Afropean summary

Outside of communities like Firth Park, Black Europeans can seem invisible. Many are first- or second-generation immigrants from former European colonies such as Mozambique and Ghana. They work long and odd hours as cleaners, taxi drivers, or security guards. And many live tucked away in housing projects at the outskirts of their cities.

This creates the illusion that there’s no such thing as “Black Europe.” But it took only one stop in Paris to convince Johny that this is a major misconception.

Brussels, Johny’s next stop, was once voted “Europe’s most boring capital.” But the clean, bureaucratic surface of the city hides a particularly brutal chapter of Afropean history. Belgium’s colonial rule in the Congo in the early twentieth century claimed the lives of over ten million Congolese people. 

Here’s the key message: Brussel’s Black community pioneered the new Afropean identity. 

Did you know that the New York districts Brooklyn, Harlem, and Bedford-Stuyvesant are all named after Dutch cities? 

Like Paris, the Netherlands and its capital, Amsterdam, have deep historical connections to New York – many of which run through Amsterdam's Black community. 

When Johny checked into his hostel in Berlin, the receptionist explained to him that he was about to encounter “an ugly city full of beautiful, open people.” Indeed, to Johny, Berlin in winter appeared quite harsh and unwelcoming, and when he wanted to join an anti-fascist demonstration in the city center, he first thought he’d accidentally run into a group of skinheads.

But he quickly learned that the 4,000 or so rowdy-looking youths in dark clothes were actually members of the Antifa – an international anti-fascist organization with roots in Nazi resistance movements.

To many people, Scandinavian countries like Sweden represent a kind of European utopia: a good social security system, free health care and education, and a progressive, tolerant culture. For Johny, Sweden was a refuge from the racial tensions prevalent in many other European countries. 

Here’s the key message: Stockholm boasts many Afropean success stories – but can be blind to the roots of racial injustice.

Of all the places he’d planned on traveling to, Johny was least excited about going to Moscow. In recent years, Russia has seen a rise of racist attacks against immigrants, especially African students. When he’d applied for a visa in London, even the clerk at the Russian consulate warned Johny not to walk alone at night.

But Russia wasn’t always such an unwelcoming place for Black people. For example, one of the most important figures of modern Russian literature, Alexander Pushkin, was of African descent. His great-grandfather Abram Gannibal was born in Ethiopia, kidnapped and enslaved by the Ottomans, and later sold to Count Peter Tolstoy.

Bringing his journey full circle, Johny traveled from Russia back to France. This time, he took a train around Provence, stopping a few times to admire some of the beautiful villas along the coast. Many of these luxurious buildings are relics from colonial times – and, more or less literally, awash in the blood of African people.

The Villa Leopolda in the coastal village Villefranche-sur-Mer, for example – the most expensive villa in the world – was built by Belgian King Leopold II with his Congolese blood money. And the Villa del Mare in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin once belonged to Congolese military official Joseph Mobutu, who conspired with Belgium and the US to assassinate Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba. One of the old French villas, however, was home to a true Black icon: James Baldwin. 

Of all the cities he’d visited, multicultural, working-class Marseille had come closest to his personal dream of Afropea: a multi-faceted but interconnected community of African Europeans and European Africans, where people, histories, and cultures merged to stand against racism, fascism, and economic exploitation. 

In Lisbon, he found another example of this kind of intercultural, working-class solidarity.