Another event we went to in Ghana was the Fokuo Festival. This is a religious ceremony in a small village. The basics are that there is a high priest that sends up the wishes for the year to the heavens, then there is a celebration once the results come back. That celebration was very interesting and consisted of elephant guns being shot into the air, a chicken sacrifice and lots of drumming, drinking, and dancing.

 

The charcoal on the men was collected from the fires of several of the wives. It was ground up and mixed with water and spread over their bodies. A small loin cloth, made from the bark of the homaben shrub, called danta was also worn.

I think the children in this neighborhood don’t see a lot of white people, so they would touch my hand to see if it felt the same as theirs. We created a few videos of the drumming and have a picture gallery of the event.

The following movies are from the Fokuo ceremony in Ghana.

During the second week of the volunteer trip, we were able to attend a Martin Luther King Jr ceremony in rural Ghana. A few of the children from the school recited quotations from Martin Luther King Jr and one of the students read an excerpt of the “I Have a Dream” speech. Listening to the child saying Martin Luther King’s words was very moving, and the state chief that was attending the ceremony gave him praise by placing money on his forehead.

There was a bust of Martin Luther King Jr and a picture of Rosa Parks as a part of the memorial. We would like to thank Madam Felicia Obuobie, Director of the Centre for African Art and Civilisation, who was the prime organizer of this event along with the Bono Manso council of chiefs. Please see the picture gallery and some short movies of the children reciting Martin Luther King quotes.

The following movies contain two of the children at the school reciting Martin Luther King Jr quotes. The quality isn’t that good due to the sun, microphone feedback, and lack of a tripod, but it’s better than nothing!

This is a video of the students vs teachers match.

During the last volunteer trip to Ghana, we were able to visit a monkey sanctuary with a few of the teachers from the school. To get there we had to drive on a few unpaved roads to a small village. After arriving, word spread quickly in the village and one of the park rangers came to greet us. We negotiated a price for our tour and we were on our way. The ranger led us through some trails in the woods and of course, we saw monkeys! There was a very cute mother and baby monkey that we were able to get about 10 feet close to.

 

We also got to see some strange vines that grow and take over trees, and in a way, then become trees themselves. One of these was hollow in the center so that we could crawl up inside it!

After seeing the monkeys, we bought some sodas and some jewelry. There is a gallery of pictures from the monkey sanctuary and also a video of the cute mother and baby.

The following is a video of a baby monkey and mom. Sorry for the shakiness, I didn’t have a tripod.