Cape Coast/Elmina Castle Trip

Today was absolutely amazing. We visited Cape Coast and Elmina Castle which was a site where the first slaves in Ghana were transported, captured, and imprisoned. We had a very knowledgeable tour guide, whom appeared to have rehearsed and told the story a million times, yet remained very sincere and serious in his lecture. It almost always isn't until I reach home that I truly reflect and can appreciate the context of places like these. Here is a picture of me taking in the site of the vast ocean and thinking about how the people who were captured must have felt, thinking about what their fate would soon be.

Once approaching the castle, there are townspeople, local Ghanaians, who rush to visitors and tourists asking their names and what country they are from. Kingsley forewarned on the bus that this would happen, and explained that when returning from the castle after the tour, the people who have seashells with the tourist's name and country on it, making the tourist feel inclined to buy the shell. This, I thought was a great sales pitch, and good marketing. Kingsley had himself told one of the townspeople that his name was David, and low and behold after the tour, a man was holding a shell with "David" painted on  it. It amazes me again to grasp the concept of how these people make a living, depending on others, foreigners for money, so that their families can eat. This brings me to another topic of disability. Selling shells, bracelets, and jewelry, are some of the paying jobs in this town, would it be feasible for someone in a wheelchair to do this type of work? Could a visually impaired individual be able to make as quick moves as those in this area? After all these townspeople run up to tourists, haggle them for their information, remember and recall their information while painting them onto seashells, remember which person is who when bringing the finished project to the individual, bargain a price, and collect the money. I mean talk about ACTIVITY ANALYSIS, this requires skill!