Accra, City of Squatters

Whenever one gutsy vote-winner tries to make angsty Accra ‘marchable, ‘breatheable’, ‘tourable” and humanly habitable, another (usually more powerful) will freeze the Fahrenheit of the effort. We, who are lightsome with free-flowing pavements, may well be in the minuscule minority now, and politics being a statistical sport, we are doubly doomed to lose our homes and space to streptococci-squatters

At The Cinema, A Twice-Told Tale

At the Silverbird, ’spooking’ ‘New Moon’ with the lovely Lil Girl, the guy behind us kept echoing the dialogue in the fantasy flick to the chesty-and-cheeky chick with him – not translating; just repeating.

So, she was either not cosy with the accent – which was quite universal, by me – or she was doing some...thing, else, that was dulcetly distracting her in that darkened, slightly isolated corner of the frigid room.

‘New Moon’, itself, was all it had promised to be, after Lil Girl had shown me ‘Twilight’ on her lemon laptop. But, from the way the well-muscled werewolf, the gothic girl and the vanishing vampire left it, a tantalising trilogy is truly served.

University Liberian

I sensed a judge’s anguish, today, as she subtly struggled twice (and crashed) to enlighten a university registrar that, although the people of Liberia are famous for achieving higher education, it is not every university in the world that has a Liberian student or lecturer. So, the clueless registrar made off from the courtroom not knowing that what he really wanted to say was “Librarian”.

Spintex Supermarket Road

They are broadening the hairline hips of the Spintex Road into a buxom, bodacious dual carriageway. The cuss-the-government gridlock is already easing up, and the previously plugged passage has more fluid flow, now, than the 37-TQ artery, which is suffering a cardiac arrest. Sundry supermarkets are sprouting up on either side of the works: Melcom, Sneda, Palace (which calls itself a Hypermarket), Price Club and others. I predict some tasteless traffic in 2010. Could it be time to move?

Pastors and Demons

They have ‘carteled’ clout over the prissy population with their doping displays for decades. But, in recent rough times, they have faced faecal flak. From who? Desperate demons? Hallucinating humans? Guerrilla pastors? The media casually pukes their reverent names in association with sold sex, shanghaied sex, fatuous fraud, talented theft and obeah-occult.

Star-struck by Okyeame Kwame

I honestly thought that I was beyond that (unless you brought Barack Obama or Nelson Mandela). But I have twice met Okyeame Kwame in the past week, and I've been mildly star-struck. He’s doing a good thing too – launching a foundation to fight Hepatitis B. Talk about using one’s coolness to spread more coolness and love. And he gave a great speech at the launch. The best rapper alive (cut off your own head, Executioner Obrafour) is also a great speech-maker. And, guess what, he made me his MC (I had to add this) on the spur of the moment. I got my 15 minutes of ego-heroin!

Because They are Children

I do not care what tired toes I tread on – it is an inferior culture which treats children churlishly; no rational respect. At an otherwise winning wedding reception last Saturday on a sunny shore, the hungry minors were ejected by the MC from the querulous queue at the food table, while the adults ate and wasted. Even the lower species feed their young first. Thankfully, the gracious groom had the children put back in front.