Four whiskeys and a funeral

On Saturday, I went to my first Ghanaian funeral for the uncle of Mary, the woman I stayed with in Koforidua. Mary offered to buy me a traditional African funeral dress tailored to my dimensions. It came out splendidly and now I have my first big souvenir from the trip. Funerals are a significant part of Ghanaians’ lives. I have heard on occasion that the reason people don’t have as much available cash is that they spend it on funeral attire. I asked Bernard how many funerals the average Ghanaian attends in a year. His answer was 12 – “maybe one a month.” Tawiah felt this was a little low and would actually put the number at 20 or nearly twice a month. Not only are Ghanaians going to a lot of funerals, but they often are all day affairs that begin with a 3 to 4 hour church service, followed by a service at the gravesite, then there is an afternoon gathering that includes refreshments. More frequently now, people are also hosting dinners or throwing parties with quantities of alcohol that probably rival most American weddings. I asked if this party portion was a celebration of life, but was told that it is not quite so complicated and really just provides an excuse to drink. The other interesting aspect of Ghanaian funerals, getting back to the clothing aspect, is that typically women and men buy new outfits for each funeral. I was told that they are becoming like fashion shows and are well attended because people see it as a chance to see and be seen. I felt like I was in for quite the experience.

Mary picked me up at 8am with her friend Constance. The funeral was to start at 8, but alas we are in Ghana and showing up a half an hour to forty five minutes late to a funeral is probably considered showing up early. When we pulled up to the Presbyterian Church, cars were already lining the street with people milling around next to them. Awnings and plastic chairs were set up in the parking lot of the church to provide additional seating for funeral attendants. Mary opted for us to sit outside, which I was a bit surprised about considering she was his niece. Two things explained this though – 1) Ghanaian families are very large and so between the deceased’s siblings and children from various wives, Mary was actually more along the lines of extended family and 2) she said that it allowed us to duck out early if we wanted. We took our seats and received a program. The program was nearly 20 pages long with all of the speeches people were going to give about Mary’s uncle. It was a nice tribute and it helped me to get to know the man much better, but I was definitely impressed by the breadth of the funeral program. As we were sitting there, I realized that the service was going on inside the church but we couldn’t hear anything. There had to be at least 200 people outside and no one seemed to be phased by the fact that we couldn’t hear the service except for me. I saw a few people sleeping, so maybe they appreciated it. I was a little nervous though about sitting there for a few hours without being able to hear the service and I was already sweating in the dress at 9am.

Just when I was not sure whether I could take the heat anymore, Constance announced that she was hungry and was going to look for food. The possibility of a snack perked me up and I took advantage of my more awake state to look around and notice some of the clothes, this was supposed to be akin to a Ghanaian fashion show after all. Many of the men were in traditional African attire. It looked like a short toga in brown and/or black. The men use 12 yards of fabric and drape the fabric around their waists and over one shoulder. I noticed American looking khaki shorts underneath the togas when the men readjusted the cloth. The women were also dressed in predominately black or brown. They wear an outfit that is referred to as a slip and cover, which includes a long fitted skirt that flares out below the knee and a matching top that zips in the back. Some women also wrap matching fabric around their hair. The dresses are not easy to walk in, especially when you have to negotiate open drains, potholes, narrow walkways and tall SUVs. I had to essentially pull myself up into Mary’s SUV to get into the car. Luckily, my dress had a pretty knee-high slit that helped me move around more freely, but it was still a challenge. A few women were in white, but that is usually reserved for when a person dies at a very old age. Mary’s uncle was 76, which is not considered that old here. The white funeral attire typically is worn when the person was in his late 80s and 90s. Several people also had on red scarves that were either tied around the heads like bandanas or tied around their wrists. The red signals a family member. Since Mary was not wearing one, I assume it is just for immediate family or for family members who are speaking at the service. I did see four other white people at the funeral, which meant that we total five out of about 600. They wore traditional American suits as did the wives.

