There’s a reason some are calling Ghana the gateway to Africa. Having just returned, I’m more convinced than ever that a Back to Africa movement is the right vibe for all forward thinking Black people in the diaspora. This wasn’t my first trip to the continent, but Ghana is the first African country I’ve been to where I truly felt like I’d returned home.
Anyone paying attention will notice I’ve referenced Ghana as a great starting place even prior to my inaugural visit. In all of my research, everything about the country just screamed “welcome” to Blacks who descend from those formerly enslaved in Europe and the Americas. That the government also dubbed this year, 2019, as the “Year of Return” helped a lot. But I soon came to feel the sincerity in the phrase and found it to be more than a simple ad campaign. After meeting Ghanaian after Ghanaian who treated me like family, I’m convinced that those of us descending from Africans stolen from the continent have a place to return to…a place where we are valued, needed, appreciated and wanted!
Why Ghana?
This was the question I was most often asked here in the states after announcing my next destination. People who know me well know Ghana’s been on my heart for a minute, but those who don’t were puzzled as to why I wanted to visit the West African country. I was asked if I was going on a missions trip or if I had business there or even if I had any relatives there. It was outside most people’s realm of imagination that I’d actually want to visit for any other reason.
Oh how I delighted in telling people I was heading to Ghana because my enslaved ancestors had longed to do so, but never could. Every question gave me the opportunity to remind people that, though born in America, Africa lives inside of me based on the history of my people. Blacks nodded at the remembrance that this was their history too. Whites gave uncomfortable, yet polite, smiles at my mention of our shared history being so personal to me– a fact many would like us to forget.
I really did do this for the ancestors, though. I also did it for myself. West Africa and, specifically, Ghana is where I needed to have a conversation with the devil and tell him he is an absolute liar with his so-called “door of no return”. I was returning!!! And I was doing so with the very DNA in my body…the blood still running through my veins…belonging to those broken and chained women and men who were told they never would return. I went to Ghana to let my ancestors know that I carry their genes in my very flesh and to say to them out loud, “I am here because of your African resilience. I am bringing you home, at last”. I am proud of them and the journey back to West Africa was the first step in taking back all that was stolen from them and from us!
Akwaaba Means Welcome!
I’ll go into more specific detail about my latest trip in future posts, but I do want to leave you all with the assurance that we are welcome in Ghana. Often, those who are “anti” back to Africa love to tell us that Africans don’t like us or that they don’t want us in their various countries. Well, this is definitely NOT TRUE in Ghana, so don’t believe the hype!
From the moment I stepped off of the plane and saw “Year of Return” (in our honor) all over the airport to the moment I met a Ghanaian man as we were at the airport on our journey back to the states, everyone genuinely welcomed us home. As the gentleman at the airport on our way home told us, “I hope you enjoyed “our” country, because it is yours, too.” When I joked with him about my newfound love for jollof rice– referring to it in our exchange as “your rice”– he quickly corrected me and told me that it is my rice, too, because I am his African family returning to my homeland.
Like, seriously, at no time did I feel unwelcome in Ghana. In fact, every single day I felt the exact opposite. Of course, we are all being invited to “come home” so that we may help build Ghana into what the country should be, but I’ve been to Kenya and S. Africa who both also have an interest in foreign investors. No shade to those countries, which I’ve enjoyed immensely each time I’ve visited, but there I felt like an outsider. As warm and friendly as the people were, I was still referred to as “the White lady” in Kenya despite my obvious Blackness (it’s what they call Americans, period). And I was simply an American while in South Africa. There was no sense of kinship even though the local people were absolutely wonderful and welcoming in their own way (except for the White lady in S. Africa I literally wanted to fight…but that’s another story for another day).
In Ghana, formal apologies have been made. The history of the plight of our ancestors has been taught for the last 30 years in school systems there, so they know what we’ve been through and they feel us! I didn’t get this in other countries. Hell, I barely get that sense of awareness from some people right here in the U.S.! But in Ghana the awareness was deep and strong and there was a connection that just can’t be faked for propaganda’s sake.
