News Snippets from Ghana

“No one tests the depth of a river with both feet.” –African proverb

Ghana has multiple newspapers. English is the official language there so English readers have a variety of news sources. In 2008, I had clipped a few articles in my wanderings. Here is a sampling.

♠The Circuit Court convicted a woman for stealing two cabbages from a farmer’s crop in the field. She explained “her husband who has two other wives was unable to support her and her children…”  A lawyer, listening in the courtroom, stepped forward to pay her fine.

♦A six year old was selling waakye (cooked rice and beans) by the road side with her elder sister, who sent her to get change from the mother.  A farmer saw the unaccompanied girl and “asked for sex in exchange for some toffee.  The victim obliged and…[the farmer] sent her to a nearby bush.”  The elder sister went to check on the six year old and upon hearing a noise from the bush, found the farmer on top of her little sister. The farmer was later arrested.

♣Village residents were storing food in anticipation of tension degenerating into conflict after the a recent ban on drumming and noise-making. The Muslim community took issue with the ban in that it suspended calls to prayer through the public address systems. The Muslim community was seeking a compromise–turning down the volume of the public address systems.

♥A couple were arrested for having sexual intercourse on “the plain grass” near the court premises. The man was “dragged to court wearing only his boxer shorts while his lover,…was in a T-shirt with no panties on.” They confessed and maintained they were married. “…the couple said they thought they wouldn’t be seen as most of their colleagues had gone to work.”

♠Six people were arrested for stealing rail tracks. “A native of the town who was returning from a hunting expedition heard an unusual noise from the bush and when he ventured to find out what was happening, he saw a group of young men cutting the only railway line connecting the village to other parts of the country.” 

And my favorite…

♥A fight that ensued over mutton soup left two dead.  A man was visiting and “mistakenly kicked the firewood under the cooking pot resulting in the tumbling of the pot.” The woman who had been cooking the soup “was said not to have taken kindly” to that and “therefore confronted him…” The visitor “became offended and gave…[her] a heavy slap.” So she called her husband, who became furious at the visitor’s lack of remorse for kicking the pot over and gave the visitor “a heavy blow and as he fell with his head hitting a rock, he became unconscious.”  The couple carried the visitor to the hospital but “upon realizing that he was dead left the body by the roadside and fled to the bush.” The villagers apprehended them and handed them over to the police. In police custody, the husband “was said to have complained of dizziness but died while being conveyed to the hospital.”

Barbecued Bats – Take care not to tip!

TATTOO—Journeys on My Mind by Tina Marie L. Lamb is available at Amazon and BarnesandNoble and iBooks and Audible.

Buy it. Read it. (Or listen to it.) Let me know what you think. –TMLL