TIA: This is Africa

I was recently introduced to a new motto: TIA, This is Africa. It's amazing, because we use it all the time. Before we would just shrug and saw, "oh Ghana..." but "TIA" has since been embraced. Today, for example:

We are walking in the burning heat in order to collect clay from the farm in order to make pottery. The sweat is pouring off our bodies, and shirts are being lifted, exposing the bright white flesh that nevers seens the light of day. TIA.

"I hope you don't mind I've decided not to wear clothes anymore." TIA.

"I haven't shaved in two months" TIA.

The beer's not cold. TIA.

"I need you to leave me something, your iPod, camera or phone so that I can remember you." TIA.

"I hope you're all getting used to this heat, because most of us are ending up in hell." TIA.

It's times like these that you laugh, shake your head - this is Africa. And I love it.

These last two weeks have been a whirlwind. We've covered several kilometers of the country, traveling from Tamale to Kumasi to Cape Coast to the Volta Region, where we've stayed in a small village called Dagbemete and yesterday arrived in the town of Sogakofe. I've had more experiences to recount, but there are a few that I will never forget.

At Cape Coast I discovered something I never knew existed: glowing sand. It's beautiful, and like magic. We walked, ran, danced and drew in the sand to watch the small sparks of light ignite and glow for miliseconds. We turned into small children as we marveled at the sand in the Gulf of Guinea. I am told that it's due to the phosphorous in plankton - this is yet to be confirmed.

While the sand made me marvel in amazement, what Cape Coast is known for made me marvel in disgust. The Cape Coast and Elmina Castles, though they are better described as dungeons.

In history class we learned all about slavery from the auction block to the plantation. But we never really heard about what happened before the Africans reached the Americas. I had seen the diagram of the ship where the people were packed like sardines, but that was where my education ended. In Cape Coast I witnessed what happened in a foreign land - a tragedy.

The dungeons at Cape Coast Castle held 1000 men and 300 women, at Elmina they held 600 men and 400 women. After they were captured and brought south to the coast the people would live in the dungeons for at least six weeks, but it was often longer. They lived amongst their own refuse and the dead were not removed often. When workers began excavation in order to preserve the dungeons, over two feet of human refuse was removed that had been packed for years into the floor. Within the mess hundreds of human bones were uncovered.

Rape was commonplace and expected. After the men and women had been held for almost two months they were marched in underground tunnels through the Door of No Return, where they were packed into the ships, one on top of the other, head to toes and toes to head. Those on the bottom rarely survived.

It was an incredible part of history to discover, however the dungeons were not the most horrifying. The worst part was that even today, the history of slavery is not taught in Ghana.

Many Ghanaians do not even understand what the word slavery means. We would say it to children and they would look back at us with blank stares. A university student can graduate without ever knowing about slavery. If it happens in Ghana, one of the most developed African countries, you can be certain that most of Africa remains in the dark.

That's a tragedy.