“Here, we don’t believe in the American dream, we want the African dream.” These words, proclaimed against the backdrop of a mural depicting the Lumbalú death ritual, were the first that met my ears when I arrived in San Basilio de Palenque. Last weekend, I was privileged to take a tour of the historic town, hosted by the Black-owned company Experience Real Cartagena.

Colombia’s Caribbean coast is full of palenques, towns established by Black people who escaped slavery in Cartagena and made homes in the hills so as to be fortified from any Spanish offences which attempted to find and recapture their inhabitants. San Basilio de Palenque, established by Benkos Viohó of Guinea in 1603, was the first of these towns in all of the Americas.

Our guides taught us an array of cultural gems, like Viohó’s creation of a sort of underground railroad helping enslaved people escape Cartagena and set up life in San Basilio, and women’s use of traditional braiding styles to draw maps to freedom. They also spoke highly of their recent legal successes in gaining the State’s official recognition of their autonomous government and administrative mechanisms. Our guides commended Vice President Francia Márquez, the first Black woman to hold her position, for her work in creating diplomatic ties between Colombia and various African countries which have led to educational and language exchanges. They boasted of successful Palenquero musicians who have used their craft to teach the world about their culture.

The Palenquero history of escaping slavery and freedom fighting, as well as some of there more recent legal and diplomatic accomplishments are very similar to those in other parts of the Americas. But there was one recurring trope in the Palenquero stories that struck me as unique: the fervor and tangibility with which the Palenquero people continue to honor their African heritage, particlularly through the Lumbalú death ritual.

Lumbalú, a branch of Santería, is the ancestral religion practiced in San Basilio de Palenque. As part of the death rituals, when someone dies in San Basilio de Palenque, as the casket is carried to the grave, it is followed by women who sing the names of their African countries of ancestry. This is done to lead the deceased person’s spirit back home to the Continent.

As someone who spends the vast majority of my personal and professional life learning about the African diaspora, it’s easy to focus on what’s missing rather than what’s present. I often come across the evidences of the successes of white supremacy and colonialism, usually manifested as popular societal beliefs or stereotypes which denigrate African cultures, religions, and aesthetics. Even on the Continent we see girls getting sent home from school for wearing their afros, native languages becoming scarcer by the generation, and traditional religions being rebuked as evil.

Against this reality, San Basilio de Palenque was a breath of fresh air. As I was guided around the town, the refrain of the day was: here, in San Basilio de Palenque, there is an African dream; through our music and our art, and even in death, we are African and we long to go home.

Over the past several years, I’ve made efforts, inconsistent as they may be, to explore my precolonial history, learn my language, and discover the cosmological beliefs of my ancestors. A feat that is much easier for first-generation me than for a people more than 400 years removed from their ancestral home. Yet, in San Basilio de Palenque, their heritage spills from their lips in the Palenquero language (a hybrid of Spanish and Bantu dialects), is written all over their walls in beautiful murals, and is proclaimed in dance to the visitors they receive from all over the world.

After a day spent in San Basilio de Palenque, I too have renewed hope in the African Dream.

Signed,

N.A.