The weekend which didn't go quite to plan

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I think it is fair to say that I have had one of the weirdest, yet probably my favourite, weekend to date.

This weekend, Me, Louise, Tom, Alice and Baptiste all traveled together, for the first time, down to Busua (a little coastal town,) and also to Nzulezo, a village on stilts above a lake a few hours from Busua. We all met in Kumasi to get a tro to Takoradi on the Friday, before going on to Beyin where we would stay the night and use as a springboard for Nzulezo the next day. However, the cost of 12 Cedi was considered a tad expensive for the tro and it was decided that we should get the Metro Mass instead.

It wasn't worth it, not for 5 Cedi anyway. We waited from 7am until 12:30pm and all we saved was 5 Cedi. We should have guessed really, as every experience I have had with the Metro Mass from Kumasi has involved a long wait, but money is money! After a ridiculously long journey (constant stops, awful traffic,) we finally arrived in Takoradi around 7pm. We had told Steve, the hotel owner, we would be there at 5 originally but we called and said we were in Takoradi and would probably get there around 9 - which he said was fine!

We were too late for a direct tro to Beyin, so instead we had to get a tro to Essiema and get a taxi from there. Annoyingly there was only 1 guy willing to take us and charged double as he wouldn't be able to get a fare on the way back, which I guess was kind of fair and we didn't really have an option. I would also say that if I had the choice again, I would never get in a car with him ... ever. He seemed to have absolutely no idea where he was going, the petrol seemed to be coming into the car rather than the combustion chamber and it was tipping it down with rain, the window steaming up and he was wiping it with a rag whilst we were driving too fast over a bumpy dirt road. We eventually arrived in Beyin at 9 and asked the guy to take us to the hotel, which he had no clue as to where it was and ended up dumping us in the wrong place entirely - a different hotel which was closed for the night. Walking around Beyin, in the dark and rain with no idea where on earth we were going, we asked a security guard at a huge mansion house where the hostel was. He went inside and brought a young man with him who said he was willing to take us. 15 minutes later we arrived outside the hostel to find that our good friend Steve had decided to shut up for the night. Unreliable! Baptiste insisted he was going to ring him the next day and shout at him, but never did which was a shame. Anyway, the young man (a guy named Theo) walked us for another 15 minutes to a different hotel, which we decided was far to expensive (50 Cedi a night for a double, and he wouldn't let 5 of us stay in the 1 room.) We rejected it, and were ready to rough it under a porch we had found earlier, until Theo said that he would put us up at his place!

We walked back to his house, after Theo had called his Grandma to say we were coming, and were shown to a room in a little side building. His grandma apologised and said that her cousin had just died and the main house was filled with family otherwise we could have stayed there, but a roof over our head was more than we could ever have asked for really.

The next morning when we got up, Theo (or someone in his family) had lain out a huge breakfast. Bread, fruit, fruit juice, biscuits, Tea and Coffee. Definitely not expecting that, and he refused to take any money for it at all! We wanted to do something to say thank you, and Theo had a deaf brother called Kofi who wanted to come to the village with us, so we happily took him along with us.

The stilt village was a 45 minute canoe trip from Beyin, along a canal (although different to the English idea of canal, more a cleared path through a massive lake of reads, before going through a forest-y area and then across a large lake.) The village was bizarre, and amazing. Everything was made from bamboo and raised about a foot from the water, and all of the houses were built off 1 main street. The village is home to 450 people, 120 of them children (school in the primary in the village,) with another 15 or so 'commuting' to JHS and SHS daily. Strangely, amongst the adults, the largest profession wasn't fishing, but farming - on land that was a few miles from the village (accessed of course by walking.)

We spent about 45 minutes in the village before traveling back to Beyin. There isn't too much I can say about it - it is best described through photos which I promise I will put up when I can! As we got back it started raining again (it had literally stopped for the 2 - 3 hour period we spent travelling to, from and at the village.) We asked if it was possible to get to Busua directly and we were told to go to some junction and from there it was possible. Of course this was a complete lie, and we eventually ended up in Takoradi having to go out again (which we wanted to avoid as it was in the same direction as Beyin.)

We arrived in Busua around 3, and thankfully it had stopped raining. Whilst on the beach playing frizbee, a Ghanaian boy joined in and then invited us to watch the news with him at 6 that evening, with 'a white guy and a load of black guys.' Of course, we went along, and found out that 'the white guy' was actually the guy who owned the hostel and 'the black guys' were the other orphans. Unfortunately we arrived during the 2 day overlap where bills hadn't been paid, so the satellite had been cut, but we got chatting to Mike (the white guy), who said he would show us the new orphanage building the next day (I'll explain that in a bit.)

So, no news, we left. It started raining again, and rained all the way through until 2pm the next day. Not just drizzle, but proper a proper downpour. When it stopped raining we had a walk around Busua (which was tiny, but also really nice as although it is quite touristy, the locals don't hassle you at all,) and then went over to see Mike. Mike is an American (about 27 I think,) who had been in Ghana for 4 1/2 years. He originally tried to set up a school in Kumasi, but after a huge amount of bureaucratic nonsense (lasting a year,) after finally opening the school the Ghana Education Authority told him he wasn't running the school how they wanted him to (in other words, he was teaching in a western way,) so he was forced to close it down (and the orphanage attached,) and move. He moved to Busua (due to its relaxing nature) and set up there, but hadn't got the building for the orphanage fully renovated so was renting somewhere else in the meantime. So on Sunday we effectively relaxed in the morning playing cards then chatted to this random American who had been in Ghana so long he was just really laid back about everything.

Naturally, the day we traveled back was an absolutely glorious day, and I think the only thing I would change about my weekend is not having the 70 bed-bug bites on my feet, and not being stabbed in the foot by something which managed to pierce the sole of my shoes!

I think that's everything, see you soon

Sam(uel) x

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