Using your head in business..Being a white person in Ghana is a very odd experience. Not because the people around you are different but because how they see you and treat you. One would think that Africa would be the last place on earth where whites would get preferential treatment. Not so. Just because of your skin color you are automatically considered a member of the top level of society. On the streets you are treated like a rock star – people stare, point and come up to you just to shake your hand. Everywhere you hear people and especially children yelling “Obroni”, “Obroni”, meaning “white person”. The really bizarre thing is that very small children aged 2-3 years are yelling that as well. Children run up to you and want to touch you. They are overfilled with excitement if you wave to them or answer one of their “How are you?” questions. When you enter a place or just walk down the street all heads turn to stare at you. Incidentally this is one factor that makes Ghana so safe for western tourists – as long as there are people around, everybody will be watching you. Should somebody try to rob you it would not go unnoticed by the crowds and you’d have plenty of people coming to your aid.
Of course, to the street vendors a white person equals a walking bag of money. They swoop down on you as soon as they spot you. “roni, special price!” The “special price” is the usual price multiplied by a factor of ten. With a Ghanaian average yearly income (and the median is lower) being $230, they are quite right in a way. So when they spot a white person taxi drivers and street vendors (and there are lots of them everywhere) all go for it. At first you get overwhelmed by it – mostly because your first instinct is not to be rude. Soon however you realize that you can’t possibly shake hands with 20 people at every street corner and that if you give them an introduction as they request, you would spend all day only doing that. Although some will physically grab you and try to drag you to them, most will not. And the ones that do pull your arm do not do so forcefully so you can easily pull away. This kind of attention is especially common in places of potential tourist interest. In areas where only Ghanaians move you still get a lot of attention but it is much less hands on. Ultimately you learn to walk by, not paying attention to them individually, shaking your head and weaving your hand saying “No, not now” or “Maybe later”. Ironically the massive waves of assault from the vendors make it almost impossible to do any shopping. If you stop for a second to look at an item the salesman will insist on trying to sell you his entire shop to you and all the other salespersons in the vicinity will give you that special attention that you really don’t want.
To be fair all Ghanaians that you meet on the street are not like that. Most will just limit their interest to just staring at you. In the busiest streets of Accra a lot of people may even just go about their business without taking notice. There is however always enough of those that just have to talk to you that make any excursion into the streets of the city a demanding and exhausting experience. And while you learn to live with it, on occasion you just want a bit of peace and quiet and some anonymity.
In Ghana, if you have the money, it is no problem. In fact you could be living there hardly noticing that you are in Africa. There are expensive hotels and restaurants that only cater to westerners and the Ghanaian elite. The Golden Tulip hotel in Accra is exactly such a place. A single night at the hotel costs more than the average yearly Ghanaian salary. Although technically only a four star hotel, it is luxury beyond belief by African standards.
Of course, to the street vendors a white person equals a walking bag of money. They swoop down on you as soon as they spot you. “roni, special price!” The “special price” is the usual price multiplied by a factor of ten. With a Ghanaian average yearly income (and the median is lower) being $230, they are quite right in a way. So when they spot a white person taxi drivers and street vendors (and there are lots of them everywhere) all go for it. At first you get overwhelmed by it – mostly because your first instinct is not to be rude. Soon however you realize that you can’t possibly shake hands with 20 people at every street corner and that if you give them an introduction as they request, you would spend all day only doing that. Although some will physically grab you and try to drag you to them, most will not. And the ones that do pull your arm do not do so forcefully so you can easily pull away. This kind of attention is especially common in places of potential tourist interest. In areas where only Ghanaians move you still get a lot of attention but it is much less hands on. Ultimately you learn to walk by, not paying attention to them individually, shaking your head and weaving your hand saying “No, not now” or “Maybe later”. Ironically the massive waves of assault from the vendors make it almost impossible to do any shopping. If you stop for a second to look at an item the salesman will insist on trying to sell you his entire shop to you and all the other salespersons in the vicinity will give you that special attention that you really don’t want.
