Not a Foot over The Line

Holy shit I just looked around me and noticed that there were 4 females in the room. Just to think that for a good few weeks I was the only one, the gangbitch with my 3 burly gentlemen. This is balanced.

Everyone’s scratching, mosquito bites all round, toes and ankles, noses. The occasional clap of someone aiming for the little bugger. The hum of the fans. The faint odour of the evenings pungent meal of Ochra Stew and Banku, no-ones favourite-lingers in the air.

My Canadian housemate; a bundle of fun whom, ironiocally along with my other favourite homo; inspired me to go out independently into the world of Ghana; to have my own adventures and fly; has just left Ghana. As he flies across the seas, towards Quibec, Canada; thousands of Liberians in Ghana are crying, packing their bags, defeated, again. Due to the Cessation Clause of the 30^thJuly 2012, when their refugee status in Ghana ceased to be, those who remain do so without rights, without protection, and without a home; as Buduburam, “Liberia Camp” the massive, thriving amorphous of Liberian haven that has been home to the refugees for many years is being closed down. Thousands have applied for exemption; for a chance to say ‘hear my story again, I AM a refugee, I AM in need of international protection, ‘my country’ CANNOT give me the protection that a nation owes to its citizens and I am here, in Ghana, without a home.

In Two weeks I will smoothly navigate my way through the airport bureaucracy and return home too. All these weeks I have been waiting for that shot of urgency to kick in, for the adrenalin to pump away the lethargy. I think I’m slowly becoming addicted to the feeling of leaving; the cravings, the need- to do everything under the sun, the fear, the anticipation.

On Wednesday, the 4^th July, 4 days after the passing of the cessation clause, I (along with a fantastic 16 year old who was doing research for her fancy IB High school curriculum!)  was given the opportunity to take the other interns of the Human Rights office I’ve been volunteering at to Buduburam ‘Liberia’ Refugee Camp. After struggling to put together a request for permission to visit the site, organising (with much help) a vehicle (a tro-tro) to take the 15 interns,  copies of the surveys and interviews.  Trying to make up a reason to tell the other interns about why we’re going there “due to the cessation clause, after which Refugee Status for all the Liberians living there will be terminated, we {at our human rights organisation} are expecting to get a great influx of refugee clients and we need to do research at the camp in order to find out what sort of problems are likely to come up in order to be adequately prepared” where-as infact, the reason we were going was out of our own interest, too see the place, to understand, and- most importantly I rate, to talk to the peeps in order to get things from their perspective, because most of what everyone hears about nationless peoples, is gossip from the nations.

Angel, my Liberian woman (with a accent typical of Rastafarians?) whom I interviewed came to Ghana when she was 4, brought by her aging grandmother to escape the civil war. She’s been living in the camp ever since. She has 2 kids (the youngest, on her back during the interview). She picks up littered water sachets for a living and has never received any sort of education. She, along with the other Liberians cannot go and work in Accra because they feel threatened as Liberians. ‘Its no good here (Ghana), its no good there (Liberia)’.  She wants ‘to fly’, to move to a mythical land {which starts with A and rhymes with ‘freethinker’ or ‘swastika’)

Which doesnt surprise me; given what people see on TV. Its almost like Cold War West Germany here off the side of Africa...

Out of the Nest and into the Deep End

I fell head first out of the nest, and landed in the Deep End
How?
It went something like this

 
We called the Commision who are in charge of handling the visit, to no avail. We called 2 dozen hostels, hotels, gueshouses, twice- to no avail, either. We almost didn't leave; but the stakes were too high not to.
We left our friends in the Cape Coast, a city by the sea where we'de gotten mugged the night before (our Japanese friend has a big tourist camera). Our housemates were going to explore the area, but I'de wanted to make the most of the long weekend; have an adventure without 6 other people who may not even want to be there, and to prove to myself that I could adventure out without 3 big burly men by my side. The newest volunteer, a Californaian youngster, with peroxide hair and home-made tattoos, who's never left home before; accompanied me.

