Sensible traveler Destinations Where they went Travel gear Student travelCloth weaves a spell
By Daniel Daniel, Globe Staff, 9/1/2002
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Sensible traveler Destinations Where they went Travel gear Student travel |
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"There are a lot of things that dictate weaving - the loom size, material, and the culture. I was just fascinated by the variety of design and how things would be sewn together," said Csipke, a technical editor in his 50s who lives in Boston. Csipke used to weave and now researches and collects textiles as a hobby. In many parts of Ghana and other African countries, he noted, weaving is a man's profession.
"I like to travel around on my own. But I was looking for a tour because I wanted to see crafts and meet people," he said. He found an outfitter that seemed perfect, Aba Tours (www.abatours.com), which specializes in taking visitors inside Ghana to meet artisans. When he heard back from the owner, Ellie Schimelman, he was surprised to find out she lived only a few miles away, in Brookline Village.
Csipke said the tour two summers ago was not overly structured and included a lot of time for contact with local townspeople and villages. Other participants included two sculptors from New York, a woman from northern Vermont, and a weaver who was about to graduate from the Rhode Island School of Design. The group was based on the outskirts of the capital, Accra, and the travelers stayed in individual round huts, clustered around a common yard with a gazebo, where they had breakfast. Their view was familiar - the Atlantic Ocean. Their two guides spoke English, the national language of Ghana, and Twi (Asante), the language of the biggest ethnic group and their local dialect.
"Ellie would set up a day trip that might include things like a weaving village or a pottery village, or a village that specializes in lost wax casting," a way to shape molten metal using clay and wax, he said. At the pottery village of Mpraeso, for instance, artisans made grinding bowls from local clay.
Most towns of any size have markets, Csipke said, and some villages are noted for certain things. For instance, they visited one of the bead makers of Odusami, where ground glass is made into beads.
Shopping was a big part of the trip, said Csipke. He bought several cloths that now hang on the walls of his home.
For one trip, the group traveled by Land Rover to the Boabeng-Fiema Monkey Sanctuary in Nkoranza to see the sacred mona monkeys, of which there are several colonies.
Sometimes they would eat at a "chop bar," a large room with electricity but no water, where the staple was fufu, a grain mixed with plaintain or yam, mashed and boiled "into a gooey ball," served with boiled fish. They would eat with their right hands, using no utensils, as is the custom.
A deeply moving stop for Csipke was to Cape Coast Castle and Elmina, two former slave forts on the western coast, where slaves were held underground and moved directly to waiting ships.
Csipke's first trip to Africa whetted his appetite for more, and he and Schimelman are putting together a visit to northern Ghana and through Burkina Faso to Mali. The events of Sept. 11 delayed plans; they hope to depart in January.
Send suggestions to ddaniel@globe.com.