Cruise Port 10 – Tema, Ghana
Kudo! Afo gangia! (Hello two ways in Fon)
Today is May 8th, 2023, and we are in Ghana. The port is Tema, but the destination city is nearby Accra.
We have a tour today to learn The Art of Making Beads!
I wake at 6 AM just as we make our way past the breakwater to the Tema harbor.
Once we are cleared to go ashore we board the bus for our tour. Surprise! This is the same bus we had in Benin yesterday with the same driver!
We meet our tour guide for today, Gilbert, and he tells us our driver is Mr. Edward. (None of the three guides yesterday told us who the driver is.)
Gilbert teaches us a couple of words – when he says, “Ahgo!” he is asking for our attention, and we need to respond, “Ameh!” to confirm he has our attention! We try it a couple of times, and it finally sticks!
Just off the main road the homes are bleak. But a huge satellite dish looms overhead! Someone is getting a signal!
Goats are plentiful and for sale!
Personal-size satellite dishes are available, too!
School desks are available! The desk frames appear to be made of wood, but the chair frames are tubular metal. Kids might be more interested in the slide than the desks!
This shady stand carries loaves of bread and uses rocks to hold the melons steady on the table!
Whereas this stand uses coffee cans to hold the melons steady!
About a 1-km stretch of the highway is under construction. This is nice, but this isn’t where the road work is needed! Ghana wins the prize for the worst roads we have ever encountered! Extreme kudos to Edward the driver for knowing where the nasty and hidden potholes exist, many masked by tree shadows.
The landscape is stunning in greenery and rocky outcrops, especially after the dunes of Namibia!
Looking inland the land appears very fertile!
Within minutes we begin passing massive groves of mango trees!
Then the pavement runs out!
Kids out on recess get to play in a play area similar to our road.
Pavement resumes and we find ourselves in a clean little town!
But, as usual, the pavement does not extend to the side streets.
I am humored at finding this little goat roaming the parking lot in front of a Veterinary Shop and a restaurant! The Vet’s sign show they work with goats, sheep, pigs, and other similar animals!
Please accept my apologies for this poor shot, but the coffins created at this little shop are beautiful! The fancy ones are in the front row. The simple coffins are in the back row.
Another school does not have the water drainage problems of the previous school, but it also does not have the big shade trees. The kids hang out in the shade of the school and the fence!
Many vendors have cages like these selling chickens! There appears to be a healthy mix of roosters and hens here!
Here is one more example of pole-assisted construction. I still find this incredible!
We arrive at the turn-off to the bead factory. The sign is interesting – “Cedi Beads Industry is a place where beads talk” and “Dealers in quality but not in Quantity”!
We meet Cedi himself! He is our instructor today.
Cedi gives us a lesson on the sources of bead glass – all their glass is recycled – and the types of beads that are made. Of particular importance are the “bodom” beads that are made for royalty (chiefs and queens).
He gives us a quick demonstration of how the bodom beads are created by building the glass powder mix in a shot glass to allow us to see the result. A casava stick is placed in the center to create the hole. This is a cat’s eye, and he created it in less than five minutes! He does the actual bead prep in an opaque mold.
We move to the kiln room. The kilns they have are made of the mud created by termites in their hills! They find an old termite hill, break it up and add water to form it into the dome shape you see here. The secretions of the termites make a structure that can withstand incredible temperatures!
Molds are created from “fufu” which is a mashed potato-like substance created from casava fruit. It hardens and can take firing!
The molds are painted with a while substance called kaolin. It dries and forms a surface the molten glass will not adhere to, so the bead can be removed from the mold. The single hole molds make the single large beads like the royal bead Cedi demonstrated. The six-hole mold allow six beads to be created at the same time and are typically used for transparent glass beads.
We will do one of each in the class!
When beads come out of the mold they are covered with the kaolin from the mold. A quick rinse in water reveals the colored glass bead inside!
We go to another hut to fill our molds, then as they go to fire we get to go shopping in the gift shop! There are beautiful works awaiting us there! There are multi-colored complex necklaces!
There are single-color simple necklaces.
You are only limited by your imagination when you create your own colors and shapes!
We are informed our beads will not be ready for us to take back with us. We are not surprised. They assure us the beads will make it to the ship before we depart.
So we head back to the bus!
I’m surprised to catch this fence with very American colors and symbolism on it! Again, another lousy picture through a bus window.
I try an experiment as we drive slowly through a congested part of town – putting my camera in panoramic mode and letting the bus motion to take the picture! I captured this fabulous shot of a bunch of women carrying packages on their heads!
On the highway we encounter a family of baboons crossing the road! Another not-so-great picture, but these are animals in the wild!
A short while later we are back at the harbor. I am shocked to find this is the last picture I took this day!
Beadmaking is interesting, but Ghana is not my favorite port. Let’s see what tomorrow brings!
Next port of call – Lome, Togo! Odabo!
