Accra

My stories were bound in counting to nine and in taking precaution against mosquitoes. But the story was also larger than the mundane, larger than the errands we ran: buying a new phone, SIM card, minutes, and water, always water. The story was of the vestiges of European colonialism it was the “No Loitering, No Hawking, No Begging” stenciled on the cement walls along the route, and the formal introductions, handshakes and nods that accompanied every meeting. It was of our driver navigating the van, overfull with luggage and people, past capacity, even, of the fold down seats, pulling over for a cop and then making a left turn against both directions of traffic from the median. It was of the men seated on skateboards crossed ankles resting before them and knees splayed wide, who propelled themselves between stopped cars with flip flops on their hands. It was the women walking so, so straight in the instant dark of the tropics, of trays of bananas, stainless steel bowls of bottled water, cloth, soap, meat balanced on their heads. It was the fruit stands on the roadsides with who knows how many varieties of fruits, and the corrugated steel stalls with fried whole fish, soccer jerseys, CDs. It was goats ambling against traffic, and the cement gutters two feet deep that dropped away from both sides of the road, open to catch an unwary driver’s wheel.

We pulled in for dinner at a local restaurant, and settled in for a meal of Banku, chicken, rice, and French fries. Banku, a fermented dough of cornmeal and cassava, is one of the many starches that lie at the center of Ghanaian diet. They vary from region to region and tribal group to tribal group. Feeling adventurous, I pinched off a lump of Banku, soaked it in the tomato-chili-chicken sauce and ate it. The fermenting leaves the starch sour, but it was pleasant enough and the sauce, delicious.

Though our internal clocks registered 3 p.m., it had been dark for two hours and the power on our hotel’s block was out. So, using flashlights, we erected our mosquito netting and slept knowing our 3 a.m. departure would come all too soon.