{"product_id":"black-gold-of-the-sun-isbn-9780307275783","title":"Black Gold of the Sun","description":"At the age of thirty-three, Ekow Eshun—born in London to African-born parents—travels to Ghana in search of his roots.  He goes from Accra, Ghana’s cosmopolitan capital city, to the storied slave forts of Elmina, and on to the historic warrior kingdom of Asante.  During his journey, Eshun uncovers a long-held secret about his lineage that will compel him to question everything he knows about himself and where he comes from. From the London suburbs of his childhood to the twenty-first century African metropolis, Eshun’s is a moving chronicle of one man’s search for home, and of the pleasures and pitfalls of fashioning an identity in these vibrant contemporary worlds.“A life-affirming memoir about belonging, identity, and hope.” —\u003ci\u003eEbony\u003c\/i\u003e“An impressive debut. . .An unusual memoir in which the personal and the political are entwined with great skill.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Times\u003c\/i\u003e (London)“Leavened with insight, self-awareness, and flashes of humor . . .Eshun is a skilled wordsmith.” —\u003ci\u003eChristian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e “Refreshing. . .Eshun’s writing is fluid and self-assured. . .his wistfulness and wry sense of humor add to the book’s charm. . .an engaging and eye-opening account of one man’s journey toward self-discovery.” —\u003ci\u003eBlack Issues Book Review\u003c\/i\u003eEkow Eshun is a former editor of the British men's magazine \u003ci\u003eArena\u003c\/i\u003e and is now artistic director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, where he lives. This is his first book.I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Where are you from?' he said. 'No, where are you really\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efrom?'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was the businessman who wanted to know. He'd been\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eslumped beside me with his eyes shut and his mouth open\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esince we'd left London. As the Boeing 777 dipped towards\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAccra he heaved himself up straight.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Where are you from?' he repeated.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe overhead light glistened off the darkness of his skin.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe wiped the film of sweat from his forehead.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI gave him the usual line.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'My parents are from Ghana, but I was born in Britain.'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn all the times I'd been asked the same question it was\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estill the best answer I'd come up with. It wasn't a lie. It\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ejust wasn't the whole truth.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Then you are coming home, my brother,' he said,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eleaning across me to empty a miniature of Teacher's Scotch\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003einto the plastic glasses on our foldaway tables.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Akwaba,' he said, raising his glass. 'Welcome home.'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs we drained the whisky I thought of all the other ways\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI could have answered his question.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhere are you from?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI don't know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat's why I'm on this plane.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat's why I'm going to Ghana.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBecause I have no home.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI'd caught the plane that afternoon: a British Airways\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eflight straight down the Greenwich Meridian line from\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHeathrow to Kotoka airport in Accra.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe'd risen above the clouds and, seated over the wing\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith the whine of the jet engines in my ears, I'd tried to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003econcentrate on an anodyne movie about a gang of con\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eartists breaking into the vault of a Vegas casino, before\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egiving up to watch the plane's shadow ripple against the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eclouds below instead.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt Lagos, the flight made a stopover, and I caught my\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efirst glimpse of Africa since childhood. The sun was low\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand from out of the shadows ground crew in blue overalls\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehastened across the tarmac. A staircase thunked against\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe plane's flank. The doors sighed open. Tropical warmth\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efilled the cabin. A stewardess with brittle make-up sprayed\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egusts of rose-scented insect repellent along the aisle.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'They treat us like animals,' grumbled the businessman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA line of passengers in heavy cloth robes joined the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eplane, haloed with sweat. I compared their faces to mine.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI looked as African as they did. But I didn't know how far\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat affinity stretched. Did it reach beneath the skin or did\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eit end on the surface, in the slant of our eyes and the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efullness of our lips?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was April 2002, and I was thirty-three years old.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI was flying to Ghana to find out what I was made of.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy name is Ekow Eshun. That's a story in itself.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEkow means 'born on a Thursday'. The Ghanaian pronunciation\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof it is Eh-kor and that would be fine if I'd grown\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eup there instead of London where, to the ears of friends,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEhkor became Echo. Throughout my childhood I was\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epestered by schoolyard wags who thought it hilarious to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecall after me in descending volume: 'Echo, echo, echo.' It\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewas my first lesson in duality. Who you are is determined\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eby where you are.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy parents arrived in London from Ghana in 1963. They\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enever meant to stay. And even though they have spent\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emost of the past forty years in Britain, Ghana is still their\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehome. When I was a child growing up in London, its\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esounds and smells pervaded our house. Ghana was there\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ein the hot pepper scent of palm nut soup tickling your\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enostrils as you entered the house; the highlife songs rising\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efrom the stereo; the sound of my mother shouting down\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ea capricious telephone line to her sister in Accra.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut Ghana was their home, not mine. I knew this from\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eexperience.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI was born in 1968 in a red-brick terraced house in\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWembley, north London. I was the youngest of four children.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen I was two my parents moved the family to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGhana. We lived in Accra for three years. In 1974, we\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ereturned to London. I was five years old. I didn't plan to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ego back.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy last sight of the place was a country in meltdown. A\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emilitary junta had taken power shortly before we left. I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eremembered long speeches by generals on a black-andwhite\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003etelevision. The hourly price rises for a bag of rice.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStrikes and shortages and demonstrations. What was there\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto return to?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI asked myself the question I'd been turning over since\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI first booked my flight: why make this trip?