting. Pool tables. Dance floor. Thumping, drrrty hip-hop beat. Dismissive bar staff. A scattering of young-ish local men in expensive baggy clothes and young-ish local lasses in expensive tight clothes. One middle-aged white guy chain-smoking at the bar, sucking away to kill the loneliness. As I appoach the bar to order, he disappears Stage Right in a cloud of Marlborough. Olfactory memories of Mary Street Nightclub. No, don't go there. Those horrible memories are for the safety of backyard bbq's in the comforting light of day. Pray this place doesn't descend into that kind of depravity.

Deep breath. May as well make the most of it. I'm in it now. Solo travel. Time to embrace the random. I ordered a meal and sat in a corner at one of the tiny black cheap-gloss tables. Observe my fellow weekend-greeters. They seemed to be multiplying by the minute. Beat from the sound system making my pants flap. Sweet lord it's loud.

The bargirl with the wasp-waist and mammoth chesticles slings a Red Bull onto my table, un-ordered and unexpected. Cool sidelong glance at me as she turns and strolls away. Almost daring me to say something. Indeed. My bright yellow t-shirt and cargo pants mark me out as being unmistakably in the wrong place. No matter. 'Tude is everything. Assume the air. Own this table, this corner. Belong.

8:30pm
Chesticles reappears with my vittles. "Drink?" I stare at the Red Bull. At her. At the Red Bull. Back up at her. She sighs in impatience. Like watching a pair of mountains about to erupt. "Err, vodka thanks love". Gone before I can clarify. Behind the bar, in the shadows, a tall willowy bargirl with long purple cornrow braids. Half-lidded eyes. Motionless, leaning against the spirits rack. Watching me. Not blinking. Narcoleptic gaze. Scenes from "28 Days Later" flash unbidden to mind.

9:30pm
At the bar now. Be sociable. Precarious stools. Sporadic conversations. Broken English. Smiles. Enthusiasm. Handshakes. Eyes on me everywhere. Bring me vodka, dammit, Zombie Girl. A whiteboy's not a camel. Especially under the heat of all this observation.

An early sprinter informs me it's my lucky night. Beer breath and muscles. Holding my hand after the handshake, throughout the conversation in that eminently West African way. Apparently it's Ladies Night. You going to get lucky tonight, my frien'. Faaaaantastic. Laugh off the first genuine wave of discomfort. "I got a girlfriend, Akwabe old mate. Not for me tonight. They're all yours". Shaking head. Finger in my chest, leering grin. Promises of introductions. No wife means all okay. The pool table beckons. Safe haven. Escape from Pimp Daddy Beer-a-Lot.

10:30pm
My run of stylish victories ends. Trounced by a pudgy skinhead Brit. Ageing lager lout bovver boy, all sour puss and arrogance. Still reeking of headbutts and kiddy sex in tropical destinations. Stool in the corner has my name on it.

The local lads descend. What you name? Where you from? I have a cousin in Melbun! Ad naseum. "John", a be-suited Linford Christie doppelganger, has some murky connection to the owner. Drinks begin appearing at my elbow with disturbing regularity. No, THIS is my serious face. No more thanks Johnno. But the first buzz is already fizzing through my limbs. Danger, Will Robinson, my hooks are flailing wildly. Err. Control yourself, you're not in Kansas anymor, Dorothy.

Scan the crowd. The place is rammed to the gunnels. Some sort of function, apparently. Euro interlopers at the corner pool table, with attendant swarm of with-it local studs. Rest of the club........ dear god, I've stepped onto the set of a hip-hop video shoot. Acres of dark exposed skin and muscles, glistening with a light sweat even under the arctic a/c. Muscles and abs. Jeans at half-mast, do-rags, bling and underwear on display. Bumping writhing. Shaved female heads and hip-length braids. Huge earrings. Slick, straightened fringes. More moves than a can of worms. Amazing to watch it all. Intoxicating, even. But the locals drag me back out of my reverie. How you feel Ghana, Machew? How long you been here?

Kriss Kross spins up on the dj's playlist; suddenly it's the Louisiana Purchase all over again, and we're All Americans Now. Laughing, bouncing, shouting the lyrics tongue-in-cheek at each other, aping the moves from the film-clip. I know they're utterly naff, but do the locals? Yeah, they get it. Dis song be SO old, man!! You're not wrong there, mate. Hilarious to see an entire club at it though. Everyone smiling, forgetting to look cool. Quality moment. Realism.

