Features
Beyond the polished glass: everyday scenes at Accra mall trotro station – Part 2
Early signs of the night food scene begin to appear as sellers set up. A kenkey seller with a baby strapped tightly to her back stands behind a wooden table. A large silver bowl filled with a mountain of steaming kenkey sits in a plain plastic basin. Beside the kenkey is a sieve containing fried fish such as red snapper, sardines and chunks of tilapia, along with a bowl filled with red pepper.
In front of the kenkey stand, eight people form a crooked queue. Two women near the front lean in, laughing at something on a phone. The kenkey seller works quickly, unwrapping hot kenkey from the basin while her baby cries softly.
She sways her hips to soothe the child, never pausing as she serves. She smiles at someone in the queue and says, “Customer, today the fish is fresh-fresh. Try and take two.” Her voice rises through the traffic hum; a brief moment of warmth exchanged over food and sweat. Behind them, a man with a laptop bag taps his foot and checks his watch. The others shift in line, caught between hunger and impatience. The kenkey seller’s back carries not only her child but the weight of the day’s labour as she continues to serve.
Next to her on the curb, a man tends to a kebab, known locally as “kyikyinga”, turning the skewers with practiced hands. Smoke curls upward as chicken, beef and sausage sizzle and pop over the hot coals. Every so often, he fans the grill gently, drawing glances from passersby. Some slow down, others smile or take a quick look before moving on.
A few metres away, an immigrant family, possibly from Mali or Burkina Faso, sits quietly on the pavement. The father and mother rest with plastic bowls placed in front of them as they beg in silence. Their three children, two boys around the ages of ten and thirteen and a younger girl about five, move barefoot along the sidewalk in faded, dirty clothes. They approach passersby with outstretched hands, pointing to their mouths and stomachs, sometimes holding onto strangers as they plead for money.
Not far from them, a footwear seller sits low on the pavement, shoes neatly arranged on a large black polythene bag in front of him. In a black T-shirt, short rasta hair framing his face, he bends over a big bowl of palm nut soup and Banku, eating slowly, totally focused on his meal despite the chaos around him.
Across the road, towards the motorway, the Trotro station echoes with the voice of the public announcer: “Ashaiman, Ashaiman! Afienya, Afienya! Spintex, Spintex!” The station’s ground tells its own story: puddles of muddy water dot the station from the previous day’s down pour, littered with empty floating pure water sachets, bottle caps, corn cobs and scraps of old torn paper and filth stuck in the muddy puddle. People tiptoe carefully around them, lifting trousers and skirts to avoid the mud and dirt.
With Eyram, the Tale Bearer
This week I have a very strong desire to put on my Apostolic Cap and talk about the power available to children of God which we can utilise to generate positive outcomes, in our lives.
There is a phrase in the Bible that if Christians meditate on, can immensely transform their lives. In Matthew 28:6 there is a phrase “… as he said…” according to the King James Version.
Thus phrase forms part of a statement declared by an angel of God to two women who were disciples of Jesus who had gone to his tomb early in the morning on the third day after his death.
According to the Biblical account, the stone covering the entrance of the tomb had been rolled away and an Angel was sitting on it and he made the statement to the effect that the Jesus they are seeking is not there and that he had risen, as he said before his death.
His resurrection affirmed the authenticity and dependability of the word of Jesus and therefore the word of God.
Christianity has to do with faith in the word of God. Pastor Mensa Otabil said if we view Christianity as an inside out view, you would go inside to operate the power that is in you.
As a Christian, the spirit of God and therefore the power of God, dwells in you. Anyone who is aware of this truth, does not go around seeking to have a so called powerful person resolve his or her spiritual issues.
Most Christians who move from prophet to prophet, do not believe that the spirit of God which operates in a Pastor or Prophet, is the same spirit that dwells in him or her.
In fact , that Christian may be more ‘powerful’ than the Prophet or Pastor he is going to for prayers because he is living a holy life, which is pleasing to God, for God is no respecter of persons according to Acts 10:34-35.
