Wassa Domama Village and the best weekend of my life

Last weekend, well starting on Thursday, all 60 of us left Legon for Cape Coast. We went to a slave castle where some of the slaves were held before the middle passage. I was expecting it to feel a bit like the concentration camp I visited, but it was a completely different feeling to be in this amazing white castle on the ocean where it was so beautiful, yet also at the same time be in a place that was tainted with unimaginable cruelty. After lunch we were supposed to go to another slave castle in Elmina but I joined a group that left early to travel for the weekend.
We started out walking down the road towards a tro tro station and I finally felt free from the massive spectacle we were of 60 Americans. People here are so helpful we saved a lot of walking time and ended up at the Hans Cottage Botel, a very nice German owned hotel on a pretty large pond of crocodiles. It was so cool to see them gliding through the water. The next day we went to Kakum National Park for the only canopy walk in Africa. It was a series of 7 rope bridges through the canopies, I think 140m high. The view was amazing, and the forest just went on forever. It is this misty blue green color where the canopy meets the sky. There were lots of bird sounds and tiny butterflies but besides that everything comes out at night. After a guided walking tour where we learned a lot about traditional medicine from certain plants we found a driver that would take us to Wassa Domama Village. It was the closest place we could stay to the Domama Rock Shrine we were trying to get too.
On the way to the village we would pass little hamlets of people working and cooking. I saw a woman with a tree on her head and a baby on her back. The village was very welcoming. It is about 1,000 people with no electricity or running water. Almost everything that was there came from the area, so the huts were all natural mud and bamboo. I felt like we were in a historical recreation of some anthropological ethnographic study. It was amazing. The whole weekend we had Kofi as our guide. He took us through people's farms and cocoa groves to see how the beans are harvested for cocoa powder. The fruit is actually very sweet. You break open the pods once they turn yellow and there are a ton of squishy tropical starburst tasting beans inside that you can suck the fruit off. They are so good I can't stop thinking about them! The whole time kids would follow us and want to be carried or sung too. I will never forget this one girl in a blue dress, probably about 6 years old who was on my friends back smiling and holding on so tight with her eyes closed, as if she was trying to hold on to the moment forever, and at the same time I think all of us were doing the same thing. We spent the rest of the day playing with the kids in the village who would move us around like puppets and make us dance for them, and then they would dance for us. That night we were invited to meet the chief of the village. It is customary to bring a bottle of schnapps, so when we went we could drink and pour libations to the ancestors. The chief was very welcoming and eager to hear our input about his eco-tourist village and what could make it better. He had had peace corps volunteers in the village before who had helped to create a eco-tourist "attraction." It was so cool to see the impact the volunteers had, and find their projects as successful and self sustaining. I have seen so much cynicism around those ideas and it is nice to see and be part of the positive effects in real life. Anyway, I couldn't believe I was there on the chief's porch, meeting the village elders, pouring libations and sharing blessings, and talking about the future of this village that had welcomed us in, as if they truly didn't know what tourism was. The chief wanted to know our mission and how he could help us. When we told him we were there to find the rock shrine and just experience the culture he invited us to stay another night for free so we could meet more of the elders and have a small festival with food and dancing. All 8 of us just looked at each other and knew that we had no way of wrapping our minds around this place and each minute amazing things were happening that we had never seen before so we just kept smiling and of course said yes.
The next morning we left early for the shrine. All we knew was that it was a giant rock in the jungle. We drove for a while and then walked a kilometer or so through this amazing jungle that was so dense and varying in so many plant species, all a brilliant green. None of the plants were poisonous and the ground was wet and soft. The vines made everything look that more prehistoric looking. It was beautiful how they twisted around everything in huge swooping spirals all over the place. Every now and then we would walk through a farmers field of cocoa or plantains, sugar, mangoes... Approaching the rock was like finding a treasure. All we had seen was plants and trees that went on forever and then all of a sudden, there was 2 huge 50 foot tall smooth dark gray and mossy green rocks leaning up against each other, with a third on top to make a cave through the middle. There were lots of schnapps bottles and offerings inside and the rock is believed to have medicinal benefits. Twisting roots and vines came down from the top of the rock and we used them to climb straight up the rock face. We climbed two more levels and then from the top you could see the canopy once again. My shoes were slippery so I climbed it barefoot. The earth was so soft and on the way down I grabbed a vine and swung off like Tarzan. Halie and I agreed that it is the best mode of transportation.
Once we got back to the village it poured. I stood out in the rain, eating oranges, trying to feel every drop because it was an amazing rainstorm in the rainforest and because it was the only shower I was going to get in a few days. That night the elders from farther way couldn't make it because of the rain, but the chief mother was there. It was amazing to see how revered she was and how the society was matrilineal. This time the elders chose to appoint us positions in the tribe. Halie was made the Queen of the Footsoldiers and I was made the Linguist Chairwoman to the Queen Mother. The Queen Mother also gave her bracelet that has her mark on it to another one of us, who she appointed Queen Mother as well. It was amazing to be sitting there with the light of an oil lamp and fireflies. I realized some village children had fit their faces between the slats of the porch walls and were watching the ceremony too. Because we had brought more schnapps, more libations were poured. This time Halie was asked to say them. It is really hard for me to explain what happened because I think the whole time we were pinching ourselves, but it was definitely real. The chief and elders invited us back for a ceremony where we would be presented to the village with our village positions and they want to post our names and pictures in the guest lodge. That night lying on the floor (every bed I slept in that weekend broke...) in complete darkness where we couldn't even see our hands a centimeter from our faces I heard the most hysterical crying and screaming. The mourning went on through the night and before the sun came up I heard drums. We found out later that a mothers 3 month old had died after being sick and not responding well to treatment.
The next morning we set off for home. We were about 4 0r 5 hours from the university and we were really lucky and avoided the broken bus we were supposed to be on and and even switched to our orientation university bus that had been driving behind us later . Some more people from the program had luckily found their way onto that bus too. We were almost back and starting to hear about everyone elses crazy adventures from the weekend...