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Sao Vicente greeted us with colorful buildings, palm trees and a nice calm harbor. Dani, Ben and Eliza graciously took the watch so the rest of us could have time ashore. Some of my shipmates found a home with some beers at Club Nautica. A few of us went to find an ATM under the guidance of Paulo, a young man our group encounter. He later showed us where to buy post cards, and tried to help me find a watch to replace the one that fell off of my wrist into the harbor at Praia when I was out on the head rig. Somewhere, there is a very punctual fish.
Paul and I went with Paulo up a hillside to look at an old building we had seen from shore. We walked up a road and then up a hillside, dirt sliding into my flip-flops. It was an old jail with a great view of the harbor. We looked back over the city and saw the different zones, one of which is named Che Guevara. Paulo showed us “Face Mountain” a tall mountain whose silhouette is a striking image of a man’s face looking up. We walked past the beautiful building of either the Swedish or Swiss embassy. Paulo spoke some English and Spanish, so we communicated with some English and my very rusty Spanish. The houses around the harbor look very nice. There are certainly some wealthy people on the islands, though many people are poor according to Paulo. We ran into the rest of our shipmates and joined them in a restaurant for some Portuguese beer and Catcupa, a delicious local dish Paulo had been telling us about. It was a mixture of beans and corn, a fried egg and a few pieces of spicy sausage. Paulo said we wouldn’t believe it if we tried his mother’s Capuche, mixed with more ingredients and way better than what was delighting my lips. He tugged on his right ear to show his enthusiasm. We drank “punch” a delicious sweet, syrupy rum type drink with lemon or lime slices in it. I had a cup of Cape Verdean Coffee, which now might rival a cup of coffee I had had in the Dominican Republic as the best cup of coffee I have ever had in my life. The coffee might have come from Sao Antao, another island nearby. Paulo’s parents are from Sao Antao, where he said they grow amazing fruit such as papaya and apples. The French-speaking man with dreads, another local who had joined our group, came back with a two-liter bottle filled with clear rum that continued to be enjoyed. We stopped back at Club Nautica and listened to a great band. They sang traditional Cape Verdean music, and then sang the words of Bob Marley . . . “Emancipate your self from mental slavery . . .no other can free your mind . . .” Those words stuck me harder than ever before sitting on an island next to people whose history was so impacted by the slave trade. Paulo had asked for some money to help him with the cost of raising his child, so I slipped him a few bucks and we headed back to the ship.
The next day Toby, Sia, Vincent, Nina and I got a chance to go ashore and explore the history of Sao Vicente. We were armed with questions posed by all of our shipmates and set off. We ran into Paulo waiting at the gate to the yacht club. We looked at a statue whose bird represents peace. We went to the library and found, of course, all of the literature in Portuguese. I spoke to a few university students. A few models of tall ships dressed in flags decorated the halls. The library closed at one, and most things like the museum and tourist center were closed on Saturday. We walked around, had lunch in a park where a man offered to shine our shoes. The park was lined with palm trees and sunshine. We stopped in an Internet café to do a bit a research about the Island. I read about Fatima Veiga, the Cape Verdean ambassador to the US who had visited the ship in Praia, and Carlos Veiga, the man who started one of Cape Verde’s political parties, was once president, and, according to some, will be again, whom we had met in the restaurant in Praia earlier. We met some nice children on the street who spoke great English and liked football and Play Station. We met a man from Senegal who spoke a bit about the island. We went to a market that had cassava, fresh fruit and friendly faces. We went to an outdoor market selling souvenirs and goods that looked like they could also be found in West Africa. Blue and while tiled murals depicted images of Mindelo’s (the main city of Sao Vicente) harbor and people working. We ran into Osmond, who had sold me a blue bag the night before. I told him I had no money to buy anything else, but he gave me a scarf with the image of the Cape Verde flag. He also answered some of our questions about his island. Sia and Vincent met man from Ghana who spoke more about the island. He told us about a town on the other side of the Sao Vicente where British builders had dug up some artifacts, spoons and bowls that were possibly representative of a place where slaves had lived. He found a mini van/bus to take us to the other side of the island.
As we drove out of Mindelo the colorful houses became grey concrete. We drove through desert like mountains, brown with dirt as their main surface, and a few houses. We came to the other side and got out on the beach. We saw some windsurfers and met a man who was there to guard the beach. He old Paulo we should walk into town and ask the older fishermen about the place. The town had one main street, and we were greeted by friendly children playing with sticks who excitedly wanted us to take their pictures. We met an old fisherman who was in a meeting with other fisherman. We couldn’t really understand him, but a girl who spoke Spanish came out. She said she hadn’t heard about the historic site. We ran into a social worker who spoke English. She said the pieces they excavated (from the beach where we had been dropped off) had been sent to Lisbon for study. There are two schools of thought on what they are. Some believe they were items used by slaves, and that the site was a cooking place for Africans. Others believe that the artifacts actually pre-date the Portuguese settling of the islands, and thus suggest that other people had been to Cabo Verde prior to the Portuguese. Apparently the Portuguese are not in favor of this theory. She said a lot of the people who settled this island came as freed slaves, choosing to come to Sao Vicente. She said the island is full of people of mixed races: Africans, Portuguese and other Europeans. She said it is reflected in the food – their favorite dish (Catcupa), being mixed like their people.
We hurried back into the red van that came to pick us up. The drive out to Salamanza took about half an hour. The drive back to Mindelo took half that time, as our driver raced to get us back on time to make the small boat run out to Amistad. Later that night went back out, a windy ride on the small boat. I had a coffee and listened to a lady sing the longing melodies of Cape Verdean music. She was a friend of Paulo’s. I met Paulo’s girlfriend. We then went to an outdoor concert and listened to great musicians who were either from Mali or Senegal. We headed back to the small boat. Paulo seemed very sad that we were leaving. Sao Vicente is yet another place I wish to return to.
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