entrance to the river

The Gas Chamber of Africa





Parting Thoughts

the last bath river

We then went as a group to visit Cape Coast Castle, the last place the enslaved would touch African soil. Lined with canons pointing out to sea, turrets, and dungeons, the castle served the dual functions of short term imprisonment and fortress.For those uppity slaves who dared to choose to fight for their freedom, they were set usually set free because it is just too hard to deal with someone with such crazy ideas.“Look at Vernon,” (likely not his real name, but who knows) the slave merchant would yell at the rest of the slaves while Vernon was shackled and lead away with spear tips pressed against his neck, rifles pointed at him from all directions, “For his exemplary behavior we have decided to set Vern free.”And of course by “exemplary behavior” the slave master was sarcastically referring to Vernon sneezing in his (the slave master’s) presence and by free, he of course meant, “dead.”So what would happen to Vern, and up to two hundred other damned souls at one time is they would be thrown into a cell with no light, no water, no ventilation, and no Internet, packed like sardines, unable to see their own hands, with temperatures inside easily exceeding one hundred degrees from all the body heat and the African climate, amidst sewage and decay from the previous group. Some would die in six hours, some would last two days breathing in the stench of the rapidly decomposing bodies around them before they too passed.At least the Nazi’s made it quick.I can tell you that I was in the gas chamber with the entire group, who comprised less than 100 people, and the door was closed and the light turned off. Many people let out a yelp of fear. It was exceedingly hot, and it would be very easy to feel claustrophobic as densely as we were packed. Now put more than double that number, and KNOW that you face Death.Many cried. For their ancestors, for the energy of the room, from the thought of what it must have been like, from their own fears.Without a system of agreed upon morals, society could not survive. It would be difficult to justify enslaving a neighbor and an equal, so we skew these morals by re-framing the way we see other tribes/races/etc if it gives us a competitive survival advantage. It further separates the ego from the pure divine love that is innate inside all of us.