Cape Coast Castle
This castle would be so idyllic, if the walls that talk wouldn't tell a story so horrific, so tragic it makes your stomach turn and your tears fall. If the waves of the ocean wouldn't expose the crushed bones of black women and men.
Maame Marion
400 years after the beginning of the transatlantic slave trade, the implications can still be felt. Cape Coast Castle, one of the slave castles in Ghana, was used to hold slaves before they were loaded onto ships and sold in the Americas, never to return again.
It is a place I had always wanted to visit, even though a part of me had dreaded it, it was important that I went. After a week in the motherland, my parents, my cousin and I plan our trip and went to visit Cape Coast Castle. During the entire trip to the castle, my eyes were glued to the road, wondering about the many women, men and children who walked many days and nights to meet their undeserving fate. I wondered what the scenery looked like back in the day. Not knowing what was ahead of them, if some naively thought that what was ahead couldn’t be worse than what they were leaving behind.
I had read about the transatlantic slave trade, written essays and term papers. Done hours and hours of research, going through hundreds of pages in the library. But there was nothing that could have prepared me for this experience: The scorching sun, was not able to overshadow the darkness that the castle portrayed.
The dungeons, the darkness, the dreadful experience of our ancestors was felt with every step and heightened with every word our tour guide spoke.
Standing right next to my father in the male dungeon, I felt an overwhelming sense of gratefulness for his freedom. And for mine. There were no shackles around his neck. No one restricting him from moving around freely. He was free.
Seeing how the masters lived, with rooms that had plenty of windows and the breeze of the ocean going through their rooms. Having church services right on top of the dungeons, where human beings were force to live under grotesque conditions and blinding darkness is one of the many things that brought in a bunch of emotions on my part. The female dungeon took me out. I couldn’t stop my tears. There’s a presence that I felt in these dungeons. And a pain that was in the air that is impossible to put into words.
The Gate of No Return.
As we approached the gate of no return. Looking out to the ocean that transported thousands and thousands of black men and women, the tour guide said something that stuck with me: “This may be the door of no return but today we are free and are powerful to walk through on our own and to return.”
I recommend everyone to visit the castle. Join a tour. Meditate. Take it in, buy some literature that they have to offer. Educate yourself through this unforgettable experience.
And most importantly let us not let our past control our future but rather help us shape a better future for those who are here and those who are yet to come.
Have you ever been to the castle? Please do share your experience.
Love,
Maame