By May of 2021, we (the scholarship recipients) were certain we’d finally be travelling to Türkiye for our educational experience. I was more than ready to leave UG. I just had one too many traumatic moments that it would be suspicious if I weren’t happy about leaving. So from April to May, I was traveling all over Accra, printing one document and the other, visiting the Turkish consulate and embassy to process my visa as well. And you know this travel story would never be complete without Okponglo traffic and extortionist taxi drivers but hey, that’s Accra for you!
I vividly remember one encounter where I was going to the embassy and took an uber. The driver and I got talking and he told me about the time he went to play football in Türkiye. Shocked? My state? An understatement. What were the odds? Where were the odds from? It was nice catching up with him on his experiences, why he came back to Ghana and was now working as a taxi driver. He even advised me to leave the country. If I were Nigerian, which I can say I am by association – my Nigerian friends will attest, I’d say everyone has to japa!
But let me take this opportunity to complain about the service industry in Ghana because why did I go to a shop to take a visa photograph, which this man knows very well he had no experience in taking, yet he made me sit down and took the UGLIEST picture I have ever seen of myself and went ahead to print it? Granted, I didn’t speak up but seriously! He even charged me for it, shamelessly! I have taken ugly pictures of myself in the past. Lord, forgive me for I knew not what I was doing. But this passport picture, the epitome of beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder, yet I was not even beholding anything. Not even myself! I took the picture and went to the embassy only to realize it was not even the right measurement. So I, a broke university student just paid for a set of ugly pictures of myself that are now in essence, useless. Oh, Ghana! I was redirected by the embassy to another photography spot that actually took a cute picture but whew, did he not charge me an arm and a leg? Why was it so expensive, you ask? Oh because he set up his tentlike shop close to the embassy. Yes, the location factors into the cost, interestingly. So, you get horrible quality, you pay. You get good quality and now they demand body parts in payment. Lord, your children are not childrening!
From extortionist taxi drivers to bad photographers to extortionist ones to students who want to japa, everyone is just trying to earn a living in this country. That’s what I tell myself in consolation.
Thankfully, everything else works out – the way things work out in Ghana, and I get my visa. Yep! Your girl finally had a second visa in her passport.
I had already started planning the luggage I would take. Had started wondering how much luggage I could actually carry onto that flight. I finally decided to use the suitcases I had won from the PTA as the best graduating student from my high school(I’m saying this as if I had a market of suitcases to choose from). After my final exams, I went home and began the preparation to leave for Türkiye.
The hardest part about achievements such as this is saying goodbye. I remember when I said my first ‘international goodbye’ to my family. I had won the US government scholarship to study on the KL-YES program in the US for a year. I remember all the sad faces I had to say goodbye to and most importantly, I remember seeing my dad cry for the first time ever when I returned. A story I will never get tired of telling. I even won an award from Xiaomi because of this story. Anyway, I digress. I packed all I could fit into my luggage and headed to the Kotoka International Airport on the 20th of June after a host of sad goodbyes.
After 5 hours on a manhole-like pothole filled road from the Volta Region, I arrived in Accra only to meet the worst Accra traffic I’ve ever encountered. Lord! If I want to wait out the traffic out, I will definitely miss my flight. Dear Universe, who did I offend? I called a friend who was operating an uber at that time and he picked me up. He managed to find some less traffic ridden roads and got me to the airport in time. I was beyond grateful.
I went to check in only to find out my luggage was extremely overweight. Yep, my dad’s scales had failed me! Thankfully, because I didn’t have any hand luggage, aside my guitar, one of the porters at the airport advised me to buy and ‘Ghana-must-go’ and put the overweight items in it and carry them as my hand luggage. And you guessed it, Ghana-must-goes cost an arm and a leg at the airport. Once again, the location and demand determined the price. Oh this country of mine. I got my things into that luggage and was finally able to check in. But not without one of the ladies at the counter trying to be a headache. Asking why I had a guitar and a hand luggage. Miss ma’am, do you not know Turkish airlines policies? Why are you working for them? Shame! Thankfully, another gentleman came to my rescue and explained to her. My friends and I boarded but only after having a photoshoot and marveling over how far we’d come.
Ghana, I’m finally leaving!
Türkiye, here I come!
to be continued...
GLOSSARY:
Japa: leaving one's country to seek greener pastures.
KL-YES program: a student exchange program sponsored the United States Department of State
Ghana-must-go: a bag woven with rubber that is usually very colorful
PLAYLIST:
My mother - Ms. Vee and Yemi Alade
Category: Türkiye Geçilmez
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