How moving to the US made me feel closer to Ghana

To be honest, I always presumed I would quickly be absorbed by the “American way of life.” This is because most of the times when I interacted with people I had known in Ghana who had moved to the US, their accents had changed and they sounded more American. I truly believed this was an automatic thing that I would acquire even without realizing.

But this is not the case. After two years in the United States, my accent is as “Ghanaian” as ever and perhaps even sometimes exaggerated so that it is obvious that I am different from everyone in the group.

Why?

Because as the months have gone by, my appreciation for my country has grown. Things that I always took for granted suddenly did not seem so trivial anymore and I found myself desperately trying to cling to any trace of my “Africanness”, no matter how shallow that “trace” seemed.

As the saying goes, “absence makes the heart grow fonder.” Not having easy access to spicy and delicious Ghanaian food made me crazy. For this reason, I am constantly looking up recipes and the nearest African shops in the area in order to get ingredients to make dishes, dishes that I barely even thought of or ate back home in Ghana. Every chance I get, I like to adorn African clothing, so that I can get asked on the street about its origins and have the opportunity to talk about my country.

Let’s not forget that in Ghana,  I can always wear comfortable clothes because the sun is out all year round. You can never appreciate how much better life is without winter until you’re holed up in your room on a snowy day and looking up beaches you can visit in Ghana at Christmas time.

Yet it is more than that. There is the fact that when I open my mouth to speak, everybody immediately knows I am different. Should this make me feel weird? No. Rather I revel in this uniqueness and I use it as an opportunity to bring a differing and therefore a valuable perspective to my conversations with friends and to the classroom.

Let me not forget the great sense of community that Ghanaians have. Your family friends become your cousins and your cousins become your siblings. I cannot put a finger on the number of cousins I have who are actually not cousins by blood. If I ever say, I am visiting my aunt for Thanksgiving, it is more than likely that this aunt is a friend of my mom. When somebody has a party in Ghana, a guest can come with her friend or her sister in law or even her work colleague and the doors will be open to them too.

Everyone supports each other all the time. Hence it came as a shock to me when I noticed how extremely individualized the American society is. The bustle in this country erodes that sense of community because it seems like everyone is focused on achieving their goal and there is no time for anything else.

In Ghana, people who don’t know each other sit on the public bus and talk about current events as if they have always been friends. However, I can literally count the number of times I have had a conversation with a stranger on the bus in the US because that would just be “creepy.”

I used to find it annoying when a random community member would ask me about school or my life in general. Now, I find such great joy whenever I get to spend time with the other Ghanaians on my campus and I look forward to these events because I know they understand and truly cherish the ideals of togetherness and forgetting all else, even if it is just for a moment.

Finally, I feel like there is a responsibility on my shoulders to reveal my country to the people I interact with in the US. Being an African country, it has been doused and clouded with many negative stereotypes. While it has its problems, Ghana and Africa are booming with resources and talent and people are making great advancements in infrastructure, education, entrepreneurship, among others.

My accent gives me away as an outsider when I speak. Legally, I am described as an alien. Nonetheless, I feel I am an ambassador of Ghana and of Africa. I am constantly keeping up with current events and advancements in my country and on the continent in order to share with others and to burn down misconceptions.

Moving to America has made me feel closer to Ghana because I am not just an alien in a foreign country, but an ambassador of my people; one who will speak for her country and her continent in an environment where no one else will.