The Araba Memorial Internet Café

The Araba Memorial Internet Café, which opened on March 15th, 2004, lies in the middle of the small town Nkoranza. The internet café is named after a little girl called Araba. She was a cheerful and wise girl who lived in the Hand in Hand community for over six years. Unfortunately, she passed away in the summer of 2003. She was only 14 years old.

The income generated from the Araba Memorial Internet Café goes directly to the Hand in Hand Community. It is hoped that in the future the internet café will become the main source of income for the Hand in Hand Community, thus making the community less dependent on other sources of funding such as sponsors, gifts, the guesthouses, and the sales of postcards and jewelry. The internet café also provides employment for the locals. Six people from the area surrounding Nkoranza are able to make a living by working at the internet café.

The Araba Memorial Internetcafe in the city centre of Nkoranza.

All the computers in the internet café are second hand and have been donated from Holland. There are currently eleven computers available for browsing and e-mail. Two other computers are reserved for business purposes. There is also a photocopier, laminator and binding machine. Unfortunately, several of the café's computers have been damaged due to electrical disturbances. Although the café has its own generator, it does not operate automatically and needs to be turned on after every electricity failure. Too late to avoid damage to the computers.

Fortunately, the internet café has a very fast internet connection that is gaining a positive reputation in the surrounding vicinity. After a slow start, the number of visitors is growing and the café now attracts not only tourists and residents of Nkoranza, but also people from the surrounding villages and the neighbouring town Techiman.

Staff of the internetcafe: Prince, Grace, Fausty, Baffo, Agyemang (from left to right)

On the second floor of the internet café, there is a computer school where people from the local population can pay to take courses which help to familiarize them with computers. There are already fifty students (from age twelve and up) and thirty school children (ages six through ten) participating in one of the ten courses offered. The most popular courses are the MS DOS/Windows, Microsoft Word and the Microsoft Excel course. One of the main challenges currently facing the school is a computer shortage. There are only nine computers for classes of 12-15 students.

The Araba Memorial Internet Café is located in the heart of Nkoranza, opposite the taxi/tro-tro station.