My Ghanaian name is Kwaku, what is yours?

Last Friday, 24th July, guest blogger Edward Amartey-Tagoe made a post on PathGhana's new initiative, PathGhana Friday, which is aimed at promoting tourism in Ghana to higher heights. This development has been further boosted by the release of a facebook application by the PathGhana team. This facebook application, called "My Ghanaian Name", helps users to know their Ghanaian names based on the week day on which they've been born.

The application is the brain child of PathGhana lead developer Christian Kojo Tamakloe. Christian studied facebook's popularity and infered that developing such an application on the facebook platform would attract many users and thus promote Ghanaian tourism.

Ghana's unique naming system is widely used among the country's diverse ethnic groups. This special naming system gives special names to people based on the specific day of the week on which they are born and their gender. For example, I am a Wednesday born so the various variations of my name are Kwaku, Kweku and Korku. These names also have certain specific connotations. According to the application, "Wednesday borns are mischievous, vicarious, vigilant and daring. They are usually fully in control of every situation, do not want to be told what to do (some what know-it-alls), spontaneous, vibrant and cordial. Be sure not to cross their paths though". Visitors to Ghana are usually intrigued by these names and therefore adopt them for themselves. My Ghanablogging colleague, Kajsa has one such name. Foreigners, who do not know their week days would find this application very useful.

So, go ahead click here, give it a try and forward your feedback to the PathGhana team at admin@pathghana.com. Be sure to let all your folks know about this cool new app!

Picture: Yours truly with Christian Tamakloe

PathGhana: Promoting Ghanaian Tourism Through Web 2.0

By Edward-Amartey Tagoe

Ghana recently launched a special campaign dubbed the Tourism Marketing Campaign to help take Ghana Tourism to the next pedestal. Over 300,000 jobs have already been created by the Tourism Industry and more are expected to benefit from this boon come next few months. The Ghanaian youth have been advised to take advantage of the prospects in the tourism industry.

A team of software developers from the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST) took it upon themselves to jump on the tourism bandwagon and contribute their quota to the Tourism campaign. They therefore built a very interactive website www.pathghana.com, on Ghanaian tourism to showcase the treasures that Ghana has within.

PathGhana.com, since its launch in June, has attracted lots of interest from tourism enthusiasts from all over the world. It seeks to be the number one web portal, providing comprehensive information about Ghana and the people therein. PathGhana.com delves into the history of Ghana, facts and figures and other important information and details that all lovers of Ghanaian tourism need. Taking full advantage of advancements in web 2.0 and developments on the social media landscape, the pathghana.com team has developed a community around the site to encourage blogging for free.

In line with the Ministry of Tourism's awareness creation campaign, the PathGhana team will commence a very exciting monthly campaign called PathGhana Friday. The campaign encourages all young Ghanaians, and other nationals who love Ghanaian tourism, to display links to a tourism webpage on any social network that one belongs to. These social networks include, Facebook, Twitter, Hi5, MySpace, etc. They are also encouraged to display the banner of the website that started it all; PathGhana.com. PathGhana Friday is expected to be observed on the last Friday of every month starting from Friday July 31^st this year. Many individuals are enthused by PathGhana and are bracing themselves for the commencement of PathGhana Friday. Already, the site has been tagged among the 100 most popular sites in Ghana by Alexa.

The Tourism Industry in Ghana is expected to see a major boost despite the global economic recession. President Obama's first visit to the sub-Saharan country of Ghana is also seen to be a major factor that will push tourism further. This year Ghana will celebrate Emancipation day, Panafest and the World Tourism Day. All these festivities are expected to draw in more traffic than ever before. Why don't you join the PathGhana community?

Gameli's notes: Edward Tagoe is the founder of Path Ghana and blogs regularly at Tagoe blogger and moonlight expressions.