It started with a trip to the Accra Mall, which I had initially had no interest in going to, especially so soon after arriving in Ghana, but I figured it was probably the only place where I might find something to help with the 95% humidity rate in my bedroom and attendant mildew issues. Moving to Accra has been a very comfortable experience, in part because the social stratification between obrunis and locals is much less polarized than the mzungu-local divide in East Africa. Not only is the obruni population of Accra (especially the area where I live) pretty big, there are also a lot more wealthy Ghanaians than there were wealthy nationals in other countries I’ve been to. The market for places comparable to what I’m used to in the US is therefore fairly large, and a trip to the mall only emphasized that point.
Nevertheless, Accra is an African city, and that meant that after I’d finished my search of the expansive mall filled with hip Ghanaian teenagers and possibly the world’s highest cell-phone-per-capita rate, it was time to figure out the tro-tro system. Everyone had told me that 37 station was the main hub, and the point of connection between the mall and home. I had even gotten detailed instructions on where the first tro-tro would drop me and where the second would be waiting. How hard could it be? I sat on the tro-tro heading for 37 and waited for it to pull into a big station: that’s how I would know it was time to get off. Except we never did pull into a station, or not before I got a sneaking suspicion we’d passed 37 and saw a sign indicating that my neighborhood was to the left and the tro-tro’s final destination was ahead. I hopped off the tro-tro and walked to the left until I reached familiar ground. And so the mystical 37 eluded me.
On my way back, I walked through the edge of my neighborhood, as though I needed a reminder that I’m in Ghana, not America. While the main street of Osu is obruni-central, with roadside stalls clearly targeted at tourists and many of Accra’s most Western restaurants (including the gelateria I frequent and the newly opened KFC), this part is completely different. Poorly paved roads lined with cheaply constructed one-storey compounds and people selling Ghanaian food and daily necessities, and talking, laughing, singing, children running in and out of the compound yards… there is a palpable atmosphere of community, a sense that I’ve wandered into a neverending block party.
I began to get that feeling that people were staring at me, or that there was something going on that I didn’t understand. A woman tried to call my attention, but we shared no common language. Young teenagers ran up from behind. A steady stream of people moved in the same direction as me, as though something was pulling us forward. I assumed it was one of the Ghanaian funerals, where they set up a tent in the middle of an intersection for most of the day and hold a long open ceremony. An explosion goes off, the streets are more and more crowded, loud music ahead and why is everyone wearing yellow? I’ve walked into a political rally, perhaps? A company’s promotion? Why are people shooting fake guns in the air all around me? I duck down a side street to order a kebab with a disappointingly high intestine-to-meat ratio. It turns out I’d just wandered through a Ga festival celebrating agricultural successes and the end of a historical famine—something I wouldn’t have encountered mere blocks away in Obruni Land: maybe these worlds aren’t so integrated after all. Maybe I’m just stuck in my comfort zone.
The following weekend I set out to walk to Makolo market, which seemed surprisingly small when I (thought I had) arrived. It was still fairly early on Sunday, as I’d escaped my apartment shortly after the neighboring church’s lengthy and enthusiastic service began. Nothing makes me miss living next to mosques in Dar es Salaam as much as that church’s terrible speakers and the speaking in tongues… especially on those rare nights, such as last night, when I can just make out the call to prayer from a distant mosque before Friday night service begins.
The entrance to the market was bustling, and the first stalls were filled with women selling cleaning supplies, cooking utensils, vegetables, groundnut paste, shoes, clothes and other essentials. But as I wandered further down the line, I saw empty stalls, stalls with laundry and other personal belongings, and stalls where people were sleeping and living. The farther I went, the less sure I was whether this was a commercial workplace or a residential community. I felt that I was intruding on a world I wasn’t supposed to see, the private underbelly of a usually public space.
