The Marriage Feast

The day before, the bride’s family women perch in a circle of wooden stools in the clearing between the huddling houses. They’re cooking Banku and Okra soup, Ampesi and Garden-Egg stew, Jollof Rice and Beef stew, etc, etc. The chatter is high in the beginning, but drains off every now and then, until somebody ‘bribes’ their enthusiasm with a round of safe alcohol. Some are not joining in – too many cooks will confuse the taste, I guess. But they burnish the banter, and provide substitutes. The kids are playing close by; hoping to be favoured with testing-tasting first servings. A neighbour sets up mammoth speakers and belts Hiplife tracks on the humid air. Passersby look on amused. The atmosphere is sizzling with expectation, and with preparation. My best friend’s traditional marriage.

My Best Friend's Ghanaian Marriage

If, out of character, I have been away from this space, it is all for good reason. My main man is getting married, and I am his best man. He's actually getting married twice as we do in Ghana. The first marriage, today, (the Ghanaian marriage) is what Ghanaians unknowingly call the 'Engagement'. The white wedding comes tomorrow. Preparing for the 'Engagement' was such fun. Not so much the running around as how all the women (the bride's friends, sisters, cousins, neighbours, etc come together to cook for over one hundred guests. While the men clean the compound, install canopies and arrange the chairs. I will serialise different parts of this spectacle, but I have to go help the groom now.

P.s. I take no responsibility for anything strange I may have written up there. I am not in my usual state of sobriety.

The Economics of Football

I gape at the Beautiful Game: is one successful African footballer not more beneficial to his community than a highbrow hat trick of doctors or teachers or politicians? I may take out teachers because they give a golden gift and (together with doctors) they deal direct benefits. The ball juggler’s jewels, however, glitter indirectly, and are somewhat sentimental, but he regularly remits, right?

Counting Life

17 World Cups
1 Haley's Comet
1 marriage
The curtain comes down

Enye Wo Car N’eeko No?

Office Colleague, Tiger 3, is tottering home knackered. He stops to buy oranges on the way. As he carefully selects the best, the seller asks, “Enye wo car n’eeko no?” (Is that not your car moving off?). He drops the fine oranges and charges after the errant car. He does not make it. The car careers into a drain. He had left it in neutral gear on a sloping bend. The ‘area champions’ who go to his aid, end up picking his wallet. Then they turn around and ‘hold him hostage’ until his wife brings some money to pay for their car-salvage service. There was scant money left to buy oranges after that.

Dog Bites, Man Bites, Bosoms and Laps

Have you heard of a dog being treated for a man bite? Well, a colleague at work swears that in the movie Escape from Sobibor, a man interned at the concentration camp lay his teeth into the hinds of a prison dog set on him to prevent his escape. Ha ha ha ha ha! Otwiara Kose.

Another colleague, a buxom woman, pointed to her (lovely) lap as she referred to her bosom. She’d thought all her life that lap and bosom meant the same thing. Ebei, can’t a man do some serious work in peace. My sides are splitting from the laughter. It’s Silly Tuesday.

Whaaaat! No More Hot Fork on the Streets?

It’s said the Ministry of Information has “banned” the sale of movies rated X in Ghana. I do not know when such movies were ever legal. So I do not know if the Ministry is now saying it has created a new law. Further, doesn’t the ‘Ministry’ know that it does not have any power to make laws? I am all for enforcing the laws against obscenity, but I wonder if we will win against the market forces.

Readying for Your Coming

It’s only two weeks more -
The longest of the eight.
I’m sprucing up the house;
Polishing the rust in my heart;
Remembering the places we love to go to;
Doing callisthenics at dawn;
Sleeping earlier like you want me to.
I’ll be ready when you come.

Nothing Good Comes Easy

As seen unlawfully posted on an Electricity-Company transmission box outside the building I work in. Breaking the laws of the land and of grammar.

