Tours in Ghana – Cultural Tours and Local Guides in Ghana!

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Paying For Goods And Services in Ghana

Ghana is a country where almost every transaction is done using cash. This means that paying for essential consumables like bottle water from the streets to settling an expensive hotel bills requires cash. Whereas the west is familiar with card payments, it is very rare in Ghana. However, It is only on limited occasions where you will find some big hotels, restaurants and malls accepting card payments. This events only happens at some few hotspots in Accra and other big towns like Kumasi, Cape Coast and Takoradi. Having cash, preferably smaller denominations on you during your holidays in Ghana will ease any headache of “we are sorry, we don’t accept card here”. Contrary, there is an electronic method of payment known as “Mobile Money” which is widely popularizing the country. A lot of businesses are now accepting payments from this platforms. They are operated by the mobile telecommunication networks and can be linked to ones bank account locally. One best way to use this method of payment is to get a local sim to use or have one of those trusted money transfer platforms that you are familiar with and can send money direct to a mobile money account here in Ghana. Ghana is not a country where tipping is mandatory but giving something appreciable to your service attendant for an excellent service offered may bring joy to someone.

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Breakfast on the streets of Ghana

There are variety of breakfast meals to lay hands on in Ghana. The commonest to find at almost every corner of the street are waakye (mixed rice and beans cooked with sorghum leaves to give it reddish brown color) eating with shito (hot black pepper), spaghetti, gari and other sides of ones choice. Hausa Koko (fermented millet dough and natural spice cooked in a liquid-ish style) eating with either koose (blended mixture of pre soaked beans, onions, chili pepper and other spice fried in oil), bofrot (puf puf) or white bread with other sides like roasted groundnut (pea nut), milk, sugar or honey. Of-course you find other breakfast meals like egg and toast with tea, oatmeal, tom brown, rice water (broken rices cooked in liquid-ish style) and many more. Since breakfast is considered an important meal of the day, don’t forget to try either of the above traditional dishes and give your comments.

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Taxis in Ghana

Taxis are very common everywhere in Ghana especially in the cities and big towns. A lot of these taxis offers drop off services meaning you will privately charter to your destination at a fee sometimes negotiable. There are others that offer shared services, where a required number of four passengers (one at the front seat and three at the back seat) are on-board at a time usually running from one destination to another or vice versa. However, there are some locations in Ghana where passengers on-board maybe six or more (two at front seat and the rest at back seat) at a time due to scarcity of commercial vehicles. Also, there are instances where you may find children siting on the laps of their parents or wards purposely to minimize cost. Most of the cars used as taxis in Ghana do not have a working air condition unless they are newly registered (even not all times). Taxis feels a little comfortable compared to trotro’s especially when you charter them privately and you do not have to share with other passengers. Taxis in Ghana have yellow painted colors at all four corners above the tires with a cap boldly written TAXI on top. Their vehicle registration number plates are also yellow colored. Some taxi drivers can be polite whiles others can be rude without paying much attention to passengers needs. Additionally, if you want to charter a taxi for a drop off please ask of the price of the fare before you hop in the car. This is to makes sure the driver’s offered price is fair and reasonable enough to go with your budget and if it does not, do bargain to settle at a price fair to you. If the driver do not agree upon further negotiation please let them go and look for another taxi that come with a reasonable price. Do share you experience next time you use a taxi in Ghana.

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The Ghanaian Woman And Bead

For ages, locally made beads (either glass or clay) has been a part of the Ghanaian woman. At birth, babies are adorn with beads around either their wrist, knees or waist. This is superstitiously believed to have some form of spiritual protection for the newly born in a lot of communities in Ghana. From infancy, the girl child is made to put on the waist bead as a way of differentiating her from the boy child. It is also a way of showcasing her femininity hence nurture her into a true womanhood in the society. There are different types and shapes of beads worn by the Ghanaian woman. There are some worn on the neck, wrist, waist, ankle and even the head sometimes. The Ghanaian woman wears a particular type or shape of bead to specifically suit an occasion. Above all, the waist bead is the most culturally worn bead because there’s a belief that it helps shape the hips of the adult Ghanaian woman into a curvy mode for good attraction to men (their husbands or boyfriends) and sometimes arouse their sexual feelings during love making.

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Oware (A Traditional Game of Wisdom)

Oware is a mathematical game that involves great reasoning. Two players are traditionally involved in playing Oware, whereas each player is entitle to 6 of the 12 circular shallow holes on a same horizontal row. I remember as a kid, my friends and i used to create 12 circular shallow holes on a dry ground with 6 of such circular shallow holes horizontally facing each other (because as kids we didn’t have the money to buy one of those expensive wooden types seen in the picture). I remember we used palm nuts as marbles. We picked a sum total of 48 palm nuts with 4 pieces in each circular shallow hole. The objective of Oware game is to capture more marbles than your opponent. Because there is a total of 48 marbles in the game, capturing 25 marbles is sufficient to win at a time. Also, there is a possibility that the game could end in a draw where each player captures 24 marbles since the total number of marbles in the game is an even number thus 48. Oware game is historically, believed to be of an Akan origin popularly among the Ashanti’s of Ghana. However, the infamous Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade which resulted in the displacement of many Africans made Oware game transited to the Caribbean and is now a popular game in some countries out there also.

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Aiden Fruit (Prekese) from Ghana

Tetrapleura Tetraptera as scientifically called is a flowering plant species in the Peg family that is native to Western Africa. It is locally called ”Prekese” in Ghana. It is well known for its medicinal benefits and aromatic flavor. It may be found almost in every home in Ghana. People add them to their soups and other dishes to give it a natural aromatic taste. It is sometimes used to flavor some locally brewed soft drinks. Some people mix them with other herbs and alcohol to make bitters to cure some diseases. One of the most happy moments is when your are served fufu (pounded boiled plantain and cassava into fine mixture) with light (pepper) soup garnish with Prekese in the afternoon, Yummy!