Happy Birthday America! (from Africa)

I spent the fourth of July in Ireland—instead of drinking Coors Light and saluting the American flag, I took a shot of Jameson’s Irish Whiskey and paid tribute to the orange, white and green. No, I didn’t opt out of my Africa adventure early. Instead, the 13 obronis ventured to Accra’s ex-patriot neighborhood, Osu, to celebrate the fourth of July.

I went to work at 9:00 on Friday morning as previously instructed, but I was alone until several hours later. That’s the other thing about Ghanaians—they really take their time. Instead of always being in a hurry to be on time as in America, they instead stop to visit with every random acquaintance they happen to pass by. This isn’t necessarily bad, but it is extremely different than anything I’m used to. Anyway, I passed the time reading the local newspaper with the headline “Rawlings blows Mills.” I’m not quite sure how they come up with these. After catching up on Ghanaian news, I was still waiting on the cold tile steps of the ABANTU house. I was suddenly roused, though, by the beats of drums and the steady chants of women and men leaking through the cracks of the fence surrounding me. Curious, I peeked through a small hole in the fence and saw a church service of some sort going on. Women wore brilliantly colored traditional dresses and men had cloth thrown over their bodies. Of course, the whole service was in Twi but I found myself humming along as if I knew just what they were saying. One man, who I assume was the preacher or leader, would yell something at the crowd, and they would shout “Amen!” Soon, I was saying amen right along with them. Why not?

The hot sun was beating its steady rays down on the dry earth in full force by the time Auntie Grace came. Auntie Rose followed shortly thereafter and I went over my research plan with her. She seemed impressed, and gave me the approval to move ahead. I stayed at work for a few hours reading musty back-editions of newspapers (all with ridiculous headlines). After awhile, I asked if I could leave an hour early to celebrate the holiday. Auntie Grace and Matilda (another intern) looked confused. They calmly explained, with thick accents, that the holiday was last Tuesday, referring of course to Republic Day. With a smile, I explained that it was America’s Independence Day today and the questions started rolling:
“Today?! What does that mean? Independence from whom? How old is America? What do you do to celebrate? What do you eat?”
I answered the questions as best I could, and when I was done I’d attracted something of a crowd for the small ABANTU office. At the end of my interrogation, Auntie Grace chimed in, “Well, what are you waiting for? Go home and celebrate!”

So I did. I loaded up my bags and hopped on the next trotro headed toward Okbungalow. Only it wasn’t headed to Okbungalow, but rather some different stop completely. I’m starting to get to know the streets well enough that I know when I’m headed in the wrong direction, and I definitely knew that this way was wrong. I jumped off the dilapidated bus at the next stop and tried to find another trotro going the right direction. After about 30 minutes in the hot sun, beads of sweat dripping from my brow, I gave in and flagged down a taxi. The driver was a small, bald man with a crusty gold necklace dangling from his long neck. After a typical bartering conversation that ultimately resulted in me probably paying too much, I collapsed into the cab’s deep plastic seats. The driver introduced himself as Kwame, a typical name for Ghanaians here and one I can almost pronounce properly. Kwame asked me every question known to man about America—I felt like I was on a game show climbing the ladder to the million dollar question. He had no idea where Oregon was, but as soon as I mentioned its close proximity to California, Kwame lit up: “Do you see movie stars? Do you live in mansion? Are there palm trees in your yard?” Kwame was especially interested in JFK International Airport (which I had to explain was on the other coast) because his cousin’s son had been there several years ago and said, “It’s like going to heaven.” Kwame wanted to know if everywhere in America was like going to heaven. How do you answer that? Somehow, we started talking about Ghana in comparison to the US—I think Kwame just about fainted when I told him I’d like to stay in Ghana. Why would I want to leave a place like the US that’s so much like heaven?

After a long, hot, sticky and amazing taxi ride with Kwame, I was greeted at home by the few lucky obronis who hadn’t gone to work today. Molly had gone to a school to talk to middle-school children about the United States. She, too, had some hard questions from a room of pre-teens. Some that she recalled included, “Who are your founding fathers? What’s better about the US than Ghana? What can you find in the US that’s not in Ghana? Why do you love America?” That last one was especially interesting—yes, we have a lot to be proud of as Americans, but what exactly is there to love? The mountains, the valleys, the lush forests and sprawling fields are nice…but we’re destroying them one by one with urban sprawl and natural resource abuses. The freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution are great…but people are repressed, paid to keep their mouths shut and violated by government actions like the Patriot Act every day. So what, exactly, do I love about America? I love that education is so widespread; I love that people can practice hundreds of different religions from all over the world without persecution; I love that we have laws to protect people and means to care for the mentally and physically ill. Oh, and a hamburger sounds pretty good right now, too.