Constance called Mary after about 30 minutes of searching for food to say that she bought crackers and soda for all of us. Yeah, it isn’t taboo at all to talk on your cell phone at a funeral. We headed back to Mary’s car to enjoy the snack. I figured we would go back in, but after eating shortbread and drinking a coke we bought more food. This was the shadiest food I have eaten yet in Ghana. I have seen these food vendors many times, but was quite wary of eating anything from them. They are the women who carry large quantities of prepared food on their heads in giant bowls. This girl was selling white banku, a variation I had not seen before, and seafood. The banku is cooked in plantain leaves and is sort of like a more solidified version of mashed potatoes. The seafood was a mix of fried shrimp and unidentifiable fish – whole fish. Constance demonstrated how to eat the shrimp which was essentially by putting the whole thing in your mouth – head, tail, eyes and all – and just chewing. I thought I would give one of the small ones a try to start. It was definitely not as bad as the fish snout I had tried the week before, but the crunchy consistency was unusual. I was thinking that if I had grown up on it, I probably would have really enjoyed the crunchy shrimp goodness. It tasted pretty good and the banku was very nice. There is a spicy tomato sauce that goes with it all. I did manage to eat most of one fish, minus the bones, which was also tasty, but couldn’t eat one that was very flat and seemed to be nothing but deep fried bones, skin and gills. Although it took me three times as long to eat it and I frequently had to reassure the group that I was doing OK, I felt satisfied food-wise and thought that I could eat it again without a problem.

I was a little surprised that we ended up sitting in the car for about an hour until people started emerging from the church. It was difficult to determine whether everyone was leaving or if the service had ended. Mary told me that likely everyone was getting tired and hungry and wanted to leave. At 11:30 we received confirmation that the church portion of the funeral had ended and we were to go to another location for the continuation of the service. As we waited to depart, busloads of funeral goers passed by which really showed how many people had been there. It also explained why so many taxis were waiting outside and why so many street food vendors had congregated in the area. I saw about eight buses leave the church. We all headed in a gigantic convoy to a local high school. Plastic chairs and awnings had been set up in a large rectangle around a fountain. There was probably room for several hundred people and many were already positioned in their chairs. We at first took a space on an elevated platform that caught a nice breeze. It was heavenly after being so hot during the morning. Mary asked us to move closer to her cousins, the sons of the deceased, who for some unknown reason decided to camp out in a breezeless section along a wall. There was limited talking and most people seemed to be waiting for something to happen, so I felt justified in lowering my sunglasses, closing my eyes and trying to rest for a bit. They passed around bags of water, but other than that nothing seemed to be happening. We sat for about two hours around this fountain. Again, no one else seemed to be concerned that nothing was happening. Also, no one seemed to be up and about conversing. People were relaxing in their own seats and content with waiting. They say that when you travel, you actually discover more about yourself than the destination. Ghanaians’ stunning ability to wait patiently and live in the moment has really highlighted my need for a predetermined endpoint. This is not an original idea of mine, but this situation showcases that while some people live in the past, Americans tend to live in the future. Our thoughts focus so much on what is to come as opposed to being in the moment. I don’t think the Ghanaians were actually waiting for something to happen at the high school as I was, but were simply meditating on the moment.

In somewhat of a non sequitur moment, Mary suggested we all head to a bar and ditch the post-church funeral services. It was 1:30. Ironically to me, many of the deceased’s sons followed us as well to a nearby bar that was situation behind the multi-storey Ghana police headquarters. The bar consisted of a market stand with plastic chairs and folding tables with an awning to provide shade. Oh, and the bathroom was a tiled sloping floor – no toilet, no sinks, and definitely no signs that read “Employees must wash hands before returning to work.” Adding further surprise to my funeral experience, one of the sons planted a handle of whiskey on the table for everyone to share. It was 96 degrees out. I just couldn’t fathom drinking warm whiskey in the middle of the day and in this heat. It was certainly a recipe for disaster for me, and I was guessing for the others. They seemed less concerned than I was about the consequences and poured generous servings into glasses sans shot glasses. A teensy splash of coke was added to each, perhaps for flavor, I wasn’t sure. I was offered something similar to Baileys and thought since I wasn’t drinking the whiskey I could try a little of that. When I asked for a small sample though, well over a shot and a half was emptied into the glass. It was a little tough without ice, but the flavor was quite nice. I tried my first Guinness here too, which I discovered is more bitter in flavor and has higher alcohol content. It was nice, especially with the kenkey, fish and fried chicken that the ladies prepared for the day and shared with everyone.

