Email from Sandra: The album of Osu

I was about turning into the road behind the Accra Sports Stadium, to reach the High Street in Accra last Friday morning when I noticed that the thoroughfare was blocked.

 A policeman who was standing close by signaled me to take a different turn to join the Osu Castle Road; a road which would eventually usher me to the High Street. 

 Initially, I wasn’t too enthused about the idea of driving through those unfamiliar routes.  But when I realised that the directive was the next best option, there was really very little I could do.  

I obliged and drove slowly through the narrow lanes which meandered in between prehistoric family houses - ancient foundations which inaudibly knew more about the Danish colonial rule and its attending experiences, than any other.

The thicket of human and vehicular traffic, probably due to the diversion, made movements real slow.  I had the chance to make involuntary observations after the similitude of an anthropologist.  

Some “Osuians”, mainly women, washed by the side of the gutters outside their homes; others sold in house-front shops.  A few more could be seen through their opened gates, cooking on their compounds.  

Happy toddlers ran across the choked road in careless abandon.  Three grey haired men who wore black, sat on two separate benches at the front of a freshly painted house, holding a meeting.  Nice cocktailed aroma of commercial meals – boiling kenkey with fried fish, fried rice with chicken, Red Red, all  filled the air.  

Two matured he-goats stood in front of a drinking spot, starring at the vehicular traffic as though they had never seen moving engines on those slim roads.  Young folks, mainly women, carried large pans of water on their heads.  

Then I wondered how a town as Osu, planted firmly and deeply in the heart of the nation’s capital, could be deprived of running water.  

The lanes along which I travelled were really very busy.  Then I noticed something peculiar about the walls along my route. The walls!  The walls along the travelled paths looked like large murals of picturesque happenings in and around town.  They had hoards of posters of activities pasted on them under dissimilar captions.  “Revival, Revival, Revival,” was a heading of a group photo of prophets who were to be featuring at a programme to be held in the first week of March in Accra.  

Others were, My Story Must Change, Call it Quits, Suffer No More, Arise and Shine, Tooth For Tooth.  These all bore photos mainly of men, scheduled for upcoming and past programs which were yet to be held or had been held in Accra.  Skip Over, Jump Over, Cross Fire, Rise to Victory, were titles of other bills of worship services which showed the various prophets who would be sermonising at those programmes; those services seemed to have been held during the last night of last year. 

 Some of the photos, were printed on water proof banners which had been hanged along the walls to sway to and fro in the breeze of the Atlantic Ocean.  There and then, I concluded that the people of Osu were very religious.

On the walls were also posted recent and old posters of Nigerian and Ghanaian movies.  Posters which indicated which foreign football team was playing against which team, and which venue these matches could be watched, were also littered on the walls.  

Posters indicating which drinking spot was offering best deals were also found among the lot.  I also concluded that the people of Osu, no doubt, were a joyful group which loved entertainment.

I had always seen posters of death announcements on walls, but had never really paid attention to them like I did on Friday.  I saw on the walls of Osu, the photographs of many a dearly departed.  Truth be told, the walls simply looked like huge photo albums, fit for the Guinness Book of Records.  

The photos, which looked as though they were in competition with each other, had all sorts of captions:  Obituary, At Rest, Call To Glory, Celebration Of Life, Gone Too Soon, What A Shock, Home Call, A Life Well Lived, Transition among others.   With these, I concluded that the people of Osu loved to mourn with those who mourned. 

Glad to have had time to commit to memory, all those captions, I began to wonder what factors informed the choice of each header. When I eventually arrived at work that morning, I entered into a discussion with some of my co-equals and these were some of the jocularly interesting views articulated in respect of chosen captions:

“Obituary is old-fashioned.  It is used for those whose families had to put in a lot of effort into gathering of funds for the funeral.  Such families do not really expect a lot of cash in return for any effort.  Donations at such funerals are less”. 

At Rest as explained by my colleague, “is usually used for those over eighty who were afflicted with a disease or two who need to go find good rest”.

Call To Glory, I was made to understand is used for those whose enemies thought had succeeded in ending their lives, but who didn’t know, that the demise of their victims would serve as a catalyst to their glorious habitation. 

Celebration Of Life, am told, is used mostly for those who used to attend either a Pentecostal, Apostolic or Charismatic church.  Those churches, I hear, are optimistic about the passing on of a person; they believe there should be a celebration rather than mourning because really, there is life after death.

Gone Too Soon and What A Shock are mainly for the youth.  Especially persons whose passing on took place unexpectedly.”  “Those captions invoke a lot of tears”.

Home Call and Transition: Used as caption for those who had lived long and obviously had to answer to the roll call of the heavens.  Black and white is mostly the colour used for such funerals.

“Ablah, A Life Well Lived is normally used for the rich whose relatives have hope of getting good shares in the properties left behind. 

Do you have differing views?  Please feel free to send me your definitions on the captions too.  Enjoy your weekend.