Garden Club Hotel - Ada Foah - 8:31pm (excerpt from personal journal)
Restless, cramped, and downtrodden we arrived in Ada Foah to begin our journey. Despite the fact that I left many of my things at Ken's, walking through Accra--hot, sweaty Accra--witha a large pack was Hell. To all prospective backpackers (Ben, this means you too) I implore you: bring a SMALL pack and travel LIGHT. You can always buy things there! And for now it's annoying to have such a big frame that's 1/4 empty.
Ada Foah is alternatingly wonderful and terrible. Firstly, we were granted a much-needed reprieve from the incessant, inscrutable "obruni" and "brofonyo" catcalls that are all too common in other regions. Here this has largely been supplemented by the more cordial "hello" "how are you?" and "you are welcome"--so nice! However, a healthy minority of the kids also greet you with "hello! Ska Ska Ska Ska!" That means "money." That's not so nice.
The beaches here are beautiful--so long as you ignore the tendancy for people to shit on them and the unfathomable level of trash littered upon them. Fortunately, the beaches near the estuary are so remote that they are somewhat removed from this human factor. The estuary itself is gorgeous (photos on the way) and very clean indeed. Quaint, seaside villages make for great photos but we were marginally harassed by some punks who wanted us to stop (presumably unless we gave them money), but we paid them no heed and marched on.
Right now we're staying a 30-minute walk from the beach at a overpriced $5-a-night joint thta happens to be the cheapest in town. When we arrived we asked for a room. The woman responded:
-Okay, two rooms is 100,000 ($10).
-No, we want ONE room.
-We can't do that.
-...wwwhy?
-Because you are two men so you can't share a room. If you are partners...I don't know. We can't do it.
-Listen, if it were up to me we'd get two rooms at the nicest spot in town, but we're poor so we'll just take ONE room here. Okay?
-You're students?
-Yes.
-Volunteers?
-Yes.
-...let me ask my boss. (Yells something unintelligble to my ears and doesn't wait for a response)...okay okay I guess.
Hilarious.
Oh and by the way, I saw my first monkey today and I fed it a banana...but it was tied to a tree so I don't think it counts. More to come.
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