History

I have been working on a pile of assigments lately so have spent a lot more time on the computer then I would like, but also it gives me the privilage to communicate with all of you, so for that I am happy.

Today I was walking across campus- it is beautiful, and thinking of how many people had walked here before me. Legon used to have 600 students. Now it has thousands. They say now knowlege is power. They say that educating the margenalized is going to change this world. I went to the library and walked through shelves and shelves of dusty books, marking the history of this great continent, its struggles for freedom, its opressions. In them are the stories of so many voices we never get to hear in our industrialized countries. In them are voices of violence and pain, liberation hope and peace. When I look around campus there are so many young people bennefiting from the fruits of these struggles, as we do in the industrialized west. Only thier scars are more recent, only 40 years ago there was still colonialism in Africa. But in this bustling city people are still the same- trying to make a living, trying to love their families, surviving in this whirrlwind; and life goes on, God is still good.

This weekend we traveled to cape coast and visited Elmina Castle. It is the largest castle in subsaharan Africa to have partaken in the transatlantic slave trade. The walls were quiet, I felt like if I spoke too loud they would echo the voices of all those who had been there before me. We walked through dungions- where slaves (if they survived) would stay for three months in captivity- bound in Iron and sleeping on eachother, in their own human waste and pain. I stood at the place they call the "room of no return". Looking out onto that sea I wonder what it looked like, years ago, when those captives bound for slavery looked out, did they see freedom? did they see death? But now the sea's resided and there are the reminents of resent industrialization littering the profound view of this raging sea.

Later I walked up to the top of the battiments, and looked out over the villiage. The town of Elmina is colourful, vibrant and full of the hustle and bustle of every day life. Hawkers surrounded the entrance of the castle, waiting for me, and children played to the sounds of drums and pounding fufu as the sun set crimson on the sea. It seemed striking, and the people walking up and down that beach were named "Smith" and "Brown"- with caramal coloured skin from this colonial legacy. And yet life still goes on, God is still good.