Tags
African books, biltong, British Airways, Brussels, Kony 2012, Madri, Paris, Portugal, UK, urban planning in Africa
I’m back from a holiday trip to Portugal and England (with a very brief foray in Madrid) – unexpected travel conditions also had me touch down in Paris and Brussels, so in about 10 days I managed to touch down on the land of all of the post WWI European colonial masters.
My trip had no Africa focus at all, but nonetheless, the continent popped up in a much more prevalent way than one would observe in the US/DC. Lisbon had Tuareg bars (see above picture) and its museums had numerous odes to Portugal’s African ‘discoverers’ of centuries past. There was curiously little mention of Salazar, who led the colonial wars in these museums however. Even the British Airways inflight magazine had references to Liberia, Namibia, and African literature. Continue reading