Day 2: Monkey Adventures and Botanical Gardens

Let me tell you the story of how my dad almost got mauled by a monkey. So yesterday my family decided to take a little field trip to the Legon Botanical Garden. We were very excited and interested to see what kind of beautiful plants and flowers Accra had to offer. Upon arriving, we could tell the garden wasn't exactly what we thought it would be. The picture below shows the entrance to the very very modest "garden". Now, even though it looked absolutely nothing like a botanical garden of any sort, we decided to give it a try and walked in. We talked to the guards at the doorway, asking about their favorite things to go and see in the "garden". Now, while this was going on, I looked deeper into the park where I saw some movement. I could've sworn I saw two very small and lively baby monkeys jumping around outside of their cage. I thought, "No they must be in a cage", and blamed my faulty vision to my sunglasses. I heard the guards tell my parents to check out the monkeys which reinforced my thoughts that they MUST be in a cage, they wouldn't let them run free right? Wrong.

As we walked into the park and towards the monkeys, I told my dad of my suspicions about the monkeys. He brushed it off, thinking as I had that they couldn't be out of their cages! We approached and could see a couple standing near the cages, the man very close to the cage, seemingly talking to the large parent monkeys in the cage. What should've immediately been a red flag was the fact that the female was standing noticeably further away from the cages with an apprehensive look on her face. But nope, we kept approaching the cage. And then we saw the baby monkeys. They were messing around under the cage, so it was hard to tell that they weren't boxed in, but I knew. Guys, I knew. My mom, brothers, and I kept our distance with the other woman but my dad inched closer to the cage, greeting the other man. Then, the monkey’s rough play brought them out from under the cage and that's when it got real. They began chasing each other, not straying far from the cage but in a crazy roughhousing manner. This is when I, along with my brother and mom, started making my way far far far far far away from the little monkeys. Unfortunately, my dad didn't get the memo, and was too close to the cage to back away without being spotted, and he was. One of the monkeys began making their way towards him and this is when we began to freak out a little (a lot). Soon, the monkey was inches from my dad and looking like it wanted to jump onto him. Naturally, he did his best to shoo it away, but these monkeys weren't afraid of humans, as they were used to being around them. I'm really sorry I don't have a picture of this moment, because I was trying my best not to pee myself. Maybe next time. :) We finally escaped the monkeys by jogging (sprinting) away from them. Over the course of the next few minutes, my whole family was on edge, heads whipping around, looking out for the monkeys at any sound. I'm sure we looked slightly insane running away from the monkeys and being on the lookout for them wherever we went, but they felt like the right measures to take after the terrifying encounter.

Below is another picture from the "garden", a path we took and saw some incredibly huge termite hills, while still being on the lookout for crazy little monkeys of course.

White people are a rarity in Ghana, so seeing them is an interesting experience, but it's comforting to know that there are others visiting and doing the same kind of thing we are. That said, when coming across them, or any people of a lighter skin tone, we tend to feel a bit of a bond and compelled to help them out if we can. As we were exiting the park, we saw a European family about to enter the park. We contemplated warning them of the dreaded monkeys but eventually decided against it, that would be their adventure :).

As you can hopefully see, the Joseph family was traumatized and in need of a nice cool down and treat so we headed over to the bar/grill/pizzeria called Nayiba that was directly next door to the botanical garden.

On the left is a snazzy pic of the super cool Sprite bottles we got with our meal of goat kabobs. Sadly, I forgot to do the Instagram thing and take picture of my meal but I can assure, there will be plenty of meal pics coming up.  Below is a picture of our view from the table at Nayiba, a really nice and calm eating place.

After our adventure at the garden, we decided to head home and try to get some naps in before the Super Bowl, which was on at 11pm Ghana time.

Being the loyal American Ghanaians we tuned in to the Super Bowl on time and watched the whole thing, my dad rooting for the Broncos and me and my brothers for the Seahawks.

Thanks for reading and please leave comments with any questions/thoughts about what I should talk about!

-Layla