3. Kokrobite. (Big Milly’s)
2. Anomabo. (Anomabo Beach Resort)
1. Axim. (Lou Moon Lodge)
Which is your favorite Ghana beach?
Ghanaian Funeral Coincidence
This weekend I went to Takoradi for a funeral. I have been to quite a few funerals since I moved to Ghana. However this time, I was invited to the funeral and my husband accompanied me.
As usual for a Ghanaian funeral, it was a multi-day event for hundreds and hundreds of people, but being closer to the bereaved family, I saw more nuances, had more people to ask and hence understood slightly more than I have before.
This picture is from having a snack on the roadside after the burial. By chance, the newspaper that is wrapped around the smoking hot charcoal-grilled plantains on this day happened to be the Obituary section…
“Unsustainable” Student Migration or a Gold Mine?
Yesterday’s news of UK immigration minister Damian Green talking of student immigration being 
“unsustainable” and suggesting changes to the visa laws interested me. Why?
- My research is on student emigration out of Ghana and many Ghanaian students end up in the UK. I know personally that many of them stay on (21% according to the Home Office).
- Green’s speech was based on interesting numbers showing, among other things, that the number of student visas issued increased the last years to 362 000 in 2009. Meanwhile, the official story has been that because of terrorism it is harder to get a student visa today compared to 10 years ago.
- The “unsustainability” according to Green is in the UK! A country which has a 12,5 billion pound education industry, according to the National Union of Students in the same article.
Other voices from the blogosphere includes Sara Mulley/leftfootforward.org who writes:
It seems that we must ask: what is the Government worried about? There seem to be two main concerns. The first is entirely legitimate – it seems likely that some abuse of the student visa regime continues, despite the measures taken by the previous government. This may be a particular issue with visas issued for courses below degree level (which account for up to half the total), and with visas issued to smaller colleges and institutions.[…]
Their other concern is about total net immigration to the UK. Rising student numbers is one of a number of factors making it harder for the Home Office to meet its target of reducing net immigration to ‘tens, rather than hundreds, of thousands’ a year. […]
Although rising foreign student numbers increase net migration figures in the short term, most student migration is temporary, so it’s not clear what the impact is in the longer term.
I have seen some evidence in Ghana that to apply for a visa as a student it is a strategy (mainly because all other routes have closed). I think it supports my theory that courses below degree level account for a big chunk of these visas.
Blogger Mark Hillary suggests that
The UK is an attractive place to study. English is the language used for study and daily life, and even though the universities charge non-EU students a lot more than Europeans, a British education remains good value compared to American colleges.
Mark’s comment reminds me of something I once read about the intangible value of the use of English to the UK which manifests in sales in dictionaries, literature and education.
The migration might be unsustainable. But much more likely, student migration is a gold mine for Britain (and its effects highly complex for developing countries, if now anyone cares about that).
Photo credit to the Guardian.
Do You Believe in Witchcraft?
If you do and you live in Ghana, you are not alone.
According to a recent survey carried out by Gallup, three out of four (or 77%) of Ghanaians believe in Witchcraft.
Only Ivory Coast (with a staggering 95% ) and Senegal (with four out of five) have larger shares of the population suggested to be witchcraft believers. Mali, Cameroon and the DR Congo has around the same levels as Ghana. The average for Sub-Saharan Africa is around 55%. Surprisingly, to me at least, Nigeria came out under average with less than half a population believing in witches. Rwanda and Uganda being the only countries in the sample in which less than 20% answered yes to the question: Do you personally believe in witchcraft?
I just threw myself over this survey. The aspect of witchcraft is a very intriguing one for a westerner moving to Sub-Saharan Africa.
Intrestingly, the Ghanaian witch does not have a pointed black hat and a cat that talks, nor does she need a broom to fly and need not wait until Halloween before she comes out. No, the Ghanaian witch lives close to you and me and can cause harm to anyone she – or he – wants to hurt. Diseases, deaths and ill fates are often blamed on a malicious witch.
In Ghana, the absolutely worst thing you can call anyone is “a witch” (well, apart from stupid, but that is a different blog post). Read this post by Nana Kofi Acquah on a street quarrel. I have also heard people talk about meeting witches, witches casting curses and occasionally lifting them, see for instance this recent account by fellow blogger AntiRhythm on a curse over a lost mobile phone.