After finding two bags to replace the one I’ve officially worn to shreds, and wandering through the parts of the market that were slowly stirring to life amid scattered debris left over from the week, I walked home, feeling quite pleased with myself for successfully exploring the famous Makolo market. It was only when I looked at a map to measure the length of my walk (over 6 miles) that I realized I hadn’t actually made it to Makolo market: I’d been in a station a mere block away from Makolo market! No wonder it seemed so small! And I’d been so close…
Later that evening I decided to try my luck with the tro-tros again. Perhaps this time I would figure out where 37 was, finally. I smushed into the van headed for “Circle” (the center of Accra) with several laughing women with their children, all in their best traditional dresses. When I got off, I followed a woman into a shaded, enclosed market, winding along narrow lanes between stalls. Peering beyond the snaking pathways of busy stalls, I saw that the others were deserted: a lazy Sunday in the cool, quiet market. I emerged into brilliant sunlight, crowds of people trying to cross a busy street, more and more vendors, and an elevated footbridge crawling with busy commuters and the beggars and sellers hoping to win their patronage. It’s thrilling, vibrant, foreign.
When I thought I’d walked through most of the loosely connected center, sprawled messily across several traffic-stalled intersections, I set about trying to find another tro-tro to take me somewhere, anywhere.
Tro-tro mate: “Obruni! Hello! Where are you going?”
Me: “Um, I’m not sure”
Mate (with a look of concern for the lost obruni) “But where are you trying to get to?”
Me: “Oh, anywhere. I don’t really have a specific place in mind.”
Mate: “No, no, no, listen, white lady – what place are you going to?”
To be destination-less is a hard thing to explain to people trying to help you find your way. Especially when you’re trying hard not to laugh at your interlocutor’s consternation. Finally I jumped on a tro-tro, enjoying the adrenaline rush of having no clue where it was going. I piled off with the other passengers at Achimota station, where rows of mostly-empty tro-tros were lit by the golden light of the afternoon sun. Time to head home, I thought, or failing that to 37.
“How do I get to Osu?” I asked a nearby tro-tro mate.
“Ah hmm… you go take teyseyn car,” he gestured ahead. I hoped that “teyseyn” didn’t mean “taxi,” since I was determined to do this by tro-tro.
“How do I get to Osu?” I asked the next guy, a couple rows down.
“Osu? Take tesseh” (vague arm motion).
“Uh hmm, how about 37?”
He rolled his eyes, looked at me with pity and said “Ok, come with me, I go take you tayssen”
“Oh!! You mean thirty-seven!” I felt like an idiot.
I got on the tro-tro, where a passenger assured me I could finally get to this magical 37, and the mate continuously called out “Teyseyn! Teyseyn! Last stop teyseyn!” (which, I must admit, was starting to sound more and more like “thirty-seven” the more I listened). I was excited: this can’t go wrong.
Twenty minutes later, we reached a stop along a road and the passengers told me I’d arrived.
“This is 37?”
“Yes, yes, get off here.”
As the suspiciously still full tro-tro rushed on, someone leaned out to say, “Go there!” pointing ahead. I walked towards the entrance to something… a dusty clearing where some tro-tros were being washed and taxi drivers languished under a tree. Definitely not 37. I walked until I began to think I must be in the wrong place, and decide to seize the opportunity to ask for directions from two leering, bling-draped men who were clearly about to bother me for my number.
“Oh hmm… 37 station? That’s very far.” A glance between them and a slimy smile. “Would you like us to take you? We can take you.”
OH HELL NO. I’ve seen that movie before. Fortunately, a slow-walking group of older men and women passed and I launched myself into their group. Finally, I made it to 37.[*] I took in the smells of gasoline, Ghanaian food and kelewele, the delicious spiced fried plantain chips, before locating my tro-tro back home.
And so the adventures go: haltingly, with excitement, frustration, detours and helpful or less-than-helpful advice from others. Life, like Accra, has few signposts. Directionlessness can be difficult and seemingly unproductive, and it can be exhilarating but confusing to others. I’m stumbling through, clumsily, asking for directions but still not quite sure if I’ll make it there or almost-there. Either way, we try to see the wonder in whatever route we take.
[*] If you’re wondering, like I was, why I was dropped a mile and a quarter away from where the 37-bound tro-tro claimed to be going and how I was ever supposed to have found it on my own, it turns out that I was supposed to wait where the tro-tro had dropped me to get another one that would go directly there. False advertising!
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