On the Court

"I wish I was a little bit taller.  I wish I was a baller..."

--Skee Lo

Being white in Ghana means I’m always the foreigner. I can learn the language, know all the customs, dress in all the local styles and go to school with them, but the color of my skin is too bright to be overshadowed by any of these. For a long time I felt like this was stopping me from integrating at all; wherever I went, Obruni, the Fante word for foreigner, was shouted around me.

At first, being placed on the basketball team didn’t seem to change any of this. The coaches were excited to have me because I was one of two players on the team who had any previous experience. The other girls were interested, like everyone always is, but that’s where it ended.

As the season went on, we got better and better and we all became more and more comfortable with each other too. Basketball practice was something I looked forward to every weekend. We were winning every game. Other schools started noticing me and I began making friends who were interested in getting to know me for a reason other than my race.

After taking first in Central Region, we had a team meeting. While we waited for the Sports Master (the Ghanaian equivalent of an Athletic Director) to arrive, everyone started talking to each other. The conversation was in Fante, so I didn’t have much to contribute. I turned my head though when I heard “…yɛ obruni.”

Joana, the team captain noticed. “Oh! Did you think we were talking about you? You’re not obruni. You’re Lisa.”

We went on to the National Tournament and took second. Those words were worth more than the prize money or any certificate to me though. I was a part of the team. I was no longer a foreigner.

Thoughts from the Mat

“Thank you is for weak people. I’m doing this because I can. I don’t need gratitude.” 

--Ahmad 

I spent Easter weekend in the Eastern Region for a festival taking place in the Nkawkaw/Kwahu area. Laura, an exchange student from Belgium, lives there and her host family graciously allowed seven of us to stay there. 

On Saturday night we went out to a “street carnival” where there was a lot of music, food, drinking, and dancing. We stayed out until a little after 11 and then decided to come home. We were out with Laura’s host brother, Ahmad; he had wanted to stay until early the next morning, but with some convincing he came with us. 

When we arrived at the *compound, Laura’s house was locked. She had the key, but her host mom or dad had used the deadbolt from the inside. It was late, we were tired, and we didn’t have any beds. Laura, in desperation, went to her brother’s house and asked him what she should do. Ahmad and I had become friends during the festivities and he called me over as they were talking. 

Ahmad’s room was small and had only a mattress in the middle of the floor, a suitcase full of clothes in the corner and an ironing board pushed against the wall. He asked me if he pushed the mattress against the wall, laid a mat on the floor and gathered up his things, would it be possible for the seven of us to sleep there. He would sleep on the floor in Ishmael, his brother’s room. Laura would sleep on one of those sun reflectors that are used in car windows. He was so nervous in asking me – almost as if he were sure I would say it was beneath me. 

In reality, I was touched. He gave up his room and bed for a group of exchange students locked out of the house. I told him that it would be perfect and that it was so kind of him. Laura and I helped him get everything arranged and I was sent to tell the others. 

They weren’t happy about it, but they all agreed. We fit four on the mattress and two girls and I took the mat. Ahmad came in one last time asking if everything was okay. I thanked him profusely for the sacrifice he had made. He refused my thanks, and went to bed. 

I didn’t sleep that night, but it will forever remain a night I will look to with gratitude toward a person I had only met that day. 

*Compound Homes are common in Ghana. One family will build separate houses all facing each other. It creates sort of a courtyard. They are ideal because a tradition of extended families living together still stands here.