Also, the newspapers report regularly about witches flying here and there. Last time I remember reading about witches in the news it was a witch from the Volta region who had mysteriously found himself landing on a house roof in Ashaiman, close to Tema where I live. A few years ago, reports on a witch conference taking place in Kumasi, Ghana spurred on newspaper Daily Guide to suggest the following:
The numerous road accidents, boat disasters, floods in the north, gas explosions in Kumasi and collapse of buildings that the country has witnessed in recent months may not be for nothing.
A global meeting of witches, currently underway in Ghana, is targeting thousands of lives through fatal road and other accidents.
So the accidents on our roads and floods in the north are due do a 2007 conference of witches? Let me tell you that these have not really subsided after the conference was over and done with…
On a more serious note, in Ghana there are sadly a need (?) for enclosed areas for witches or “witch camps”, predominately for women who have been named witches by their community. For more info on this, read this account about life in Gambaga Witch Camp or this insightful and frightening article about What Makes a Woman a Witch? by writer Yaba Badoe. Recently the plight of those women have been recognized, for instance by SOSYWEN and Stop Witch Trials.
The GALLUP survey also suggest that witchcraft believers live worse lives than those who do not believe. Of course, that seems plausible but possibly with a spurious or false relationship, with education for instance being the real explanatory factor. But when I look at the presented numbers, I wouldn’t say that there is really much of a difference in percieved living standards between witchcraft believers and non-believers.
Those who believe in witchcraft rate their lives at a 4.3 on average, while those who do not believe or don’t have an opinion rate their lives higher on the scale, at 4.8 on average.
Is it very marginal, or am I not getting it right?
Anyway, this survey gives me scientific proof of something I already knew: that most people in Ghana do believe in witches.
So, do you? And why?
View from Ghana: Education
This post is part of Ghanablogging‘s monthly theme post “a view out of Ghana” – this month we write on education.
In school we have other names
School uniform, school bag and white socks in black shoes
Ama and myself
and many others
(but in school we have other names)
Lining up in front of ‘new block’ (although it doesn’t look new)
On the red dirt football field
Standing still
(Longing for eating a bo’flot during the morning break)
(Thinking in Fante but) answering “yes, sah”
when asked if I swept the headmistress’ office
First period is Social science
(I have memorized the definition of marriage)
Sun is hot
Standing still
(schh Ama)
Keeping quiet
(Is this Education?)
Light Drizzling Rain
Sometimes life in Ghana is very poetical. Like this statement about the current rainy weather:
“This is the rain that is good for tomatoes,but kills old women”
My Favorite Tree: Flamboyant
My favorite tree in Ghana is the Flamboyant (Delonix Regia) that periodically turns in to a huge, red bouquet.
Which is your favorite tree?
End of Week Fun incl. Ghanablogging Meet-Up
This is my plan for the end of the week. Will I see you there?
Wednesday, Circus at Alliance Francaise, 8pm. 5GHC?
Thursday, Ghanablogging April Meet-Up. Theme: “How can my blog get more noticed?”at Smoothies in Osu. 6.30-8.30pm. FREE
Friday, Ghana Goes 2010, football themed poetry, songs and fashion at the African Regent, Tetteh Quarshie Interchange, 8-10 pm. FREE
Saturday, Ghana Planetarium, Close to Police Headquarters, Accra. Theme: Saturn, 5 pm – 7 pm. 5GHC.
Sunday, Chill at home. All day. FREE
After a few days with my blog down, I can now post again, but still not upload pics 🙁 Working on it. Thanks for your patience!
UPDATE: And here is the pic from the Ghana Planetarium Flickr album.
House Cleaning in Ghana
There was a program on TV called Extreme Home Makeover some years back (maybe its still on?), anyways, I sometimes think of that when it is time to clean our house here in Ghana.
The combination of louvre-windows or a house that is not completely sealed and dusty surroundings makes for so – much – dust – EVERYWHERE.
In wardrobes, in drawers, on books, on walls…Then we also have the left-behinds of the involuntary pets – spiderwebs, wall gecko droppings, dead flies, a leg of a cockroach etc. As Ghana is also a humid country certain things get moldy, especially clothing, bags and shoes, but also pillows, table cloths and napkins – that is if you don’t take them out every so often to dry in the sunlight. What I am trying to say is that a house in Ghana can get really, really dirty.