Village Flower

I was enchanted by a vestal village girl with an apocalypse body. In the magical moonlight spraying the countryside, she was skipping, frisking and entertaining among twenty craving ‘cannibals’. She performed with unawareness and white innocence – the same colour as her quivering quarter skirt. I did not want to go back to Accra.

Message Manipulation

See how any message can be manipulated!

MTN’s Insufficient Credit

Lately, when you try to send a text message on MTN’s service, a stupid text message comes up to tell you that you have “insufficient credit” to send the text. Then, you check your credit balance and find out that you have more than GHC11.00 of credit. But when you try to resend your text, the offensive MTN text just keeps popping up.

Those idiots at MTN should know that they do not have SUFFICIENT CREDIT IN THE ESTIMATION OF CUSTOMERS IN GHANA to play around with people like that. If they read this and get angry, they can sue me. I will teach them that "TRUTH" IS THE ULTIMATE DEFENCE in defamation. Incompetent people! They have not even apologised for it.

Toiletiquette

As seen on the door to the toilets at a hangout at Aburi.

We All Do It To God

Two sisters aged 4 and 6 are skipping along a bushy path a few metres from home to buy toffees, when they lose their coins. They look everywhere on and around the path, but do not recover their money. Younger Sister has a brilliant idea, “Let’s pray to God to help us find our money.” Older Sister prays to God saying, “Dear God, if you help us find our money, we promise to give you half of it.”

After the prayer, Younger Sister nudges Older Sister in the ribs and asks, “What have you done? Don’t you know that if we give God half of our money, we won’t have enough left to buy the toffees?” Older Sister smiles a knowing smile, draws her kid sister closer to her and whispers, “Oh, don’t worry about that. I did not mean it. I only said it to trick God into helping us!”

Elias and the (Spelling) Bee

As seen among a friend's Face Book pictures.

On another note, this marks my 600th blog post, and I am celebrating it with a mention as has become a custom. I'm so glad I have not let go of it. You, readers, are the reason why I love this so much. Thank you for coming for the ride.

Boffin Blackout

Ghanaian scientists are whining in Bonn that the ‘benighted’ local media is treating them like an unwanted stepchild. The media counters that the baby-bawlers are media-maladroit, bungling boffins who do not bait with any tantalizing titbits. I side with the media. We have annual floods, electric sockets from China, Indonesian matchsticks and Ivorian body lotion swarming in to fill a vulgar vacuum. So, the Theory-Talkers should shut up, please!

Kwashay

Two boys in overalls scooter-cruise in broad daylight in ‘uncrowded’ streets of Accra. They turn a nook and creep upon an isolated walker. The bike halts; one comes down; he’s brandishing a machete pulled out from under his over-sized clothes; the bag is snatched, the laptop, the watch, the phone and the wallet. They’re gone in ten seconds, leaving only a foul wisp of fuel-adulterate behind. They will hack you down if you resist or delay. Kwashay – riding robbery (or motorbike mugging) in the City of Accra.

Road-building in Accra

Reputable road-builders from Europe and China carve, chisel and plane our African roads with some of their cutting-edge knowhow. In no time, the rains tumble and devour deep holes into the roads and into the reputations of these firms.

Funeral Party in Accra

Twenty cars whizzed through the court-road traffic at high noon towards the Korle quarter of Accra ferrying feisty, frolicking funeral-goers (not mourners) in white Adinkra fabric. They sped on-the-verge-of, and ignored the static cars in the lunch-hour queue, looking to ram through anybody who dared to enter from a side route. Some were beating deafening drums and playing loud-park music, while a camera van 'panoramaed' it on tape. Happy people decked in white (a 40-something-year-old woman winked at me). The deceased must have been very old.

The Lure of the Chieftain

Folds of fine, woven cotton in ivory and azure, sunflower and crimson. Gold bangles, bracelets, rings and ancient pendants. Cowries, beads, a hand-crafted, silken, horsehair whisk and fine-leather sandals. A dark crown-hat with bright reddish-gold and silver sequins, spangles and medallions. Such human pride and splendour. What are his interests: service or ‘serve his’?