The Last Thing I Expected

One of our professors is the daughter of the former president of Ghana.  He ousted Nkrumah, and then was ousted by Nkrumah, but still – he was president. This professor, Dr. Busia, is a wonderfully dynamic woman. She is a full time professor at Rutgers University of English and specifically African Literature.  Her mother died in late January – the wife of the former president (now 30 years deceased), and we were invited to the funeral. Let’s keep in mind that Professor Busia is of royal lineage on both her mother’s and father’s side. This means that Nana Busia (her mother) was Ga royalty, and the family she had been married into for 60 years was Asante royalty. This subsequently means that it was a chief heavy funeral.

In Ghana, funerals are celebrations. Huge, gigantic, enormous celebrations. There is definitely an aspect of mourning and grief, but the point is to honor the dead in every way imaginable. So funerals often turn into whole neighborhood parties with food, drinks, music, dancing and various rituals. Everyone is invited.  This funeral was no exception, excepting that her and her husband’s family are all royalty. There was a whole tent for “chiefs” and literally entire pods of elders and ethnic leaders were chillin out watching one of the three groups of traditional drummers and dancers.

It was a great afternoon. Nisha and I had traditional print (white with black symbols, because the person who died was over 70) dresses made, and then we tro-tro’d to the event (miraculously…we were really lucky with some of the mates we encountered). It started at 1, so naturally we showed up at 2 and people were just beginning to get settled in. There were traditional proceedings, and a lot of shaking hands. Each group of people (kind of? Maybe? We couldn’t actually determine) got introduced over the loudspeaker (tons of huge speakers set up all over the place) and then went around and shook hands with everyone. Neat experience indeed. On our loop around, I stopped and talked to some women, and a couple that had a daughter going to school in Villanova.  Overall it was just a really awesome  event – we were lucky, in a way, to be able to see what goes on at such an epic traditional funeral of a really well loved first-lady. There was an air of sadness, but also an intent to remember with grace and happiness. It’s difficult to articulate, but Ghanaian views about death and mourning are very different from those in the West. Maybe more on that later.

Oh yeah. And Stevie Wonder was there. Legitimately sitting in the family section; apparently he’s a friend of the family. He didn’t sing – he was on the phone most of the time – but it was still pretty bizarre and cool. Yeah. I go to Ghana, go to the funeral of a royal former-first-lady, and see Stevie Wonder. These are the times I question just what else the universe has in store for me.

Comment, question – anything. Emails are also always appreciated J