Destination: Ghana : A Heritage Reclaimed : Travelers discover cherished rituals, a warm : reception and a panoply of color in West Africa

My mother was first. We had just left a dark room to sit on a row of stools in the center of a town called Akutukope in the village of Adutor, which is in the south-eastern part of Ghana. We had received wisdom from elders, been wrapped in fine handwoven cloth and adorned in strands of beads culled from the earth. And now, amid the noise of celebration, the head of the village, a woman, was guiding my mother before a man with a short black sword. My mother looked back at me and widened her eyes in an expression that was partly fear, but mostly anticipation.

The man raised the sword above her head and the crowd quieted. Then he began speaking in his language, Ewe, in a tone I recognized as one of pronouncement. The crowd cheered and, suddenly, I understood: My mother was being embraced by the people. And she was being renamed. Bea Johnson was now Queen Mother Ametoryor.

We hadn’t set out for the West African country of Ghana looking to be reclaimed. It started with our typical premise: Mom, my sister and I looking for a place to go together. Since 1990, we have visited the African continent twice, each time returning weeks later laden with gifts, better informed and filled with the desire to see more.

We choose countries to visit on little more than emotion and shreds of history. This year we wanted to see Ghana--the home of kente cloth, colonized Africa’s first independent president Kwame Nkrumah and a family friend. My sister, always good with games of chance, then won two round-trip tickets to Italy in a raffle, so she bowed out. So it was Mom and me, on the lookout for a group tour that promised education, adventure and shopping.

What we found was a tour filled with two dozen other American mothers and daughters traveling to West Africa to fulfill a sacred ritual, the rites of passage of a girl into womanhood. The trip was among those being handled by Alken Tours of Brooklyn, an agency in New York that had arranged other African trips we’d taken.

The sponsor was African Womanhood Is Mine, a Brooklyn-based organization founded in 1991 by elementary schoolteacher Barbara Brown Gathers. It strives to teach 11- to 13-year-old girls about responsibility to themselves, their families and their communities. This year, the program culminated in the ceremony in Ghana, and since there would be a rite for adult women, too, we signed up enthusiastically for the 10-day tour that included three nights in neighboring Cote D’Ivoire.

We arrived in Accra, Ghana’s bustling capital at 7 on a July evening this year. By the time we gathered by poolside tables at the Novotel Hotel for dinner, drums were sounding a welcome. In Africa, the drum has a voice--in its beats are tales of life, death, anger and war. The Novisi Cultural Group of Ghanian young people danced for us, leaping, shimmying and all the while smiling at our enjoyment and their own. Soon, the dancers came to our tables, taking our hands and encouraging us to join them. So, between bites of curried meats or groundnut stews, we did.

The next day we toured Accra with our Ghanian guides, Stephen and Patience (Pat), and our bus driver, Kwame, who all spoke English, one of the vestiges of British colonization.

With nearly 1 million people, Accra is a humming metropolis, its streets crowded with vendors, students in uniforms, beggars, housewives going to market and taxis. In fact, in Accra there were more taxis than I have ever seen anywhere. And through it all weave graceful women, balancing seemingly impossible loads on their heads, often with a baby bound to their backs. They move with languid ease, and I was spellbound by each example of sang-froid.

The wave of color in Ghanian fabrics heightens the vibrancy of the street scene. Between the ntama --the smooth cotton of which most everyday clothes are made--and the adinkra --a stamped, hand-stitched fabric--the city looks like an animated patchwork quilt. I longed to be off our tour bus, walking among that color, moving at its pace.

(Later, when my mother and I finally did stride along Accra’s streets, we had no trouble keeping up with the pace. But with no tall buildings as landmarks, we were lost after one wrong turn. A policeman smiled at our dilemma, hailed a taxi and negotiated a fare for us in a typical gesture of Ghanian hospitality.)

Our tour began at the National Museum, where artifacts chronicling the history of Ghana and all of Africa are on display. Although it is a modest building, among the treasures inside are extraordinary examples of kente, which means “handwoven,” the now-popular fabric indigenous to Ghana. Examples are displayed with the names, meanings and regions of particular patterns. One black-and-white pattern (originally all kente was black and white) was named Nyawoho, meaning “You have become rich,” because only a man worth a certain price in gold could wear that pattern--and even then he needed the king’s approval.

