A BIRTHDAY SUNDAY

Sunday morning, my main focus was getting to Takraodi to catch my bus. Actually, my main concern was going for one last swim for that weekend in the ocean. I got up around 6:30am, and headed into the water which was warmer than the morning air. The waves slammed into me playfully, threatening to take my shorts a few times. My heart and voice was filled with praise and prayer.

After my time in the water and giving reverence to the Creator of this life, I picked up my freshly squeezed juice and headed to the French restaurant from a freshly baked croissant. Both were delicious. I was seemingly running late after an intriguing exchange between Tamara, Angel, the Parisian Torontonian and me, but I was actually right on time. I met with Shaq and his girlfriend (who I saw for the first time that weekend) and we headed to Takraodi.

My destination was the STC station where I would meet with Idrissa. She had spent the weekend with Kary passing through the El Mina Castle, the Cape Coast Castle and had concluded in Takraodi.

With only a few minutes before the scheduled departure of the bus to Accra, I limped (with a fractured toe and an infected in-grown toe nail on the same foot), past some local hustler who tried to tell me that ‘STC doesn’t run on Sunday, but luckily he knows where I can go’. Yeah right buddy, I have a ticket for STC that is about to leave.

As per usual, the STC service was running late, so Idrissa and I sat and caught up about our weekends. The ride back to Accra was pleasant. We talked a bit, slept a bit, and read a bit. Usually, we would both be in church on a Sunday morning, instead we discussed the damage done by those who continued to spread the image of Michealangelo’s close kin that passes for the world’s most famous face, the European image of Jesus. We also discussed God’s great mercy illustrated in the Biblical book of Micah.

When we arrived in Accra, we decided to head to Idrissa’s house which is much closer to the STC station, and is around the corner from Osu, where Adwoa’s birthday dinner was to take place.

The time we were told was 4pm, but we assumed that she really meant 5-6pm. We were wrong, as Adwoa was there at 4pm. We actually got there at around 5:30pm, but we beat more than half of those who attended by an hour (and in some cases two hours).

The dinner was at The Caribbean Restaurant in Osu, just off of Oxford Street. My dinner of jerk chicken, fried plantain and rum punch was delicious!

It was also really nice to spend the evening with Adwoa, celebrating her birthday abroad. In September, we only knew who eachother were (I was a friend of Gordon and Melezia to her, and she was Melezia’s cousin to me). What a difference and few months and a different continent can make.

That night, rather than brave the late night streets of Accra, I decided to stay in an open room at the house that Idrissa lives in.

At the house, there were a few volunteers that had just come to the country. Two were from Toronto and one from B.C. We spoke about so many things about Canada and Ghana, like two sides of a spinning coin. It was interesting to feel like a newbie in Accra, and yet like a vet in Ghana. I shared stories, offered advice, and inquired about their ideas and expectations.

I had to laugh at one point, where this one shifty looking guy in a blue spandex outfit who had some how been invited into the house by one of them convinced three Canadian girls that he was a tailor and needed to take their measurements. He was honest enough to tell them that he had no fabric, but could make a dress for them if they got some fabric. As he tightened the measuring tape around them, they mentioned the akwardness of the moment, but agreed to continue. I found it humorous, but kept an eye out for anything that crossed a line.

After a cup of Milo and watching the first third of a bootleg version of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Black Pearl, I went off to sleep. While outside, passing through the courtyard to my room for the night, the palm swaying in the breeze, and in the other direction, the orange moon, were overwhelming to my senses causing me to stop and sit down in an attempt to digest the reality of where I was standing…in Ghana.