Barack Obama arrived in Ghana late on Friday night, spoke to Parliament Saturday morning, and visited the slave castle in Cape Coast Saturday afternoon.
It is a massive understatement to say that Ghana was excited for his visit. After he made the announcement that he would be visiting Ghana, it seemed that every fourth word the next day was "Obama". About a week before he arrived, there were massive billboards erected to greet him.
I don't exactly look American, so I didn't personally experience the pro-Americanism sentiment. However, I witnessed an elderly vendor spontaneously break into a chant of "Obama Obama Obama!" when my American friend walked past. He told me that this sort of thing happens to him all the time. The whole city was buzzing with anticipation! People even had clothes made with Obama's face featured on the fabric's print.
Obama visited Ghana because of the country's history of peaceful, stable democracy. This was his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa. He passed over larger countries, including his father's Kenya. These simple facts combined to instill a tremendous sense in Ghanaians, who are generally a proud people in the first instance.
We camped out Saturday morning, at a busy intersection, hoping to get a glimpse of him. Despite waiting for approximately five hours, we ultimately didn't get a glimpse of him up close. We did see the current Ghanaian President, John Atta-Mills, as well as the popular former-President Jerry Rawlings.
His speech (to which I listened while huddled around a car radio) emphasized the need for African self-sufficiency. My favorite line, delivered near the beginning, was "We must start from the simple premise that Africa's future is up to Africans." It was a simple phrase that carried great meaning for the people of Ghana, and Africa.
I also had a, "Wow, we're in the 21st century moment" while listening to the radio in the run-up to his visit. The American government was advertising a service, where you could register via text message to receive live SMS updates from Obama's speech. Firstly, it showed how willing Obama is to leverage technology to his advantage. Moreover, though, I think it illustrated one of the chief surprises I've encountered while in Ghana. Growing up in the 80s, I can still remember a time when cell phones were luxuries restricted to the elite few. Nowadays, in Ghana, one of the world's most impoverished countries it seems that almost everyone has a cell phone! I find this interesting, because the telecommunications industry has almost entirely leap-frogged the land-line phase (greatly reducing the infrastructure demands of establishing a communications network). There's actually a 3.5G network in Ghana (that being said, browsing the interwebs on your iPhone is a surefire way to incur a four-digit cell phone bill).
So, in conclusion, Obama is my homeboy.
