DAY 1
Kumasi - Cape Coast - Beku
Bouncing in
a pitch dark bus, I must have dosed of for a moment since there suddenly was
light. Then again, that's just one more feature that characterizes tropical
regions more than is generally noted. The day arrives, as well as leaves, in a
hurry. The time between is one of impenetrable darkness of a much more intense
kind than the Scandinavian night, thanks to the absence of an exaggerated
electricity supply that is replaced by a widespread presence of dark, dense
vegetation that seems to swallow all light.
I woke up to the sunrise about an
hour into an eight-hour bumpy bus ride southward that was to begin our tour
around the country. The route took us through rarely changing views of dense
tropical forest dotted by small townships and villages, one being very similar
to the next (As probably is the case with small rural settlements anywhere in
the world). Here the houses consist of walls made of big mud bricks, grey or
rusty roofs of corrugated iron and an occasional Mama pottering around outside.
You will also find the standard hawkers, vendors and stands selling
agricultural produce, pastries and other small meals as well as pre-paid credit
for cell phone subscriptions.
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| Beyin Beach |
Several weeks of time spent in the inland city of Kumasi had had an effect on
all of us. When we finally reached the ocean on the outskirts of Cape Coast at
9.30 am, the bus exploded in applauds, exclamations and other displays of joy.
Suddenly everyone seemed awake and very much alive. Regardless of cultural
background, it seems to be an almost universal aspect of human nature to
appreciate the proximity of the sea and other bodies of water. The beaches on
the Ghanaian coast will, when it comes to natural beauty, stand comparison to
most places in the world. They stretch as far as one can see and are bordered
just some steps in, by a towering forest of coconut palms. In Beyin, our target
and final stop for the day, they are also in a relatively pristine condition,
not ravaged by western, "modern" facilities such as restrooms and
showers. Tearing down on the perfect image of a tropical-beach-experience was
also the fact of the rainy season which provided us with that ever-important
cloud cover and in fact probably saved us from a lot of sunburns.
Beyin does however have the most
basic tourism-related infrastructure in place. In addition to the actual beach,
there are western style hotels offering western-style food, pool tables,
swimming pools etc. Also the basic plan of the township follows that of some
more established beach resorts I've visited. This includes a road (a potential
boulevard) parallel to the beach, supported by several narrow roads or mere
alleys leading to the beach. All in all Beyin has some notable potential
for developing at least a small scale tourism industry. I will not here touch
upon whether that's a good or a bad idea because everyone can surely make up
her/his own mind about exclusive tourism development in the third world.
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| Beyin |
This is the point where Joan joined
our fellowship. He is from Barcelona, the uncontested Mecca of the contemporary
football-world and arrived the day after Spain ravaged Italy in the Euro 2012
final. He doesn’t follow football.
DAY 2
Beku - Nzulezo - Takoradi - Cape
Coast
None of the above is an actual
reason to bother coming to Beyin particularly. The following morning, we
again got up at sunrise, ready for an hour-long paddle along a short canal and
on Lake Amansuri. On the way we came upon a weird embodiment of the interplay
between local culture and the colonial experience in the form of local
schoolgirls canoeing to school in traditional canoes but wearing perfectly European,
identical school uniforms.
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| Nzulezo |
Our goal was
to reach Nzulezo (meaning
"surface of water"), the village on stilts, constructed entirely on water
by Malian immigrants in the 14th and 15th centuries. These were people escaping
conflict and violence over scarce resources back home, a classical example of
migration caused by population pressure. When they reached the coast of the Gulf
of Guinea, they again ran into conflict with locals. This is when the wondrous
human creativity, evident in Ghana in many minor and major examples, kicked in.
The immigrants decided that if there was no land for them, they need to live on
the water. According to the legend this order was given to them by one of their
gods, a snail. Today the population of the village lies around 500, and contains shops,
small joints, a community house and an elementary school. No teachers have yet
agreed to teach at the school, though.
DAY 3
Elmina - Cape Coast - Accra
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| Elmina |
I have to admit I was secretly
embarrassed for how much I felt at home in and enjoyed the cities of Elmina and
Cape Coast. Naturally, a big reason to come to Ghana is to see something
different from Europe and appreciate all things African. But honestly, what
makes Elmina and Cape Coast so pleasant is that they were mostly
designed and built by Europeans, more specifically the Portuguese who seem to
have been the first to arrive everywhere. Both cities are characterized by
narrow streets and in the Ghanaian context relatively high-rise and clear architecture.
Most dominating buildings are painted in white. This gives the old central
spaces a sense of unity. There are certain spots where you can almost imagine
being in Lissabon, Mindelo or some other city with a Portuguese past. Both
cities also supply a number of western-style beach resorts which is one more
reason why you will find a lot of westerners here. Maybe me enjoying myself
there is an expression of some home-sickness…
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| Cape Coast |
Of course, both Elmina and Cape
Coast have a strong African touch regardless of the architecture. This touch is
provided by the population. Physical treats of the people aside, both cities
are cramped with hawkers, vendors, tro-tros and other distinct parts of African
culture. In short, Elmina and Cape Coast are today two of the places in the
world where connections between different cultures have created something out
of the ordinary (apart from both of these cultures), something worth a visit.
