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Journal of African trips

Africa, spring 1999 part IV

Agelasto
2004-05-21 18:30:15

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which,
every time the occupant rises, tries to retain its natural position, at the armrest for the
adjacent seats. In many places it is not unusual for busses to have these types of seats, but
they are usually taken by late-comers, as all the desirable seats are filled up by the first
passengers to board. Ghana busses assign seats but passengers load on a first-to-elbowthe-
way-in basis. Thus, taking one?s seat means that aisle-seat passengers (late to buy
tickets maybe, but early to board) need to get out of their seats to let passengers through
to the back seats, or in the cases of long-legged youth, they just hurdle over the seated
people. In contrast, passengers on busses in francophone countries take their seats on a
first-come, first-served basis (no seats assigned), and the bus leaves when it?s full.
Loading may take longer, but there is less chaos. I suspect that the Ghana system (which I
experienced on four different busses) used to work in colonial times, before busses started
using scales to weigh baggage and before aisles were taken up with springy seats. The
earlier system has been tampered with and what results is chaos, and no one has taken the
initiative to invent a more reasonable method. I note that initiative is something in short
supply in Ghana.

This example is illustrative for Ghana. On the surface this is an impressive country in
many regards. But once you scratch the surface, the veneer dissolves. I have never been
to a country, for example, where menus so fail to reflect what actually is available from the
kitchen. After a few days in Ghana, I learned to dispense with menus totally and just ask
what could be prepared. I then learned to qualify this with the phrase ?in the next ten
minutes.? What you think you see in Ghana is not often what you get.

18. A superficial university

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