Christmas Day in Ghana
- Jenna
- Apr 3, 2019
- 4 min read
Spending fourteen days over the Christmas holiday in Ghana will stay with me forever. The Christmas holiday itself was unique, challenging and beautiful. The experience of being exposed to and learning how another culture celebrates Christmas was challenging, as it exposed me to my own conceptions and associations held toward the holiday, thereby stretching me and my level of comfort. The holiday was joyful, vibrant and full of community.
During our time in Accra, Molly and I shared a room. Our Christmas morning began quite early and started off with some dancing*, Nescafe, chocolate and peanut brittle (all before breakfast, of course). It was pretty perfect.
*If you want to hear some of the tunes we danced to on Christmas morning, check out the Ghana Blog playlist (specifically Early by Juls)!
As a unit, we spent Christmas morning with a dance rehearsal to prepare for our performance later in the afternoon. During our time in Ghana, we had the amazing opportunity to learn traditional West African Dance from Mr. Charles at the University of Ghana. We learned three different dances, Batcha, Gahu, and Tokoe, as well as two traditional songs.
After dance class, everyone gathered together into our Trotro to head back to the house to celebrate Christmas - drums included!
Our Trotro ride was an experience - with 13 people and two drums! We celebrated Christmas during the drive with festive hats and lots of singing and dancing.
Christmas Festivities in Accra, Ghana
Christmas Day is traditionally celebrated through the sharing of food with family, friends and neighbors. Holidays in Ghana are celebrated by traveling from house to house and sharing meals with those you love. This makes holidays in Ghana quite special, particularly for children, because many meals are enjoyed. Each family prepares a dish that is special to them and their own culture, which is then shared with whoever visits.
While we were dancing, Auntie spent the morning preparing Fufu and Light Soup, the meal which was served to our guests for our Christmas celebration. Fufu, a traditional dish of the Akan people is made of boiled cassava and plantains. After the cassava and plantains are cooked and soft, they are mashed and mixed with cassava flour (or other flour) until no clumps remain. The dough is then shaped into portions and served.
Fufu is a unique food from a Western lense in that it's texture is not similar to anything within the American cuisine. Fufu is smooth and slimy all at once, and completely delicious. Fufu is traditionally eaten with your clean right hand and shared with family or friends, as displayed in the picture below. We each pinched off a piece of fufu, created a cavity in our piece and used it as a tool to scoop up some Light soup to enjoy.
Pictures of our time celebrating Christmas Day!
Throughout the day, loud and energetic music was played to honor the celebration of the birth of Jesus. Approximately 71% of Ghanaians are Christian (1). In the US for my family, Christmas is typically a quiet day spent with family and maybe close friends. Music that is playing throughout the day is played softly, with an occasional festive track or two. In Ghana, beginning before 7 am, there were speakers set up outside the house blasting music. In the morning, festive music played and by the afternoon, there was a lot of Michael Jackson. The music and high energy continued all day. By the afternoon, many of us (Americans) had headaches and felt over stimulated. It was a very interesting experience and I believe it challenged all of us in hearing very loud music constantly as well as our idea of how Christmas is celebrated.
The real challenge for me personally occurred on Boxing Day. The morning after Christmas, beautiful soft music played from the speakers. The music was festive and I became so happy until anger hit me with the thought of, this is what we should have experienced on Christmas day. It was a cultural experience for me to acknowledge and work through, as Christmas is celebrated differently in different cultures. I did not anticipate the emotional responses to these differences. This is the beauty of experiencing another culture - being pushed outside of your comfort.
A video of music on the morning of Boxing Day
Back to Christmas Day...
In the afternoon, we performed the three dances Mr. Charles had been teaching us. The two traditional songs Mr. Charles taught us are components of two of these dances, which we sung during the performance. Here are a few images from each respective dance.
The Gahu Dance
The Tokoe Dance
The Batcha Dance
Aside from the dance steps, movements and traditional songs, I learned two important lessons from Mr. Charles regarding West African dancing:
1. Always respect the master drummer
2. Don't think about it
The master drummer has the power to change the rhythm at any point. Therefore, they always deserve your respect. Be sure to always thank the master drummer and do not wrong them, or they can make you look like a fool. The dances we learned are all based on rhythm. Rather than memorizing the next move, Mr. Charles asked us to feel and hear the rhythm. The drums will always tell you what move to do, therefore you do not need to memorize what is coming as the drummer may change up the order or tempo at any point. This is why you should always have a good relationship with your drummer, and not overthink the dance moves. Feel it rather than think about it. Which is hard to do coming from an Western dance culture - and yet, this can also be very freeing.
Friends and family during the dance performance
Merry Christmas from Ghana (a few months late)!
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