A Desert of Desserts

For a culture that takes at least 2 teaspoons of sugar in coffee that is made with evaporated or condensed milk, for them to claim ‘desserts are too sweet’ simply does not make sense to me. With starchy main dishes designed to fill you right up, there is no room in Ghanaian culture for a delicious post-meal indulgence.

One restaurant serves Western favourites such as Apple Pie and Chocolate Brownie, rumour has it a past expat taught the kitchen these tricks, so this makes a welcome dinner sometimes. But it is up to yourself to create some sort of dessert if you want it, or alternatively to learn the will power to resist our impulses.

Of course the expat dinner parties include the first.

Here are some more food options in northern Ghana;

"Red Red" - fried plantain (cooking banana) and beans in palm oil. 

"Wagashi" - fried local cheese - served in a plastic bag for your freshness

Lebanese food! Felafel and Fattoush salad. Expat food. Takes hours, but worth the wait. Even if it doesn't taste like felafel it tastes Good!

Plantain Chips. A great snack. Best with guacamole.

A Picture Can Tell 1000 Words

And so I choose not to include any photos for this post. Google Guinea Worm and you’ll see why. It makes my skin crawl. These worms have now (unofficially) been eradicated from Ghana, and I’m so happy that I came at such a time.

Guinea worm is a parasite found in water, that when ingested, will start to grow inside you. It hangs out for a while, then starts to exit your skin, in the most painful of ways. These are the images you’ll see. The worm comes out of any part of the body, yet anyone is yet to see it come out the eyeball. My driver exclaimed the most painful Guinea Worm experience for him was when it came out his balls. He also offered it even “comes out from where you poo-poo”. He had many Guinea Worm and offered to show me his scars… Based on the afore mentioned suggestions, I declined.

The worm takes about a month to come out entirely. Each day you wrap it around a stick a little bit more. It’s extremely painful and can be debilitating. I heard the best way for it to come out is the nipple because it can come out in a day. When it is coming out it creates really hot pain, so relief is found when immersing your wound in water. But this is the worst thing you can do. As soon as the worm touches water it spawns, infecting the entire water supply. This can mean entire communities’ water supply. Starting the whole cycle again of ingestion and infection again.

It’s a big achievement to have it eradicated, and it was not an easy process. Included in the campaign was a reward of GHc200 (about AUD$110) for anyone who was found to have the worm. This was to help treat infected water, prevent recurrence and track the cases. But some desperate families made their children drink infected water so they could get the reward. Luckily this could not go on for long, as the water would soon be treated, however it’s an awful consequence of a campaign with best intentions.

Water cloth filters were created and given to communities to help filter out the drinking water. My first encounter with these was when I saw them being used to filter soy bean husks from soya milk! But they can create safe drinking water from any source. Chemicals treat dams and other preventative methods are used. 

When for 1 year there were no new cases, a fabric was made to celebrate, with Guinea Worms all over it! 

So Ghana is now Guinea Worm free. But the stories are still everywhere. Scars are everywhere. And luckily clean water is now everywhere.

Did you Google Image it??

Australia Day in Ghana

It stared with a power outage and no water in the pipes. But is that really important when you have good mates and cold beer?

Wearing red and blue (like our flag) I rode my bike to work, arriving late to ensure I was in true Aussie spirit. Teaching ‘G’day’ to my colleagues showed me their proper use of pronunciation when the best I could get out of them was ‘Good Day’. Ghanaian greetings always have a response, so when asked what our response is, it was natural to reply ‘maaaaaate’ (as opposed to saying 'nnaaaaaa' in Dagbani). So that was fun. 


My colleagues wore the Australian flag apron that Kat gave me, I advised everyone we don’t eat guinea fowl to celebrate, but usually throw a "shrimp on the barbie", and I took it upon myself to have a cold beer at lunch, but found the local restaurant only serves soft drinks! Then reclining to my office later to write personal emails and click around the internet, I enjoyed my very first Australia Day at work.

Dingo spotting at the local Spot

A table full of coldies, wouldn't have it any other way

Drinks after work at the local Spot, a few good yarns, and it was a ripper of a day! 

