Traditional Wedding Adventure!

waiting to load up tro tro number two...

After attending Ghanaian funerals I didn’t think it would get more exciting but oh yes it does…Last weekend we were invited to a traditional engagement (wedding) of one of the teachers at the primary school we volunteer for.  We traveled with two of the teachers to the grooms house on Friday night on the bus to stay in his compound until the morning when we would travel to Tema (just outside the capital) where the wedding would be.  The bus ride was a blast and I told Dennis, a teacher, he was experiencing a rollercoaster because he was telling me that he had never been on one.  We went to bed not really knowing what town we were in because we forgot the name but somehow slept for a few hours before waking up at 4am.  We half showered in a bucket with the warm water they were so kind to warm up for us Obronis.  We were supposed to leave at 4:30 but instead waited until about 6am…that’s GMT for you (Ghana man time).  Then we went to the road where one tro tro and taxi were and his family was all gathering for the journey.  All of us got in the taxi and awhile later we finally took off.  We stopped to get the rest of the people in another tro tro and taxi which took about another hour at least and then stopped about 30 more times (bathroom breaks on the side of the road, oil ran out, lost…really really lost x25 times, tires pumped up, you name it…).  At one point the driver (the grooms brother) stopped on a road and said “We are waiting for them” but we knew we were way way lost and they were trying to find us.  We were kind of glad for the break from the blasting Twi radio though.  Good thing white people stand out or I don’t think they would have seen us and found us.  I pinched myself just to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. 

Finally we arrived about 10:30am and although the invitation said 6am, we were EARLY at 10:30am.  That’s GMT for you…The bride’s family fed us delicious and spicy food and we think goat in a back room and Dennis said that he wanted us to help with the program.  There is so much tradition in the engagement ceremony that was really fun to watch.  So I learned to say the Reverend and Vice’s names and then announced them.  We all got to sit behind the bride and groom as guests of honor and then we did a dance after the bride and grooms dance.  After the last funeral we all decided the next time we danced we would all do the Macarena so we got up and did that and then broke into freestyle dance.  Some of the family got up to join us in the dance, especially Aunti, party woman!  Then they had a dance competition and Chelsea won against Aunti and another Aunt, but we decided to not take the alcohol she won even though the drunk reverend said it was nonalcoholic.  

Yvonne, one of the teachers was also continuing to travel since the teachers are on strike this week so she helped us get to the right tro tros to continue to Accra.  This time coming to Accra I felt like I was going back to a first world country, it seemed so nice compared to the first night we were there.  Amazing how our perception has changed after being out “in the bush”. 

Sunday we were able to attend church in one of the nicest wards in Ghana and they even spoke English most of the time!  It was great and wow, those members have such strong testimonies.  One of the interns that served his mission in Sierra Leone had a companion in the ward.  Funny enough, even Stephen Abu Sr’s brother was in the ward (We are living with them here in Abomosu) and we made many other connections.  It is such a small world…

We tro tro’d back and the first tro tro leg was great because it was more of a van and supposedly had A/C.  After being clocked at customs he convinced the police we were going to church so that’s why we were speeding so much.  And for some reason they believed him and let him go for cheap!

Also...prior to the trip we experienced our first flat taxi tire on only our third taxi ride in Ghana coming home from the high school in a far away village.  This was quite the set up they had and after seeing them fix the tire it made me feel real safe about them driving...haha  

So its back to work for a week and a half except the primary school for a few days since they are on strike until we are planning to travel to Cape Coast!