Ghana Day 42

I started off my day by going to the embassy. The tro-tro went on an amazing back route I’d never been on before that only took an hour, so of course it was on the one day I’m going somewhere where earliness doesn’t lead to productivity. I got there an hour before the consular section opened. When I got in I asked about seeing someone about the Obama visit and a press pass and I got directed to consular affairs, so I waited around for an hour and 15 minutes only to be given a paper with the public affairs section’s contact information. Apparently they are appointment only, and when I decided I would try to make an appointment while I was there I was disappointed because apparently the entire section of people was out on a field trip. So that trip was a bit of a waste, although it was nice to be on American soil for an hour and to know where it was and how to get there.

I was stood up again for the presidency visit, which was pretty annoying. Since I got told that we would go around 10, and then at 10 that we would go after he filed his story, and then he disappeared after a bit without saying anything, I was unsure about my plans for the day and so did not attach myself to any assignments that got doled out in the morning. So most of my day was sitting around and handing out surveys about media freedom.

One interesting point of the day was the campaign stop. There’s a woman running for treasurer of the Ghana Journalists’ Association. She was promoting a group investment fund for retirement. One of the reporters voiced a complaint that the IGJ dues were auto-deducted from her salary, but so were the commercial union dues, since IGJ isn’t an official union yet. Made for some interesting watching, at least at my current standards of interesting. I got the woman’s name and email address, so I might follow up with her some day.

There was a new guy at work named Matt (too many Matts!) from Oregon here on a university project. The newsroom is now practically overflowing with obrunis (4 of us). I showed him how to get transport home, so hopefully he made it ok.

The trip home was exciting. I showed Matt how to get to Circle, and there was a throng of people there again. I was one of 5 or 6 people who ran really fast to follow a Nungua tro-tro that stopped a fair distance from the stop and then took off right away again to avoid getting mobbed. I was pretty proud of myself running in heels. The traffic was surprisingly light, and I was home by 6:30.

In the evening we went out for what I had been misled into thinking was live local music but turned out to be a bar that played local music on Tuesday nights, but in fact did not do it while we were there. I had Tony come as well though, and he’s a very nice guy. He brought his sister Cassandra and brother Adrian as well. They and their mother have a business; she and Tony are architects, Cassandra’s an interior designer, and Arian’s an accountant. They’ve been in Ghana only 7 months, before which they lived in Abuja (the capital of Nigeria) and before that in Lagos. They’ve got dual citizenship (also South African citizenship – they’re self-described nomads). Cassandra was super fun; I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard since I got here. She’s very exuberant about everything and has great stories. They’re all a little sad about the pace of life in Accra – apparently it’s a lot slower than in Lagos or Abuja. The explanation for that is that in a city of 350 million (or however many – Lagos is the largest city on the continent and I think 2nd in the world after Mexico City, but don’t quote me on that), if you slow down 50 people will be there to take your place. They’re used to working from 4am to 10pm, so they’re pretty bored here. This explains why Tony has been over-excited to get to know me and I think is really a saving grace – I’m much more comfortable befriending another outsider who hasn’t gotten to know many people yet than I am making friends with someone who wants to hang out with me because I’m white. In any case, I got an interesting perspective from them on why Ghanaians dislike Nigerians. Cassandra told me that yes, in fact, “all Nigerians” are criminally minded, but it’s because of the sink-or-swim mentality more than anything else, and Ghanaians are just jealous because they aren’t doing as well. Apparently Nigeria is much more developed (I think this probably means there’s a sizeable rich/middle class that have developed downtown, because there’s definitely also a larger poor class). I’ve been told not to walk around along in Lagos though, which is probably fair advice. They’re pretty astonished at the low crime rate here.

So it sounds like we’ll probably hang out a couple more times before I leave, which is cool. They’re good people.

Final anecdote: on the way into work Wednesday morning the door to the tro-tro wouldn’t open for 3 or 4 or so minutes, which was exciting. I thought maybe I’d get to spend the day in a 20-year-old van with 15 other people. Unfortunately for that plan, they got it open.