One example of this consanguineous spirit was found in a young lady named Confidence who toured Elmina dungeon (it’s not castle, it’s a dungeon!) with myself and another group of Black strangers who all hailed from the United States. Confidence was the only Ghanaian in our group. While the tour– which consisted of standing in the very dungeons and cells where our captive ancestors were tortured as we listened to story after story of the brutalities they suffered there– was hard on all of us, none of us shed a tear. For months, I’d been afraid of the emotion I thought I’d be overwhelmed by there, but, surprisingly, being in the dungeons gave me a sense of power, triumph and strength I hadn’t expected and that I’m still processing.
At one point in the tour, however, Confidence couldn’t take anymore in. She broke out in a howling and heaving cry as she held onto the walls of the women’s dungeon. In this dark, underground, cramped space, which housed the rusty, narrow “door of no return” leading to the sea where the women were marched to the ships that would take them away forever (until our return), Confidence wept in pain and horror. She was so shaken by the evil of it all that she literally couldn’t go on and had to be consoled by some members of our tour group.
While I felt her pain and wished for her to be comforted, I was also comforted by her cries. To me, I felt like an African was truly seeing our devastation. She was feeling not just our trauma, but knew these were her ancestors, too! Confidence wept for all of us as one family who, through some of our dysfunction, ignorance, greed and tribalisms had come face-to-face with hell…a hell which tried to take us all under and bury us forever.
All throughout my experience in Ghana, I felt seen, understood, welcome and embraced. I was constantly greeted with, “Akwaaba”, the Twi word for welcome and repeatedly told that Ghana was my home. These sentiments were beyond heartfelt and sincere as Ghanaians truly consider us to be Africans. Perhaps from a different tribe, but family all the same.
Want a Business or Land in Ghana?
I’ll be back soon to talk more about Ghana’s Right of Abode, dual citizenship possibilities and more. In the meantime, I encourage all of you to do your own research and think about starting a business in Ghana, investing in the country, owning land, building a home or just taking a return visit on behalf of yourself and your deserving ancestors. Everyone should visit at least once in a lifetime!
Here’s some good advice from my friend Kwame on how everyone in the diaspora can come together to help develop Africa. If you’d like to communicate directly with Kwame for more information, contact him directly at Akwaaba2Ghana@gmail.com.
Questions or Comments?
Stay tuned for future posts on the real estate market in Ghana, as well as a few of my favorite outings during my first visit. We’re also going to talk about racism in the U.S. vs the vibe in Ghana and a few more things I’ve been asked about since returning home. I aim to return again before 2019 is over to do a little more exploration as I ultimately hope to make a permanent home there, so add your comments or any questions you may have below. If I don’t know the answer now, I’ll do my best to help you find the information you seek.
I’m not sure why you were expecting to feel at home in South Africa. It would be like a Korean-American moving to Cambodia and expecting to be welcomed home. They may share a few physical features but that’s where the similarity ends. Korean ancestors are from Korea not Cambodia and African-American ancestors are from Ghana not South Africa.
I was coming from an American mindset where I assumed all skinfolk would be welcomed as kinfolk. At the time, I didn’t even know that most Africans didn’t know about our struggles since being taken from the continent. That’s why traveling is so important. It took the experience of being in Africa to understand just how different some of us are. On the other hand, I have come to know many other continental Africans from all over who DO feel like we are all one. On the continent and off, there’s a lot of talk about borders (made by Europeans) and how they’ve been used to divide and conquer the Motherland and to keep us, throughout the diaspora, separated and ignorant about each other. These conversations aren’t new, of course, but the mindset of “one Africa” is expanding day-by-day and more people from all over are embracing all skinfolk as kinfolk simply because we are all African in origin. Btw, our ancestors are not all from Ghana. Many came THROUGH Ghana and other western coastal ports, but our ancestors were also captured from other places like Congo, Chad, Mali, etc. We can literally come from just about anywhere west, south, east or central. Thanks for chiming in and I hope you’ll help spread the word about reconnecting with the continent!