Merekɔ Kumase

CIEE definitely knows how to spoil us on these little trips they take us on. Even though we've technically paid for it already, but it still feels like we're being spoiled. This past weekend in Kumasi, I took my first hot shower in 3 months. And I would have taken another hot shower before we left but both the power and the water went out right before I was going to. The hotel also had air conditioning in all the rooms, which made the hot shower that much better. I haven't felt that clean in such a long time.

Anyway, so Kumasi: we went from Friday morning to Sunday night. It's about a 6 hour drive to the Asante region (on a pretty rough road. In the US, the same distance would probably take about 2 hours by car).  Friday, we spent the day visiting another Kente village called Bonwire. Personally, I liked the Kente place in the Volta region much better, but this one was fine too. It was just that you could tell this one was frequented by tourists because we were swarmed by people selling stuff from the moment we got there to when we left. Even after we left actually, because some guy trying to sell us key chains actually ran after the bus while it was leaving. The one in the Volta region was much more informative about the tradition of making Kente, and there was barely anyone pressuring us to buy things. The one in Kumasi stressed me out.

Then we went to another village (that I can't remember the name of) where they make Adinkra cloth. It's basically just Kente cloth that they stamp Adinkra symbols on in a special dye that they make out of a certain kind of tree bark. Adinkra symbols are special symbols that were used by the Asante people back in the day that all have different specific meanings. The Adinkra cloth they make is traditionally worn at funerals, but it's been becoming more common to see it worn at other special events as well. The symbols are everywhere around Ghana though. Especially this symbol, "gye nyame" which means "except for God" which is a symbol of God being the supreme being or something along those lines. It's just one of those things you see everywhere, painted on the sides of buildings, or whatever:

And here's my personal favorite symbol, "Sankofa", which symbolizes the importance of learning from the past:

So that place was cool. They showed us how they make the dye and stamp the cloth, and we all did some stamping, and some people even designed their own cloths and picked out the symbols they wanted to use.

Yaa Asantewaa

On Saturday we went to see an Asante traditional home, which was really cool because it was actually the home of Yaa Asantewaa, who was the Queen Mother of the Asante people during the time when they were resisting colonialism. She led a lot of people to fight against the Europeans, and just seems like she was a really brave, smart, kick-ass woman in general. Unfortunately, she was captured and sent into exile, the Asante people lost the war and most of the traditional homes were destroyed, and now the one we saw is one of ten that are left. They're now protected by the UN.

The house was really interesting though. There were reliefs of adinkra symbols carved into the walls, and drums they used for communication with other villages, and there were some turtles just chilling in the little courtyard in the middle. And we got to try on this skirt thing, that apparently really wealthy people wore back in the day. Check me out, wearing a rich Asante person's outfit:

Me and my boyfriend.

So that was really interesting. And then later we went to the palace of the current King of the Asante people. According to my program director, the Asante king probably still has more power and influence than the president of Ghana. And they still have a Queen Mother as well, who is even more powerful than the king. She's over 100 years old though. But that's the one thing I really like about the Asante people. It's a matrilineal society, so women have more control as far as traditions go, and the Queen Mother is the most powerful person in the society.

I just wish you'd see that kind of respect for women in modern Ghanaian society, but unfortunately there are still a lot of problems with the status of women. I won't get into that too much, but it's been one of those things that upsets me about Ghanaian culture. But there's still a lot of different traditions practiced in Ghana, and gender roles play a very large part in those traditions, so I guess that's where that stems from. But anyway, it was refreshing to learn that the Asante people of Ghana honor women as more important members of society.

So after all that culture and traditional stuff, we headed to the central market in Kumasi to do some shopping. It's the largest open market in West Africa. And it was intense. Markets are always intense though.

Kumasi Central Market

First of all, as an oburoni, you quickly learn what names you're expected to respond to. My name isn't always oburoni. It can also be Akosua, Amma, Afia, Abena, Akua, or Adwoa. It's actually gotten to the point where I will automatically turn my head whenever I hear any of those names shouted in my immediate vicinity. And about 90% of the time they are, in fact, talking to whatever oburoni happens to be in the area. They yell out any one of those names randomly because those are the day names--people in Ghana are often named based on what day of the week you were born on, so those names happen to be the ones for women (minus Yaa, which is the name for Thursday). The male names are: Kwasi, Kwabena, Kweku, Kwame, Yaw, Kofi, and Kojo. None of those are in order, because I forgot which days and which names go together. But I know Akua is for Wednesday, because that's my day name. :) I even introduce myself as Akua sometimes, when I don't feel like telling people my real name. And people usually just think it's really funny that you're calling yourself by a Ghanaian name.

Anyway, so the market was basically your typical crazy market experience that I've described here before. People shouting at me, grabbing my arms, etc. I even got slapped on the butt really hard while I was standing and waiting for a friend to finish shopping at one of the stands. I was offended, expecting to turn around and see some creepy old guy or something behind me, but no. It was some woman in her 20s or 30s. The strangest part though was when I turned around to look at her after she slapped me, neither of us said anything. I just gave her a puzzled look and she just stared right back, and then I slowly walked away to the next shop. Awkward, yes? And I got a marriage proposal by some creepy guy who wouldn't leave me alone for a good 10 minutes, spoke German with a Ghanaian because I told him I was from Germany, and made a new friend with a woman because her day name was also Akua. I don't know why that was a big deal but I just went with it.

Also, I practiced my Twi with a ton of sellers. A lot of people get really excited when they ask you something in Twi and you're actually able to answer them. I think most of the time they expect blank stares, because when you answer them they start laughing a ton and tell everyone in the area that the oburoni speaks Twi. And then they ask you more questions you can't answer, and that's when the blank stares start.

But I was surprised at how much I can sort of guess what people are talking about when I'm listening to conversations now. Like I definitely cannot understand a majority of it, but I can pick out words here and there and figure out what they might be saying. Like I was trying on shoes at the market, and this woman didn't have any shoes in my size, and when I was walking away, I heard her telling another shoe seller about how Americans have big feet. And that's about all I could understand.

I did eventually find big enough shoes for my massive American feet though, and I bought them. They were like 5 cedis, which I think is less than $3. And I think I maybe could have even gotten them for less, but I stopped at 5. Everything's such a bargain. I'm currently getting a skirt made for myself that will cost me 8 cedis. Not including fabric, but even then it'll only have cost me about 10 US dollars in total. For a custom-made skirt. And she's going to have it ready for me by Wednesday. I'm so jazzed. I'm going to go buy more fabric and get a dress or something made as well, because how could I not? It's custom made and super cheap!

Also, today was a good day because I finally found what I've been looking for for weeks now--Golden tree chocolate spread. Golden tree is a brand of chocolate produced in Ghana, but you can't find it anywhere else because they can't export it because it apparently can't compete with Swiss and American chocolate. But it's really, really good! It's just made with a little more cocoa powder and a little less milk, or something. And the chocolate spread tastes like Nutella, but because it's made in Ghana, a big tub of it costs about half the price of a tiny jar of Nutella. So it's basically my dream come true. I'm only talking about this because I'm actually really excited about finding it because for some reason it's been really hard to find.

I will stop boring you with my thoughts for today. But that does remind me I haven't talked about food yet, so maybe I'll do that soon.

Until then, yɛbɛhyia bio, me adamfo! [We will meet again, my friends.]

:)