Once we left the Gambia, we crossed back into Senegal. The first matter of business was a stop in Ziguinchor to get our visas for Guinea-Bissau. This was a fairly long process. The visas are all hand-written, so multiply that by the number of people in our group and I imagine the workers at the Embassy were happy to see us leave.
From there, we headed to Cap Skirring! We had a nice day at the pool and on the beach, relaxing before the tougher part of the trip began. Guinea-Bissau and Guinea aren’t as developed, both in their infrastructure and their tourism industries. So we knew we would have challenging roads ahead.
A note about Guinea-Bissau and Guinea, since this seems as good a place as any. I often see comments about the number of countries with Guinea in the name, which is a fair question. The word “guinea” was basically a way that Europeans referred to darker-skinned people, which is why it has been applied to several places around the world. The other two countries are Equatorial Guinea and Papua New Guinea, which are both quite a distance away – PNG isn’t even in the same continent.
Guinea-Bissau and Guinea, in colonial days, were Portuguese Guinea and French Guinea, respectively. French Guinea became independent first, in 1958, which is one of the earliest in Africa. Therefore, they got to keep the moniker, and Guinea-Bissau added Bissau, after their capital, to be distinct when they got their independence from Portugal in 1974. In practice, Guinea is also referred to as Guinea-Conakry, after their capital, and sometimes the Guinea is dropped altogether to refer to them as Bissau and Conakry respectively.
My next post will include pictures from the countryside of Guinea-Bissau, but for now, I’ll focus on our first night there, which was in the capital of Bissau. Guinea-Bissau, by the way, is the only country on our trip that was Portuguese-speaking! Which was not helpful for my personal ability to communicate with people but was interesting compared to the rest of Francophone and Anglophone West Africa.
After a little research, this is a memorial to the Pidjiguiti Massacre, which took place on August 3, 1959. Between 25 and 50 dockworkers were killed by the police while on strike for higher pay, which was a major turning point in the struggle for independence in the African colonies who had been colonized by Portugal. Ultimately, this led to the realization that non violent protest was not working, and after an 11 year armed struggle, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, and the rest of formerly Portuguese-Africa became independent. We didn’t talk about this while I was there, but I thought the memorial was interesting and took a photo. As I was going through my photos, I figured I should learn what it was before I posted it – thank you, Wikipedia!
We arrived after a long day of driving. We had a quick walk around and then headed to dinner. After dinner, we headed to the stadium, which acts as a hub for the city. There are several basketball courts and soccer fields, as well as dancing and a market that is set up outside. We spent the evening there, drinking beer and talking to the locals, which was really pleasant.
Our hotel was fairly nice and had a great pool. A few of us headed there before bed. We had a pretty wide variety of hotels while we were on this trip, but a lot of them had really nice outdoor spaces and pools, which made for some very fun nights on the trip.
The next morning was, in a word, chaotic. We were switching from buses to cars. We all got our assignments for the day, and the plan was to explore the city for a bit before we headed out towards Guinea. Unfortunately, there was some miscommunication, and several of the cars, including mine, immediately headed out of the city. We caught it fairly quickly and ended up stopped on the side of the road at a market for a few minutes while we re-coordinated. It was a nice detour to see a livelier part of the city – there were a ton of food stalls and shops nearby, so the four of us in our car took a quick walk around.
We did make it back to Bissau, luckily! Some cars had never left the city, and others had gotten even farther away than us before they turned around, so we sort of explored the city in waves as we waited for the whole tour group to get back to the same place.
I loved the colonial architecture and bright colors of Bissau – I found it very charming, and some of my favorite pictures that I took were from Guinea-Bissau! It was nice to see some of the capital, but we had a lot left to cover on our trip. Next stop, Bafatá!