...otherwise known as my Auntie Michelle. Or now, by her new name Nana Serwaa Boafoa (Nana is the title given to all queens, Serwaa is the name of the queen who appointed her, and Boafoa means 'helper'). The Queen Mothers Association is basically a group of powerful women, each one the matriarchal figure in their community. These Mothers live in Accra and therefore represent the villages they are from. Today, Michelle was made a queen by being dressed up in kente and beads, and sat on a stool like a chief. She has been given the special title of Development Queen instead of representing a specific community for all the work she has done in Ghana over the past three years. It was quite the event, and I had lots of fun taking photographs with all the fabric being paraded around...
Everyone present at the Enstoolment: about 25 Queen Mothers, with the friends and family of the new Development Queen
feet dressed in fancy slippers and knees covered in rich cloth, hands and wrists and necks weighed down with beads and gold...
The three head Nanas - no lack of clashing brilliant cloth hanging off every shoulder
Pouring of 'Libation' to the ancestors
The smiley New Nana in her green, red and gold kente, beads, headdress and surrounded by more cloth-draped bodies
The proud family, starting to the left of Nana: little Paulie, tall Graham, Jamie the umbrella bearer, Uncle Ian, yours truly, and Nana of course: seated on her new stool in the middle.
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