Afterward we headed to Kwame Nkrumah’s burial site. Ghana was the first African country to gain independence from Great Britain, in 1957, and Nkrumah became its first president. His tomb sits on the former polo grounds of British expatriates. The memorial park is immaculately manicured and absolutely spotless; when you walk onto the square, there’s an immediate sense of reverence.

Behind the tomb is a small, but thorough, museum documenting Nkrumah’s life and work, including his many books. Also on the grounds are trees planted by various dignitaries, including a small mango tree. The black sign with white lettering says it was planted by Nelson Mandela in 1991.

Lunchtime found us at the National Theatre, a sprawling, futuristic building completed in 1993. We ate at its restaurant, dining on mostly traditional Ghanian fare: kenkey , doughnut-shaped patties of ground fermented maize; kelewele , fried and spiced plantains; red red, a red bean sauce over fried plantains; and salad, roasted chicken, fish and mutton. Desert was fresh pineapple, as succulent and sweet as in Hawaii.

By this time, weary of bottled water, many of our group craved a bottle of Pepsi. But despite advertisements to the contrary, Coke seemed to rule in Accra. I’m not typically a soda drinker, but I developed an addiction to Muscatella, a crisp cream soda. One 10-ounce bottle was never enough.

Sated, we headed to the village of Osudoku, an hourlong drive east of Accra, where people of the Ga-Adagme ethnic group live. Osudoku was to be the scene of the girls’ two-day rites of passage.

Along the way, our bus passed artisans selling their wares--wicker hampers, baskets and chairs, and intricately carved blond wood doors and similarly sturdy bed frames. We also drove by lush fields in shades of greens ranging from lime to emerald and storefronts with names such as “As It Is in Heaven Fashion.” Schoolchildren in uniforms of brown and cream stared as we passed, some smiling and waving.

The preparation for the rites had been set months in advance, so the people of Osudoku were awaiting our arrival. The elder women of the village sat on benches in front of the home of the area’s head chief, Nene Klagbordzor Animle V; we were to be presented to him.

We removed our shoes at the door and were led upstairs. The chief was a smooth-skinned man in his 60s swathed in navy batik and wearing thick glasses. Around his living room were six of the kind of chairs you sink into, upholstered in wool despite the temperate climate.

He explained the purpose of the rites to our group, saying that although they are still intended to prepare young women for life as adults, they now also are seen as a way to help prevent teen pregnancy, by teaching the girls a better sense of personal responsibility.

Needless to say, the rites would not include circumcision. Although an estimated 80 million African girls, from Senegal to Somalia, have undergone female circumcision, the villages we visited don’t follow the practice. Two years ago, on a trip to Senegal, I asked a guide about the prevalence of the practice in that country. He said it still occurred in some villages, but that as more women came to the city, fewer followed the tradition.

After meeting with the chief, our group was separated. The mothers, and all of us adult women, sat outside of the chief’s house while the eight American girls were led away to be dressed for the ceremony.

Wrapped in colorful prints and wearing toquelike straw hats, the girls were led to a concrete area just beyond the chief’s house where the elders had poured libations of wine or oils on the ground to acknowledge ancestors and show faith. Some of the elders shook gourds and danced around them, as others tied a strand of straw around each girl’s neck. Soon they were all singing a melodic chant that translated, “Our lost friends are back home, rejoice that they have returned home.” The first day ended with singing and dancing and the pouring of talcum powder on the girls’ shoulders and faces, a sign of purity. The heat and the celebrating had left us exhausted and nearly all of us slept on the way back to Accra.

The next day in Osudoku was an even noisier one. The children were out in full force. Soon, two of the women in our group had them form a huge circle and in short order, the group was dancing and playing Ring Around the Roses. I’d brought two packs of Polaroid film. I began taking pictures and giving them out as small gifts. Twenty pictures were gone in less than 10 minutes.

The drums began to speak, and the village’s initiates came out. They entered the concrete area united in a dance, stepping twice quickly on each foot, arms out, palms down. At first they faced the crowd, but after a while they did the step while slowly turning. It seemed a step they were born knowing.

Then our girls came out, one at a time. Like the village girls, they were adorned with beads and their skin decoratively striped with dried clay. The women of the village watched as our girls entered to see whether they did the step correctly. The first girl did, earning smiles of approval from the village women. We beamed.

Soon the entire group was dancing amid a clamor of clanging cowbells, pounding drumbeats, melodic intonations and shouts in a language we could not understand. And then, suddenly, it was over.

