By knowing the quality of the italian cusine, it feels awkward to admit but after a while, I got bored of it. This time I wanted to try something completly different. I was full of all the pastas, pizzas, fishes, tomatoes, oliva oiled breads oranges and red wines. In this state of stomach, I ended up in the "african district" of Palermo, where I shortly found, what I wanted the most: a ghanaian restaurant.

Well, okay, maybe I won't call it a restaurant. Actually it was the ground floor of a ghanaian family's home, which was mostly visited by family members and other immigrants from Africa. They have had italian guest already, but I could be the first non-african and non-italian visitor.

They were very friendly and patient, when they started to list me their menu. Of course, I didn't know any of those food, so I just asked them to give me something, which suits a stomach, virgin from Africa and a student's budget. They looked at each other, and immediately started to prepare my "standard african" lunch. In the meanwhile I had the possibility to look around in the room.
Except of the skin color of the guests, the "restaurant" looked just like any other eastern europen low class pub:cheap tableclothes on the dirty tables, fly-trap on the ceiling, football in the tv. I sat down to a vacant seat, where some food leftover, a half bottle of water, and a soap welcomed me. Soon the waiter arrived and gave me a plate filled with water. I thought, he might bring the vegetables soon as well, but when he came back next, he just started to remove the leftovers from the previous guest.

I politely asked, if I could get a spoon at least. The waiter had good fun on me for thinking that is was the soup. It was actually for washing the hands. But after the laugh, he promised me, that he will try to find some cutleries, even though they usually never use one. I started to wash my hand, but I wasn't brave enough anymore to ask, what was the half full bottle for: handwashing, drinking, or was just left there by the previous guest.

Soon my food arrived: some terrifying shaped meat and a plastic bag filled with a white mass, in the similar texture to the mashed potatoes.

Instead of the cutleries, I ended up by getting a short presentation to the eating by hands. But it wasn't only a theoretic presentation, but a real demonstration to the way of african eating. He washed his hand in my water, and then made a hole in the plastic with his thumb, and grabbed a little amount of the food and ate it with a piece of meat.

To be honest I found this scene a little bit disgusting, but I didn't give up, and the waiter was also excited to see me trying his food. I tried to follow his way of eating, and I have to admit, that it was more tasty, then it looked! At least the souce, because the white mass didn't really have any taste. And the meat was a bit difficult to eat, and I have to honestly admit, that I couldn't finish that.

It felt a little embarassing to leave some pieces of meat on the plate, after all this friendly welcoming. I said sorry, and told excuses like, this was very new for me. They said that this was just a very basic food from Ghana, so if I travel there I should be well trained...

This happened in the spring of 2015, and now I'm planning to spend almost all my year in Africa. And guess, where I will fly in just a few weeks? Of course to Ghana, where else?