Street View
The long African journeys start at dusk Taking advantage of cooler yet still hot times Dimly lit machines hit the road in a flurry Destiny stands on the roadside to hike a ride It will leave you at a crossing or in a bend Or it will follow you to your destination Photo Hugh Ardoin […]
A mottled tropical sky quickly turning purple The dust of a long hot day settles above the trees The Saharan night will come like the flick of a switch And the Southern Cross will light the sky for the lost traveler Eternity rides camelback across Africa with the long salt caravans Photo Hugh Ardoin The […]
Last minute shopping before dark The golden hour is in the purple blue phase Tropical night will suddenly drop like a curtain Birds will go silent as the frogs pick-up the music The unnerving hum of hungry mosquito hordes Photo Hugh Ardoin Niamey Dusk and Dust Gallery
Away from the Western selfish materialist societies Where confinement is made possible by individualism Where a two persons gathering becomes a legal limit And lockup has a meaning only because of the locks Exceptionalism is the disease, fortunately less contagious Self-isolation is just an acute form of Narcissism This ignorance may save the ‘invisible’ part […]
Camels, taxis and oranges, here is the capital’s life Light traffic at no peak on the Niamey avenues The sand is everywhere on the road in your hair and in your eyes Even the famous spicy roadside grilled chicken has some grit Photo Hugh Ardoin The Niamey Streets Gallery
Niamey, some ten years ago, it could be twenty Time passes at the speed of centuries day by day Following the rhythm of the desert’s tides From sandstorms to rainy season and back again The crops are the clock of life Photo Hugh Ardoin The Niamey Streets Gallery
Outside, looking out as we drive by Safekeeping fortunes he will never behold An old man in a ragged uniform stands guard A container like a red wall, keeping worlds apart Heavily pregnant of its abstract load of value More than meets the eye, but forever unseen Photo Hugh Ardoin Africa by any Means Necessary […]
The old Accra is famous for its boxing schools The choice of the name is another matter Reminds me of “Discipline and Punish” by Michel Foucault A famous philosophical work about education, society and its prisons It matters what we learn, but it matters even more how we think… Photo Hugh Ardoin Africa by any […]
Every man is king in his own castle Happiness is not an incontrovertible rule We find sunshine in our own sunny spots Ghana was once called the gold coast A name that betrayed the purpose of the colons Before then, it was a powerful empire in its own name Photo Hugh Ardoin Africa by Any […]