Leaving Accra, we stayed overnight at the two-star Villa Cisneros in nearby Sogakope, owned by a Ghanian UCLA graduate and built along the eastern bank of the dark waters of the Volta River. Some of the 55 rooms are bungalows, and some of them have hot water; we hit the jackpot with both air-conditioning and a ceiling fan. Other than that, the room was pretty basic: twin beds with clean but not necessarily matching sheets, an ancient mini-fridge, one really low chair, and a wood closet with a skinny full-length mirror and a television with remote control. The bathroom was lovely, sparkling clean and outfitted with a towel and bar of soap for each guest. The facilities included a home-style restaurant, a pool, tennis courts and swing sets.

Our reception in Akutukope was especially warm because of a memory that has been kept alive since the 17th Century when white men first appeared there. Villagers had never seen such people before, but they grew to trust and befriend the newcomers. Then one day, during a celebration, the white men invited them onto their ship. It was a trick. In one fell swoop, many of the people of Akutukope went dancing and singing onto a ship that would send them toward enslavement.

Although other villagers were captured at other times, this was the only mass exodus, so it is the most remembered. Because of this, when we arrived in Akutukope for the dageye or women’s rites, we were treated not as special visitors, but as people returning.

Our reception was of a magnitude that would humble anyone. There was royalty relaxing under huge umbrellas of red, blue, yellow, pink and green triangles, the men holding staffs topped with ivory figures, the women draped in multiple necklaces. The queen mother of the village, who was also a teacher, greeted us and led us to our places of honor. We were treated to traditional dances and songs by the village’s children, just like a grade school performance. Everything was translated by a passionate young man.

The celebration went on after the women participating in the rites were led into a private room. There we met with the women elders. Traditionally, the rites are for those getting married or who have had children. They focus on fertility, but also on productivity, emphasizing the many skills needed to help support a family. In, Akutukope the rites are typically three weeks long.

Since our time was limited, we asked the elders questions as they showed us various weaving techniques, the specialty of their village. At first, the questions were benign; someone asked advice on keeping a marriage happy. Things loosened up with the question, “What do you do when your husband gets on your nerves?” From there, we asked about domestic abuse, childlessness, herbal hygiene formulas and how men are prepared for marriage. After we were done, one of the elders said she had a question for us. How, she wondered, could they raise their children these days at a time when they were moving into the cities, losing their sense of tradition and watching videos. We laughed ruefully at the familiar dilemma.

As we talked, other women and elders began adorning us with beads, nearly all knotted with strands of splayed raffia. Kente that had been woven for the occasion was tied around us and we were led outside and seated on arklike stools, called sese-zik pe , to await what was next. In front of us was a table covered in white with large bowls of scented powders, perfumes and soaps.

Suddenly, my mother, as the oldest mother, was called forward. A member of the royal family stood before her and held a black metal sword with shapes cut out of it, above her head. He intoned: “Upon this sword I swear before the gods and ancestors that today you have been identified as a true daughter of this town. I give you this name.” And then he renamed my mother Queen Mother Ametoryor, a name of a prominent woman in the village, meaning “what is hers is hers.” When my turn came, I was named Borborloer, meaning “gentleness and tolerance is essential in life.” The ceremony ended as all do, with dancing.

The next day our group headed west of Accra to the coast of Ghana to visit the Elmina and Cape Coast forts, once used for slave trading. Although it was the rainy season in Ghana, we had seen only sunny days during our stay. But as we got closer to the coast, it was windy and overcast, adding a solemn feel to our visit. We arrived in Elmina, a town peppered with palm and coconut trees, with roads of red dirt. As we headed through gates up a hill toward the fort, we passed the central fishing village, which was packed with skiffs, canoes, dories and catamarans flying flags of various nations. Hundreds of people were shopping in the area, which was surrounded by faded bi- and tri-level stone houses of white and yellow.

The Elmina fort was built by the Portuguese in 1482 as a post for trading gold and ivory. In the early 16th Century, slavery became a more lucrative business. By 1637, the Dutch had taken the fort over and held it until 1872 when it became British property. Converted into a barracks during World War II, its next incarnation came in 1948 when it was turned into a police academy for the colonial force. That ended after Ghana’s independence.

Because the Dutch held it longest as a slave post, their presence is most strongly felt. Chiseled in a large stone in the courtyard is a memorial in Dutch praising a governor who died of cholera at the fort. Over the door of a room used as a chapel is the 132nd Psalm.

