TWO LEFT FEET

Dixcove, Ghana 1/18/2011

Going shopping in a foreign country is always an experience. First, there are no Super Walmart's or shopping centers where you can go and do all of your shopping in one stop. Everything that you need has to be bought one item at a time from small shops and stalls along the road way. So the simplest of shopping trips can take some time.

For instance, I needed a pair of cheap flip flops (sandles) to wear at the guest house where we were staying. So I went to the local market in Dixcove to buy a pair. I looked at them at several different shops, but finally decided on one lady’s little shop as the best option for my purchase. She showed me different pairs and insisted that I buy a certain type and brand. Of course she did not speak any English so all of this was through hand gestures and pointing at certain qualities on the plastic sandals. I selected a pair that I liked, but she would not let me have them. She chose the pair that she had insisted that I buy, found the size under her stall table and put them in a black plastic bag and I was on my way with my two dollar pair of sandals. So having completed my mission in the market, I was on my way happy to have accomplished my task. I put the sandals in my back pack and headed on into a busy day.

That night when we got back to the guest house I decided to try out my new purchase and got the sandals out of the black plastic bag. I put on the left sandal first and reached for the other. To my surprise it was not a right, but rather another left. Now they say that “two rights does not make a wrong”, but I am hear to tell you that “two lefts is definitely wrong” when it comes to buying sandals.

The next morning we were back in town to work and I headed back to the little lady in the market stalls that sells only left footed sandles. She was surprised to see me again and even more surprised when I took the sandals out from the black plastic bag. At first she did not understand the problem and ask she did not speak any English I could not explain it to her. So I held up the two sandals and demonstrated trying to put them on my two left feet.

All at once she bagan to laugh, realizing the mistake that had been made and realizing that I was not upset; that I only wanted the right “right sandle”. She quickly apologized in her native language of Twee and looking under her bench found the other “right” sandle to match my left sandle. We both had a good laugh as she put them in the black plastic bag once again assuring me in Twee that she had the right sandles this time.

So next time you go to the shop to buy sandals in a Ghanaian market, make sure you don’t have “Two Left Feet”!