In Everlasting Memory: Slave Dungeons

So,

if you ask me this is sort of late post. When I say late I mean that I returned from Cape Coast on Sunday and it is now Tuesday. Maybe it's not that late. I did sort of need to come down from the emotional high that was this past weekend.

So,

this past Friday like the Friday before we all got breakfast at the guest center and boarded the bus for our drive to the coastal city that is Cape Coast. The ride wasn't bad. It was shorter than the one to Kumasi and my thoughts and sleep were less heavy...

I didn't stay awake and cry both inwardly and outwardly. My mind did not take in every detail I saw and question what things would be like if it weren't for those damn Europeans. I closed my mind and my heart and just breathed. And, my heart was lighter if not less dense.

We arrived and settled into our guest house and then headed for Elmina castle. We drove through all these beautiful palm trees and you could almost reach out and touch the Atlantic Ocean. It was a surreal sight.

We arrived at the castle and it looked like just that...a castle. It was white and large and cold. It looked very old but I had no idea how old it really was. I guess it hadn't hit me that we were about to walk into where African slaves (my brothers and sisters, lovers, fathers, mothers, cousins, nephews and nieces) had be held before being shipped to the New World...

I was still happy-go-lucky. My smiles were still visible, my innocence still intact. It's pretty much shattered at this point.

The castle was built by the Portuguese in 1492 (it first trading post built on the Gulf of Guinea) and initially it was used to trade resources. It later became a slave castle and part of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. It was seized by the Dutch in 1637 and the slave trade continued under the Dutch until 1872 when the castle became property of the British Empire. If I remember correctly the British didn't abolish slavery until 1833. Therefore, slavery officially continued there until that date. It unofficially continued after that...

Overall about 11 million slaves passed through the walls of Elmina castle into the New World (Europe and North and South America).

The experience was surreal. The cannons were all still there...rusted and real and burnt. I couldn't believe it. I was standing on the ground that my people had suffered and perished on. It didn't hit me. It didn't hit me as I walked through the male and female holding areas...


they were damp and dark and dirty. The slaves were expected to urinate and poop on the ground. Hundreds of them were packed into tiny underground dungeons of gore and grit. I cannot imagine how many of them died of disease, malnutrition, and overwork. So many. So fucking many.

It still didn't hit me though. I walked through it all and removed my mind from my eyes...I was not attached. I was not attached until we reached Cape Coast castle and that's when all my togetherness came crashing down...



it was as if someone inside of me was screaming. Like an old ancestral spirit that was forcing me to look into her eyes. She was forcing me to see what she saw, to feel what she felt. I tasted her blood in my mouth yet I felt the warmness of her touch. She was beautiful and black and her voice was hard yet melodic. She grasped my right hand walked me through her experiences. I was scared and cold and she warmed my hands. At times I was too afraid to look and I covered my eyes and she pulled them away and whispered in my ear "Eka Ema don't be afraid to look. Don't be afraid to confront the past. Don't be hesitant. It has already happened. Be more afraid of your apprehension towards the future." I shivered at her words yet I listened and nodded and trudged on.


Cape Coast castle was the second castle we visited on Friday evening. It was built in 1653 by the Swedish and since then it has been the property of the Swedes, Danes, British, and now Ghanaians. This castle was grander to me although less slaves were held there (approximately 4 million slaves). There was something about it's demeanor. You could just tell that it was built to hold people captive. Elmina castle was once used for goods. Cape Coast castle still wreaked of tortured souls.


My left eyelid twitched from the time we arrived at Elmina till we were through with Cape Coast. Remember what Mother said about twitching eyes...

Cape Coast castle was whiter and blacker at the same time. The dungeons were deeper. The male and female quarters were more emotional. I felt something. I felt them. They had so little sunlight, so little breathing room, so little space. They drank disgusting rain water. I'm sure it was infested. They were fed in the morning and in the evening...slop I suppose. Slop that contained lots and lots of carbohydrates. You've got to keep the black niggers strong so that they can work you know...


then there was that condemned room. That was the worst. And, when the tour guide shut out the lights I thought I was going to die. I clutched Jelan and she held me. I held my breath. It was this little cell that slaves that were deemed to be rowdy and stubborn and difficult were sent. It had no outlet for sunlight and little if any air. They were not fed. They were left there to die and then rot. It was meant to serve as a lesson for the other slaves. If they did not behave they would be sent to the condemned room to suffer the fate of their brave brothers and sisters...

there was nowhere for the slaves to get rid of their bowels in the condemned room. For some reason that thought bothered me a lot.



At that point I had to literally fight to hold back the tears. This was not because I was afraid to cry. I couldn't care less what other people thought of my tears. I just knew...I knew that if I started then it would never end. I would still be crying right now. Maybe I still am...


My strong willed brothers and sisters. The British called them stubborn. I call them brave. They were the rebel leaders. They were the freedom fighters. They were the leaders of that civil rights movement. They refused to be any body's slave. They would rather die that be reduced to men and women without souls...

that's what they were trying to do...rid us of our humanity. Rid us of our souls.


On average slaves stayed in the castles for about 3 months. You know...it took a while for those ships to sail back and forth. Before they were sent most of the male slaves were branded. They had to be easily identifiable once in the new world. Some of them died due to the branding. They were weak from overwork and bad nourishment. Some would say that they were lucky...

then it was the door of no return...this was the location where men and woman (families) were reunited. Ha...reunited. The men and women were never allowed to interact with one another. Then, they crawled on their hands and knees into the ships/canoes...

those were their last moments on African soil.


They weren't even allowed to walk off mother Africa. They were reduced to crawling.





They were heroes. They were me. They are heroes. They are me.

"IN EVERLASTING MEMORY
OF THE ANGUISH OF OUR ANCESTORS
MAY THOSE WHO DIES REST IN PEACE
MAY THOSE WHO RETURN FIND THEIR ROOTS
MAY HUMANITY NEVER AGAIN PERPETUATE
SUCH INJUSTICE AGAINST HUMANITY
WE THE LIVING VOW TO UPHOLD THIS"