Residents of the Atlantic villages and towns scattered along the coasts of the Gulf of Guinea are mainly fishermen and their families, who for many generations had dealt with fishing and had been in trade with fish and other gifts of the sea.
For several years in the region (it really affects the whole of Africa, including Kenya and Somalia), there has been a deficit of a source of their livelihood –the catch is no longer sufficient to bring the precious material of which sale they lived.
International organizations, including Environmental Justice Foundation, associate this phenomenon not only with the illegal fishing that bypass the conventions and break the law fishing in prohibited areas catching too large quantities of fish, but also unfavorable agreements concluded by irresponsible governments of African countries. Short-sightedness of such a decisions, today, on a large scale can be seen in the wave of emigration of the African people for bread.
Despite the plans, resolutions and provisions of the policy-makers and politicians, the problem affects the poor, as usual, and its source from day to day does not decrease.
Following theses of William Easterly , who in his book –‘ White Man's Burden’ -has an important message - we think that to resolve the problem of finding a solution should come down to its ‘lowest level’ – to talk with those most affected by subjecting them to a solution , sometimes temporary and sometimes far-reaching.
That is what has become a spark for us to take the job of creation of a project (trail of slaves), which implementation will help to survive people who have frequently experienced negative impacts of foreign powers.
The tourism industry remains a lot of peoples’ source of income, even entire countries’ in the world. Despite the rich history and excellent conditions for the development of leisure tourism in the region of West Africa and especially its coastal areas, theory could be made easily that the best option for young people who may not become fishermen is to get involved in the tourism industry.
Expedition "African journey in time"
The goals of the expedition
Road trip through Europe and West Africa succeeds and lands in the "Gold Coast" of Gulf of Guinea. There, for hundreds of kilometers of coastline, are scattered remains and prove of the colonial slave trade. These souvenirs, in the form of forts and castles, are in many places suffering devastation, thus losing its historical value. The main task, which we intend to do during our trip, is to create a photographic documentation and to collect as much information as possible on existing then as well as today places of shameful colonialist practices.
During our trip we want to determine the suitability for tourism of the remains of the fortifications, or the possibility of using the ruins of forts and for the creation of a tourist route linking several West African countries. The creation of a "slave route" speaks first of all of a need to find new sources of livelihood for people living in towns along the coast of West Africa and especially the coast of the Gulf of Guinea.
During our trip we will engage also in the works for the Foundation Freespirit in Ghana.
Route
Route of adventure begins in Krakow, and leads up to the Spanish Algeciras, where the ferry passes into Ceuta and we will continue the journey on the African continent. From Morocco and then through the Western Sahara, Mauritania, we will ride through Senegal, in Dakar, where we plan to arrange another visa to go to the Gambia and Guinea. Then, skipping Sierra Leone and Liberia we want to reach out to the Ivory Coast and Ghana. In Ghana, we expect to stay close to the famous Cape Coast - in the small town of Moree, in which we’ve already worked as volunteers, and where once again we want to leave something behind. After a period where we will stay in Moree we go east to Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon, Guinea Ecuatorial, and Gabon.
On the way we want to visit a friendly library in the Gambia and Ghana Farafenii. The Library in Moree is carried out by the Foundation FreeSpirit from Gdansk. In Africa we intend to take similar route to that which has been crossed by the well-known Polish traveler Kinga ‘FreeSpirit’ Choszcz during her hitchhiking trip to Africa. We also want to get involved in work on the project for construction of Freespirit Foundation Educational and Cultural Center in the aforementioned town of Moree.
Project
The project "African journey in time" involves a course of two expeditions to Africa. One of them we had in early 2010, called "The door of no return" wich was the introduction to work on main task of project.
Expedition along the "Door of no return” owes its name to the practice of repatriate the enslaved African peoples in the international slave trade extending from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century. Slaves took the cruise, formerly called " a journey of no return ", in inhumane conditions, under the decks of merchant ships. Journey into the unknown often lasted more than three months, during which many of the enslaved people died. History has still not cleared up the number ranged probably from couple to tens of millions of lives.
Travel, from which the slave did not return, began in breaching the so-called "door of no return." They were the last barrier separating a free man once, then a prisoner, a slave from a long and hard road, and slave labor they had to perform away from their homeland. The doors were located in almost every castle, used for commercial purposes where the a man became the subject of transaction. After crossing the threshold, the road led straight to a slave ship that took him beyond his known world.
New dimension to the "door of no return"
Today the opening of the "door of no return" suppose to mean a form of support for the fight against slavery in the world, which exists in different variations and is often considered to be unpunished. "The door of no return" is a journey to places connected with the history of the slave trade in the lands of Africa, which carries with it specific tasks, to ultimately change the character of these places. Places once used for the devastation of the continent, by a drastic reduction in the number of people, today can become a tourist product that can ensure prosperity of the inhabitants of this part of the continent.
The expedition is an introduction to the work related to the release of the album / guide, in which we want to indicate both the historical value of the sad reminder which colonizers have left here, but also the stories of ordinary people whose lives changed because of the impact of the colonial machine. We want to indicate the possibilities in these residues which are used in the context of cooperation between nations can bring many benefits to this strip mired in poverty in Africa.
For more information please contact: doafryki@gmail.com
English text created with the help of Anna Mangan
Thank You!
