Greetings from Ghana

And a Call to Action

Dec 10, 2023

Opening day at the Bitcoin Dua education center in Agbozume, Ghana.

Facilitating broader Bitcoin adoption is a challenging task.

When you’re at a conference or listening to a podcast and someone is talking about how Bitcoin will save The Global South, it’s hard not to believe that this will magically just happen.

But magically happen it won’t.

It’s going to take a lot more work from the grassroots to policy levels for it to happen, and this work will be challenging.

I understand this more acutely than ever in the wake of attending the African Bitcoin Conference and then traveling to Bitcoin Dua — Ghana’s first circular Bitcoin economy — last week.

So, in this edition of the newsletter, I’ll discuss some of the challenges that lie ahead, recount some of the beautiful experiences I had in Ghana and leave you with a call to action.

High on Bitcoin in Accra

When you attend a Bitcoin conference, it’s easy to get the impression that Bitcoin has already saved the world.

Speakers share stories of how great Bitcoin is and the change they’ve seen it catalyze in both their own lives and the lives of those around them.

Yes, they also discuss some of the challenges they face as well as the hurdles we need to clear if we’re to onboard the next few billion people onto Bitcoin. However, as I said, there tends to be so much optimism at these conferences that you end up feeling like these next few billion people will basically onboard themselves.

Part of that optimism comes from the fact that you get to meet some people in person that you’ve previously only spoken with online. These interactions tend to put people in the good mood.

I mean, I was pumped when I ran into Luthando from South Africa’s Bitcoin Ekasi.

He was the fourth person I interviewed on my podcast.

The first time I felt a deep sense of purpose in doing what I do as a podcaster was when he spoke about how Bitcoin not only changed his life for the better financially, but also prompted him to make positive behavioral changes.

He’s truly inspiring, and I recommend your listening to what he had to share in our interview:

I also met the Kenyan Queen Marcel Lorraine herself.

The work she’s doing educating African women about Bitcoin via her program Bitcoin Dada is utterly inspiring.

You can learn more about it in my interview with her:

(See episode 7 at the link below.)

And the gentleman standing next to her above — KG — invented Machankura, a system that allows people to transact with Bitcoin over ‘dumb phones’ (non smartphones, like those old Nokia types), without an internet connection.

He’s one of the most impressive innovators in the Bitcoin space, and he’s a remarkably engaging speaker.

Pumped to have him on the podcast next week.

And I also got to meet some of the bigger names in the Bitcoin space, like Jeff Booth, one of my favorite thinkers on planet Earth.

So, the challenge in attending one of these conferences is to try to soak in the good vibes and positive energy and to carry it out into the world with you to do the more challenging work of educating others about Bitcoin and bringing them into the Bitcoin community.

I gave this my best shot in the days after the conference.

The Post-conference Work in Ghana

The day after the conference ended, I headed out to Agbozume, which is about 30 minutes from the border of Togo, to visit Bitcoin Dua.

Bitcoin Dua

Unlike what I saw in El Zonte (Bitcoin Beach), El Salvador — widely considered to be the first official circular Bitcoin economy — just a few weeks back, Bitcoin Dua currently has few resources and is in a very early phase of development.

While the team there has onboarded a few shops (at which I spent some Sats), our visit on December 4th actually marked the official opening of the center.

In the picture to the bottom right of the tweet, I was teaching the group how to earn free Bitcoin online via a piece I wrote for Finder.

Here’s a link to that piece, you know, in case you’re into free Bitcoin: 12 ways to get free bitcoin

In having conversations with the team members there, I learned that they need everything from computers to books on Bitcoin to furniture for the educational center.

So, if you feel so inclined, please donate to Bitcoin Dua here: Bitcoin Education Center (Geyser Fund)

They also need people to teach virtually and to respond to questions they have.

I’ve signed on to do both. I’ve been in touch with the Bitcoin Dua squad via WhatsApp since I left, and I already find both sharing resources with them and just simply being in touch with them very rewarding.

If you’re interested in doing this sort of work, too, please shoot me an email at newrencap@gmail.com, and I’ll help plug you in.

Onboarding Solomon

When I returned to Accra, I met with my friend Solomon. He and I worked together when I lived in Ghana 14 years ago.

We’ve stayed in touch since then, and I’ve been meaning to get him involved in the Bitcoin space for a while now.

I’ve sent Solomon money on a few occasions over the years and the remittance fees were always high. When you send bitcoin over the Lightning Network, though, these fees virtually disappear.

So, I set Solomon up with a good starter Lightning wallet, the Blink Wallet (which we aren’t allowed to use here in America, the “land of the free”), sent him some Sats to show him how payments over Lightning work and then asked my connections on X to send him a few Sats, as well.

People from around the world ended up sending him many more Sats than I thought they would, which brought tears to my eyes.

If you’re reading this and you sent Solomon some Sats, thank you very much. I deeply appreciate it.

And if you have a Lightning wallet and want to send Solomon some Sats, please use the QR above to do so. (Thanks in advance!)

Lastly, if you don’t yet have a Lightning wallet and want to download one, I highly recommend Phoenix.

Moving Forward

Visiting Bitcoin Dua and onboarding Solomon was just the beginning of my work there.

I’ll stay in touch with both Solomon and the team at Bitcoin Dua to continue to educate them about Bitcoin and to support them as they teach others in their respective communities about Bitcoin.

99.99% of Ghana doesn’t use or seem to care about Bitcoin at all. Part of the reason for this is because they’ve either heard it’s a scam or maybe they’ve never heard about it at all.

If some have heard of it and don’t want to use it, that’s totally fine. But, in my experience, I’ve yet to meet someone whose learned about Bitcoin and begun to use it who’s decided not to use it anymore.

In fact, the opposite is often true. Not only do they tend to continue to use it, but they do so more and more, and they encourage those around them to use it, too.

Call to Action

So, my call to action to you today is: COME JOIN US ON THE LIGHTNING NETWORK

Download Phoenix Wallet.
Use this tutorial to help you set it up.
Send some sats to it.
Send a few sats to Bitcoin Dua and a few Sats to Solomon (links above).

If you do this, I can almost assure you you’ll feel the rush and the sense of empowerment that comes with actually using bitcoin. It’s quite awesome.

And that’s all for today.

Paid subscribers, I will send out a market update either later this evening or tomorrow morning.

Thank you all for reading, and don’t forget to heed this call to action.

Best,

Frank