One World, Many Africas

Yesterday my husband Alex asked me if I intended on anyone in Africa reading this blog. "Of course I do, why would you say that?" I replied. He pointed out that in my post about packing I clumped together all of Africa and labeled it "corrupt" when talking about the difficulty of sending packages by mail.

It bothers me when people summarize Africa as a monolith, and in my distance from the reality of Africa, I did the same thing. While I'm passionate about thinking of the world as one, I feel as strongly that cultural differences be appreciated, like the diverse flowers of a garden. The different colors, textures and scents that each one brings makes the whole more interesting.

The Gambia, where we're going, is the smallest country on the continent, with about 1.6 million people in the whole country, and just twice the size of the state of Delaware. The capital city, Banjul, has just about 35,000 people, and its metropolitan area has over 520,000. Despite (or maybe because of) its smallness, the Gambia is the fourth most densely populated country in Africa. It's a very safe place. The culture is colorful, proud and rich, and is known for its tolerance of diverse races and religions. To my knowledge, there are no animal safaris.

Many Philadelphians who hear about my trip ask me two well-meaning questions: 1)Am I looking forward to seeing all the wild animals? and, as of last week: 2) Will I see Oprah's leadership academy? This is pretty much like asking someone who is going to Sacramento if they look forward to commuting to work via New York City subway or if they worry about a New Orleans hurricane destroying their home. Actually, it's even less likely, as Africa is triple the size of the United States, and the continent is divided into 54 countries, with over 1,000 languages spoken. There are diverse types of food, clothing, music, homes, cities, natural resources, climates, economies, forms of government, and places where different features known as "African" are located. For example, the animals one sees on safari are generally located in Kenya and Tanzania (to the far east of Africa), or Botswana and South Africa (in the south). Oprah's wonderful leadership academy is in South Africa. I worked for one year in Nairobi, Kenya 17 years ago and visited the Gambia 15 years ago. At the time I was struck by the strong differences between these two countries.

To find the Gambia on the map, look for Senegal. This tiny country is bordered on three sides by French-speaking Senegal and on the fourth by the Atlantic Ocean. English-speaking Gambia is split in the middle by the river Gambia (which is why it's "THE Gambia" and not just "Gambia."), which runs the length of the country. Since the Gambia was a British Colony (until 1965), business and government are conducted in English, but if you leave these environments and go to the countryside, or even to many urban neighborhoods, conversations are conducted in local languages, like Wolof and Mandinka. Despite lower education levels, it is common for Africans from most countries to fluently speak 2-3 languages, and to know more about the US than we in the US know about them.

Within seconds, many facts about anywhere in Africa can be found through a simple Google search. In less than a week, when we're on the ground in the Gambia, I will try to fill in these facts with the sights, sounds, textures and scents from a little slice of Africa.