Way back when I first applied for the Media in Ghana program, I had some preliminary thoughts about what Ghana would be like. One of the first thoughts I had was what public transportation would be like in Accra.

The public transportation is expert level here compared to many parts of my home state, California. There are more taxis than you could ever ask for, but more importantly there’s a system run by these vehicles called tro-tros. Tro-tros are essentially minivan sized cars that carry people to and from various locations across Accra, East Legon, and other local regions. The tro-tros are incredibly compact as the seats are small and the drivers attempt to squeeze in as many people as possible into them.

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The tro-tros are cheap to take (typically 1.50 cedi for an average ride to work and back, essentially $0.50), but operate at various rates of speed. Most drivers in Ghana operate on their own agenda and display plenty of aggressive maneuvers on the road. However traffic as well as the number of stops a tro-tro makes ranges, giving you an uncertain arrival time. My trips to and from work range anywhere between 40 minutes to 2 hours one way.

Ghana is a culture rich with eccentric personalities. If you take enough tro-tro rides, you’re bound to run into a few of them. For instance, the other day on my way home from work I was in a tro-tro that pulled into a nearly empty station except for one tro-tro that was awkwardly parked at the stop. My driver became impatient thinking that the tro-tro was stopped for no legitimate reason while the fee collector was shouting in Twi at the other driver. Our tro-tro backed up and started to pull away when suddenly the other driver leaped from his vehicle and started throwing punches at the fee collector. The next two minutes were filled with heated exchanges in Twi until the other driver walked back to his tro-tro, still fuming.

From what I collected from another patron on our tro-tro, the fee collector was shouting obscenities at the other driver for stopping randomly when in reality the other tro-tro had broken down. The other driver, clearly distressed and agitated, took out his frustration on him and our driver. I’ve know for a few weeks know that Ghanaians are normally very hospitable towards one another and what I witnessed may very well have been the repercussions of not showing common courtesy.