Two Weeks in Ghana

I’ve now been in Ghana for exactly two weeks. On the one hand it feels like time has flown by at amazing pace, on the other hand I’ve experienced so much that it feels like I’ve been here a lot longer.

I spent the last 2 days at Cape Coast, which is a city 100km west down the coast from Accra. One of the oldest and biggest European Castles outside of Europe is located there. Pretty cool trip. Went with Rochelle and Kaisa, whom I study with in Canada and another girl we met who studies in Montreal.

Getting there was an interesting experience in itself. We went outside out hostel and found ourselves a “tro-tro”, which is a mini-van-turned-into-bus. The driver said he would drop of us off at a bus station, from were we would be able to catch another tro-tro to Cape Coast. And so we did. The moment we arrived at the bus station a friendly man guided us over to another waiting tro-tro, and we immediately jumped in a drove off towards the coast. Always more fun and convenient to drive in the small local buses, compared to the big and infrequent “public” busses. Though I have to admit that if the ride is any longer than 3 hours, sitting with your knee’s under your chin is not exactly comfortable. Even though the price is often less than half.

Touring the castle was a cool experience and it was really scary to see how the slaves were handled before they were sent off to the Americas and the Caribbean.

When we made it back to Ghana yesterday night, we just made it in time for the “Welcome Durbar”. An event put on by the international programs office to welcome all the new international students. Lots of good Ghanaian food and dances for entertainment. So yeah, all in all a good first two weeks.