Homecoming: A Love Letter to Africa and the Diaspora
"Africans in the diaspora are Africa’s true gold." - Dr. Arikana Chihombori-Quao
I could not be happier about my experience in West Africa. Senegal and Ghana were both great starting points for my African exploration. I love words. Usually, through writing, I know what I want to say and how I want to say it, but it has been hard to figure out what I am truly feeling and how to put it into words.
In Africa, I felt a magnetism; I felt a confidence and beauty that has been a heightened form of any of these feelings I have ever felt. Africa, my whole journey felt easy. I met the right people. I met people who genuinely want to connect, people who absolutely love their Blackness and want to see the continent soar to new heights. Meeting Ladi on Goree Island and talking through his experience growing up in Nigeria and now living in the UK, connecting with Karl, a fellow Haitian working on development in Senegal, meeting sweet Abena, who gave me my Ghanaian name as a Sunday baby- Akosua, who then invited me to a New Years Celebration at her father’s estate, connecting me to Christine, responsible for Haiti, Ghana and Nigeria Tech Summit. And there were so many more. Navigating Africa felt easy. My soul knew it was home despite being absent from its soil for the last three decades.
I feel even more connected to the African diaspora globally and think my mere presence and dialogue shifted things in people and myself. Our connections are deep, and we need to continue to deepen them. To see the shoutouts to Haiti in Senegal at Goree Island and the Renaissance monument felt so deeply personal. We of the African diaspora are limitless; we are miracles, and I am even more dedicated to the upliftment of my people. The fact that we exist despite all that has been done to us, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, Indian Ocean Slave Trade, Genocides such as in Congo, casualties from resistance from invasion across the continent, and exploitation that exists today. From Jamaica to The United States, our lives are so important and meaningful.
I marveled at our food, music, dancing, fashion, landscapes, ability to speak so many languages, laughs, smiles, and intelligence.
Everyone Black needs to visit Africa. I want to dedicate my travels in the coming years to Africa. I need to see the beaches of Praia in Cape Verde, explore the nightlife of Nairobi, Kenya, and Explore Togo beyond the Lome Airport; Guinea, Ivory Coast, Rwanda, and Uganda are all calling my name. A fire has been lit in me. I feel highly reinspired. There are so many thoughts I want to unpack and dissect. There is a stronger sense of identity that I am feeling, and my understanding of Blackness has exploded.
The backdrop of this experience was knowing that places like Ivory Coast are removing French military bases from their country, Senegal removing the French language as the main language in which they learn and conduct business, Nigeria is placing restrictions on ADs that have white people promoting their products, and Ghana is removing visa restrictions for others on the continent and making citizenship for the diaspora extremely accessible. I often think about how long it took me to get to Africa. I am a world traveler, but I know my feet touched the soil at the right time. A time when we are reclaiming our brilliance. We are reshaping the narrative. We were not colonized; we were invaded. White supremacy does not exist; white inferiority does. We are a continuation of the fighters who stood before us. Africa is the future.
I imagine the next few weeks and months will be me processing these very real experiences and seeing how much they continue to haunt me and in what ways.
Africa, thank you, medasse, jerejeff for welcoming me home. I love you, and I KNOW you love me ooo.
Independence Arch: Accra, Ghana December ‘24
Renaissance Monument: Dakar, Senegal December ‘24