My 'Kofi Ne Ama' Experience, Buger Vs Burger, I Was Ambushed.

Sarpong, Justice

I arrived at my town, my place of birth dressed for the kill and to show my old

friends how a Yankee should look like. I am not the kind of guy enamored with gold

chains or for that matter, chains and rings but when it comes to watches, I am a

'sucker'. It was a sunday in early January 2008 and all the people in my town were

nicely dressed to attend various churches in town.

My Nieces, Nana Ama and Yaa Panin have convinced me to go to my town with them since

the biggest church in town was having a special service in raising funds for the new

Church they intend to build, I assume you all remember how these churches are always

raising funds to build churches. I assumed my nieces, 29 and 33 wanted to show their

just arrived Yankee Uncle off.

I arrived at the church with my nieces and two of their friends comfortably

ensconced in my 'pimped' up car and we were guarded to pack closely to the entrance

of the church by one of the Usshers of this church. We were seated closely to the

pulpit, the second row infront of the church. I am not the kind of guy that is too

enthustiastic about spending three hours in Church that is why I like my Catholic

services which usually ends in forty five minutes, one hour tops.

In the newly Apostolic and Charismatics churches, you are lucky if the Pastor,

Bishop, Reverend Dr's 'release' you in three hours, most of their services go as

long as four hours but on this occassion, the service was short so when the Ushhers

were instructed to pass the offertory plate around, I beamed a sigh of relief

because usually offertory is collected close to the end of the service, but 'mine oh

mine', I was mistaken though the event that followed was very comic and interesting.

My intention was to put five dollars in the plate but the way all eyes were on me,

that would have been an insult to my nieces by their uncles' 'tightwardness' and

since there were not too much money to hide my five dollars under so I did my

"Abrokyiresem" and prominently 'advertised' my twenty dollars offertory by placing

it on top of the cedis, and straightened myself for about two more inches that I

didn't know I have. Hey, twenty dollars offertory is a lot of money ok? I showed

them how it is done.

Hey!!, what is this? On the same row like me but on the left side of the church

pews were these two guys and three ladies that I thought might be Burgers too with

their gold chains and the smell of " Aborokyire" cologne. After the offertory,

Reverend Dr Pastor(Name witheld) called for all Guests to come infront and asked us

to introduce ourselves and who brought us to the Church, what city we live in and

all. It was then that I learned one of the gentlemen and his wife were domiciled in

Germany and and the other three live in Italy. The Reverend Dr. prayed for our save

return to our various places of abode and then entreated us to make the New building

fund raising a historic one by participating in the "KOFI NE AMA" contest about to

take place.

My niece Nana Ama started bragging about how Kwame ne Ama are going to carry the day

since his uncle Kwame is going to drop some 'Benjamins'(For the sake of those not

familiar with American slang, Benjamins means American hundred dollar notes with

Benjamin Franklin head on it).

My experinece with 'Kofi ne Ama' is that, most of the time, it is usually won by

Kwame ne 'Ama or Kofi ne Afuah'. Reverend Dr kicked the competition off by calling

Kwasi ne Akosua and the last to be called were Kwame ne Ama. For some strange

reasons, four of the European Burgers were Yaw and Yaa and with their "PIMPINIIS",

they displayed their "Abrokyisem" by making it interesting. Though there were more

Kwame ne Ama and Kofi ne Afua than those born on Thursday, 'Yaw ne Yaa, by the first

count, Yaw ne Yaa were on top, thanks to the European Burgers but I was not

going to let these Tomatoes pickers in Italy get away by thumbing their nose at a

Yankee so when the second round was called, I brought the hammer down on these Yaw

ne Yaa by losing a fifty that I didn't intend of leaving behind in my town. Now

these European Burgers are going to be put in their place where they belong, but

wait a minute, I've misjudged my competition.

The European Burgers were not even the competition but Papa Kofi Boateng, the

Chairman of the Church building fund and the towns richest person was not going to

allow these "KORBOLORS" from USA, Germany and Italy to come to his town and disgrace

him. He has about twelve children with about eight of them abroad so when Kofi ne

Afua were in third place, I saw him consulting one of his children who went outside

and came back in about two minutes and he went to the mens rest room and came back

where he dropped some Euros and Pound sterlings that vanquished the nonsense from

the Yankee and his European counterparts into oblivion. Papa Kofi Boaten, next time

I will bring a lot of 'Benjamins', you ambushed me.

Justice Sarpong

Houston, Texas.