We waited around the house all afternoon for everyone to arrive home from work. Soon, we all donned our best red, white and blue outfits and headed out for a night on the town. Molly and Krista had met some students from NYU at a fancy restaurant near their work the day before and made plans to celebrate the holiday with them.

In a group so large, transportation can be tricky. A select few of us have cell phones and so we are strategically placed in taxis with those cell phone-less obronis. None of us really knew where we were going, but we all had a landmark to find where we’d meet up and go from there. Unfortunately, the landmark was apparently different for the different taxis. Two taxis of Oregon obronis wound up at MetroTV; the other taxi found its way to the Walanga Hotel. Those of us stranded at MetroTV saw a flashing neon sign advertising the Monte Carlo restaurant and decided to wait for the others inside, out of the torrential downpour that had soaked us to the bone already. The Monte Carlo was perhaps the most surreal, ludicrous place I’ve been to yet in Africa. First of all, there was no one there. Bouncers stood at every imaginable doorway and greeted us eagerly as we slid like giant raindrops through the front door. The place was dimly lit, with a nice bar reminiscent of somewhere in Vegas. The doors were all padded, with crushed red velvet covering them tightly. There were private, cornered off lounges with leopard skin couches and blown up posters of Marilyn Monroe. Where am I?

Needless to say, we booked it out of the Monte Carlo, with its $10 cover and $9 gin and tonics. We started walking in the general direction of the Walanga Hotel where the other car full of people was supposedly waiting. After ten minutes walking down a dimly lit residential road, we opted to hail a taxi instead of go any further in what could have been the wrong direction. With help from our Ghanaian friend Kelly, we successfully hailed two cars and drove for less than a minute to the Walanga. Krista, an obroni from our group, met us there and walked us back to the NYU house. When we turned down the road to their house, though, the whole group, Oregon and NYU, were standing in the nicely paved street. Apparently, the plan had again changed and we were all headed to some bar in Osu. By this point, I was completely drenched from head to toe and feeling somewhat like a drowned rat. One of the NYU guys whose name I didn’t catch escorted Jessica and I back to their house to use the restroom. I wouldn’t even call this place a house—it was more like a mansion. Four different buildings all faced each other with a giant courtyard in the middle. The house itself was nicer than most in the US—again, where am I? The particular mansion we entered had a huge, spacious living room with a big TV and a fancy kitchen. The tiles were freshly swept and mopped, and I’m guessing the students there didn’t have much to do with that. There were no leaks in the ceiling, no giant cockroaches and no flickering lights like our place. Somehow, though, standing in the air-conditioned house with wireless internet and a washer/dryer combo, I wanted to go home. Okbungalow might not be the fanciest of places, but it really does feel like home.

After our brief visit to the NYU mansion, we jumped in a few taxis and headed to Ryan's Irish Pub. The rain had ceased and the air was hot and humid--believe it or not, I'm starting to get used to it. As soon as I opened the creaky taxi door, I knew we weren't in Ghana anymore. First of all, Obronis out populated Ghanaians--a clear indicator that we had definitely crossed some sort of line. Secondly, drinks were as expensive as they are in the US--what?! But we're in Africa?! We shoved our way up to the bar and ordered drinks all around nonetheless. Jameson's and Guinness flowed freely from the taps as the two groups (NYU, UO) separated like oil and water. The students from NYU have been here for a week--in their posh apartments, they have personal drivers so no one even knows what a trotro is and they've certainly never thought of going to a cheap Ghanaian bar where you can buy a coke for 35 cents. I'm sure they're all nice, but I'm definitely glad to be an west coast gal (thanks, mom!) Anyway, we Oregonians celebrated the fourth of July by starting our own dance party in the middle of the concrete floor, much to the enjoyment of our bartenders (some of the only Ghanaians in the place). We wound up staying out late and sleeping through most of the 5th of July.

Overall, it was a great 4th of July despite the trips to a wannabe Vegas club and Ireland. I have to admit, though, I did miss the fireworks, my friends and family, and good ol' American hot dogs! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AMERICA!