About half of our group woke up early and went to the local LDS temple here in Accra. Because you have to hold a temple recommend, the rest of us were unable to participate. In my world, this is a good thing. I got to sleep an extra 3 hours this morning!
At 10 AM, the rest of us got on the bus to head to one of the markets, located near the city center. I plugged in my iPod, jammed out - until we turned onto a street that drives parallel to the ocean shore. At first glance, I saw the ocean and got excited. However, the actuality of the ocean line near this city is devastating. Black smoke lines the majority of the view, the beach is FILLED with waste! They are using the ocean for their waste management! Tractors were at work, picking up trash, dumping it in the ocean. As the waves went up, you could actually see the trash in the water. I find it extremely concerning that probably more countries than not use the ocean as their waste management.
Once our bus arrived at the market, we had multiple people already waiting for us - we have money, they have, in their words, "shit" for sale. Because we have been dealing with this for weeks now, we all got off the bus, didn't make eye contact, walking straight into the market. If someone tried to stop me, I'd simply say "Debi! Ko!", which means "No! Go!". If you're too nice, they'll follow you all day.
This market is nothing like shopping at home, by the way. They consider it indoor because parts of it has a roof. No doors, dirt for the floor, motorcycles honking at us as they drive through. Each shop has a spot about the size of a typical shed back home. Again, some sell jewelry, wood carvings, metal, drums, machetes, fabric. Women are walking by with metal bowls on their heads selling produce. Each shop we walk by, we are hassled. They say "My friend, my good friend, come inside, just take a look!". We just say "no pressure", which usually makes them stop hassling. Now I understand that everyone is so pushy - it's about survival for them. If we don't buy from them, they don't eat. We spent a good 3 hours at this market, purchasing what we like, bargaining the prices down from astronomical to reasonable. I'm known here for getting the prices low and running a hard bargain.
Next stop, KFC! You would think we were all eating our last meal. I have never been so excited to see a KFC in my life! Me and a group of friends went and got some ice cream after. While I was eating my ice cream, I talked to a guy selling sun glasses and bought a pair. By the way, these guys walk around with thick styrofoam on their heads, probably 5 SQ FT, filled with sunglasses. Of course, they're all fake branded, even though they try to convince you otherwise. This resulted in 8 of these guys selling sunglasses to follow us into a parking lot, where we tried on sunglasses for abut 30 minutes. As it was time to leave, we said goodbye and started to walk away. We had about a half mile walk in thick traffic, no sidewalk, and no laws regulating pedestrians. So if you get hit, you're the dummy who walked in front of a car. We were chased by these guys trying to sell us sunglasses. We were walking in between traffic, trying to get them to go away. Because there was a crowd, other vendors selling wood carvings, postcards, and other useless crap starting following us as well. Finally, we saw our bus driving in the traffic, caught up to it, and jumped on as it was moving.
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