To be fair all Ghanaians that you meet on the street are not like that. Most will just limit their interest to just staring at you. In the busiest streets of Accra a lot of people may even just go about their business without taking notice. There is however always enough of those that just have to talk to you that make any excursion into the streets of the city a demanding and exhausting experience. And while you learn to live with it, on occasion you just want a bit of peace and quiet and some anonymity.
In Ghana, if you have the money, it is no problem. In fact you could be living there hardly noticing that you are in Africa. There are expensive hotels and restaurants that only cater to westerners and the Ghanaian elite. The Golden Tulip hotel in Accra is exactly such a place. A single night at the hotel costs more than the average yearly Ghanaian salary. Although technically only a four star hotel, it is luxury beyond belief by African standards.
You can always live in a tree...When I woke up on Thursday morning I found out that Matilda wasn’t feeling very well and that the others would not be interested in breakfast anytime soon. So I decided to try out the Golden Tulip on my own. The breakfast buffet was excellent with a chef on standby to take individual special orders. The hotel is of western quality – and not just a bad approximation. The guests eating breakfast were almost exclusively westerners with one or two sharply dressed Ghanaians present. It had a light African theme – just enough to give it a comfortably exotic look but without any risk of being intimidating. If you lived here you can be in Africa without really being in Africa. Early on, I did consider staying at the Golden Tulip – but I’m very glad I did not.
By the time I got back home to Dzorwulu, Matilda was feeling really bad. All the symptoms of malaria were there so she and Måns left for an emergency clinic specializing in the disease. After having an interesting experience with the byzantine medical system of Ghana they were relieved that the malaria tests were negative. It wasn’t malaria but some form of infection - she got broad spectrum antibiotics to nuke it.
Julianna and I met up with them for lunch at a place called Galitos – which is part of a Portuguese chain of restaurants and that specializes in various forms of chicken. The food was very nice and the restaurant very clean. The customers were mostly more affluent Ghanaians and a few non-western foreigners. The price levels were somewhere between the street prices and the western hotel prices and the apparent target group were the upper middle class of Accra. We also visited a supermarket nearby that had prices ranging from reasonable (by western standard) to insane. A pack of cornflakes cost two or three times as much as it would at home. It was quite obvious that only the super-rich shopped there.
By the time I got back home to Dzorwulu, Matilda was feeling really bad. All the symptoms of malaria were there so she and Måns left for an emergency clinic specializing in the disease. After having an interesting experience with the byzantine medical system of Ghana they were relieved that the malaria tests were negative. It wasn’t malaria but some form of infection - she got broad spectrum antibiotics to nuke it.
Julianna and I met up with them for lunch at a place called Galitos – which is part of a Portuguese chain of restaurants and that specializes in various forms of chicken. The food was very nice and the restaurant very clean. The customers were mostly more affluent Ghanaians and a few non-western foreigners. The price levels were somewhere between the street prices and the western hotel prices and the apparent target group were the upper middle class of Accra. We also visited a supermarket nearby that had prices ranging from reasonable (by western standard) to insane. A pack of cornflakes cost two or three times as much as it would at home. It was quite obvious that only the super-rich shopped there.
More head acrobatics
In the evening b that we had found referenced in a guide book. While you may think that African jazz sounds interesting, this wasn’t it. It was live music, but it was bland lounge jazz that was played. The only other customers were a Dutch group that was already a bit over-refreshed when we got there. Still, the drinks were not half bad and the singer had an amusing voice. Afterwards we decided to try out a second jazz club we had heard of. We took a taxi and guided the driver to the address we were given. The club was closed and we had ended up in a very poor district of Accra. There were people sleeping on the ground all over the place which was excessively run down. We did not feel it was advisable to hang around there for long so the taxi drove us to Dzorwulu.
As we were walking the final distance home, I fell into an open gutter. Accra's sewage system consists of canals by the road sides. They are supposed to be covered, but often they are not. It was into one of these that I fell. I simply didn't see it and fell right into it. Fortunately it was empty at the time and I just scraped my knees and arms as well as provided some entertainment for the others.
I have studied the most disgusting parts of Accra up close. Literally.
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