Elmina slave forts

We enjoyed a pretty luxurious buffet breakfast this morning at the African Village (“luxurious” in terms of what I had been expecting in Africa) with sweet white pineapple, red pepper and onion omelets, beans, and biscuits. Driving into town, we passed by huts of wooden panels and mud, displaying rack after rack of silver fish outside, glistening in the mid-morning sun.

My favorite was this giraffe building, which I luckily snapped a photo of through the window of our speeding bus!


We arrived in town in time to participate in Sunday service at Bethel Methodist Chapel,

where the joyously dancing members were clothed in garb of various styles, all created from the same fabric – the print read “Bethel Methodist Church, 170 years”. Amazing. I love that worship in Ghana involves a full-body experience, after which members sit and dab sweat from their foreheads with their handkerchiefs as the sermon commences.


The pastor delivered the message in Fante, and worn leather hymnals were thrust into our hands as the choir welcomed us to join them in worship. Those of us who believed in Jesus Christ as our savior were invited to take communion with the members of the church, which was an awakening experience.


It’s so different when it’s done in a language you don’t understand, and yet the motions and significance of it all remain the same. It makes me wonder how service and communion will be in Beijing, in a language I do understand, but not for the Christian vocabulary.


We did not stay for the entire service, as African church services can last as long as six hours. (Can you imagine? I love Jesus and all, but I think six continuous hours of sermons, worship and prayer would give my noggin quite the workout!)


We headed to the slave castle at El Mina, built by the Dutch in 1471 and later occupied by the Portuguese. The name “El Mina” is actually an African distortion of Portuguese "al mina" -- "to the mine".


As with the slave fort at Cape Coast yesterday, being present in a place where so much brutality and dehumanization had taken place merely 200 years previously was… I don’t know. There aren’t any words. It’s as if gravity is gradually altered, pulling your heart lower and lower in your body, until it feels as if it weighs a hundred pounds. Tears simply don’t come, because you’re feeling so much that you can’t feel any more.


What’s even more atrocious than the conditions is the fact that the governor would reside in luxury in the quarters directly above the slave dungeons. Church services would be held in the chapel on site, also directly above the dungeons where humans suffered, standing six inches deep in their own urine and feces, without an inch to move, without food or ventilation. Inconceivable.


At both slave forts, a marble plaque is inlaid, reading:

In everlasting memory of the anguish of our ancestors.
May those who died rest in peace.
May those who return find their roots.
May humanity never again perpetrate
such injustice against humanity.
We, the living, vow to uphold this.

In light of it all, we chose to celebrate African culture this evening with a performance by African drummers and dancers. It was quite the experience, not unlike Polynesian dancing, with war faces and isolated muscle movements in every part of the body.


I must say that all of us from Columbia could now effectively and believably put on an African drumming and dancing performance ourselves, after an evening of rigorous instruction from the Ghanaian performers that evening. ;) Who needs a gym?

Cape Coast

I awoke this morning to this gorgeous view from my room:


One thing that you should know about restaurant table service in Ghana is that it is incredibly slow in comparison to service in the States. Our plan was to have breakfast at 9:30am and be on the bus bound for Cape Coast by 10:30am. Instead, we were seated at 9:30, waited patiently for our bread, eggs, and juice (standard breakfast here), and left Accra by 12:30pm.


En route to Cape Coast, our wonderful guide, George, shared with us a history of the 52 Ghanaian tribes, their languages and dialects, and rituals for birth, courtship, and death.

When a Ghanaian child is born, he or she is not given a name until the eighth day. At this time, a name is selected, so significant and so meaningful that any true Ghanian is able to identify and locate the address of another Ghanian whom he has just met, simply by learning his name. Also included in a name is an indicator of the day of week on which the child was born. For example, as I was born on a Tuesday, my name would include Abenaa.

Courtship in the Ghanian culture is traditionally polygamous. When a man has chosen a woman whom he desires to be his wife, he approaches the woman’s family with a bottle of Schnapps and a Bible. In return, his future wife’s family gives him a dowry along with their daughter. Vows exchanged in marriage do not include fidelity, as it was traditionally acceptable for a man with a wife to pursue another woman who has caught his eye. Hm.

As we headed on along the dusty road to Cape Coast, we also were able to see Liberian refugee camps, where many Liberians chose to stay after the end of the civil war (only two years ago) and make a life.

Slave Forts

Although we had been forewarned, the experience at Cape Coast Castle, where captives were held in dungeons before they were sold for labor to European traders, was indescribably sobering.


We entered the male slave dungeons, unlit and damp with stale air. Lights that had been hung for safe treading were turned off once the dungeon door was closed behind us, and the twenty-five of us felt cramped and a bit too close for comfort in this room, which trapped over one hundred black men at a time, less than two centuries prior.


As the lights were turned back on, our guide, Matilda, pointed out to us markings that had been scratched into the dungeon wall to indicate the level of human feces in which the captives stood. The markings were well over twelve inches from the floor.

Matilda led us through various other dungeons in unimaginable conditions, and we arrived at the Door of No Return. Ironic was the view from the threshold of this door, as it was a beautiful sight to behold, and yet such an atrocious life lay ahead of those who gazed out at this view, years before we did today.



Because meal preparation in Ghana is so... well, slow, we placed our orders at the restaurant before embarking on our 3-hour tour of the slave forts. Even so, after we arrived, we waited at least 20 to 30 minutes for the dishes to arrive at our table. 'Tis baffling, as the meals aren't exactly what you’d call elaborate. I ordered Red-Red with chicken, which is essentially seasoned black-eyed peas with fried plantains (yum!) and chicken.

With satiated appetites, we reboarded our funny little bus, but not before being bombarded by vendors selling shells, bracelets, and snacks. Despite our polite refusals, the men of Ghana are quite persistent. Jackie even received a gift from an enamored admirer -- a shell with a romantic message scribbled across the top: "Jackie. I ♥ U baby. Be with me." followed by his name, email address, physical address, and phone number.

Boy, is Matt lucky that I didn’t receive this shell. With poetry like that, how could a girl not be instantly wooed?

With gifts from many suitors, we journeyed on to Elmina,

a beautiful village on the beach. Tonight, we stay at Coconut Grove African Village, under the stars and to the soundtrack of the crashing waves along the coast.