Mole, Mystic Rock, Crocodiles, Slave Camp = Interesting Weekend

I would have never guessed that Africa would present so many more questions for me to ponder and answer so few. In the last five days, I have done things, I have said things but most importantly, I have deeply questioned myself, my motivations, and the role that I play as a Black Westerner in an African country.

As we headed along a seemingly endless paved road that eventually turned into a seemingly endless bumpy red dirt road, I stared in admiration at the mud houses with straw roofs and sometimes aqua blue doors. I love the northern countryside because it is what I imagine all of Ghana was like before colonization. The mud houses are so kempt and appealing, more so that the modern cement buildings, with chipping paint and bright telecommunication advertisements (MTN, Vodofone, Zain, Tigo) splashed over them. They are just as natural as the landscape that they so perfectly decorate, these mud houses…so my admiration turned into a desperate attempt to capture all that I could with my camera. I took picture after picture of these roadside villages trying to create a digital representation of the entire scene but to capture the entire scene meant that I need to capture the inhabitants of these villages as well. So, I found myself desperately trying to capture the people walking or sitting along the side of the road in their beautiful colorful attire as we sped along at 60-70 mph. I was trying to time when to press the shutter button but most times I missed the shot and got blurry trees or blurry buildings…and then it dawned on me, who am I to take these pictures of people without their consent? What role am I playing in the exploitation of the third world taking snapshots with the intention of showing them and even selling them to others. Trying to turn someone else’s reality into a piece of art…what gives me the right? When we arrived at the village of Larabanga, we met a man by the name of Emanuel, who told us the story of the mystic rock.

Hundreds of years ago, the people of the Northern Region built a road from current-day Mali to Tamale. They wanted this road to be straight but the mystic rock was in the way. They moved the rock but when they returned, the rock had mysteriously moved back to its original location. Thus, the rock earned the name the mystic rock and they were forced to build the road around the rock. It was also from the location of the rock that the founder of the village threw his spear to determine where he would build his village. The next day, he found that the spear had landed in the oldest Mosque in Ghana, only a few kilometers away, and the village spread from the Mosque outward. In this community, I was faced with the same ethical dilemma…should I or should I not take pictures with and of the villagers. For some reason, it just seemed so dehumanizing. I think I would be offended if a stranger came to my house and started taking photos of me and my children, to do who knows what with the pictures. And to make it worse, all the kids were asking for money and random objects in our possession and while I felt compelled to give, I also felt that giving would only perpetuate the notion that they are lacking something. By giving a cedi or two, I am feeding into a cycle of dependence and 2 cedis is not going to significantly change anyone’s life. In fact, I feel like it is disrespectful to give money because it’s like I am saying this is all that you are worth to me when actuality this is not my sentiment at all. I believe they deserve all the goodness and riches the world has to offer and I also believe they already possess so much of that richness, perhaps not in the form of money...but they are no doubt rich in my eyes.

Perplexed and disappointed in myself for giving money, we moved on to the entrance of Mole National Park. After 13 hours of travel and 2 months of unfocused studying, I was elated when I found I had a room to myself. And equally livid 3 hours later, when I found out it was a mistake. I spent most of the night trying to detox from the internalized anger that had built up from my own actions and from the actions and words of those around me.

