At the start there is "Roots"

  Once upon a time, there was a Polish man who had a boat. This long distance captain left his beautiful lands, skirted the European coasts, surmounting very bad weather in the Channel, sailed down the African coast and arrived in 40 days at Banjul “Bay”. His project quickly started up with the help of a tour operator who filled the boat with passengers and the Laico Atlantic who filled the passengers’ plates and glasses. Beautiful boat, the most beautiful as a matter of fact with a stability that stops the boat from pitching… and which is the envy of the competition with their older chuggers.

     Chef Ousman, top left, Sullayman, waiter, top right. Pascal goes onto the pirogue to Kunta Kinteh Island.

  We were part of the first ‘inaugural’ sortie and it’s a great ‘well done’ to everyone, the boat’s team, the tour operators and most of all the chefs and waiters who were all smiles and enthusiasm. The boat is well equipped; I see there’s even a market for Allaman Chaudronnerie with some safety rafts in their trademark orange. Hey guys, you already have the colours in stock, all you have to do now is to pitch to the ship owners☺

  We left Banjul near 9 a.m. and navigated up the Gambia river for about 2 hours to reach Albreda/Juffureh. A peaceful and tranquil ride with a bit of reading on the upper bridge. La vita è bella!

  We’re going to visit the village of Albreda/Juffureh from which comes the main character of ‘Roots: The Saga of an American Family’, the famous novel by Alex Hayley. The book, based on the story of slavery made into a novel, tells the story of Kunta Kinteh, born into a Mandinka family. As a youth, he is captured by two colonists and two Africans as he goes to pick up some wood. They make him a prisoner, mark him with a red-hot iron and send him to America on a slave ship. Having arrived in Maryland, he’s sold to a planter who calls him Toby Reyynolds. Hayley then tells his and his family’s story.

  The village has a statue which commemorates that sad age of slavery inscribed with “never again.” Every 2 years in February, there are celebrations which bring together many descendants who come primarily from America and the Caribbean. The next one will be in 2013. Albreda/Juffureh was occupied by the French for close to two centuries and it’s the first location where Europeans settled in Western Africa for the slave trade.

     Kunta Kinteh Island, scale model of a slave ship (un négrier).     

  Commerce with Africa, which was primarily done through the desert, evolved in the 15^th century with the exploration of the western coasts by Europeans. The slave trade exploded with the need to fill the new American colonies with labour for sugar, cotton and tobacco plantations.

   James Island, a “rock” in the middle of the river, close to Juffureh, was in British hands for 300 years. First and foremost a strategic outpost for the control of the river, it also served as a holding area for slaves. On this small island, there was a fort which the French destroyed in 1778. Despite this, the English continued the trade of Juffureh. They abolished slavery in 1807, but it’s after this period that the most traffic occurred up until 1870.

  There only remain a few ruins of the old fort. The English abandoned James Island in 1816, opting to go to St Mary Island where they built Bathurst (Banjul).

  The island was rechristened Kunta Kinteh in 2011.

   We went for a walk in the Juffureh village where life carries on its course (bottom) but which follows the rhythm of holidaymakers’ visits which is their golden-egged goose.

  By politeness and respect, you must go pay your respects to the village elders, descendents of Kunta (bottom left – Binta Kinteh is of the 7^th generation). The title of village chief “Adja” is given to the elder of the chief family and can be a man or a woman, but if the person does not do (incompetence or other reason), then there is the option to vote to choose the Adja. At the moment, it’s a woman, who is in charge of collecting taxes and resolving eventual conflicts.

  Here and there, people start to crush the rice as you go by, waiting for a little banknote. This mercantile side of things isn’t the most agreeable it’s true, but on the other hand, it’s a way to survive for them. This way of life occurs in every village that you drive through in your car, no need to find yourself lost in the middle of nowhere, to see people drawing water from wells or crush grains, it’s still the way of life for the majority of people.

  Everyone is free and the handcraft is interesting and not very expensive. A 70 cm sculpted giraffe is about D250 (About €6/£5/$8) and the guy does his work “live”. The children sell fruit offered by nature worked or not (top – calabash, loofah…).

  We discovered a good piece of history and they use a famous saying which says: “We can forgive, it does not mean we forget”.