How to Offend Royalty

I wrote most of this entry more than a week ago, but I haven’t been able to access the Internet till now. Hope my shenanigans amuse everyone!

The last few days have been amazing in so many ways I haven’t found the time to write about them. But, I’m sure if I don’t write it all down now I’ll want to kick myself later. Yesterday was our first official tour in Ghana. We finally go to go into the city of Accra and see some things. We visited the Kwame Nkrumah mausoleum, which was in a lovely park. Our guide was very cheerful and explained many things to us about Nkrumah’s life and his significance to Ghana and all of Africa. I found the statue over the mausoleum to be the most interesting. It is half of a tree. This signifies that Nkrumah’s work is the root of a forward moving Africa, but that his legacy and work must be carried on and finished by Africa’s people.

We then visited old Accra or Ga Mashie. This is the section of Accra where the Ga people live. As you might or might not guess, they speak Ga, not Twi so my, “Etisan? Aye Aye.” Was useless here… not that it’s that helpful among the Asante either. The day of our tour was the climax of a major Ga festival called Ga Homowo. Our tour guide is a friend of our Professors. His name is Sam, and he seems to have many connections in Ghana, so I’m very excited for the rest of our visits. Sam managed to arrange for us to meet the Chief of Ga, When we arrived we were shown into a room with many traditional decorations and a throne. The chief came in, and our guide explained that we were a group of students from the U.S., and our purpose here in Ghana was to further our knowledge at University as well as to better understand and learn about Ghana and it’s people. It is tradition to bring a gift or token of thanks when visiting the chief, so we presented two bottles of schnapps as a thank you. The chief then said a traditional prayer with the schnapps asking for our safety and success while in Ghana. I was able to get an awesome video with my camera of the chief praying for us. Unfortunately with the Internet connection I won’t be able to show anyone until I return home. He then spoke with us for a while and offered us drinks.

We were then taken to the Kings palace in Ga Mashie. We waited in a room with food for a while. The traditional food of the festival is called kpokpoi. I can only describe it as a kind of yellow cornmeal in fishy broth. All present are invited to eat some… but no one from our group was brave enough. We were then shown in to see the King! He spoke to us for a while about the festival and allowed us to ask questions. Since we were out and about for the day I had decided to wear a long skirt. And when I’m in a skirt, and seated in a chair a bit too far from the ground for my stature, I tend to cross my ankles. Unfortunately for my habits, crossing your legs in front of royalty is apparently offensive. The first time I crossed my feet while the king was speaking, one of the people in his court motioned for me to uncross them. However, we were sitting for quite some time, and in the course of a half hour or so I managed to end up with my ankles crossed again. Again, the court member motioned, and I quickly uncrossed them. The king then said something like, “It is tradition not to cross your legs in front of the king, it’s just one of those things.” I then of course apologized and made sure not to cross my legs for the rest of the time. My embarrassment was trumped, however, by the member of our group, Mike, who broke the chair he was sitting in during the middle of the King’s speech. The leg of the chair just snapped out from under him. A court member quickly took the broken chair and replaced it with a new chair. Totally hysterical. Fortunately we somehow managed to keep our composure for the most part.

After the tour our tour guide Sam, invited us into his home for a traditional festival meal with his family. The meal was by far the best food I’ve had since I’ve been in Ghana. And his family was so welcoming and friendly. What an awesome way to start off my travels in Africa.

I’ll be writing more soon! And thanks to everyone who’s been keeping in touch via e-mail and phone!