Friday, August 9
Chickens, small goats and sheep wander all over the place normally. Roosters start crowing in the early morning hours. On most mornings, I could hear about 3 or 4, and one broken one. That one just couldn't make the full range of sound the others did, and sounded like he ran out of gas mid-crow.
But this morning it was worse though. One of the unbroken roosters had wandered directly under the window at about 4am. It was like a car alarm going off near your ear. I saw nearly everyone in the room jump!
Breakfast was usually peanut butter, bread and coffee or tea. The usual coffee is Nescafe, and you can put Milo (like Ovaltine) in with it. Anandan brought starbucks, and these really cool little coffee presses which was a nice break from the local coffee. Nescafe isn't bad with Milo though, and I started getting used to it.
After breakfast, we tried out the six bicycles. Akpene had her own mountain bike, and she lead us to the monkey sanctuary at Tafi Atoma.
On the way, in a small hut in the bush, we met another Peace Corp volunteer, Dan, and his son who was visiting from the states.
Dan was helping the village develop their economy. The monkey sanctuary helps bring money into the village, and in fact they were building a small new building next to where we paid admission. We then walk through a mud hut village to the trail to see the monkeys. We watched them follow their leader through the trees, as they travel from one area to another in search of food and exercise.
After the tour, we all had 'minerals' as they call soda, at the stall on the road. Someone bought some "bowl fruit", which resemble badly formed donut holes. There was also a baggie with some very hot red sauce inside. We dipped the bowl fruit in the sauce. I could have eaten all of them!
On the trip back through the brush and really hot sun, we came across a totally unexpected pleasure. The palm wine tappers. There were about 4 palm trees knocked over, and about midway along them were gourd containers capturing the palm wine. On the top (the other side of the tree) were larger holes where they put sticks that are on fire. Somehow this draws the sap and ferments it as it runs through a hole into the gourd. A palm tree will run for about 45 days like this, filling 2 gourds every day (about 2 gallons per day).
This is one of my favorite images from the trip, taken by Anandan. Truly a picture worth a thousand words!
They brought us one of the gourds and a half a calabash as a cup. The proper way to drink is with your thumb on the top edge of the calabash, and never inside, because if we had ill intent, poison could be on our thumb, so tradition dictates that if your thumb is on the top edge, you show you have nothing to hide. Also, whoever brings the palm wine must try some first to show it is safe.
At first, we passed around the calabash and tried a little, after flicking the bees and other foreign matter out of the liquid. It's kind of a cloudy milky liquid. The taste has a hint of champaign, and is slightly sweet. Before long, we each had a full bowl of the stuff. Then another. The tappers were giving us a half days' worth of work, without even asking anything from us. I'm constantly surprised by the generosity of the Ghanian people. We did "dash" them some money before we left - kind of a tip, for their hospitality.
As we settled into our palm wine buzz, Anandan showed us the "stick trick" from India. Each of us took a turn to see if we could pass the stick over our heads, under our feet and back in front without letting go of the stick. Here, George demonstrates.
As we rode back, we came back through the Kenti weavers village. There was a warehouse kind of building with many clicking sounds coming out. I decided to take my recorder inside while Anandan took his camera. Inside there were about 10-15 boys busily working on their cloth creations. They get a rhythm going, happily working their hands and feet. And to keep the pace, the rattle the thread spools between passing it between the threads, producing the clicking sounds. Mesmerizing.
While Anandan and I went into the building, he took the picture, and I recorded the sounds. Kente Weavers 2:42 (2.6mb)