SANKƆFA BACK TO OUR ROOTS | Garden of Return Anomabo Ghana 🇬🇭 | Commemorating 400 years of slavery

The trip to Anomabo was one of the most challenging as we had to battle the rains, SDCard not working, mobile storage full, losing footage, but still managed to get some video footage for you.

The Memorial Garden of Return was an idea which had been on the drawing board of the minds of Pan-African leaders for centuries. It is a shame we had to wait 400 years (1619 - 2019) to actually realise this plan. The best thing, against all odd the Year of Return was a successful project and realisation, contrary to those who would have liked to this see this idea shelved.

The official opening of the right to return to Africa, commenced from 28th September 2019. This initiative, opened the door for all diasporas to travel to the motherland, it also set the trend for all Black people irregardless of their location outside of Africa, to starting thinking/planning at least one trip to the continent in their lifetime, just as we annually witness our Muslim brethren travelling to Mecca.

A visit to the Memorial Garden of Return at Anomabo, on balance serves as a gradual introduction to the history and the realisation of how our ancestors were forcefully kidnapped, branded (like cattle), packed like sardines and shipped off to the Americas and the Caribbean for sale to work on their plantation. The mere thought of the suffering of our ancestors, is sufficient enough to churn ones stomach and violently agitate the mind.

The take away from the visit to the Memorial Garden of Return at Anomabo, made it succinct that history is a necessary fact of life. It's a shame some groups of race are hell bent on twisting the truth pertaining to the injustices meted out to Africans or black people across the world, but there is good news, things are changing. Granted things are not changing as fast as it ought to be, but it is changing and it is only a matter of time.

Aside from history being necessary, it is vital for all to realise, history is meant to administer a heavy punch to the gut or to one's solar plexus, enough to induce an enormous shock to shake the mind. History, is also meant to serve as a template to enable the living to adjust or correct the wrongs of the past.

History, is meant for you to question past events and past decisions. History, also triggers and challenges our thought processes comparable to a PI/Private Investigator, permitting us to make informed decisions by deducing the truth as best as we can.

The Memorial Garden of Return, is a landmark that signifies our ancestors who were illegally detained and removed from the African shores shall not or never be forgotten.

After the visit to the Memorial Garden of Return, we were able to walk across to Fort Anomabo/Fort William to pay our respect to the ancestors that were forced to live in inhumane conditions for months before being exported via their Middle Passage to the Americas and the Caribbean.

A visit to the Memorial Garden of Return and eventually to the Fort William would be a good pre-cursor to break one into the harsh realities of slavery, prior to visiting the renowned Cape Coast and Elmina Castles.

We hope you learned something from this brief.

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