GHANA
|
GHANA
|
||
| on the Gulf of Guinea. Most of the country is made up of wooded hill ranges, wide valleys and low-lying coastal plains, though the northern third of the country is thick with rainforests. A fair chunk of central Ghana was swallowed by Lake Volta in 1964, when the Volta River was dammed and the lake swelled to become one of the largest in Africa. For a country that's borne the brutality of colonization - from the stripping of its mineral wealth to the enslaving of its people - Ghana retains a remarkable sense of self. Its craftspeople have a long, rich cultural history to draw from, and their work is thick with that tradition - be it the colourful kente cloth of the Ashanti or any of the stools, icons, beads or baskets you'll find in the major markets. Even the leftover forts and castles, recalling five centuries of European influence, today seem less like Ghana's ghosts than players in her narrative. | ||