Four Girls Walk Into A Club In Accra
in da club, we are NOT all fam
Fans are being wielded like shields to block an unrelenting Ghanaian sun—trying to keep cool is pointless.
It’s Detty December in Accra, and the heat here hits different. It laughs at sunscreen, sunglasses, and even the strongest setting spray as portable fan batteries quickly drain under its menacing rays. You can hear the “mchewwws” from a mile away as yet another victim scowls after realizing they forgot their power bank back at the hotel.
Thousands of us have descended onto the one and only Obi’s House, squeezing past an endless stream of partiers looking for tonight to be the night. Phone numbers between potential new hookups aren’t the only things being exchanged; sweat and body heat pass through the crowd like we’re all one single organism. Under the sweltering night sky, our makeup and cologne slides away, but we sway our hips, pop endless bottles, and throw our hands up to the same sun in enjoyment.
I needed air.
The entire Black diaspora across the UK, US, Caribbean, and Africa was here, and there was zero space for me to breathe.
“Samsung phone, did someone see a Samsung phone? Please, if you have this phone bring it to the DJ booth,” a voice croaked over the DJ’s speaker in the distance.
I was with my girls Shelley, Chioma, and Lana, and though we didn’t have a table when we entered the party, each of us had a unique superpower to acquire one if we wanted to. Chioma likes to yap and could talk us in or out of anything. Shelley was the flirty one who threw a mean doe-eye look that got the guys to melt every time. Lana was the social butterfly who somehow knew any and everyone no matter where in the world we were, and I was the finesse queen: the impossible will always be possible with me.
Luckily, Lana’s best-friend’s-ex-boyfriend’s-homeboy was there and had a plug. And just like that, our stomping grounds for the night were secured.
The table was packed. It looked like it was meant to hold 10, maybe 12 people, but there were at least 20 people stuffed in, with some sitting on each other’s laps and some standing on the makeshift plastic benches with pillows they tried to pass off as a couch.
And even though there were already at least 10 girls, some of the guys embarked on solo missions to gather even more babes. The rest of the men stayed back, guarding the bottles as tightly as entry past the angels at Heaven’s gate; getting access meant an initial face card check (will it decline or not?) and then profusely confessing your sins. It was a whole ordeal. Shelley was seated at the table while knees knocked and asses gyrated on top of her head when she emerged from the trenches.
“Wanna do a lap? It’s hot as fuck and smells like balls and ass crack in there.”
“Say less.”
In girl culture, doing “a lap” refers to taking a cute stroll around the party you’re at to see who’s who in the building. If you’re stationed in one spot, how are you going to connect with the cuties on the other side of the room? How is this outfit going to be seen by more than the 10 people in your immediate area? How are you going to successfully get invited to a table that you didn’t pay for?
Doing a lap is where the magic happens. It’s where going out to the club goes from “it was whatever” to “biiiiitch, you had to be there!” Being alert, open, and ready to detour to other sections is key for a successful lap.
We squeezed our way through from the back to the front of Front/Back. It was packed wall-to wall with nothing saving us but the slight breeze filtering in from Accra’s night sky, thanks to the lack of a roof over the club. Beads of sweat began to make their journey south from the nape of my neck to the crevice of my back. I tried to cutely dab the sweat forming above my upper lip to preserve my makeup, but I quickly found myself melting. As we moved through the thick crowds, I made a pit stop at every fan I saw along the way for a sweet sense of short-lived relief. I slyly snuck myself into the back of someone’s section who had a dedicated fan—closing my eyes as it blew a cool breeze gently on my face and through my cornrows, buying me a few minutes of time before more members of the sweat army began their journey.
Shelley grabbed my hand as we continued on. We offered “Sorrys” and “Excuse mes” as we pushed our way through the party. The DJ made yet another announcement of a lost phone, this time an iPhone 15. Someone is getting lucky in here, I thought. We were almost to the front when Shelley saw someone she knew. Too drunk to remember to introduce me, I turned back around to scope the scene when a tall man with skin the color of black coffee came into focus.
