GHANA
A Very Fishy Story
One of the best adventures I have ever had was as a solo traveler to Ghana in 2007. Truth be told, I wasn’t completely alone. My husband, Dennis, was working in Accra at the U.S. Embassy for six months, so I actually was staying with him in his hotel. But because he had to work every day, I was pretty on my own for my ten-day trip.
My first order of business after I arrived was to line up a guide/driver for the duration of my time in Ghana. Enter Liberty, a young man who was from a nearby village. He came highly recommended, and I was very lucky to have snagged him, and at only $30 a day!
You may be wondering how he got the name Liberty. His given name was Joseph, but he loved America so much that he called himself Liberty after the Statue of Liberty. Every day he wore the same shirt—a red, white and blue polo. He had a thick Ghanaian accent, but his English was very good, and I had no problem understanding him. He had the best personality--super friendly and vivacious! From the moment I met him, I just knew I was going to have an incredible time.
Liberty picked me up in his car early my second day in Accra. Being January, the harmattan winds (which occur between December and March) were blowing in from the Sahara and limiting visibility because the dust and sand from the desert filled the air and blocked the sun. Regardless, we had a full day planned to explore Accra, Ghana’s capital.
After walking around the huge arts and crafts market, where there were hundreds of artisans making traditional Ghana handicrafts (though I didn’t buy anything that particular day), and then visiting the museum honoring the life of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first president, it was time for lunch. I told Liberty that I wanted to go to a place filled with locals and eat authentic Ghanaian food. He said he knew the perfect place—Asanka Local, the best chop house in the city.
As we walked into the restaurant, I noticed that I was the only non-Ghanaian person there! The place was huge, about half the size of a football field, on two levels with a high metal ceiling. The floor was covered with green and white tiles, and dozens of tables were covered with red plastic tablecloths. It was very open and buzzing with people talking and laughing and upbeat music. I fell in love with the atmosphere the instant I walked in.
Liberty and I grabbed a table, and he recommended that we each get a bowl of the fish stew, which is made daily with freshly caught local fish, as well as other local seafood such as shrimp, crab, mussels, and clams.
Now, you don’t eat the stew with a spoon; you eat the stew with your hand—your right hand to be exact! How do you eat stew with your hand, you ask? Fufu!
Fufu is a staple food in Ghana and is made by pounding boiled cassava and green plaintain and then mixing it with water. You know it’s ready when it has a consistency of sticky dough. It is then formed into a shape that looks like a big, soft dumpling.
To eat, you pull off a little piece—about the size of a quarter—and roll it into a ball between the fingers of your RIGHT hand. Next, using your thumb, you make an indentation in the middle of the ball, scoop up some of the stew with the fufu, and then “pop” it in your mouth.
Thankfully, I had prior experience eating this way when I was in East Africa a few years earlier. But instead fufu, the mixture was called ugali.
I was game to try the fish stew, but before I ordered it, I asked Liberty if the fish contained bones because, I told him, I definitely did not want fish with bones, and Liberty replied in his deep, Ghanaian accent, “This stew have no fish bones.”
My stew was brought to me in a huge bowl, filled to the rim with big chunks of fish, seafood still in the shell, tomatoes, onions, and peppers, all piled in a deep reddish-orange, oily liquid that smelled wonderful, and, on the side, a plate of fufu the size of a small loaf of round sourdough bread.
Without delay, Liberty pulled off a piece of fufu, scooped up a piece of fish and liquid stock from the bowl, and shoved it all into his mouth, while I was still inspecting the bits and bobs in my own bowl. Right away I noticed lots of tiny white bones poking out the pieces of fish. What the…! Ohhhhh, this was not going to be fun!
Following Liberty’s lead, I took a piece of fufu and dipped it into the stew, “spooning” some of the stock and a piece of fish, and cautiously put it in my mouth. The first thing I noticed was the delicious taste of the stock. As I bit down on the fish though, I felt the sharp little fish bones poking the roof of my mouth.
“Liberty,” I said. “You told me there were no bones in this fish stew!”
Liberty responded, “Bones? ptooey There are no bones ptooey in this stew ptooey.” What did he think those sharp little white things were that he was spitting from his mouth onto the floor of the restaurant!?! I guess fish bones in Ghana mean something different than in the U.S.
Next came the fire! My mouth was ablaze with the heat from the peppers that were in the stew. What kind of peppers I never asked; I was too busy guzzling room temperature water trying to cool the inferno in my mouth and throat! But I managed to get most of the stew down, as well as a gallon of water, though I did pay for it that evening back at my hotel. But before our day ended, Liberty and I did one last bit of sight-seeing – we went to the Accra Zoo, which is a story for another day!
Over the next 8 days, Liberty and I traveled from one end of the Ghana coast to the other, returning each night to Accra. Together we had some amazing adventures. It was an experience I will never forget.