kumasi

the trip to kumasi was beautiful. we passed through a lot of interesting towns. we didn't get to go to the butterfly sanctuary, unfortunately, because it was raining a lot and the road to the sanctuary is poor and our bus would've gotten stuck.

kumasi is very different than accra. first of all, it has about half the people, 500,000 to accra's million. the infrastructure in kumasi is much much better than accra. allll the roads are paved, the buildings are bigger, there are less shanti-like structures. i think the reasons for this are that kumasi has historically always been a very busy place, so the infrastructure is more developed. they also have less people to accomodate for. there are more people in muslim garb as well, which is because of kumasi's more northern location. we're staying at a reallyyy nice hotel called the Miklin.

last night we had dinner at the hotel and watching the VERY disappointing ghana vs. uruguay game. (i can't even comment on it i'm so mad still. i hate uruguay, cheating scum). today we went on a tour of kumasi. we visited the palace museum, we didn't get to visit the actual palace where the Asantehene (asante king) lives. the museum was cool; it was where the first few asantehene's lived and they preserved it the way the lived in it, with added artifacts and life-sized replicas of the past kings and queen mothers. by the way, the queen mother of asante isn't the king's wife. she is the one who decides the king, because the asante are a matrilineal society (where all power passes down from the mother's lineage). then we drove to a site where a sword was stuck into the ground and no one has been able to remove it. even muhammed ali tried and couldn't. next we went to a cultural center, or a small market, and shopped for 45 minutes. i bought 3 carvings, 3 bracelets, a key chain and a painting for 50 cedi! ghana is great.

i have to go to dinner now and i'm supposed to meet up with father anthony later tonight. hopefully i'll be able to post again soon.