"finally, finally dem don show demsef" as the area boys in home country would say. after 13 days of constant electricity supply at about 1.00 AM GMT the lights went out. for a moment i wasn't sure what was happening. i went to peep at my window perchance that is was only in my apartment but i saw the whole neighborhood in pitch blackness. i waited for the tell tale sounds of generators blaring off and heard none. either my neighbors where exceedingly confident about the power situation or they were too much into serenity so they avoided noisy generators. i dozed off, i was woken about two hours later when the light returned. so far its been stable.
when i told a more seasoned 'immigrant' about the light situation. i was assured that it was a normal occurrence but that the light always came back. mentioned something about them just being back from an 'energy crisis' the famous energy crisis. well atleast its good to know that there some flaws in the energy system afterall. from lessons learnt in home country , if light is on for too long there must be a problem!
yesterday i confirmed the theory that all policemen given the same conditions will act in the same manner irrespective of the country they are in. on my way to renew my permit to drive around with naija number plates ( a small act of patriotism - the ima ndi anyi bu principle) i encountered the blue cloth fella's ( they wear navy blue here). the driver of my car was a ghanaian , he knew the way to the border i was a jjc. the police stopped us about 30 mins to be border asked for the car papers which i presented. he now asked the driver for his international driving license. now you only need such a license if you are a foreigner driving in another country. we were asked to park. though i'll say here the policemen are more polite when asking for egunje.
on parking i and the driver came out of the car. the driver was wearing leather sandal-like footwear with no buckles. the policeman asked him why he was improperly dressed for driving. that he needed to wear something that held his legs well in case of braking. so the driver was booked for driving with wrong credentials and not wearing the correct foot wear. we were asked to show up in the district court by 9.am the following morning and meanwhile they held onto the car papers. so the guy tells us we had to bring GH15 (roughly equivalent to $15). the driver insists we cant afford that. after wasting our time a bit they accepted GH8. in the trip to the border we encountered about 4 checkpoints in total and only one 'obtained' us. the one closest to the border.
just before we left there. the inspector called the driver aside and told him that he shouldn't say anything to anyone about letting us go after collecting money. that he is only trying to help us out, knowing the court delays and all. in essence the man was begging that it be not known that they took bribe. i was puzzled why the guy should be so worried then the driver later explained that the charges were trumped up. and that if we had to go to court he'd would have said we were brought after we couldn't give the money demanded. the way he spoke with confidence gave me the impression that such allegations would get the policemen in trouble and besides i was witness.
the experience with the customs i cant write about here. i have to protect the identity of some very helpful people should i need their services in future. the bottom line is that to get the renewal , i had to stamp my passport four times. i left ghana (one stamp) entered togo(another stamp) spent some hours by the beach, left togo ( yet another stamp) entered ghana ( the final stamp). with these i could ask for an extension of my driving permit by 30 more days.
i went to get more domestic stuff today. i got pots and a rug which has replaced the mattress. i'm seriously considering japanese like furnishing . have mats place on the floor that guests can sit on.
i heard some news which made me proud to be associated with home country. the central bank of ghana is pursuing soludo's ideas about banking. they raised the stakes for capital base to $50 million. from all indications the smaller banks will have to merge. so naija still leads in some things after all.
1 comment:
ride on...!
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