The Ghana Travel Experience

Travel in Ghana is, much like in other developing countries, an experience very different from travel in the US. We have alluded to this in the past when talking about Ghana, but have never attempted to describe it. After one year of regularly experiencing travel like this, and after a trip back to the US that reminded us how organized, efficient, and pleasant travel can be, what follows is our account of “the travel experience.”

The experience begins fairly innocently. You are to travel to a nearby town to visit a friend. So you go to the transport station, find the vehicle going to the town you want, and buy a ticket. No problem. So you set out to find the “station.” With no signs or other obvious indications of where the station is, the best strategy is to ask a Ghanaian. They respond by asking you, “Which station.” What? There’s more than one? Ok, I want the station that will have a vehicle that will take me to my destination town. Oh, that’s station A. It’s just up the street… But immediately another Ghanaian interjects by advising you instead go to station B. It’s much easier to navigate, they say. But Ghanaian A insists that at this time of day you will not get a vehicle from station B to your destination. This is where the power of statistics is your friend. Immediately ask a number of other Ghanaians until you have a consensus. Ok, most people say station A. How do I get there? It’s just up the street and then right and down the hill. After a few wrong turns (it was actually a right and then a left, then down the hill) you reach station A.

As you approach, if you are any skin color other than black, you are immediately surrounded by Ghanaians, all asking you questions at the same time. Obroni, how are you? Can I carry your bag (and then ask you for money later)? And the most common: Where are you going? Some of these interested folks are actually the vehicle drivers or mates (basically an assistant), but the majority are just sitting around waiting for something to happen. You now have to choose between politely answering all of their questions and losing an hour of your daylight in a place where night travel is significantly more dangerous, or in ignoring them all, except one, whom you ask where the vehicle to your destination is now parked. I suggest the latter. Oh, it’s over there (*points*). You can see the wooden sign with the town name painted on, resting on top of the vehicle.

But wait, what’s this? There are two signs! One is resting on a minibus with four rows of seats (four to a row), looking like a car bomb had recently gone off near it recently. The paint is faded, windows are missing, there are holes in the floor, and in big letters across the windshield it says “ENEMIES ARE NOT GOD.” No kidding. You look inside and see it looks empty. As for the second vehicle, it is a Mercedes-Benz bus, longer, much taller, and slightly wider. Also, much worse-looking. Six rows, five to a row. You avoid the sharp metal edges as you climb up to see how many people have boarded. It looks about half-full. This brings you to major decision #3: Which vehicle do you take? You decide that while the minibus (called a “tro-tro” or just “tro”) has fewer passengers, the overall number remaining (vehicles don’t leave until they are full) is less. Congratulations, you just engaged your brain in thinking critically. Unfortunately you are probably the only one in the station doing so at that moment. You go to the wooden shack functioning as the ticket counter and buy a ticket for the tro. You walk over to it to claim your seat (first come, first served) by placing your bag on it and try to figure out how to kill some time.

One hour later, and five cedi poorer from buying stuff for sale in the station, most of which you do not need, the last ticket for the tro is purchased. The car is full up, the ticket man says. The driver appears from out of nowhere and yells at any passenger that hasn’t yet boarded, which is all but three (the tro seats 18 including the two in front next to the driver). Chaos ensues, as passengers simultaneously are boarding the tro to find their seat, deboarding to urinate or buy some food, and leaving the station completely to find the other passengers, who have wandered off as they were waiting. Ten minutes later, most passengers are in their seats and ready to go. One passenger is arguing with another about whose bag was placed on the seat first (if the argument is co-ed, the man wins and the woman is forced into the less desirable seat). You also notice that the seat next to you is empty, save for a small bag. Who is sitting there, you ask. Just then a very large woman saunters up to the tro with three large bags. That’s who. The other three people in the row, have to deboard and wait for the woman to find her seat. When you board after her and try to sit, you realize that she is taking up her seat plus no less than 50% of yours. Also, one of her bags is on the floor, cramping your leg room.

Thirty minutes after the last ticket is sold, the tro leaves the station. You feel relieved and send a notification text to your friend. “Car has finally left!? :( “ As the text is sent the tro lurches right and veers into a fuel station. Seriously? The driver leaves the engine running and tells the attendant to put in thirty cedis worth of fuel. After taking the money, the attendant obliges. A few minutes later you hit the road again, this time for good.

Now, not all roads in Ghana are what one would call “good.” In fact, most of them are in the broad category of “un-good.” However, there are different degrees of “un-good.” There are paved roads pockmarked with potholes. There are unpaved roads that are well-drained and escape major erosion from rains. My personal favorite, and the standard in the northern Volta, is unpaved and ravaged from rain. It’s actually not even a road by most standards. It is soil and rocks, mounded up into the shape of a road, with a ditch carved on each side. These roads are subject to the worst of potholes, and every rainy season they are washed out completely in some places.

The journey you are taking begins on the first type, paved with potholes, and halfway changes to unpaved and ravaged. Great, you think, at least for the first hour it will be pleasant.

Wrong. The driver proceeds to floor it between every series of potholes, swerving recklessly all over the road to avoid them in addition to other tros, motorcycles, supply trucks, even fuel tankers. Depending on the standard accepted by the passengers, they occasionally beseech the driver to slow down, be more cautious, and in general show that he values their lives even marginally. Notice I didn’t say “he or she”; all drivers are men, most are young, and they drive like they have everything to prove.

