The fourth week we were in Ghana we went to the Volta region of Ghana, specifically to the area of the Tegby village. The two main reasons we were there were to (1) visit a slave castle that was near Tegby, and (2) to get cultural exposer to some of the less westernized parts Ghana. We spent four days in Dean Dallas’s father’s village, eating off of banana leaves with our hands, bathing in water out of a well, fishing with the locals, the whole nine yards.
The night before we left for Tegby, getting ready to leave early the next morning, it was slightly depressing to be setting my alarm for 2:30 am. 2:30 am seemed simply way too early for a day to start, but never the less I went to bed ready to get very little sleep. After what was essentially a prolonged nap, we had a quick breakfast and were headed toward the bus station by 3:00 am. By 4:00 am we were on a crowded bus, sitting, waiting for the bus to leave. This lasted for about an hour. This was one of the more miserable hours of my life. Having people rub various parts of their bodies up against you as more and more people continued to push the bus’s capacity to new limits, was not exactly my idea of a good time. Shortly after 5:00 am we were on road to Tegby. Things got less miserable as the open windows let some cool air into the overcrowded bus. A little after 9:00 am, we finally arrived in Tegby (or at least the bus dropped us off on the side of the road near Tegby). It was so nice to finally arrive at our destination, but as I grabbed my backpack off the bus I was slightly bitter that it was possible to have already been awake for seven hours.
After a 15 minute walk with all our gear, we were finally sitting in the enclosure of Dean Dallas’s father’s compound (a little area inside four cinder block walls). We said greetings, saw the duck that was later to be dinner, and then we were ready to face the rest of the day. By 10:30 we were heading toward the beach. The beach was literally about a 45 second walk, and was probably the most beautiful beach I had ever seen (it reminded me of a scene from Pirates of the Caribbean). There, we joined the line of local villagers pulling in their fishing nets. It took about 45 minutes to drag in one net, but for our efforts in helping pull in the nets, we were given a portion of the catch, and as guests of the village we awarded the prize catch, which was a 4-ish ft. barracuda.
We spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach, enjoying a chance to swim in the good old Atlantic Ocean. By the late afternoon we were heading back to the enclosure to try to get our mosquito nets up by night fall. By 7:00 pm, after a barracuda dinner, we were all huddled in our mosquito nets trying to get comfortable on the sand. This, not surprisingly, proved impossible. Besides the sand being really uncomfortable to sleep on, Dean Dallas snoring loudly, and a rooster thinking that the sun rose at 3:00 am, it was almost a somewhat restful night. Despite the day’s many discomforts, I laid under my mosquito net having enjoyed the day as a whole, and was quite pumped for the rest of the weekend.
The next morning, after a breakfast of some corn…stuff, we headed back to the road side to get a van to the slave castle. After our time at the castle, we had some traditional Ghanaian spicy rice and beans (after being in England for 3 months it was nice to have spicy food again): then, came one of our coolest and possibly most impactful opportunities of the weekend. When our visit was first planned, Dean Dallas’s father let the “Chief of Chiefs” of the Tegby region know of our upcoming visit. Thus, we were given the honor of being invited to come to the house of the “Chief of Chiefs” (who was called Togby). When we arrived at his house, our eyes met two rows of chairs facing each other. We, the guests sat in one row, and the chief’s elders sat in the other row leaving one seat open for Togby. Soon after we sat down, Togby exited from his house and took his seat among the elders. It was a very traditional meeting, and we did our best to honor those traditions. Another man sat in front of Togby; he was the mediator between us and Togby (we were not allowed to make eye contact with or directly address the chief). Still, we were welcomed with hospitality and had the opportunity to explain the reason of our visit to Ghana. Togby also talked about his heart and vision for the area, and by the end of the meeting he was offering us land to build a YWAM base in Tegby. Dean Dallas, who thinks he may be called back to Ghana, is still seriously considering taking the chief up on the offer to build a base there to further bring up young men and women in God’s word. As we left, the chief who we were at first not allowed to look at, was insisting we take pictures with him, and we walked out of his house with his blessing on our mission.
The rest of the weekend consisted mainly of what had already been doing; swam some in the ocean, helped out the villagers again with their fishing, and in general just really let the culture of the village really sink in. The girls were slightly scarred by the slaughtering of the duck for dinner that night, but besides that and never getting much sleep, it was really an incredible weekend that none of us will ever forget.
No comments:
Post a Comment