11:30pm
Effort of talking in pidgin English over the music is wearing thin. Last game of pool, then I'm vamoosing. The smirking lass in the gaping top-skin tight pants-heels combo who's been casting meaningful dances from the dance floor with her friends has joined the pool table crowd. Shark circling the swimmers, eyes on the prey. Last drink for me. On the cusp. No need to smack it, not here, not out in god-knows-what-suburb of Kumasi. Not with sharks about.

Akwabe lies slumped in the corner, lubricating a table-top with his drool. Mickey, the Japanese NGO worker, is politely handing me my *ss on the pool table. Crack. Only the black left now. Apologetic grin. At least I gave Lager Lout a right royal shellacking in our return match. Yeah, now you've got something to whinge about, kiddy fiddler.

John staggers up to my side, six sheets to the wind, out of focus. Christ - he's got Smirky under his arm, both of them laughing. Herrrre we go. Machew, this is Hannah. Handshake and sustained eye contact. She's all confidence and bounce and bravado. Winks from John. B*stard. Told him I had a girlfriend. Of course none of them gave a brass razoo.

Plop. Mickey delicately glides the black into the middle pocket - game. Conversation, planning my escape without being rude. Soft hand on my arm. Grace in full effect. Internal alarm bells ringing. Polite excuses, start saying cheery-byes to everyone. Takes forever. Random Solo Traveller Night #382 has been okay, but The Doctor no longer treats multiple patients. He's an in-house physician these days. Where the hell have all the taxis gone?

12:00
Fuzzed taxi ride home. Sticky, hot night, clothes like weights. Into my room, straight to the shower. Knights of Columbus, cold water feels so damn good. Hold your head under. Feel the heat getting sucked out through your scalp and down the drain.

Wait. Hold on. What was that noise? Was there a noise? Body freezes, jerk my head out from under the stream. Ears cocked. Nerves like screeching tyres. Hard to hear over the blood pumping through my ears.

"Hello? Machew?" Female voice. In my room. What. The. FriarTuck??? I grab the towel off the rail, cocoon my nether regions. Tense, then push the door open, fast, ready for anything. Hannah's there. On my bed, propped up on one elbow, facing me. Big, lazy grin. Kicking her high heels agains the side of the bed. How the hell?? I goggle at here for a second, thunderstruck. My door's closed. Surely I locked it?? Didn't I?

"Uh Hannah, what are you doing here?" Hundreds, thousands of thoughts cramming in on me in the space of a millisecond. Did she pick the lock? How did she know which room? Who else knows where I am? Did I tell anyone at the club? Hooker. Hooker?? Sh*t, there's a massive Ghanaian destroyer lurking outside my door waiting until I'm on the job, then crash-stab-grab and I'm a statistic! Big mock sigh from Hannah. Melodramatic flop back on the bed, full-length, arms above her head, abs exposed. Inviting. "I follow you in taxi. You leave too fast".

I'm frozen, unable to deal with the shock for a split second, the possibilities. Ok, first thing, first thing - f*ck, what do I do now? Check outside your door you goddam muppet! Wait, do it casual-like in case she warns The Animal. "How did you get in here?" I say as I emerge from the bathroom, clutching the towel. Painfully aware she's within reaching distance. Hug the wall, edge towards the door. Grab the handle. Unlocked. "I knock but you did not answer. I heard noise inside so I opened de door and called you name, but you in shower so I come in and wait". Hasn't stopped smirking once.

My room's at the end of a long corridor. I crack the door open, ready to whip it shut and lock it quicker than Bruce Lee on goey pills. Empty corridor. Nothing. Okay, at least I don't have to punch my way out of this. Turn back, and she's still smiling. Big stretch. "Why you scared? Is just me?". For some reason, relief starts flooding in. That, and and the question of why I always seem to get the ones who cross the line. "Ok Hannah, you gotta go now".

After another quarter of an hour of cajoling and convincing and ordering and theatening later, I'm finally alone. Seriously. Desk propped under the door handle and everything. She swore she wasn't a hooker. But that's way too freaky,even for this place. Pretty sure they're not all that forward here. Twilight Zone theme music still playing on the internal soundtrack as I finally hit the hay. Weighing up whether or not to tell anyone about this. Would anyone actually, seriously believe that this type of sh*t happens to me? *sigh* One way to find out......