Almost Feels Like Home

Overcrowded neighbourhoods, dilapidated buildings, overflowing garbage bins with an indescribable stench, artificially created footpaths where there once might have been a well manicured lawn, cluttered balconies and groups of people sitting outside watching your every move with overly suspicious looks. Did I just get off a bus or did I just walk out of an aeroplane? I know I just got off a bus but why do I feel like I'm home? Last time I checked, home was over 6000 miles away.

A walk through Central Park in Winnipeg, Manitoba had me wondering if I was back in Ghana or if I was still in Canada. Something had to be terribly wrong. No part of Canada is supposed to remotely remind me of where I came from, or so I thought. What even baffled me more was, everywhere I turned, I just kept seeing other Africans like myself and a few other minority groups including a group I had come to learn about during my stay in the country, Aboriginals. I would almost have fit right in if I didn't feel like and wasn't being treated like a stray.

All I'd wanted was to get to know my new environment as much as I could in the short time I had. Last thing I'd expected was to find a bit of my country in this country, especially since I had only been exposed to the plush neighbourhoods I had expected to see. As a matter of fact, I lived in one such neighbourhood. Of course, I termed these neighbourhoods as plush by my standards.

As I got on a bus to ride out and head on back to the plush neighbourhood I lived in, I couldn't help but hope all the people back home who would do just about anything to get out and seek greener pastures in other countries, could see what I'd just seen. Sad thing is I was one of those people. Worse yet, even though my neighbourhood in Accra was not as plush as the neighbourhood I lived in, in Winnipeg, It was so much better than this place I'd just left.