Having experienced the relative organization and efficiency and safety of travel in the US, at this point the events start to build up and you start to become frustrated. You focus this frustration on the driver. Doesn’t he realize the danger he is placing everyone in? Doesn’t he understand that to get there a few minutes later is acceptable if it means avoiding a head-on collision at high speed, not to mention the other vehicles on the road? Your anger builds with each swerve, each pothole he attempts to miss but fails, each time the wheels catch air and your head strikes the bare metal roof, until it reaches the level of rage. At this point you silently demand an ultimatum: If this driver hits a big pothole one more time, I am going to lose it. Within seconds, you hit a pothole so big that your head hits the roof, something loose on the floor below you strikes your legs, and the bag in your lap flies up and into the seat in front of you. This is the climax of the trip, emotionally speaking, as you are faced with the decision of losing your mind or finding some other way to cope. Whether it is prayer, meditation, or simply willing yourself to reclaim some degree of calm, it works. You come down from your mountain of rage. The emotional and physical abuse starts to feel less sharp and jarring and more dull and continuous. The road has not changed, it is still punishing you, but your perception of it changes. Is it a higher level of consciousness? It's possible. Once you break through this threshold, for the first time since boarding you actually thing you are going to make it.

Then you hear a loud pop and the tro veers across the road and toward the ditch. Flat tire. The driver manages, without the aid of power steering, to keep the vehicle on all four wheels as it grinds to a halt. The driver, knowing exactly what the problem is, doesn’t even glance at the tire as he walks around to open the sliding door (only the outside latch works) and let the passengers out. Some immediately walk to the ditch, arrange their pants/skirts, and urinate. Others collect their bags and search for the nearest shade. All indications are that it is going to be a while. But you have already crossed the aforementioned emotional threshold, so anger is not an option. Instead you conjure up a hypothetical situation even worse than the one you are in now, and use it to console yourself. A wry smile even appears on your face as you exit the tro and walk over to the shade of a mango tree.

Even more ironic humor is experienced as you watch the driver attempt to repair the flat. He first has to remove all luggage from the rear cargo area to access the spare. This is no small feat, as the area was so crammed with bags at the station that the door would not shut, and had to be tied with rope between the frame underneath and the precariously weak rear window wiper arm. Once the bags are out, the tire is removed and inspected. It is hard to believe, but the tire tread is even worse than on the flat. It’s practically bald. The driver sets to work removing the flat and installing the spare. As he lowers the vehicle’s weight onto the spare (not including the weight of passengers and cargo) it becomes clear that the spare was not fully inflated. A collective groan emanates from the passengers and they start to accost the driver for failing to plan ahead. After enduring a good five minutes of well-deserved verbal tongue-lashing, the driver announces that he is going to drive back to the previous town on the barely inflated spare, fill it, and come back to pick up the passengers and luggage. As another verbal tongue-lashing ensues, the driver hops in, executes the worst Y-turn ever, and drives off.

Thirty minutes later he returns with a fully inflated spare. Luggage is loaded, passengers board, and the driver takes off with even more gusto than before, but not until that Benz bus, the other choice at the station, passes us. You realize that the reckless driving you experienced before was the norm, and that since the driver was running “late” he may not be able to get back to his base town (the one you left from) that day. He is still in the denial stage of this newly-realized grief, as he mashes down the gas pedal not only on good stretches of the road but through the potholed sections as well.

Fifteen minutes later, the bottom of the road drops out as you make the transition to unpaved road. The driver does not appear to notice this, however, and continues to drive with reckless abandon. He passes the Benz bus, but it passes us back when the driver has to slow down for a monster washout. We pass the Benz bus again, this time for good. But in your enlightened state you barely notice as you speed toward your destination. The thought crosses your mind that the spare tire has already been used, leaving no backup in case of a second flat, but it immediately is whisked away by an irresistible feeling of peace. You search for humor or even casual interest in what you observe through glimpses out the right window (the left window is completely blocked by the woman and her bags). You laugh out loud when you see a toddler throw a small rock at the tro as it passes by, and again when you see a man crash his bicycle down into the ditch to avoid the tro as it passes by.

You are surprised when you look at your watch again and an hour has passed. The tro wheels lock up and you slide to a stop. You are in some small village, but this is surely not your destination. The driver opens the sliding door – this time with greater difficulty – and a young woman, in a very nice dress and embroidered cloth scarf, exits the tro and emphatically greets a woman standing just off the road. Her face, clothes and luggage are all a faded, orange-ish, dust-covered version of what they were when she boarded at the station.

Another thirty minutes pass and you finally see your destination town in the distance. As you descend the hill the tro stops, seemingly every few hundred yards, as people request to be let off. This minor annoyance is overshadowed by the exhilarating realization that you are almost there. Your legs ache and begin to cramp, and you wonder if they have forgotten how to stand and support your weight. You pull into the station in your destination town and, in too much of a rush to park, the driver jumps out to open the door. Passengers pile out and immediately start to slap themselves with handkerchiefs to beat out the dust. They repeat the ritual with their luggage as they retrieve it. All around them people are calling out names of nearby towns and ushering people into other vehicles. How could anyone want to go through this again? But then you realize that you will have to do it yourself, albeit in a few days, when you are scheduled to return back. You cringe and try not to think about it as you call your friend and walk out of the station.