He leaned over. “You look like you could use a drink!” he shouted into my ear over the bass thumping between us. I didn’t think twice. He brought me to his table, introduced me to his homies, then poured me a shot of Don Julio 1942. Niggas are so predictably obsessed with this shit, I thought to myself as I raised my cup to cheers with him and his friends. I took the shot down and grabbed some cranberry juice to chase. He began to dance in my direction. I smiled that pitying “No” smile you flash guys you’re not interested in. Thankfully, he quickly redirected.
I looked back, and Shelley was still all up in what seemed like the best conversation to ever happen. She was deeply involved, so I had to find another way to entertain myself. As I turned back, I saw the flyest group of girls next to me. Ginger hair, patterned mesh tops, chunky shoes, and ombre shades—my type of girls.
“I love your fit!” I said to one of them as “Joha” by Asake started pulsating from the speakers. That was all I needed to gain entry into their clique. We started hitting the footwork, and I told them that the guy at the table next to us has a bottle and they should join. No, it wasn’t my bottle, but two things I knew to be true about African men: they love pretty women and looking like the Oga, the big baller, the boss. We danced and vibed for a bit longer, until Shelley finally came back.
“Ugh, that was my ex, so annoying,” she said as she adjusted her small Telfar bag. “Let’s go back to the table.”
“Wait, what? He’s here?” I said, confused. The way Ghana somehow brings out the African vortex of past and present lovers should be studied. There could be some Nigerian dude you dated for three months in Oakland that you managed to avoid for a year back home, but somehow you’d run into him in the motherland during Detty December. As we began to make our way back, another man made direct eye contact with me and smiled.
“Hey! Pretty girl, come party with us!” he yelled.
I looked at Shelley and she looked at me with the “Duh, bitch” look. “OK!” I said, and we rerouted to their table. At this point, I was acting like a bird. Flying my little wings from table to table, thirsty for nectar. While the guys at our original table were being stingy, here I was easily able to procure multiple drinks just by walking past the testosterone-filled tables of thirsty men looking for estrogen wrapped in a pretty package. It’s Detty December, why not?
After we clinked glasses and did our shot duties, Shelley and I began to bounce when all of a sudden I noticed something. My bag felt noticeably lighter. I looked down, and the front of my purse was flapping open.
You know when you feel like something is wrong, but you don’t want to believe it, so you’re externally calm but internally about to jump out the window? That was me. I just knew, but I opened my bag anyway to confirm. As I rummaged through the 2” x 6” opening, like there was even a place for something to hide in that tiny Marc Jacobs wallet bag, my heart sank: my phone was gone.
The music all of a sudden felt too loud, my view went cross, and everyone was having a little too much fun. I felt a pounding in my chest as the bass from the speakers tried to assassinate the little sense I had left—suffering was a deep crimson red feeling making its way through my body and I felt myself beginning to bask in it.
Shelley pulled my hand, which brought me back to my senses. I acted like nothing happened. I didn’t want it to be real that I had lost my phone or, even worse, allowed it to be stolen?? in GHANA!?? It felt like everyone was looking at me with drunken, low eyelids held up only by their disdain as if they all knew what just happened to me, and I looked right back—they were all officially suspects.
As we approached the table—Shelly, chipper; me, sullen—it was time to confess. Our other friends Chioma and Lana were pumping their portable fans in the air to DJ Obi’s Afrobeats mix, the music was sending the crowd into another realm. It was the designated time in the night when the party turned up to its max level. Ascension was imminent; meanwhile, I was about to commit a horrible, murderous act…
I was going to kill the vibe.
Thank you for reading part one; stay tuned for pt.2!
“They were guarding the bottles as tightly as entry past the angels at Heaven’s gate, getting access meant an initial face card check (will it decline or not?) and then profusely confessing your sins”
This detail. 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