The pepper and the Child

It gets so amazing when we continue to deceive ourselves with the white man mentality and a way of doing things.

I get so frustrated about our policies and some rules, it seems the African child is different from the American Child so our policies must be related to the present conditions of the Ghanian Child. That just by the way, what I really wants to talk about is an experience I had when I boarded a metro mass bus.

I was traveling from Damongo in the Northern Region to Wa in the Upper West region. It took us hours to wait for the Metro Mass Transits. The passengers were virtually 80% more than the bus, so is all about struggling to enter or the better choice could be standing in the bus.

When we waited and the bus finally arrived that morning around 8am, I managed to get a sit with a help of a gentleman who really had sympathy on me, she couldn't imagine a pretty girl struggling with macho men for a seat.

After those who were fortunate got a seat to sit, the unfortunate once were standing, whiles others were sitting on their cloths in the bus, suddenly, a certain man appeared from outside and started to push the oldmen and women siting on the floor to stand up because in America passengers stand in the car, they don't really sit on the floor, not knowing this man, was coming to load the car, with red dried pepper and fish, the dried "keta school boys" , the pepper was loaded in the a very big torn fertilizer bags, which were placed rightly beside my sit after that, baskets of fish were placed on the bags of these hot pepper. After loading the goods in the bus, we set off peacefully.

The road from Damongo to a town called Saula which is about 2 and half hours to 3hours, have never seen a coal tar before it was a very unbearable dusty road to travel on.

My gentleness was no where to be found because, you can't recognize this pretty lady dressed neatly in blue jense trousers with high neck green top. I was totally disfigured by the time I got to Wa.

Now let's come to the real issue, the wind blowing from outside into this bus is hell, the doors of the bus were not properly closed because, I guessed they have been damaged some months back.

Now is all about the the dusty wind and the pepper. We kept on sneezing in the bus until we got to our destinations, my head was aching severely, I couldn't withstand the pepper both in my eyes and in my nose. There was this little girl which was about 3months old in the car which, she kept on crying and sneezing because of the pepper and her mum was siting on the bags of the pepper, those who were tired of standing just decided to sit on the bags of pepper some were even sleeping on it.

It was unfortunate about this little girl, since her mother was sitting on the pepper, the smell was to much for she couldn't hold, but gave a deep breadth and slept for about 15minutes, at that moment, I was scared I thought she was dead, then when she woke up her mother decided to change the dress and the pants for her, but the pains of these child became so severe because, as the mother has touched the bags with her hands, before changing for her, so the whole issue was like the mother was rather smearing the pepper on her body.The Baby girl was really in hell until we got to our final destinations.

It is rather unfortunate of how we treat our own fellow human being badly because of money. I think the authorities in charge of these buses should critically monitor how those in the remote areas use these buses.

At least the company is old enough to correct some errors in using these buses on the road.

Ms. Shallom Lumor
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