Introducing Mrs Knickers, Pokora, Yam and Beans

The chickens of the house. Strange at first to have these animals to care for – does all that clucking mean ‘thankyou for your hospitality’, or ‘give me more food’? But they are pretty self reliant. Getting them at a grown stage meant no terrible teens to deal with, and instant laying for maximum culinary delights, the four ladies of the house are pecking about happily these days, and take themselves to bed at night… mostly.

They are very fun to watch when they are let out of their house after they have laid their eggs. Chickens are fast! But I was soon devastated to return home and see the veggie patch razored to the ground by the hungry chicks. My nightly activity became fending the birds off the veggie patch, however it’s the dry season and there isn’t much else to defer them to… So I have now devised a system where I take food scraps home for them... 

With the help of the guards the name 'Pokora' was chosen for one hen. A great idea to choose a local Dagbani name for one of the chickens (the name of 'Der Dis Ting' was thrown around too) we thought. We asked for a local name for 'Old Woman' - the chickens cluck around like mother hens (!). But the (male) guards chose Pokora that means more like 'barren old grandma' than an affectionate name - a la 'Mrs Knickers'.

They really rule their roost and are providing us with entertainment and eggs.

Fresh Produce Breakfast.

What well looked after ladies! cheep cheep...

Best Real Estate in Tamale

Breast Is Best

Nothing like attending a breastfeeding week celebration and getting someone coming for a close up camera shot of your own breasts. That’s how the day started. A community durbar (meeting) was held in Tamale to promote breastfeeding. Many people were invited and attended to watch speeches, theatre groups, and traditional dancing.

The women with the most amazing voices singing to welcome us

Doing it all for the kids

Wearing my ‘Best Start For Life’ shirt (my contribution would have been for it to say breast start for life...), I listened to speeches in Dagbani being yelled down the microphone, welcomed the Mother to Mother Support Groups and pregnant women from the local hospitals, who were not given said shirts and were protesting. The women got up and sang some songs. So wonderfully in tune with plenty of fun and dancing at the same time.

Traditional drumming 

The community theatre group did a play: about a lady who was pregnant yet her mother in law and husband did not want her to have a skilled birth attendant present for the birth, but wanted to use traditional means. The antenatal clinic was attended, complete with a hilarious interpretation of an ambulance by simply using a steering wheel – let’s just say this is much better than the real ambulances around here (that do not have funding for fuel most of the time), and the pregnancy stages were clearly shown. The birth was complicated, and the mother ended up dying because she was not using the appropriate services, and so a community durbar was arranged, to advise the chief what had happened and discuss the importance of skilled delivery. The community agreed to use the health facilities, and a pregnant lady gave birth to a baby successfully and was able to breastfeed.

It wouldn't be a Ghanaian event without dancing

The message of the day was to exclusively breastfeed. That is, for 6 months, do not feed your child anything other than breastmilk. A large problem here is the feeding a child water, and often unclean water, as a part of traditional birth rituals. Water is given as a cultural welcome into the world, and it is thought the baby is thirsty after the exhausting birth. So this was discussed. It was such a fun day, and the traditional dancers were entrancing me, until I realised they were at my feet, and urging me to get up and join them! Oh no! So I took the feather thing, and swished it around, trying to shake my booty like a Ghanian, and hopefully didn’t shame myself too much. I’m not sure where the footage of my breasts ended up, but I have seen so many breasts in Ghana that I need not worry, if it helps breastfeeding, I’m out and proud!

Smock dancing

lets all celebrate breastfeeding!

Swishing the feathery thing - not sticking out and making a scene at all

HAPPY 60TH DAD!

This is a post dedicated to dad, wishing you a Happy Happy Birthday from Ghana! The local clothes are so bright and vibrant here, men wear pink lace proudly, in long dresses with pants. The shirts are never mono-tone, but brightly printed batiks or a print of any kind. So I sent dad a small token from Ghana, much to the delight of the locals here who just brim with pride when I mention my father is wearing their national dress.

Thanks to dad for all your help while I am in Ghana. Being my personal book keeper, confidant and best dad ever! Congratulations on your new work premises too, it makes the shipping containers over here look a little underwhelming.

So you have exceeded the life expectancy of a male in Ghana (59 years), and still doing Newcastle Surf Club proud – winning the beach sprint, and beating 26 of the 30 over 50 year olds in the swimming race!! You make me proud dad, and I wish you a really happy birthday – even if it has to be without your favourite Jenkins daughter present!

The Best Dad!

Ghana says Hello!

xoxox