From the outside, the fort looks almost new. It’s a soft white color with strong stone barricades in place and a cannon peaking over a high wall. But standing within its vast courtyard, you can see its age. The cannon is crumbling and the walls are mildewed from more than 500 years of ocean air. But the feeling of sorrow and agony still lingers. A guide showed us the iron balls shackled to captives’ legs as part of a punishment that included hours standing in the sun. We saw two cells with a skull and crossbones symbol over the entrance. One was for soldiers who broke regulations. The other was for those condemned to death. Some of those were pirates, but most were captives who tried to start rebellions. They were put in the room and starved to death, then tied to rocks and dropped to the bottom of the ocean.

Near the women’s dungeons, we were shown a small staircase leading to a trap door just beyond the governor’s room. It was common, the guide said, for the governor to point to a female captive who was brought to his room where she would be raped.

Then the guide led us to the Door of No Return. This was an entryway ships used for loading the captives. The opening was small to make escape difficult. Many of us walked to the door and stood in it, looking out at the ocean and the fishing boats. We were all quiet, the only sound was the Atlantic’s pounding surf. That sound had seemed so soothing, but as I stood in the doorway, it saddened me. I thought of the captured Africans hearing the waves, a sound so familiar, a sound of home.

We were all emotionally drained as we headed to the Cape Coast fort. It had special resonance, though. The night before in an open-air theater in Accra, we had seen the movie “Sankofa,” which was written, produced and directed by Ethiopian-born, UCLA-educated director Haile Gerima. The title is an Akan word meaning, “returning to the past to go forward,” and the plot tells of a woman transformed after a visit to the Cape Coast fort.

The fort was built by Swedes and then went from Dutch to British hands. Cape Coast was once the capital of Ghana and the fort served as a seat of English government. We got a brief tour of the dungeons and the trading room that still smelled of the kerosene used to clean the floors hundreds of years ago. The guide then led us to the courtyard where a stage had been set up. Students from the University of Ghana School of Performing Arts acted in the play “Ghana Is Home: The Return” for us. The play chronicles the advent of colonialism in Ghana and the changes it wrought in the people. It ended with the actors taking us into one of the dungeons. As we entered the darkness, we were given lighted white candles. Once we were all inside, Pat asked us to blow them out so that we could experience the darkness the captives did. Many in our group cried, but the actors wanted to end on a note of hopefulness. As we left, they sang: “Come with me on this happy trip back to the Promised Land. Welcome Home.”

Of the trips my mother and I have taken, this was the most fulfilling. This time, instead of returning with the notion of seeing more of Africa, we returned with the notion of seeing more of Ghana.

GUIDEBOOK: Going to Ghana

Getting there: From Los Angeles, fly to Accra via JFK in New York, changing to Ghana Air, or fly via various European capitals on KLM, British Airways, Swissair and Alitalia. Round-trip fares to Accra, connecting in New York, start at about $1,940; through Europe, round-trip fares start at about $2,230. If you are interested in making more than one stop in West Africa, Air Afrique or Ghana Air have more packages and better fares. But service on African airlines is minimal by U.S. standards, and you must connect through New York.

Ghana tours: Among generally recommended agencies for travel to West Africa: Henderson Travel Service, 900 2nd St., N.E., Suite 7, Washington, D.C. 20002; telephone (800) 327-2309. In the Los Angeles area, Kola Nut Travel (in the Vons Market at 500 E. Manchester, Inglewood, Calif. 90301; tel. (310) 674-0291), arranges tours to West African nations.

My trip was arranged by Alken Tours, 1661 Nostrand Ave., Brooklyn, N.Y. 11226; tel. (800) 327-9974. Next year’s trip is scheduled for July 12-July 22, and will cost about $2,600. Included are: round-trip airfare; three nights at the Golf International Hotel in Abijan, Cote D’Ivoire; six nights at the Novotel in Accra, Ghana; one night at the Elmina Hotel in Cape Coast, Ghana; continental breakfasts and dinners; all ground arrangements, round-trip transfers and baggage handling. For more information, contact Barbara Brown Gathers, African Womanhood Is Mine, P.O. Box 201, St. Johns Station, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11213-0004.

For more information: Call or write the Embassy of Ghana, Tourist Information, 3512 International Drive N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008; tel. (202) 686-4520.