It started with a tearful conversation late one night when my good natured med-student came to visit my room to tuck in my mosquito net. It was such a nice gesture that we got to bonding about our fears and life’s plans. The discussion made me unearth the way that my need for solitude has been devouring me these days. I feel so dependent on the safety and security that my little life here has, to offer, my housemates presence everywhere I go. It relates to my future plans to rock up in Ethiopia myself; a country on the Horn of Africa, a notoriously unsafe place streaked with beauty and culture - of which I have been having sudden councerns (myself, late at night) about. And so after many adventures with hoards of housemates, it was time to prove to myself that I can do without 4 adams apples amoungst other things;

Late Saturday Night we left the others to continue to explore Cape Coast, and travelled to Takoradi, a transit-town linking the West Coast and the Cote deVoir boarder to the rest of Ghana. {The hardest part of the 'travelled' was most likely the trek to the into-city tro tro; which involved asking AT LEAST 13 people instructions and directions at different intervals}

The adventure begun succesfully, where a lady promised to walk us to the hotel we'de eventually gotten hold of. She walked us to her husband, who (half naked) walked us back down the street we'de come up, right to our hotel. Everyone here is so nice!! We settled down in our hotel room, washed and brushed, and went down to the 24 hour hotel restuarant to buy water to take our malaria pills. Met some nice people, got talking. It was great untill they tried to follow us to out hotel room, and we literally had to turn our phones off and lock the doors and windows because a) we were paranoid and b) they were calling us from outside.

No adventure is complete without everything going counter to ones expectations (and by expectations I mean the guidebook). But 4 modes of transport later we were exactly where we had planned to be (and by transport I mean 1 trotro 2 charter taxis and 1 canoe ride). That is, at Nzulezo; the City on Stilts.

Photos are not wellcome; but I'll do my best to share the imigary:

Click: Tall muscular 'tourguide' standing at the rim of a sleek wooden canoe (give or take a few holes) tall pole for pushing the boat through the endless black lake, pauses for a moment to answer his cellphone...

Click: village sighting!! A long unorganised strip of houses sitting above the water, aurrounded by nothing but the dark lake

Flash: The only accomodation, the house of a man (he owns a guesthouse but it's temporarily under water) who sold homemade gin with tree extract that is the equivallent to viagra;for prolonged "jiggy jiggy". After much exploration of the town we discover that he is our only option.

Just like in Accra, where women walk down the {road} with pots on their heads, washing strewn between houses, children sucking water from plastic packets, and even street dogs and chickens. However the houses between the drying laundry are all wooden, as are the roads, the chicken cage is a seperate stilt structure (connected by a wooden bridge) and the entire seen seems to be floating, but is raised slightly off the surface of the water. Click.

Flash: A women bends down to scoop some water into a bucket to wash clothes. Flash: a girl dives into the water and surfaces a few seconds later. Flash: an elderly man at the back with his small son in front, as they head off from the village. Flash: youngsters crwched carving into oars, and threading reeds from into sleeping mats.  

After having a 'look around' and seeing these incredible sights, but being greeteted by no one and seeing nothing further than the wooden walkway under our feet, i wondered how we were going to pass the time untill our boatman came to collect us the next morning. Soon the last stragglings of tourists left, except for us.

We took the canoe onto the lake whilst the sun made its way down the sky,

we swam in the black water (which is actually reddish at a nearer glance) and observed the women set off in their canoes to behind the reeds where they went to bath.

We did sumersaults in the lake with a 14 year old girl, and met an 18year old called Lydia who said she wouldnt join us because she was cooking. . . So we rushed out of the water to learn to cook. But by the time we were dry and had located her; she had finished and the youngsters of her family were eating.

2 young teachers gave us a tour of the school, also in the village. the 'soccer field' seemed a good 2metres under, but apparently in the dry season its ok.

We met Lydia again, who then invited us to her meal. Cassava dough and groundnut stew and fish (from the lake). We sat on the wooden floor with them, and ate the most delicious meal of our stay, or our lives perhaps. "Eat, eat fish, here, eat more" she kept saying. Because my Canadi-merican travel-buddy was not yet competent at the art of eating with ones hands, she took us for entirely incapable and kept assisting us with deboning our fish, to ensure we ate it! And then she helped us wash our hand with a bucket and river water.

We watched Spain kick Italy's butt in one of the teachers tiny loft's overflowing with futball fantics of all ages, and we celberated all over the little village, as if the noise didnt wake everone in the beginning, because the walls were thin, in this magical town.

Lydia took us and taught us Ghanain dancing (not traditional, dont let your imaginations go wild. It was controlled, systematic, like dancing in the centre of one of those talent circles)

The house shifted slightly ever now and then as we slept. We left at 7 the next morning, (7:30, after the 'tourguide' had had a glass or two of Palm Wine, which resulted in the ride back to the mainland taking an extra hour, the steering pole breaking, and the guide falling into the lake)

It took the whole day to get home.

I have adapted a fine statement that I heard once from a Mozambican, in reference to Nzulezo, the city on stilts.

Nzulezo is not a place to live; it is a way of life.