My luggage was lost and they told me to call them around noon. It was late morning so I decided to start already. There is one difference between Douala and Accra--in Douala, there are plenty of businesses where you can use a phone to call people and pay by the minute. Accra doesn't have many of these. The sun had come out and I was still wearing the same shirt I wore on the plane and all night long. I finally found a box. But the number wasn't working.
I decided to try another box. It took a long time to find one. Again, the number wasn't working. Ugh! This sucks! I went to M&J Travel which is near Osu and asked them if they could help. All they would do is give me the number to Virgin Nigeria. They remembered me. When I was there, they thought McCain was going to win, but I had been monitoring fivethirtyeight.com, so I said the race was still leaning pretty heavily in Obama's favor. She noted that in fact, Obama did win.
I walked back to the hotel. There is a prepaid card pay phone at the hotel. I asked where I can get a prepaid card. "Oh, that phone doesn't work." (Of course not, this is Africa.) There is another one there on the desk. "That one doesn't work either." But the clerk offered to let me use a cell phone, but I'd have to get some MTN credits. OK, that shouldn't be too hard. But it was. Usually, you don't have to walk more than half a block to find someone selling credits. But I walked all over. I found another prepaid card phone outside a hotel. I went in and asked a hotel employee if they sell card. No, he said, check the gas station across the street. I went across the street. Do you sell Ghana Telecom prepaid cards? No, go down the street. I was hot, sweaty and getting frustrated. I found 2 guys out side a business that sells MTN credit, but it was closed (it was Saturday, after all). They directed to another business, but it was also closed. I wandered around some more, then finally found what I was looking for.
There are 2 ways to get time on your phone. You can buy little scratch off cards and enter the number. Or you can find people with credit on the phone and they can transfer some of their credit to another phone number--for a fee of course. So these two women were there sitting under an umbrella with a sign showing how much it costs to transfer how much credit from their phone to mine. I gave them the phone number of the desk clerk's phone and got about GH¢2 worth of time--about 15 minutes.
Then back to the hotel. The phone number I was given is still out of service. I couldn't get a human at the Virgin Nigeria office despite trying a few times. Then the desk clerk called the airport. From that we got the number to the bag reclaim desk. So I now I had that number. I called and explained my situation. Then my time ran out.
An African couple came. The man is a big guy. He asked how I'm doing. Not so well. He and his wife live in Miami, but he is a chief (Nana) in Cape Coast and was here to do chief stuff. He is also a travel agent. He offered to help and gave some advice. The most helpful piece of advice was to get a SIM card for my AT&T cell phone. He said I should do everything through the hotel clerk, so I gave the hotel clerk GH¢5 to get me a SIM card. He said I should go to the airport (I already decided I had no choice but to do that) and get names and if I needed help he knew people there who could help me. But he had to run because he had chief stuff to do.
So I headed to the airport (GH¢5). I went to the Aviance counter where they handle lost bags. The first thing I did was ask for the phone number. She gave it to me but it was the same phone number I already had. "That's your phone number?" "Yes." "I tried it--it doesn't work." "I know." "You know it doesn't work?" "Yes." "But that's your phone number?" "Yes." I stood there aghast. "Why does your office have a phone number that doesn't work?" "It usually works, but there's a problem this weekend." The girl checked her computer. She told me that my bags were going to be in the flight tonight. I asked for her name. She wouldn't tell me. That should have been a red flag--she didn't want to held accountable for the information she gave me. I would find out why later.
I went to Aerostar, a bar/restaurant near the airport. I got a Star beer. It's nice there--outdoor but shaded. And reasonably priced unlike the places inside the airport. Just GH¢2 for a big bottle of beer.
Then I got a cab to Danquah Circle in Osu for GH¢5. I walked down to Ryan's Pub and a beer while watching Everton play Manchester City. Finally I was hungry. Ravi who I met at the airport in Douala recommended Indian Heritage as the best Indian food in Accra and it was pretty close to Ryan's Irish pub, so I went there. But they open at 6:30. So I went to a bar across the street, Honey Road, and ordered a beer. Then this crazy guy who might be the owner or might just be the husband of one employee and the father of another one sat at my table.
He was talking crazy. Asking me all types of weird questions. Like "Kunta Kinte: what color is he?" "Black." Easy enough. "Who was the first man on the moon?" "Neil Armstrong." "Wrong!" he asserted and said some Russian name. "Stevie Wonder: What color is he?" "Black." "Where was Kunta Kinte from?" "The Gambia" "No--from Africa." "Who took him to America: black men or white men?" "White men." It went on like this for about a half hour. He was extremely offended that I didn't know Kofi Annan was from Ghana. He asserted that there are no scientists born in America. Naturally we talked about Obama. Finally, 6:30 rolled around and I was anxious to end this craziness with this meaningless questions.
The Indian Heritage was good. I got a spinach like dish recommended by Ravi and samosas and rice and a garlic naan and a chicken dish. Yummy. I couldn't even finish it all. They did something funny with the bill. They left the chicken dish off and then had me pay for it in cash downstairs. How odd, but I went along. Then they help me get a cab (it's a bit off the main drag so not many cabs come by) and for GH¢4, I got back to my room. I fell asleep until the desk clerk called and told me I should come and pick up my new SIM card. So I did. Then I went back to my room, exhausted since I didn't sleep the previous night, and died on the bed.
Monday, December 15, 2008 8:03 Ghana local time
No comments:
Post a Comment