In Kumasi I'm living with 7 volunteers: 4 brits and 3 Americans still reeling from Trump's victory. Ironically for them were living in a large White House, like something out of a Florida golf course estate. It's set off the main road, along a dirt track surrounded by locals. I was told to mention 'Oberni house' (white person) to any locals if I got lost. Oberni is a phrase used by, well everyone in Kumasi, if they want a tourist's attention. I'm still taking it affectionately.
I'm in Kumasi to work with Paddy. He's an EWB (engineering without borders) volunteer working on water and sanitation who I've been mentoring since September. Water and sanitation sound quite sterile; it's a project on the rehabilitation of 6 effluent treatment pools that serve the most populated city in Ghana. Once again I've found myself doing charity work through Newton that involves shovelling faeces.
Paddy guides me through the first few days of his 1-2 hour commute. To get to Paddy's office, about 8km from the house, requires us to take 2 tro tros, 1 line taxi and have infinite patience with African timings.
A line taxi runs up and down the same road collecting and dropping passengers at various points. Think battered estate car that failed its MOT 4 years ago and provides your daily dose of carbon monoxide poisoning.
A tro tro is not much better. It's a beaten up ford transit van stuffed with 18 seats. It's side door is held on only by the strength of the small boy who acts as the bus conductor collecting your 1cedi fare (20p). Local preachers use the tortuous rush hour traffic to shout the word of God to all passengers. I've started to understand the V.I part of my bus journey from Accra.
The meals have so far lived up the the none descript expectation others had set; the heavy Ghanaian house music that practically caused the salt shaker to have a nervous breakdown over lunch however was not so normal.
I was lulled into thinking I'd settled into a stable daily routine. The 10hrs sleep I was getting had started to remove the almost permanent bags from under my eyes. And the basic utilities seemed more reliable than I'd been informed.
Wrong!
On day 3 we had a 5 hour power cut from 5-10pm, forcing the volunteers into sloth-like states, sprawling across the house furniture in hope of radiating out some of the heat that was being forced on us.
Water was a whole other game. An after-work shower become a chore when half way through, lathered up head to toe in the tiled space we call a cubicle, the water cuts. I wait. I wait and I continue to wait. Hearing the toilet cistern fill up was like hearing the Coca Cola lorries roll into town at Christmas!
Paddy agreed to accompany me to the city's main Ketija Market - thought to be the largest in west Africa with 11,000 stalls and almost 4x the number of people. We went at the end of the day; chaos still ensued. We carved our way into the market, attempting to avoid the tros, carts and hundreds of women walking at pace with large packages on their heads.
Our nostrils were assaulted several times, we narrowly avoided bags of rubbish being hurled out of shops, paddy got some back splash sprayed on him as a butcher swung a cleaver into a non-descript piece of meat and I had a women grab my arm and thrust a dried chameleon into my face. Delightful.
So I've been in Ghana 4 days and I need a holiday. I'm heading to lake Bosomtwe in search of tranquility.
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