”Every moment is an experience.”
It is a bright, sunny, cool morning, but the day will be hot. We’re talking Cape Cod hot. The high will be 78°. My friends in Texas would wear winter coats.
I have an empty dance card today so I’ll be staying home. My to-do list is short. I have to hunt down my other slipper. It disappeared. I also have to vacuum, no surprise there, but I have an idea which may save me. I’ll wear socks and dust the floor as I walk. This technique originated in Moscow where they made us put covers over all our shoes when we toured museums. Their floors were all shiny and dust free.
When I lived in Ghana, my mother sent me packages. Inside them were games, books and, best of all, food. I remember beef jerky, boxes of Chef Boyardee pizza mix, envelopes like beef stroganoff and soup and candy which wouldn’t melt on the trip. I rationed my treats. Six days a week I’d eat Ghanaian food. Sunday was American food day.
Toward the end of my PST, a Peace Corps acronym meaning pre-service training, we were in Korforidua when one of the staff invited me to go to Accra with her. She drove. We went to a small, classy bar near the casinos. I didn’t even know places like that existed. We sat at the bar and played liar’s dice with the bartender for drinks. We did a bit of dancing on the small dance floor. I never found those places again.
During Easter vacation in my second year I went to Accra. I met up with friends who were also staying in the hostel. One of them was leaving Ghana as his school was closed for the rest of the year because of a riot. We all decided to have a few farewell drinks with him. We went to a large old hotel. The bar had tall ceilings and plants in pots by the long windows. There were couches and chairs covered in flowery fabrics. Overhead were fans. I felt as if I had been transported back in time to a bar in a grand hotel like Raffles. I was no longer in the Ghana I knew so well. I expected well dressed British couples to come through the door for cocktail hour. It was that kind of place.
Explore posts in the same categories: Musings
keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
July 2, 2024 at 9:39 pm
Hi Kat,
This morning our low temperature was 81°. This heat early in the morning is a result of the heat island effect in the Metropolitan area. Eight million people create a lot of concrete. The lows out in the more rural areas are cooler like 77° or 79°. The high was 101°, 38.33° Celsius just sounds cooler. 🙂
Dusting your floors with socks that you are wearing is a brilliant idea. Sometimes good ideas come from the strangest places. Necessity is the mother of invention 🙂
I don’t consider myself a picky eater, but I don’t think I would like a diet of Ghanaian food, at least from your descriptions. Like your father I enjoy the good old American diet of meat, potatoes, and a vegetable. But I do enjoy non peppery Chinese, (No Szechuan peppers), Italian (Go easy on red pepper flakes), and Mexican food, (No Jalapeños). Of course I’m referring to Chinese American, Italian American, and Tex-Mex Mexican. 🙂
July 2, 2024 at 10:04 pm
Hi Bob,
It will be in the high 50’s tonight. I have already shut a few windows. Tomorrow it will be in the low 80’s, close to your low. I’m just glad it is dry.
My socks were covered in dog hair so they served their purpose well. I’ll dig up a few more pairs.
I came to like a lot of Ghanaian food. Kelewele made with plantain is still my favorite. Fufu is pounded yam, but it is the soup which makes it. I like okra soup. I also like mango and pawpaw (papaya). Where I lived you could buy beef, and you could buy chickens everywhere. Sorry, but no potatoes. We ate tuber yam which didn’t taste like potatoes but was still good. Back then there were few vegetables. I mostly ate onions and tomatoes, Ghanaian food is hot pepper hot, but I didn’t make mine super hot. I do like a little heat, and I always use the Chinese hot mustard.