Why I Moved to Ghana Instead of Paris

For those of you who don't know, I've been wanting to move to Paris for at least five years. I've heard that some people aren't very fond of Paris, and it's quite difficult for me to imagine those people exist. I mean it's P A R I S!!!!!! I remember being in middle school and reading my first French sentence "Je ne comprends pas" in some book I was reading. Strangely, I've always loved the French language even though I can't recall ever hearing someone speak it. I don't know any French people, and as a child if anyone I knew spoke French I didn't know about it. It's likely that Ms. Patti LaBelle hooked me singing "voulez-vous coucher avec moi". Paris is PARIS so "naturally" it excited me. I truly don't know where those feelings came from. I remember reading that sentence "je ne comprends pas" in a very American accent with no clue as to how to pronounce the words, but I recited them from time to time over many years, and I never forgot that sentence.

My first trip to France was in May of 2012. It was very unexpected. I was one of the Producers on a short film titled Doorways and the Director/Producer called me and told me it was screening in Cannes. In France. In less than two months. I remember being excited and congratulating him and saying something along the lines of, "Have fun" because there was no way I could possibly make it to France in that amount of time. At the time, I had an MFA in Film and Tv Productions and over 15 years of video production experience, but I moved to Los Angeles after having at least three management positions at three different companies, yet was only hired for internships and entry level positions at studios. It's all about who you know right? I was renting a room in someone's home and paying $400/month. There was no way I was going to make it to France. As some people would say, "But God!" I was selling organic tea and coffee at the time, and my mom told everyone she knew near and far about our film screening in Cannes and me needing to go. I sold boxes of coffee and tea by the dozens, got donations from people who didn't want the drinks, ended up getting a buddy pass from someone so my flight was only a couple hundred dollars and the lead actress in Doorways secured an apartment a short walk from the Palais. I spent two weeks in Cannes, partied most of the time with rich people or people who at least spent money as if they were rich, and had the time of my life! But there was no way I could leave France before going to Paris.

Mon Amour

I won't go into details, but I spent three days in Paris. Flat broke, sleeping on someone's couch, and I had an incredible time. Almost immediately after arriving in Paris, dragging all my bags with me, I had a minute long love affair with some old drunk Parisian as we sang "My Cherie Amour" together. Aren't we cute? Those lyrics were the extent of my French. LOL Paris is PARIS!!!! I've since returned multiple times, and when life's circumstances prevented me from moving to Paris long term, I moved there for a summer. Paris has always felt like home. I'm so incredibly comfortable there. I am filled with peace and calm, and when I'm by the river or staring at the Eiffel Tower from anywhere within the city nothing else matters. I absolutely love the way Parisians live and enjoy life. Savior vivre à la fran?aise.

Before moving to Paris, I didn't realize how much of a thriving African community they had. I learned more about Africa and Africans from living in Paris for two months than I had learned in over 30 years of living in the USA. I was able to taste food from various African countries. I was listening to some of the music. All of my friends, except for one, were African and from various countries including Cameroon and Togo. I even fell in love with a Senegalese man who was born and raised in France so I fully experienced "The City of Love". Ooh la la. By the way, ooh la la correlating to something sexy is very much an American thing; it's not at all French. Anyway, a year later, I was finally in a position where I could move to Paris! Then Ghana entered the equation.

Why Ghana?

In September of 2018, the President of Ghana Nana Akufo-Addo apologized to African descendants worldwide for Ghana's participation in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and declared 2019 the "Year of Return". It marked 400 years since the first ship filled with enslaved Africans left Jamestown in Ghana and arrived in Jamestown, Virginia, USA. President Akufo-Addo invited the African Diaspora, since many of us are unaware of our country of origin, to return to Ghana and encouraged us to invest, start a business and/or relocate. If you read my first newsletter "Longing For Culture in America: An African-American's Journey to Finding Herself" then you'll understand how big of a deal it was that there was a place on the African continent that I could "Go Back to Africa" to!!!! When you're looking at a continent of 54 countries you have no idea where to start. I decided to start in Ghana.

My tune quickly changed from Paris to Ghana. The debate that I had with myself was very simple - on one hand I could go to a colonizing country and on the other I could go to the Motherland. I then began plotting how to visit all 54 African countries within one year. Ambitious, but I was confident it could be done. I researched all the visa costs and how to apply for them. I joined Overlanding groups on Facebook and read whatever I could find online about all these adventurist who'd driven throughout the continent. I was determined to visit, if not 54 countries, at least 20 or 30! I was looking for a place in Africa that made me feel the way Paris has always made me feel. I wanted to find my home.

Once people heard of my plan, and since December of all months became the "go to" month for people to visit Ghana, the list of those who wanted to visit me kept growing. I had multiple visitors during my first few months in Ghana, and then Covid-19 shut down the borders and I had no idea how long I would have to remain in Ghana. Now I wasn't stuck. I've heard people claiming they were stuck in Ghana, but there were repatriation flights back to the US every month. Sometimes there were several flights. No one was "stuck" in Ghana, but the US Embassy relayed all of the flight information to me, so maybe those people weren't in touch with the Embassy. Anyway, I wasn't able to visit dozens of countries, but I ended up living in Ghana for a year and overall I enjoyed it. It's a wonderful feeling to feel like you belong in every room you step in; unlike the US where sometimes people are made to feel they don't belong or are questioned about why they are there.

Every country has pros and cons and moving to Ghana after living in California for 35 years was a major adjustment. I also was living off of savings, so I didn't enjoy all of the luxuries that would've made my experience much more pleasant because I was stretching my money over a couple of years. Which is quite difficult to do in Ghana. It's by no means cheap! Especially if you want American brands that you're used to. Be prepared to spend $10 or $12 on a regular box of any Kellog's cereal. If you want to go to Africa and live like a king, you betta stack! On the other hand, my family and I discussed purchasing land and building a 5 or 6 bedroom two story home. That entire job only costed about $50,000 prior to the Russia-Ukraine war. While I didn't find my "home" in Ghana, I did make life long friends, grew and matured from experiencing their culture, got real world experience living in Africa, and I absolutely want to return to Ghana just to visit and also to work with the incredible people in their country. I'll go into more depth about my experiences living in Ghana in future newsletters, so ask questions if you're interested. If you're wondering, yes, I absolutely still want to live in Paris, but I also want a family home somewhere on the continent and Ghana is a perfect location for that. As always, thanks for tuning in and I'd be happy to hear your thoughts.

Questions for Reflection

• Have you ever felt at "home" in a country where you weren't born or wasn't your country of origin? If so, where was it and what about it felt like home?
• What country (African or otherwise) would you recommend I visit and what can I expect to experience there?
• If you had the option to pick up and move to another country for a year or two, not have to worry about finances, and you could go back to your current home and job afterwards where would you move to and why?