A MAG is a Modern African Girl, so no subject is taboo. My purpose is to share things which may interest a MAG.

This week's contributors: Lydia, Doré Fasolati, this week's subjects: Brocade trends 2023, Bold restaurant, Airport taxes, Sanitary Pads taxes, Full moon.

Brocade trends 2023. The fabric usually has a twill or satin background and is typically thick and heavy. On brocade, the patterns are visible only on the face of the fabric. This makes the fabric non-reversible. There are 11 different types of brocade materials available: silk brocade, velvet brocade, wool brocade, synthetic brocade, satin, cotton, himru, zari, etc. Today the largest producer of brocade fabric is China and Australia, followed by India, France, and Italy. Nowadays, brocade is more commonly used in decorations and homewares than it is used in apparel. For instance, curtains and drapes frequently feature brocade patterns, and heavy silk drapes are almost always brocaded. Brocade is also a common choice for furniture upholstery.

Here are some ways to style or design your brocade fabric into your next beautiful outfit.

Medium-weight brocade fabric can be used for dressmaking, especially for making structured skirts or dresses,

ornate jackets, pants, and evening wear. The patterns on the brocade give an opulent look to anything you make with this fabric. Brocade is a go to choice of fabric for almost all occasions. If you want a traditional and elegant fabric for your summer wedding guest outfit then brocade is the best choice.

A new restaurant, “Bold “ in Labone, Accra, opened not long ago. Beautiful place, except for a bit of too grey a deco for me my liking, and first they wanted to seat me facing a grey wall, which I refused. Looks like the wall decorations were held up in customs. We ordered sushi. Now what exactly is sushi? There are many varieties, I think the popular one in Ghana is rice surrounded by fish. And here comes problem number one. Boiled rice we know, we eat it very often, but for sushi, the rice is marinated with vinegar, which makes it sour, and soy sauce, which brings sweetness and salt into it, thus giving, an unusual combination with lots of contrasting flavours. And that was not really the case with the Bold sushi rice. And then there is problem number 2, raw fish around the rice. But that fish has to be fresh fish, crunchy, not uncooked fish which was in the fridge for too long, or even defrosted frozen fish. So that tasty crunchy taste of fresh fish was absent. I am not saying that sushi was really bad, but it definitely lacked the pleasure of a bite into raw fish and then tasty rice.

Air travelling is becoming more and more expensive with fuel prices up and all sorts of anti-terrorist charges (checking that you don't carry a bomb in your luggage). I decided to have a good look at the cost build-up of the ticket. This was a trip from Ghana to France with a stopover at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and then an additional flight to an airport in the south of France.

Ticket price USD 1045.00

Airport passenger service charge – Ghana USD 100.00 Aviation Safety Charge – Ghana USD 23.00 Common User Passenger Processing System (CUPPS) Fee – Ghana USD 2.50 Total added cost Ghana: 12% of the cost of the ticket for using Kotoka Airport for departure and arrival USD 125.50

French airport taxes USD 9.50 French airport taxes USD 22.60 French Air Passenger Solidarity tax USD 4.80 French Air Passenger Solidarity Tax Surplus USD 3.20 Domestic Passenger Service Charge – France USD 18.00 International Passenger Service Charge – France USD 22.00 Total added cost in France for using 2 airports twice is 7.7% of the costOf the ticket USD80.10

I decided to check my calculations but yes, Ghana charges USD 62.75 per airport visit, and France charges USD 20.03 per airport visit. Maybe the labour cost in France is lower than in Ghana? And then there was a Sustainable Fuel Contribution of USD 6.00 and a Carrier-imposed international surcharge (YR) of USD 240.00 which I am not sure who gets that, and
Total cost of ticket USD 1496.60

But they have now suggested to Parliament that Sanitary pads should not be subject to VAT again. Try to figure out why the remainder of the 37 % taxes should stay on. Or do they want us to use banana leaves? Sounds like a joke but Indian company Sparkle's sanitary pads are made from a mixture of banana and bamboo fibers and corn starch. And then there is Afripad, a Ghanaian company offering locally made pads, I think they are part of an NGO. Maybe we should look at alternatives for the imported pads, rather than just complain about price.

Full moon tonight, but cloudy, so just stay inside and try to feel the vibrations.

Lydia...

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