God does not give out his spirit in different measures to indwell believers. The spirit of God that dwells in a new convert, is the same spirit that dwells in a Bishop or a Prophet or an Evangelist or an Elder or a Deacon.
All you need to do as a child of God is to believe in the word of God and know that it works and that according to 1 John 4:4 we, Christians, that the Spirit of God dwells in us have overcome the world and Jesus in us, is greater than the Devil who is out in the world, wrecking havoc all around.
If we realise that we have overcome the Devil and everything he controls, then we can believe and act in faith and make declarations and just as Christ declared that he will die and on the third day, he will rise from the dead and it manifested as he said, there shall be a manifestation of our declarations also.
The problem of modern day Christians is that, a lot of them, do not study and meditate on the word of God, so they do not witness the manifestation of the power of God, in their lives.
Such an experience over time, give them the impression that the spirit of God dwells in different dimensions in believers. This then leads them to seek solutions to their challenges from so called powerful men of God.
Some Pastors also fall into this misconception of the measure of the spirit of God in believers. When the size of a Pastor’s church for instance, is not increasing the way he had been praying for self-doubt sometimes begin to set in.
Especially, if he begins to compare his church with that of say a colleague from the same Bible School, then he begins to wonder if there is not a spiritual secret he is not aware of.
This is when, if care is not taken, fellow Pastors who appears to be very successful in the ministry but are using occultic powers, could sway them from the narrow path and get them trapped in the Devil’s clutches and eventually and inevitably, destroy their lives. God bless.
By Laud Kissi-Mensah
Introduction
You have been there. Twenty tabs open comparing laptops. A blank page for an email you’ve been “thinking about” for three days. A menu with 30 options and you leave hungry.
This is decision paralysis: the state where the volume of information, options, or perceived stakes prevents you from making a decision at all. It’s not laziness. It’s a cognitive overload response.
In a data-rich environment, it’s becoming the default mode for both individuals and organisations.
This article breaks down why it happens, how it shows up, what it costs, and how to break it.
1. What decision paralysis actually is?
Decision paralysis is a failure of the decision-making system to convert information into action. Psychologists call it ‘analysis paralysis’ or ‘choice overload.’
It has three components:
1. Cognitive overload: Working memory can hold between four to seven chunks of information at once. When you try to track 20 variables, the system freezes.
2. Anticipatory regret: You overestimate the pain of making the wrong choice. The brain avoids the emotional cost by avoiding the choice.
3. Ambiguity aversion: Humans prefer known risks over unknown ones. When outcomes are uncertain, we stall.
The result is not neutral. Not deciding is a decision. It costs time, momentum, and opportunity
2. Why it’s getting worse now
2.1 Infinite options
Amazon has 350 million products. Netflix has 6000+ titles. Dating apps have unlimited profiles. The paradox of choice: more options increase initial satisfaction but decrease final satisfaction and increase regret.
2.2 Information abundance without synthesis
You can find 50 studies on sleep. Each one has caveats, conflicting results, and different methodologies. Without a framework to integrate them, more data creates more confusion, not clarity. This connects directly to the “data-rich, wisdom-poor” problem.
2.3 Reversibility anxiety
In the digital age, most decisions feel permanent. A bad post goes viral. A bad hire is public on LinkedIn. A bad career move is visible. The fear of irreversible error makes people delay.
2.4 Algorithmic mirroring
Platforms show you what you already engage with. This creates an illusion that there’s one ‘best’ option you are missing. You keep searching, convinced the optimal choice is one more scroll away.
3. How it shows up
Personal Level
Cannot pick a career path after six months of ‘research’
Spend two hours choosing a movie and watch nothing
Delay sending an email because it ‘isn’t perfect’
3.1 Organisational level
Teams spend 80 per cent of time in meetings gathering data, 20 per cent deciding
Product teams delay launch waiting for “one more data point”
KPIs multiply but no strategic choice is made
3.2 Common cognitive tells:
Endless comparison tables
Asking for one more opinion
Reframing the problem instead of solving it
Feeling drained after thinking but not acting
By Robert Ekow Grimmond-Thompson