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| Elmina Castle |
The vibrant atmosphere of today is
however shadowed by a darker history of the very same connections. The Elmina
castle and the Cape Coast castle were built by the Portuguese and the British
respectively. Elmina was first used mainly for trade in other products, but
both forts soon became important centers of slave trade. Both had a door of no
return. Today the castles are sites of reflection of the darker side of
humanity. Similar sites can be found anywhere in the world, and the message
seems to be the same in Elmina, Ile de Gorée, Tarrafal, Treblinka,
Sachsenhausen, Ravensbrück, Auschwitz-Birkenau and so on: Never
again.
Knowing I would have an interest in
it, Robert mentioned that whereas the British built the Cape Coast castle as we
now know it, there was a fort at the site even earlier. That one was built by a
not well known colonial power: the Swedes. It turns out that quite a part of
the little known Swedish colonial history took place in Ghana, back then obviously
called the Swedish Gold Coast. The fort was called Fort Carlsborg and was
just one out of six Swedish forts on the Gold Coast.
The Swedish theme continued in
Accra, where we used our small window of time for gathering first impressions
on the capital at a reggae party on something called, very suspiciously,
Pleasure Beach. There I met Jermaine, a Ghanaian who got abnormally excited
when I told him where I'm from. It turns out he visited Helsinki when he was
studying in Sweden. Where in Sweden? Lund? Stockholm? Uppsala? No, Blekinge.
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| Cape Coast Castle |
Where the effects of an infant tourism
industry are most pronounced, in a negative sense, would be the cultural center
in Accra. The name promises a lot, such as a possibility to get to know Ghanaian
cultural handicrafts and traditional products. First, you will notice that
there's no quietly getting to know. You are violently pulled in to a whirlwind
of shopkeepers that force you into one shop after the other in the narrow paths
criss-crossing the area. Most of them sell the same wooden masks and
decorations, t-shirts, jewelry and so on. Everyone knows you're from England or
Germany. Everyone has a cousin or a good friend in Finland, the country of
Nokia. The forbidding aggressive marketing of the vendors is
understandable in that westerners without a doubt possess the money to make
purchases (nothing there can be described as expensive) and the competition is
intense. This, I think is the main problem of the cultural center and other
corresponding places. I swear there were more vendors than customers in the
place. Moreover, they sell a surprisingly narrow range of standard souvenir
products. This drives the vendors to vicious competition over the few foreign
customers, which in fact works to repel the customers. Even our dinner, in a
closed restaurant area, was disturbed by hawkers constantly sneaking in and
hanging over the law stone wall, forcing products upon us in the middle of
eating. Credit has to be given to the waiter who persistently kept the
bloodthirsty salesmen away. Behavior forced upon them by circumstances or
not, it is probable that the activities of the vendors in the cultural center
work to harm more than benefit the wider selling community.
DAY 4
Accra - Akosombo
The first thing we did when arriving
at the Volta Lake was to visit the Akosombo dam. A bit worn down from the
previous night's Reggea Nite gone late, everyone was happy to get off the
bus, air conditioned or not.
The dam was built under the rule of
Kwame Nkrumah in only (!) four years and finished in 1965 mostly by the
means of foreign aid. Supplying none less than 60% of the nation's electricity,
and given the problematic international structures and relationships of trade
in energy, it is today of immense importance for the general development of
Ghana. This is very much evident in the rigorously regimented, jealous and even
paranoid prohibition of taking any photographs anywhere near the dam, were they
to present the dam or the nature around it.
The all-important relative
energy-independence did not come without costs. Damming up the river Volta
created, in a very quick manner, this largest artificial lake in the world.
This forced some 80 000 people inhibiting around 700 villages to move to higher
ground. This fact is not being covered up by the authorities and claims
are made that the evacuates received substantial compensation. Some
personal energy will be required to make deeper investigations into these
issues, but I'm skeptical about the amount of real compensation that an African
government in the 1960’s have had the resources to meet.
The main thought that comes to mind
when talking about the Akosombo dam is however that huge scale infrastructure
projects like this always come with costs and sacrifices. Regardless of how big
a supporter of human rights and rights to choose residence one is, you have to
admit that in the long run at least this particular project has been of
immeasurable value to Ghana as a whole in the long run. Beyond doubt,
this includes the communities that initially suffered from the undertaking.
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| River Volta |
Aside from, economical, social and
other aspects of the lake, the river, the dam and the energy they produce, the
Volta region is astoundingly beautiful. The area seems to be relatively densely
populated, which is evident in the high number of small wooden canoes calmly
gliding on the lake and the river. This adds an important human touch to the
environment of calm waters surrounded in every direction by dark green hills.
The lake itself is a maze of small, narrow inlets and spits, which gives it a
wide presence in the region similar to that of the Saimaa Lake back in Finland.
The natural beauty has not avoided
being picked up by the radar of the tourism industry. The riverside around
Atimpoku is dotted by beach resorts small and big, one claiming to be more
luxurious that the other. They offer swimming pools, sports facilities and
activities both on land and in water, bars, restaurants etc. In the beginning
of July, all of them seemed to be virtually empty, save for the staff.
What is a bit amusing is that the
locals seemed to be very suspicious about swimming in the river or the lake.
One of my local friends, a smart university student, commented that it is not
safe to swim because the water is too deep. A security guard told us that
swimming was not culturally accepted and would offend the local population,
which later turned out to be nothing more than a white lie. Part of this surely
is a result of the fact that most people here, quite surprisingly, simply
cannot swim and therefore fear immersing themselves in water.
