I visited home recently, and I am still reeling from the heady nostalgia that descends on you when you have had a brilliant time home and have returned to the humdrum treadmill of bleak weather, work and mountains of bills. Worse is the near bankruptcy you experience upon return, having wielded your bank card in Accra like an offensive weapon and literally emptied the ATM machines there. Your bank manager has written several threatening letters to you and has declared you a wanted person because your account is overdrawn, but hey, life goes on?
It is during these visits home that certain things you had probably taken for granted in your country of abode in the west hit you with the full force of a gusty harmattan wind. Take for instance the endless wait at the STC yard in Accra for the 12 midday Kumasi-bound bus, which eventually departs at 4pm without much complaint from a travelling public resigned to, and probably anticipating, such delays. Or the frequent power cuts and water supply interruptions without notice in some parts. Such minor irritants may induce a mild heart attack if you are not careful.
Of all the experiences I went through whilst in Ghana, perhaps the one that got me thinking the most was that of finding my way to my friend Kwame Gyimah?s house. You see, I had called up my ?long-time-no-see? friend and was to go pay a courtesy call on him. He gave me directions in the standard Ghana style: ?When you get to Kwashieman Overhead Junction, ask for so and so church. Opposite the church is a hairdressing saloon. Behind the saloon, you will see a big yellow house next to a chop bar. There is a lotto kiosk in front of it. Ask anyone for the house of Kofi Santana, the Kwahu spare parts dealer who drives a BMW. I live in the house next to his. It has a brown gate. Even a child can lead you there?. As I made furious notes, he added, somewhat helpfully: ?If you are having problems, call me and I will come to pick you up wherever you are?. Armed thus, I hailed a taxi and proceeded to Kwashieman Overhead Junction.
I found the lotto kiosk all right. That was when the trail ran cold. No one seemed to know who Kofi Santana was. The woman selling ?kelewele? next to the kiosk summoned person after person in the area to make enquiries of them. The difficulty seemed to be that there were two Kofis in the area who were both Kwahu and spare parts dealers. But neither drove a BMW. The only BMW they knew in the area belonged to a guy called Jack, who was not Kwahu and did not run a spare parts business. And of course, I could not describe Kofi Santana, which made a bad situation worse.
After 10 to 15 minutes of chatting to perfect strangers with no progress, I decided on the obvious and called Kwame. ?The Areeba number you are calling cannot be reached at this moment. The mobile equipment is either ?? trilled the metallic voice on the other end of the line. I wailed in frustration and switched off the clearly useless handset.
I then gave a description of my friend Gyimah to the ?kelewele? woman, in the forlorn hope that it would help. What seemed to have done the trick and lighted up her sweaty, fleshy face in instant recognition was my mention of the fact that my friend worked at Ecobank and got married recently. ?Ah, braa! Why didn?t you say so earlier? I know him very well. He passes here every evening on his way home from work and sometimes buys kelewele from me?, she said rather helpfully. She then summoned her young daughter to escort me to my friend?s house. It would be inappropriate to repeat here what I said to Gyimah upon seeing him, but it was far from complimentary.
Much later, after I had cooled down, I found myself assessing the way we identify locations and give addresses in Ghana. Of course, we do not have properly planned towns and cities with properly named streets as pertains in the west, so the option of road maps (never technological gizmos like satellite navigation systems) does not arise at present. Clearly, these make life easier and save time when you are looking for a place. It is therefore more efficient, one would say, especially if the police, ambulance or fire services need to trace a location and deal with an emergency, albeit in their creaking vehicles.
However, there is a part of me that finds our system appealing, my experiences notwithstanding. Here I am not attempting to romanticise a defective system-far from it. Somehow, in spite of my experience, I appreciate the social aspect of it all. One unique fact of our society back home is the opportunity, even in a tro-tro queue, for two complete strangers to strike up a conversation and engage in a fierce yet harmless debate on politics, religion or football. A westerner would be aghast at such a spectacle. To my mind, we need to preserve this uniqueness as an essential lubricant in social intercourse. It makes our society vibrant, spontaneous and helps build a sense of community and interdependency in its small way.
I resent particularly, the isolationism that is a feature of modern western society, and which in turn derives (partly at least) from reliance on all sorts of gadgets. Witness the insularity yet popularity of the ipod, internet chat rooms and the like. Armed with these gizmos, they retreat into their own personalised, worlds and defined ?personal space?, fiercely protective of their ?privacy?. No wonder many westerners feel lonely, sometimes depressed and cast adrift in spite of the technology and prosperity they wallow in. Nothing replaces the art and warmth of human conversation and interactivity. Of course, it is important that we encourage efficiency and technology, but we should be careful of the price.
Obviously, with a proper street map and corresponding properly-named streets, I could have found my friend?s place in record time, zooming from A to B in a direct trajectory. Efficient, yes. But where is the joy in that? On the other hand, I discovered that the kelewele seller was a wonderful conversationalist, as we engaged in some light banter whilst waiting for her daughter to get ready and take me to my friend?s house. Her kelewele was simply the best I have tasted in a long, long time. And her pretty daughter was such delightful company, and I was touched that she took the time to take me to my friend?s house. Now that is what I call social intercourse.
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