“Walking the River Felt Like Coming Full Circle” — Brazilian Dos Santos

By Esther Korantemaa Offei

A Brazilian family of Afro-descendant heritage, known as the Dos Santos family, is traveling across West Africa, including Ghana, Togo, and Benin, to reconnect with the painful origins of their lineage. Their journey, marked by emotional reflection and cultural rediscovery, has brought them face-to-face with the historical routes of the transatlantic slave trade.

In an emotional interview on “Roots and Routes” on ZED FM 101.9, family member Edna Dos Santos opened up about the deep spiritual and personal experiences that have shaped their travels.

Edna described Ghana as a place that stirred both heaviness and memory, especially during their visit to historic sites such as Elmina and Cape Coast.

“Walking into Elmina and Cape Coast, you feel the heaviness. It’s the same as other places, but somehow not the same,” she said. “When the tour guide suggested we do the river walk barefoot, I didn’t hesitate. It felt right.”

She recounted how the smell of the river instantly transported her back to her childhood in Brazil. “The first thing that came to my mind was my grandfather’s bamboo farm. He had a small river with exactly the same smell,” she recalled.

“I looked at my brother and said, ‘This smells like our grandfather’s place,’ and he felt the same. Suddenly, all my cousins, aunties, uncles, everyone felt present with me. It brought my whole family back.”

For Edna, stepping into the river traditionally known as the “last bath” for enslaved Africans was an emotional confrontation with her ancestry.

“When we went down into the river, I found myself saying, ‘I’m sorry,’” she said with emotion. “I was apologising to the part of me, of us, that went through that suffering. And I was also saying, ‘Thank you’ for helping us survive, for allowing us to be here today.”

She described the moment as a powerful point of healing and connection. “It felt like a full circle.”

Reflecting on the history told to them during the tour, that enslaved people took their final bath in that river before being sold, Edna shared the gravity of walking the same path barefoot.

“I kept thinking: I’m very sorry this happened to us,” she said. “I’m walking here without shackles. They didn’t have that chance. So I need to do better.”

She added that the journey taught her things she never knew about her own ancestry. “I need to go back home and explain this to people, explain what I didn’t know until I came here.”

The Dos Santos family’s travels across West Africa are more than tourism; they are a pilgrimage through memory, pain, and rediscovery. For Edna, Ghana became not just a country but a bridge connecting her modern identity to her ancestral past.

Their journey highlights the enduring impact of the transatlantic slave trade, and the healing power of returning to the lands their ancestors were forcibly taken from.

As their story continues to unfold, it stands as a testament to resilience, remembrance, and the importance of knowing one’s roots.