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDuring my late twenties I began to feel I couldn't live\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ein London any more. The bigotries of the city weighed\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003edown on me. I saw condescension in the eyes of bank\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eclerks and malign intent in the store detectives watching\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eme from the end of an aisle. Lynch mobs chased me\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethrough my dreams. I fantasized about taking a machine\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egun to the streets.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom the extremity of my mood, I guessed that something\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emore fundamental was at work than disaffection\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith the city. I knew my state of mind wasn't good.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy fantasies were getting more violent. I needed to heal\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emyself. I started to think about a childhood spent in\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLondon, then Ghana, then London again. Had I lost a part\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof myself in that toing and froing? Maybe by returning to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGhana I could become whole again.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEven though my roots were in Britain it was a white\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecountry, and I'd felt like an outsider there all my life. In\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGhana I'd be another face in the crowd. Anonymity meant\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe freedom to be myself, not the product of someone\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eelse's prejudice. I bought a map of the country and studied\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eits cities and rivers. I plotted a trip from the Atlantic\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecoastline in the south to the dry north. I wanted to discover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe whole country. I wanted to call it home.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI gave myself five weeks. I'd spend the first two exploring\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAccra, the capital. After that I'd travel west along the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eshoreline to Elmina, the town where Europeans first settled\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eon African land in 1482. Then I could visit the neighbouring\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003etown of Cape Coast, Ghana's former capital, where my\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eparents both grew up. That would take another week. In\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe remaining fortnight, I'd start heading north. I'd go to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKumasi, capital of the old Asante empire, in Ghana's central\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eregion. Then I'd keep going all the way through the arid\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enorthern plains until I reached the border with Burkina\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFaso.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBy the time I was ready to go it was 2002 - twenty-eight\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eyears since I'd left the country as a child. I was looking for\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ean antidote to London. I wasn't sure if that was too much\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto ask. All I knew was that if Ghana didn't live up to my\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehopes I'd have nothing left to hold on to. Then I really\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewould be lost.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom Lagos the Boeing skirted the African coast.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI peered at the Atlantic, 35,000 feet below. This ocean\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehad once been scattered with tall ships. Sails taut they had\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efought their way to Africa from Venice, Portugal and other\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estates of Europe. Against the force of the northern trade\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewinds masts had snapped. Boats had sunk. Men brave and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003etimid had died. When they eventually succeeded in the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efifteenth century it was no less an accomplishment than\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecrossing the Sahara or traversing the Arctic. On 19 January\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e1482, a Portuguese fleet carrying 600 soldiers, masons and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecarpenters, holds filled with numbered blocks of granite,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eweighed anchor on the Ghanaian shoreline. At the town\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof Elmina they built Sa€o Jorge castle, the first permanent\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEuropean settlement in Africa.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAll along the west coast of Africa, Europe discovered\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eriches. They named the land as they went - the Grain\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCoast, the Ivory Coast, the Gold Coast - and sailed home\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eborne down with tusks and precious metals and the human\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecargo sometimes known as 'black gold'.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYet the African connection to the western world was\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enever simply passive. Among the Portuguese crew that\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elanded at Elmina was the ordinary seaman Cristoforo\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eColombo, for instance, who led Europe's discovery of the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAmericas ten years later accompanied by his African pilot,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePedro Nino.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe plane banked towards Kotoka airport and Accra\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehove into view, lambent in the falling light. Through the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewindow I imagined the paths of the sailing ships preserved\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ein the sea, forming a lattice of wake lines joining Africa,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEurope, America and the Caribbean. It was impossible to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003etell where the connections began or ended. The shape of\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe continents themselves seemed to blur, as a result of\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecenturies of commerce and migration, both voluntary and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eforced.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKotoka control tower rose into view. Wheel hatches\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecreaked open. The past is not history, I thought, as the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eplane screamed on to the runway. It beats against the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epresent like the tide.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was the smell that I first noticed - like rare orchids or\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003erotten fruit.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCar horns blared in the distance. The lights of the terminal\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eglowed across the tarmac. From the doorway of the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eaeroplane I followed the other passengers down the steps\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003einto a steam-room heat. I ploughed through customs,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eimmigration and the scrum of porters wrestling me for my\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eluggage, until I stood with my back to the airport, facing\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGhana.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd Ghana stared back.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBehind a wire perimeter fence, wives and fathers and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003echildren playing hide-and-seek between the legs of their\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eparents waited to greet the plane. There were smiles and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewaves as they spotted loved ones. None of them was there\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efor me, but for a moment a wave of happiness engulfed\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eme as I watched the crowd. Ghana wasn't home, but\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eperhaps it would be possible for me to feel at home there.