There is – at least – one aspect of life in Ghana that has refused to be altered by the vicissitudes of social and political praxis.
And that is our friendliness and good cheer.
Within 24 hours of touching down in Accra, I was sitting at the International Media Centre, laughing my head off. As if I’d never been away.
First to arrive was my friend Chaaman. Proper gentleman who won’t tell you that he ”swerved” you because he had to go and fill his gas cylinder. Otherwise his wife would kill him.
Next came Kwaku, who having ditched someone who had been ‘time-dallying’ him, got there shortly after me.
I ordered tilapia and fried plantain. Kwaku also asked for tilapia but with something else. Chaaman went for non-tilapia fish.
Then followed fifteen solid minutes of dissecting the origins of certain meals commonly found in Ghana. Similarities; peculiarities; variations and how they probably occurred.
Is akplidzii the same as dzenkple? What makes dzenkple different from aprapransa? Is it true that garifortor came to Ghana from Togo?
Chaaman explains what distinguishes one form of akple from the other. This entails a scientific discourse on fermentation techniques.
Kwaku and I expatiate on the types of kokonte that can be found in Koforidua/Asiakwa, as against Accra New Town, Christiansborg or Mataheko.
“Do you know that kokonte is known in some places as “Face The Wall”?
“Face The Wall?”
“Yes! It’s normally cheaper than most other dishes in bars – especially, fufuo and soup, which has been teleported from the “bush” offering into posh domains – and so people ran shy of being seen whilst they’re tucking it in. So they ‘faced the wall ‘ in order that no-one could tell what their dish was!”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
How can people be ashamed because they are eating what they can afford?”
“Ha! You don’t know? “Face” is one of our greatest social preoccupations. Mr A won’t compromise with Lady B because it would make him/her “lose face”. Especially in front of Madam C.
“But what business is it of Madam C’s?”
“No-one cares about that. They assume that because they would regard a certain line of action as infra dig (beneath their dignity) everyone else also regards that activity in the same light!”
“Yeah, about 40 percent – if not more – of a Ghanaian’s behaviour can be traced to his psychological insecurities. We always want to “show” others that we are made of a mettle not beneath their own. Even without knowing what mettle they are made of in the first place!”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” A Freudjung has come to judgement!”
“Ghanaians love to do shadow-boxing in the psychological arena?”
“Kung-Fu psyching more likely!”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Ei, so kokonte was once frowned upon?”
“Yes, don’t you remember Mr Asamoah-Boateng getting into trouble, when he was at the Ministry of Information, for “dissing” kokonte?”
“Well, he’s now in charge of a place with many workers who practise “san-danho” (eating at a chop bar on credit and paying the bar-woman when the next “moon-die” or pay-day comes around).
“How fashions change. When we were in primary school….”
“What year BC was that?”
“HAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Two hundred!”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Yes, in those far-off days, you were thought to be a champion if you came to school in the afternoon and could prove – by the smell on your right hand – that you had not gone home to eat “boring” plantain and stew but had visited the market to eat kokonte and smoked herrings!”
“Or kenkey and sardines!”
“Who could better kenkey and corned beef?”
“Ei, corned beef was for aristocrats oh!”
“Yeah – when you consumed corned beef, you wouldn’t wash the scent off your hands for days!”
“Corned beef as a measure of gauging the social barometer?”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Until Tom Brown came and turned the social scales upside down!”
“Tom Brown? Ha – I swear a very important “had-been” took some money off me in 1983 to get me a bag of something he told me was TB and I never saw either the food or the money? There were days in Ghana when, as soon as you saw a queue outside a shop, you joined in!”
“Sometimes only to discover that it was only “chits” that were being issued!”
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Hey, man done suffer for Gold Coast, ke?”
“Ei, so charlie, you too went to Agege?”
“Don’t remind me! Ghana must go!”
“I swear! Those were hard times, abi?”
“Hmmmm! But today, corned beef dey for mall!”
“And you can buy mobile-phone credit without getting out of your car.”
“But try using the phone and a foolish voice will irritate your ears by asking you to choose the vilest jingle ever invented as your “favourite” tune and pay for it!”
“Yes – and why not? The guys at the NCA were busy lining their pockets instead of regulating the mobile-phone trade!”
It all makes sense now. People write about how irritating such practices are, and no-one takes any notice. Others expose the fact that when the companies say the phone number you are calling is “switched off or out of range”, they are lying, because you get the same message when you use your phone to call another that is lying right beside it!!”
“And no-one takes any notice.”
“And the government has accepted “refunds” from these people who stole money meant to buy phone-tapping equipment?”
“Yes! The government says it is trying to prevent corruption in public life. Yet when people steal, they are allowed to “refund” the stolen money?”
“They should be jailed and their assets seized as a “refund!”
“Ei charlie, shakey-shakey done catch my head oh! Ah – but tilapia too, why you done get so many bones inside you eh?”
By Cameron Duodu