The next morning, I woke up at 6:00 am, took a nice WARM shower with RUNNING water, ahhh!! And headed out on a walking Safari, swimming in Alanna’s 9 inch K-Swiss because I hadn’t brought any closed toe shoes of my own.
On the Safari, I was still detoxing and thus paid very close attention to the tiny details of my surroundings. The day was chilly with a slight overcast; we walked with our eyes prowling the ground, trying to avoid small pellets and large dung piles in our path. I especially wanted to avoid the large dung piles because Alanna’s shoe would have surely gotten stuck, leaving my bare foot to face the rough terrain alone but of course I would have put the shoe back on and just carried the smell with me. We spotted deer and antelope first, hiding amongst the trees. They looked on in fear, with a calm curiosity as to what direction we would head next. Next, we saw 4 elephants bathing in water so deep that from a distance, I thought they were hippos (which actually we saw on the Black Volta River the previous morning, on 5 person canoes). The air smelled of lemon grass…the aroma was so soothing and combined with my growing hunger, I felt like I was floating over the valley. As we progressed, we saw monkeys and warthogs and baboons and even a small fox. I learned that elephants have a work tusk and a defense tusk but in most cases, their work tuck becomes weak and breaks off, so they must use their defense tusk to work and when that one breaks, it must depend on other elephants to eat because they are unable to dig up their own food. We also learned that male antelope’s that leave the bachelor pack to try and become the leader of the females, will forever be unwelcome in the bachelor pack and if they do not win in the battle for the females, then they are cast out of each social group and being a loner makes them a prime target for lions. We spent the next night in a very nice hotel in Tamale and we had a great conversation that was even more heavily ingrained in my mind the next day after visiting a slave camp.

Before the slave camp, we visited a village by the name of Paga. Here the crocodiles are said to each be spiritually connected to one person in the village. They say there is the same number of crocodiles in the area as there are people and anytime a person dies, a dead crocodile will appear the next day. The story of how the village was founded is centered on the mutual respect and friendship between a crocodile and the founder. Because the inhabitants do not harm the crocodiles, the crocodiles in turn, do not harm people, so…we were each able to touch a crocodile and take pictures with him and he only budged once when Kwaku attempted to sit on him, haha. The crocodiles are rewarded for cooperating with the tourists by feeding them live chickens, which is actually kind of disturbing to watch.

At the slave camp, I was surprised by my numb emotional response. As sad is it was, all I could think about was how Africans sold and traded other Africans. Mostly inter tribal conflict would result in one tribe taking or kidnapping members of another and bringing them to the European masters. It made me think of a good analogy:

There is a mother, and she has a small baby that she doesn’t want to keep. She may or may not love this child but what is most important is that there are things that she needs more than this baby. She needs money, she needs clothing, protection, shelter…self-preservation is her number one priority. A rich family comes to her and offers small gifts in exchange for this child and the mother welcomes this transaction openly because they are offering things she needs for survival and in turn it seems as if this couple will take decent care of her child. At least she will know he will have shelter over his head and food to eat. What she did not know was that this couple never had the intention of loving this child as their own. In fact, this child was mentally and physically abused. As an adolescent, he tried his hardest to please them but they were nonresponsive, he was more like a burden than a member of the family. A nuisance that they barely tolerated but maintained control by manipulating his self-image. As a young adult, this man carried so much baggage and pain. Feeling as if he would find some answers about his identity, he set out to find his long lost mother. She had changed; she was weaker than he remembered. Still strong in spirit but she had lost her way. Her son took her hand and said, “Mama, let me help you,” and she turned, looked into his starry, hopeless eyes and said, “Why did you come here? I didn’t want you then and I don’t need you now.” Oh, how his heart sunk to the bottom of his chest. The mother he had dreamed of for so long was just as unabashedly cruel as his false parents. Now, he is forced to make a decision. Stay with the Mother, who pushes him away, because he loves her so very much or go back to the only resemblance of a family that he knows because at least they have the money and the wherewithal to take care of him even though they don’t want anything to do with him either. He struggles and struggles and he decides that no matter what direction he decides to go in, he should treat them all with love and respect. Because if he doesn’t, he will unintentionally exploit, dehumanize, hurt, degrade, and inflict the same pain upon others that has been constantly inflicted upon him. He realizes that his mother has also been abused perhaps not physically but mentally and thinks that if he eases into her life, they can grow and heal together.

This brings me to the theory of the closed door policy that some of my colleagues suggested developing African Nations adopt until they get on their own feet and figure things out for themselves. I actually love this idea, cut the bullshit pity aid, cut the trading, cut everything and let Africans benefit from their own resources. Some of the brightest, wisest, most gifted people on the planet live here; there is no reason except for the continual exploitation of these countries by developed countries and corporate giants, that Africa should not be a thriving, vibrant continent. My only question is, “What about her long lost child?”