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDragging my suitcase to the first car in a row of blackand-\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eyellow taxis, I collapsed into the back seat. The cab\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eshunted into traffic. Accra coalesced around me. The neon\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eimage of a grass-skirted dancer hovered above the roof of\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe hotel Shangri-La. Children materialized at traffic lights\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eselling cigarettes and cellophane bags of iced water. Street\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehoardings advertised the virtues of Guinness Foreign Extra\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStout and Richoco chocolate milk. Trucks rumbled by\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebearing ecclesiastical slogans above their windscreens such\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas 'Forward with God' and 'Shine, Jesus, Shine'. I smelled\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ediesel fumes and sewage and, as the cab paused at a\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ejunction, the aroma of plantain and peanuts roasting on a\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebrazier, the memory of which I'd savoured since my last\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003etaste twenty-eight years earlier.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom London, I'd arranged to borrow a house in a suburban\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eneighbourhood called Upper Heights. It belonged\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto my mother's cousin who lived in Nottingham and\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003espent only holidays there. Apart from Mrs Hagan, the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehousekeeper, I would be alone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUpper Heights was a modern development of trim white\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehouses built on a hill overlooking the city. Mrs Hagan,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eelderly, maternal, solicitious, had laid out a dinner of boiled\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eyam and fish stew, with sliced mango and small hand-baked\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esponge cakes to follow. But the journey had left me exhausted.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAll I could do was stab at the food, then drag myself\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eupstairs, Mrs Hagan clucking after me like a mother hen\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ein case, as she seemed to think likely, I couldn't make it to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebed before collapsing. Tired as I was, I couldn't sleep.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAccra flickered before my eyelids in a sequence of dazzling\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eimpressions, as if I were gazing up at it on a screen from\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe front row of the cinema.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNothing matches your first sight of a new city. You\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eapproach it with trepidation and its streets embrace you.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe scent of bitumen and hot street food tantalizes your\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esenses. Vendors and car horns and radios blare an unfamiliar\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003erhythm. Your heart beats a noisy reply. That first\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enight I gave up on sleep altogether. I sat on the balcony\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eoutside my bedroom looking at the mystery of the buildings\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eglimmering in the distance. By contrast to London's\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epallor, Accra seemed to sparkle.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf I knew then as much as I do now, it's possible Ghana\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emight still have appeared to shine. But first impressions\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eare exactly that. There is an order of fact beneath them\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat is inescapable. After the sparkle fades you have to deal\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith what's left - whether you like what you see or not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eII\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSaturday night on Oxford Street. Bright-eyed girls clung to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe arms of broad-shouldered young men. Thrilled by the\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epromise of the hours ahead, their eagerness lit the dark.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCouples hailed each other across the street, coalescing into\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egroups that promenaded arm in arm along the pavement\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elike a Broadway chorus line.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was my cousin Kobby who suggested meeting on\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOxford Street. I'd spent four days exploring Accra's markets\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand museums. Now I wanted to see it after dark.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'I know the perfect place,' said Kobby over the phone\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat afternoon. 'It's the most fashionable street in Accra.'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut as I strolled along the pavement past the brightly lit\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebars and the gilded couples, my mind turned to what I'd\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eread about the fashions of eighteenth-century Accra. How\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emen of that era liked to tie little gold ingots into their\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebeards and shave designs for ships or castles into their hair.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd the care with which a woman would prepare herself\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eeach day: rubbing her body with perfumed oil, then mixing\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ea fine white clay with water for make-up, which she'd press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eon to her face and bust with wood blocks shaped like\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecircles or scimitars. As jewellery, she'd have worn bead\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enecklaces made from coloured glass and gold bracelets\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehung with European coins such as the French louis d'or,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egold rings and an anklet in silver, weighing a pound, on\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eeach foot.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe'd have worn a skirt of imported silk, secured with a\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebelt decorated with keys and coins so that she jangled as she\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewalked. Attached to her hair might have been a small gold\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebell or the red tail feathers of a grey parrot. In her house she\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewould have kept a pet civet, and once a week she would use\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ea small spoon to tap the secretions of its anal gland, which\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eshe would mix with water and dab on her neck as perfume.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDuring the same period, the secretions of the civet, a\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecatlike mammal, were also being used by perfumers in\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrance and England. History is full of unobserved parallels.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was like that with Kobby and me. He'd come to\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLondon for the first time five years ago in 1997.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'This is your cousin,' said my mother. We'd shaken\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehands warily. Given he was a dozen years younger than\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eme and had grown up a continent away, I wondered what\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewe'd have in common. But Kobby turned out to be as\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehungry for music and movies as any child of the west. At\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eseventeen, he was devoted to Tupac Shakur and WWF.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI introduced him to Biggie Smalls and to Christopher\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWalken in King of New York. In return he offered stories\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eabout the trolls that were said to lurk in Ghana's woods\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand the spirits living in the lakes.","brand":"Vintage","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46305222721765,"sku":"NP9780307275783","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780307275783.jpg?v=1767722691","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/black-gold-of-the-sun-isbn-9780307275783","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}