Ghana Day 3

Interesting political observations blog:

Corruption seems to be the major scourge of the country now. Grandma (my host) told me some of her political views while I was waiting for orientation to begin (characteristically around an hour and a half late). She was a supporter of Rawlings, even though he was a dictator, because he was a clean, no-nonsense sort of dictator. His cousin had someone shot for a minor offense, and the judge let him off the hook because of his connection. Rawlings told the judge to look into the case again and make sure he got it right, and the retrial ended with the president’s cousin going before the firing squad. So the moral of that story I guess is that he was either against nepotism or else didn’t like that particular cousin very much.

Grandma’s brother in law told her about a recent occurrence that is supposedly fairly typical. His father is a pensioner and recently had a stroke. The director and some other folks at the pension bureau brought him in to sign for a pretty sizable pension and then took the money themselves – taking advantage of his forgetfulness brought on by the stroke.

While I was waiting in the car in the center of Accra for one of the program directors to tip the guard at the stadium and buy some street food, I had the opportunity to watch one street that came up from several ministry buildings, including the Department of Labour and the IRS. I saw several cars coming out that were very new, including at least one shiny new Mercedes Benz. One of the biggest anticorruption pushes right now by the government is to get the previous administration’s bureaucrats to return all of the state-owned cars that are available for government use. This might have been a recovered car or a personal car, but in any case it is unlikely the government has so much money that it should be providing Benzes as state cars.

There is a popular radio personality here who remains anonymous and has a 30 minute segment every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday at 5:30pm. I cannot recall his pseudonym, but I was told it translates roughly into “the gossip.” He seems to have some pretty high level informants and has broken several stories (for example former ministers fleeing the country because they were afraid the new administration would prosecute their corrupt acts). He is very popular and hard-hitting, but obviously the media situation in Ghana is not yet free enough for such a figure to think he would be safe if he disclosed his identity. I’ve been told that the Daily Graphic, the widest-selling paper, tends to support the government line and is state-owned (to be confirmed later I hope), but the Guide, where I will work and which is supposedly the 2nd largest paper), attacks both of the major parties. Sometimes, however, they still succumb to state pressure in what they print. (I hear this from the organization’s director Prince, who used to work at the Statesman as a graphic designer and currently does IT work for three papers, not including the Guide.)

Touristy blog:

Orientation was pretty fun and very touristy, and included lots of picture taking. Prince, Gifty, the driver Charles, and I all went to Independence Square, which is the large central gathering place (where Obama is likely to speak when he comes in July), the national stadium, and the Centre for National Culture.

Independence Square is a big open space by the ocean, and the most interesting parts about it (I thought) were 1) the prominent statue of General Kokota, a previous military dictator, and 2) the fact that no pictures were allowed of the eastern part of the stadium, since the president’s former (not current) residence was in that direction (it’s a castle from colonial times, and would be really cool to look at, but unfortunately you cannot approach it).

The stadium was pretty cool, with the bleachers in red and yellow and the grass in green to round out the national colors. We saw the national ping pong (table tennis) team practicing, and Prince decided he wanted to try. He claims he played in school, but you would never guess it – he returned two serves total in the boundaries. I got some good video of it. He’s definitely a better director than table tennis athlete.

At the Centre for National Culture, which is a pretty cool artisan market, Prince had a friend of his who makes drums give me a drumming lesson. First they played me a welcome drum song, although apparently it was quiet because of a (possible Muslim?) festival going on for which quiet is usually observed. I thought they were plenty loud myself; I don’t know what full blast would have been. I got a short video of that as well. The lesson was not as good, since I was drumming as well – I’m a worse drummer than I am a singer, and that’s saying a lot. Everyone seemed rather disappointed that I would not be making any purchases that day, but unfortunately I don’t really have any disposable income and if I can buy anything, it will be right before I leave.

Speaking of money, it turns out the older $100 bills are not valid currency in Ghana. This poses a bit of a dilemma for me, since $350 of my money is in fact in old bills. I’m going to need to make some arrangements to get some transferred to me somehow, but this will be upsettingly expensive. Apparently no volunteer has ever run into this problem before me, so Prince was as surprised as I was.

We had lunch at the sort of family-owned restaurant that isn’t really a restaurant as much as it is some chairs set up in a family’s courtyard. We had kenkey, which is a steamed mash of fermented maize (not much taste to it, but better than the fufu I had in Cameroon). It traditionally goes with fish, but I had it with the two pepper sauces and an egg. I have to say that I’m not sure African food is really up my alley (since I can’t eat most of it), but dinner was better and I’m sure I’ll find enough to keep me happy while I’m here. There are a few dishes that I had in Cameroon that I loved, and at least one (peanut sauce) is served here as well.

I discovered that I will be sharing my room starting next Tuesday with a girl from the States, and her sister and possibly brother will be down the hall. They are going to be volunteering at an orphanage nearby.