5 Things I’m Looking Forward to in Ghana

Big news for the path that I’m on: it’s taking me to Ghana for the next year! I’m very excited for this opportunity to live and work abroad, particularly because it means learning and living a new culture and a new perspective.

I’ve been reading about and researching this West African nation and I’ve narrowed down a few things that have really piqued my interest and that I’m particularly looking forward to learning and experiencing more thoroughly.

Ghanaian Music

Ghana gained its independence from Britain in 1957, and it was during this time that a distinctly Ghanaian pop music sound began to emerge. This genre is called highlife and incorporates swing, jazz, rock, ska and soukous. Many artists take traditional Akan rhythmic structures and play them using modern instruments, particularly jazzy horns and multiple guitars. More recently, highlife has been combined with hip-hop to create a new crossover genre known as hiplife.

I hoping for the opportunity to met some fans of these genres and to figure out some of the big names and songs. Maybe I’ll even have the chance to go to a concert.

Learning Twi

Having the ability to speak Thai in Thailand opened so many doors for me and allowed me to have experiences and form relationships I would have been able to otherwise. While English is the official language and the lingua franca of Ghana, more than 70 languages are spoken across the country. The most widely spoken is Akan, of which the most common dialect is Twi.

I’ve downloaded some materials to do some self-directed learning and I’m hoping I can find someone who would be willing to help tutor me. From what I’ve gleaned already, Twi is written using the Latin alphabet, so should be easier than Thai, and has terraced tones, so possibly similar to Thai in the regards of saying the same phonemes with different inflections has different meaning.

While learning a new language is often frustrating and sometimes makes me feel like a child, the benefits of having even a minimal fluency far outweigh the discomfort.

Nature

I don’t expect that I will have nearly as much ability to travel as much as I did in Thailand, but I do know that some wonderful opportunities to spend some time in nature will be relatively close to where I will be living and working.

As I’ll be living and working in Winneba, the closest options to me will be the beaches. I’ve also read that the beaches of Winneba are nesting grounds for sea turtles and that there are some conservation projects to help get the baby turtles to the Gulf of Guinea once they hatch.

Also not too far from Winneba is the Kakum National Park, that has a suspended bridge and is hope to monkeys, antelope, elephants and an extensive variety of birds.

Learning Proverbs, Idioms and Sayings

From what I’ve read about Ghanaian society, culture and customs, I’ve learned that it’s hierarchical and often indirect. This is something that I’m very familiar with from Thai society and culture.

But one difference that the two places seem to have is that while Thais are indirect and will say the exact opposite of what they really mean if it means that the situation will remain even keeled and no one’s feelings will get hurt, it seems that in Ghana, rather than saying what they mean outright, they will use proverbs, allegories and idioms to get their meaning across without saying something directly.

This goes hand in hand with learning the language, but I’ve always found local idioms to be absolutely delightful and charming and I’m really looking forward to learning some more.

The People

Everything I’ve ready about Ghana makes mention of the hospitality of the people of Ghana. This is something that I’ve experienced nearly everywhere I’ve gone, so I’m looking forward to experiencing the Ghanaian flavor of hospitality. And if there’s anything that I’ve learned from my travels, it’s that the people really make a place special.