The eclectic collection of individuals at the bar included four sons of the deceased, three or four of their wives, several friends and their wives, someone who seemed like a bodyguard that sat behind us the entire time with sunglasses on, one toddler, a couple of female teetotalers, Mary’s Ministry of Health friend, Constance, Mary, and me the lone obruni. Everyone was incredibly nice and welcoming. There was fun, spirited conversation throughout the afternoon and several offers to host me in different parts of the city. One invitation came from Kwesi, who is a local Chief and considered very highly respected in the family. However, after a while of drinking, there seemed to be some debate about how much influence he had over the brothers. I didn’t quite understand, but apparently this warranted shouting and standing up for people to emphasize their points. It never escalated in an angry way, only in volume. As the men argued, they had to keep adjusting their unstructured funeral attire. As the discussion became more excited the men had to fix their togas at a similarly accelerating pace. They also seem to have to hold the material with one hand while they are standing, so as points were being emphasized with hand gestures the men had to keep switching hands back and forth to secure the material. Perhaps this keeps the arguments from ever getting physical… or at least amongst the men in the traditional attire.

Toward the end of the afternoon, I returned from my second cringe worthy trip to the “bathroom” to take some photos of the group before we departed. Upon the second group photo we heard commotion coming from the parking lot and then Mary exclaimed, “Oh, they are fighting!” We ran over to the fence that separated the cars from the bar and saw two of the men from the group pushing each other. As we got closer I could see that they were so drunk that they couldn’t really do much damage to each other. They sort of grabbed onto each other and then finally fell to the ground. It reminded me of a hockey fight where eventually everyone just falls and the refs intervene. There had been talk of designated drivers at the table as the enormous bottle was nearing its empty point. Apparently it is illegal to drink and drive here, but there is the general acceptance that if the owner of the car wants to drive intoxicated, you let him drive. That’s sort of acceptable for the person putting himself in danger, but not OK to me since the other people on the road don’t get to participate in that decision. Anyways, back to the fight… it seems that the man’s wife did not want him driving. This guy was partaking in some sort of competitive whiskey drinking throughout the afternoon, so I certainly didn’t blame her. He, on the other hand, in his delusional drunken stupor, felt that his wife was disgracing him. As he lunged at her, another guy intervened which is the point at which we all witnessed the fight. My philosophy on dealing with drunken idiots is to just throw them in the back of the car and avoid engaging in conversation with them because they are typically unreasonable and won’t remember anything anyways. Ghanaians like to talk things out though. I give them a lot of credit though because the men really wanted to make sure that the guy had calmed down enough so that the wife would be safe when they returned home. I don’t know what was said, but there was a forty-five minute conversation that switched between different sub-groups of the main group and at different times random people would get upset and need to be reassured. If only I spoke Twi! I waited patiently and safely in the car wondering if I too should consider the sobriety of my driver. Eventually the fight discussion ended with the guy getting into the passenger seat and yelling “just go!” between tears. It took me back to memories of high school and college parties. I assumed this was all an anomaly since most Ghanaians I know don’t drink at all. When I asked Constance if this happens every once in a while, she replied with, “Yes, at funerals it seems to happen a lot.” My internal dialogue was something along the lines of “Huh, at funerals? Really? Why are people getting belligerent at funerals?” At work on Monday, Tawiah confirmed that people are using funerals as an opportunity to drink to excess. She thought that some may be drowning their sorrows, but it really seemed like something else.

The night ended with a drive out to the far edge of Accra. Mary, Constance and Mary’s cousin were staying at a hotel for the night. I was joining them to eat banku at one of Mary’s favorite places. My dinner consisted of more delicious spicy tomato stew with an entire tilapia accompanied by two sticky, doughy balls. You pinch, dip and swallow (although I don’t just swallow of course – it is like the consistency of peanut butter, I really don’t know how they do it). Despite the sunset, temperatures hovered in the high 80s and low 90s. Eating hot, spicy soup that you stick your hand into feels like it increases my internal thermometer to near feverish temperatures. I am often asked if I am OK and told that my face is really red. I can only imagine what I look like eating soup in these conditions. But, alas, it along with my Coke was a nice cap to an exciting and unusual day at a funeral.