Like a Kid in a Candy Store

I love Accra. It's another world compared to Kumasi. Here I've got tons of restaurants, an ultra-modern shopping mall, a giant cinema (I've watched Angels and Demons as well as Mall Cop since I've been here), the National Theater, a beautiful sandy beach on the Atlantic, and hotel swimming pools that can be used for a couple of bucks a day.

Now, one thing about Ghana that I find less than spectacular is their food. I'm sorry, I know its un-EWB-esque of me. When I was in Zambia, I couldn't get enough nshima! Here it's a different story though. When I got to Accra, the first place I went to was the giant obruni supermarket.

I literally walked down each aisle with my jaw dropped to the floor, awestruck, and staring like an idiot at all the different varieties of vinegar they stocked.

To give you an idea of how happy I was that night, here is what my shopping cart contained as I walked out:

- Olive oil (OMG salad just got 10x better)
- Ferrero Rocher chocolates
- a bag of GRANOLA!!!
- 4-pack of apricot yogurt!!!!1
- a bag of raw almonds
- apple juice
- can of tomato soup
- pre-made GREEK SALAD!!!
- a giant tub of plain yogurt

I'm getting excited just thinking about it. To those of you who don't know me, my favourite food combination in the world is granola with yogurt. When I held the bag of granola and the yogurt in my hands at the same time, I was almost overwhelmed with joy.

And then just as I thought I was finished, I saw it... a bag of coffee filters.

My second biggest craving here in Ghana is for some good coffee. Africa, the motherland of coffee bean production, is for some reason limited to instant Nescafe coffee. This makes no sense to me.

Anyways, I managed to track down a container of ground coffee a while back and have been drinking make-shift coffee each morning since. Basically I use the French press method, but without the press. One teaspoon of coffee into a cup of boiling water, let sit for 5 minutes, and enjoy! (But be careful not to shake the cup as this will agitate the coffee grounds, and don't drink the last 1/4 of the cup or you will be unpleasantly surprised).

Seeing the bag of coffee filters in the shop, I instantly had an idea. I noticed they even had a coffee machine, but I wasn't about to pay $17 for one. No, instead I found me a big plastic funnel. I can't wait to get back to Kumasi now with my funnel and coffee filters to try and develop a manual coffee-making apparatus. XD

(Pictures to come if I'm successful, and especially if I'm not!)