Black White Red Flag

Places: Lake Togo, Togoville, House of Slaves

Our Togolese adventure started from Agbodrafo, which is a village located on a narrow strip of land between lake Togo and Gulf of Guinea. This place gave us a real feel of West Africa the way i imagined it. Dusty streets with kids completely free to do what ever they want, women selling fruit/veg/cakes from their threasholds of their houses, crazy traffic, men gathering together for a round of some boardgame. Houses people live in are generally ground level brick huts surrounded by high fences.

Main beauty and point of interest here is the lake itself. It is massive, you can hardly see the other side. It’s cloudy water is full of fish, crabs and shrimp for the locals to enjoy. It is quite shallow, so locals are crossing it on pirogues pushed by long poles made of palm wood. Another big thing – it is croc- and bug-free, so you can go for a swim.

From the hotel we hired a pirogue to cross the lake to another village – Togoville.

The village is a significant religious spot. Legend is that on 4 Nov 1973 Virgin Mary has appeared above the lake. Since then every november people from all around the country come here for a mass to celebrate this holly happening. The gathering is hosted in a yard of a big catholic church built by german colonialists. Population is following animism here, but what is interesting is that it perfectly lives side by side with christianity. In no other country i’ve seen so many churches and church goers, but this is all other topic.  The village itself is a maze of dusty passages with market, school, church and a massive monument symbolising Togolese and German friendship – all located on the main street.

Fetishes of Togoville are ground and cement simplistic sculptures of a sitting man. It could also be a tree. There are plenty of them, some are in public spaces and some are private. Private ones are located insides gardens behind walls and are signified by Black White & Red flag and can be visited by anyone for a fee. From what it seemed each fetish has a speciality.

For example the one on the market is there for those who’s trade is not going well. The unlucky merchant would come to see the fetish with a plea for help. If help is provided and trade is going up – you’ve got to pay the price, which is a secrifice of an animal that you promised when asking for help at the first place.

is a colonial delapidated building consisting of 1 living room, 4 small bedrooms and a basement level. There is a history attached to it, but what was impressive is too find out how the slave trade was happening back in 19 century and see the very place were the deals were made.

Living room was used for negotiations, in the middle of the room there is a small square trap door to the basement where all the slaves were held. The basement has ground floor, is only 1,2 meter high, and about 10 by 5 meters large, but it didn’t prevent the masters to cram up to 100 people in there. It was not allowed to leave the basement, food was given through the trap door and no special organisation for toilet needs. Once masters agree on the price they would tap on the floor, open the trap door and get the sold slave out for demonstration. 15% of slaves would die in the process of selling.