lag

I woke at 3:30 this morning—7:30 in Ghana, which was the time I woke each morning for the conference. We touched down at JFK just before dawn yesterday; ten hours to cross the Atlantic Ocean, half a day to fly over 5000 miles. So much about this trip has to do with contrast—between here and there, then and now. I didn’t think of our visit to Elmina Castle as a homecoming; I didn’t stand in the narrow Door of No Return and think I had somehow performed a gesture of reconciliation. I said a brief, silent prayer and tried to keep moving—there were so many rooms, so many levels to explore, so many facts to absorb. The governor’s chambers were at the very top of the castle—and it is a castle, even though that seems like a misnomer to me. There’s a moat and a drawbridge, there are cannon pointed out at sea and inland at “the natives.” And rightly so, since the local Africans helped the Dutch to overthrow the Portuguese, not that that was much of an improvement. The British took over after 250 years but regardless of the colonial ruler, enslaved Africans continued to be marched from the interior to the coast and at any given time at least a thousand people (400 women, 600 men) were held in dark, filthy, airless cells on the ground floor of the castle.  When soldiers drank too much or abused their “privileges” with the enslaved women, they were locked in a cell that had three windows and plenty of light. But when a slave rebelled, he was locked in the condemned room and left to die—no window, no air, no light. From atop the walls of the castle you could walk in the sun, enjoy the refreshing breeze, look out over the sea and almost forget about the dungeons below—forget about the interior courtyard and the governor’s balcony where he stood to survey the enslaved women in order to select his next rape victim. She was then bathed by soldiers with water from a cistern beneath the courtyard before being led up a private staircase the conveniently ended at a trap door right in front of the governor’s chambers. It was hard to stay angry—you felt disgust and rage but then your sorrow outweighed everything else. I was ready to leave Elmina before the tour even ended. Our guide Ato was excellent; I asked him how he managed his emotions and he said he used to come to work early and stand in the dungeons to cry. What did we do? We piled back onto our little bus—after buying books or crafts or fabric from the shops located throughout the castle—and went to a stunning beach resort to have lunch. As soon as we stepped off the bus at Elmina we were surrounded by young men trying to learn our names so they could make personalized bracelets or sea shells for us to purchase after the tour. Elmina’s main industry is fishing but it remains a place of commerce and trade. Tourists pay admission to enter the castle (double if you want to take photos); Ato felt tourism had dropped off since 9/11 but noted that the flight is also expensive. It’s a strange irony that the descendants of those whose ancestors were once enslaved here in West Africa now have the means (some of us) to return and “pay tribute”…

Here comes the rain. I have a library presentation this morning and final exams this afternoon so I’m glad I had yesterday to rest and reflect on my trip. The Yari Yari Ntoaso conference was great—so much talent and wisdom and possibility packed into four days! I know I won’t be able to recall everything that happened since I last blogged on Friday. One of the things about being abroad is that you have to surrender AND adapt to a different way of life. Now that I’m back in Brooklyn I’ve got uninterrupted internet service and no blackouts to contend with, so when I feel like blogging I just sit down and start typing. But in Accra I often couldn’t get online at the hotel, and instead of writing in a journal I just didn’t write at all. It may take me a while to catch up but this is a start…