DAY ONE: HEADING TO ACCRA AGAIN

This chapter begins with a trip to Accra to go to a doctor. For a couple of weeks, I had been feeling a pain in my abdomen whenever I would walk fast. Before deciding to go to Accra, I did try the medical facilities in Tamale. I went along with the station manager at Justice to a doctor that he recommended.

When we pulled up, we passed through a yard holding goats, chickens and a few food sellers to a compound made up of well constructed mud huts. The doctor that I saw listened to the condition, and proceeded to suggest that it was the shift in diet.

He noted that it takes some time for foreigners to adjust to the diet.

“How do you find the peppe (that is what pepper is called here)?”, he asked.

I told him that, “I eat pepper at home all the time, and that I find the food to be less spicy than Caribbean, Indian and Thai which I eat regularly”.

He looked at me, listened to my heart, took my blood pressure, tapped on my stomach and gave me some anti-acids (a no name version of Tums).

At home, I rarely go to the doctor – only if it is serious. This to me, was a real concern, and some ‘Tums’ was not going to address it.

Earlier that week I had actually made a visit to the Tamale Teaching Hospital (one of the top institutions in the region) for a story, but I was not comfortable with going there for treatment after seeing the conditions and the service that Ramadan and I got trying to do our story.

So, I was off to Accra.

That night, for the first time, I began to have some other strange feelings while trying to sleep. I felt my heart beat racing and shortness of breath as if I was under some serious anxiety, but there was NOTHING that I was stressed about. Even the health issue was not really a major concern for me. I was going to look into it, but I was not worried. Turns out that those symptoms would mean more later on.

The next morning, after very little sleep, I headed to the bus which eventually left (two hours later than it’s scheduled departure time).

The bus ride was long and I slept very little, but I enjoyed it.

I have actually come to appreciate the buses that have a malfunction on the TV/Video systems after that trip. Over the course of 14 hours, we watched 6 Nigerian movies, back-to-back. Watching six movies straight is one thing: watching six Nigerian movies, where characters yelling at the top of their longs is a major part of each movie, and the bus driver is determined that you will not just hear the sound, but you will feel it, is another thing. Trying to sleep with a speaker above my head blasting people screaming, cheesy sound effects and no equalization of sound was not possible for me. My most difficult moment in all of this was one movie where a crying baby was a part of the plot, and the sound of the crying persisted (loudly) for at least five minutes.

In Toronto, when I would visit Chinedu’s house, I would sit with his parents and watch Nigerian movies from time to time. Imprinted on my mind is Chinedu shaking his head and making it known that ‘he can’t stand those movies’. I would respond, ‘I kind of like them’. After my overdose, I have not watched another one yet. I usually leave the room to read or sleep or go outside.

On the way down to Accra, I met a few interesting people. Behind me was an American optometrist named John who was doing some touring after finishing a two week project. Beside him was a Japanese woman named Masumi. She studied Religion and Sociology in Ghana and has traveled to a few countries throughout Africa. She is now working for a Japanese firm and is scouting out the possibility of setting up and import/export relationship that would bring Ghanian shea butter to Japan. There were also a pair of Christian girls across the aisle who spoke briefly about the churches they attend and a book one of them was reading titled “How To Find A Life Partner”, and is written by a female minister from Nigeria. One thing that struck me about these two girls is that one of them reminded me of my friend Judith from Toronto; I smiled when I found out that her name was also Judith!

Of them all, Masumi and I spoke the most, and had lunch together on one of the rest stops. We exchanged numbers and plan to stay in touch. If anyone wants some shea butter, just let me know. (I just want to add for interest sake that I actually use a shea butter soap from The Body Shop…my secret is out…and by the way, I have used one bar over the period of two months and I bathe twice a day…I lather up the washcloth very generously, but it seems that storing it in a plastic bag and only exposing it to water when I am soaping my rag leads to some serious longevity!).

If you recall my story on the bus from Cape Coast to Tamale with the big man beside me who wanted to share my seat with me and sweat on my shoulder, then the lady beside me on the bus may seem like de je vu. She was also original though, being that she was wide enough to take up her seat and some of mine, she also had a daughter with her that was sitting on her lap, rather than having her own seat. Mom wanted to save the fare of 180,000 cedis (about $25 Canadian dollars) and you can’t fault her for that, but her daughter was a big ten year old, who did not fit on her lap. So she at on Mom’s lap and mine.

Eventually, they switched to the aisle seat and the woman had her daughter use my bag for a seat. Nothing got damaged, and I avoided fourteen hours of someone else’s sweat all on my arm!

The ride from Tamale to Kumasi was now fairly familiar as I had taken it a few times before, but the ride from Kumasi to Accra was a first for me. My first observation was the heavy construction taking place along the road. As we progressed, I watched the sun set and dusk fall. As we approached Accra, it was hard to make out the landscape and hard to tell if we were in the city or in a suburb. When we arrived at the bus station, it was pitch black outside, and I was relieved to be done the journey. Ato, the country director for JHR met me outside of the station and brought me back to the JHR house.

Driving through Accra under the cloak of nightfall again, and pulling up with a bag to the JHR house in the area called Osu Re was a moment that stirred reflection. The first time that I had this experience, was the evening that I had arrived in Ghana. That night, it was still unreal to me. It was still sort of sinking in. I was feeling excited and my senses were heightened. I was also questioning which of the many warnings that we had received were real and which could be taken more lightly.

The living room of the JHR house had phone numbers and email addresses of former and current JHR staff posted all over a big white board. As well, books, cds and videos were scattered around the computer table and the book shelves, and the room had the feeling of a place where newbies settled in and the more seasoned would recline and relax. As our group placed their luggage on the floor in the middle of the room, the emotions were many. One JHR staff who was going home soon was watching “Brokeback Mountain” on the computer. Erin was happy to be back in Ghana. Matthew was really unsure of what he was doing here. Denis was focused on finding the place he would settle into, as he was the only one of the group that would be living in the house. And me, I was having flashbacks of the sights and sensations that I had when I arrived in both Cuba and Senegal, which were very similar in a lot of ways (I also arrived in both countries in the night time). I was glad to be finished twenty-four hours of airports and airplanes, and I was continually realizing and re-realizing that “I am really here”. I also remember feeling guarded, as I did not want to expose myself to any risks. At the airport, I had a run-in with a man who I thought was in our entourage and was helping me with my bag (unnecessarily) and was not satisfied with the tip that the country director gave him to send him on his way. I really did not know the area or the country at all.

Just over a month later, and coming back to the JHR house brought all of that back, but my perspective had changed. I felt like I knew the place much better. I could feel the growth, like those shoes that I had been wearing were too small. The worries had dissipated, and my awareness had broadened. I knew where Osu Re was in relativity to Accra, to Tamale, and to the whole country. Given, I had researched all of this before arriving in Ghana, but reading it and seeing it is different.

That night, I went to sleep thinking of the growth and imagining that I would have eight times more than that by March.