The difference to the TV-version of it is that I do not get to go on a luxurious vacation and only scream MOVE-THAT-BUS before my new house emerges, no, I have to be a part of the SERIOUS dust removal.
Why do I say EXTREME and SERIOUS?
Well, because of the normal cleaning routines in Ghana that seem harsh to me (although now that I am sitting in a clean house I understand the rationale). What about:
– Spreading all my shoes and purses over the lawn in our backyard
– Scrubbing all carpets with Omo
– POURING water on the floor and scrubbing (see small helper in pic)
– Emptying the bookshelf completely to wipe all the books down
– Carrying all “small furniture” i.e. tables, lamps, baskets, vases…outside for a thorough sweeping and finally my personal favorite:
– Hosing the windows/dirty mosquito netting down from the outside (yes, plenty of dirty water in the room)
Sigh, is it obvious that I hate cleaning day?
>Ex-President Rawlings’ House on Fire: Was It Electrical?
>
The shocking news reached us yesterday morning, the former president J.J. Rawlings’ residence in Ridge was on fire.
Today, facts are a bit more clear:
– Nobody was hurt
– Only Mrs. Konadu Rawlings and one of their daughters were at home
– The ex-president was not at home, but came to the sight early in the morning
– The fire started at 4 am
– By 9.30 am the house was completely burned down
– Three months ago, an electrical fire almost broke out in the residence
– The house was a colonial style bungalow, in much constructed in wood
(Sources: GNA here and Joy FM here and here).
Immediately a debate broke out on electrical fires caused by the common fluctuations of power in Ghana. The night before the fire, it was raining heavily and a substation broke down in Tema. However, GRIDCO, the distribution company found that such a discussion was premature before a proper investigation had been carried out, see here.
However, even if it was an electrical fire, what will we take from it? Has anything changed at all since Ghana’s Foreign Ministry burned down in October caused by an electrical fault?
As I heard the rain coming down heavily that night, I woke up and as I anticipated power to fluctuate I anxiously went to pull the plug on all computer equipment (beacuse yes, I am a computer nerd). Then I went back to sleep.
Next time, I’m not so sure I’ll be able to go back to sleep.
Pictures borrowed from myjoyonline.com
>Valentine’s Day in Ghana – All You Need To Know
>
Valentine’s day became a day to celebrate in Ghana first after the airwaves were deregulated and private radio channels like Radio Gold and Joy FM entered the stage around 1995.
But if Valentine’s Day celebrations got to a late start, it sped up quickly and the celebration of romantic love is today widespread in Ghana!
Fellow blogger Nana Yaw writes a funny post including five stories of what high-school sweethearts go through around this time of year, like this one
Sometimes, you just didn’t have the money to compete, but couldn’t get her to understand. So, 1 week before the Day, you kicked up a baseless fight, and broke up. No need for presents. You waited for 5 days, and went back to you were sorry.
I hope you never had to do this artificial breakup maneuvre! Read all of Nana Yaw’s Valentine stories here.
Professor Jo Ellen Fair (who I met last year) have researched the topic of Valentine’s Day in Ghana and in summary says that celebrating “Val Day” is something the middle class in Ghana does to feel modern and cosmopolitan. This quote is from the conclusion of the paper “Me Do Wo: The Creation of Valentine’s Day in Accra, Ghana”. Find the whole paper here (pdf). or read a summary here.
Many say that the Valentine’s theme of love “clicks”
in Ghana. “Because love is universal, anyone in any culture can be a part of Val Day,” said one young woman (interview, Feb. 10, 2002). Valentine’s Day sanctions gestures and words of affection in a culture otherwise characterized by public and private reserve. Valentine’s Day is “the one chance you get to tell people how you feel,” said one female secondary student (interview, Feb. 5, 2002). “Valentine is wonderful. I can hold my boyfriend’s hand and walk down the street,” said another secondary student(interview, Feb. 5, 2002). Advocates of Val Day are insurgents for romance in aculture uncertain of the future of more practical approaches to relationships.
This morning, these inputs paved the way for an interesting discussion over breakfast with my sweetheart.
Pic: Walking together on a beach early in the morning – my idea of romance! Happy Valentine’s Day everybody!
>Did I Dance with Kojo Antwi? Part III or Photo Evidence
>Finally, courtesy of pro-photographer Nyani Quarmyne there is photographic evidence of that
YES, I DANCED WITH KOJO ANTWI*!
This is for you my loyal readers! 🙂