January 17, 2023
From time to time the Gazette tears itself away from its namesake barrio and hits the road for places and parts unknown (to us, anyway). That’s the premise of the On The Road series of posts we’ve published over the years. This week’s OTR features the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe. We’ll preface it by stating that it’s impossible to do more than barely scratch the surface and faintly sense the slightest of first impressions when spending as little time in a new locale as we recently did here. But that won’t stop us from trying to share what we saw.
Guadeloupe is a lusciously named, butterfly-shaped Caribbean island that is part of France, neither a colony nor an independent nation, but an overseas département. It’s really several islands but we only saw part of one of them, Grande-Terre. Pointe-à-Pitre is the name of the town we visited and here is what we saw.
Spice Market
We first popped into a Rite-Aid looking kind of store and found out the hard way when we tried to buy something that they didn’t accept dollars or plastic, only Euros. Because we were in France. So we walked around a bit and saw a Lebanese restaurant, of all things, getting ready to open up. Making a mental note to return later for some déjeuner, we continued to explore. A number of buildings that we passed looked like they’d been abandoned for quite some time. There were big trees growing inside a few of them with their tops emerging from where roofs used to be.
Restaurant Fairouz in Pointe-à-Pitre.
Signs were all in French, of course, but Musee Schœlcher was an easy one to guess right. Victor Schœlcher was a 19th Century French Abolitionist who traveled to Africa and the Caribbean to research l’esclavage, or slavery. His journey, according to signage in the musee, led him to the conclusion that the racism underlying slavery was based on a lie, i.e. White Supremacy. To support his assertion, he collected and offered up exquisite examples of art created by Africans that he pointed out could not have been created by so-called “savages.” He further asserted that ill-treatment of anyone is a direct threat to all of humanity because then anyone can be oppressed.
Inside the Musee Schœlcher
Upon his return to France he had an opportunity to write a report on what he’d learned. He turned in a draft decree banning slavery and it was issued as a proclamation. The musee has some beautiful porcelain tea cups from his family’s Paris ceramic factory, Egyptian and Middle Eastern art, as well as Sub-Saharan art that he’d collected on his travels. One could knock the exhibit for centering Schœlcher as the man responsible for freeing the slaves given all the violent uprisings that preceded his decree and which made its acceptance far more likely. But the musee was originally intended to house and display the man’s art collection, which includes items from the Louvre’s workshops. It was only later on, after he’d passed, that it took on the vibe of a tribute to this Abe Lincoln of the Tropics.
Bust of American Abolitionist John Brown.
The musee underwent a major rehab and upgrade and only recently reopened after a few years when it was shuttered. We were fortunate to be the only visitors on the day we went and we had the run of the place for ourselves. As we were about to leave a musee staffer asked if we’d mind completing a survey? The survey was quite in-depth and took around 10 minutes to get through. Bottom line, five star experience and yes, we’d come again and recommend it. Exceeded expectations. Did I mention that it was free? I think we just got lucky.
Art of the Musee Schœlcher
The following Schœlcher mini-bio was penned by ChatGPT in response to the prompt, “Who was Victor Schœlcher and why is there a museum on Guadeloupe named for him?” We proofread it and it appears to hold up pretty well. This bot just might have a future around here, who knows?
Victor Schœlcher
“Victor Schœlcher was a French politician, writer, and abolitionist who played a key role in the abolition of slavery in the French colonies. He was a strong advocate for the abolition of slavery and worked tirelessly to bring about its end.
“In 1848, Schœlcher was elected to the National Assembly and immediately began pushing for the abolition of slavery. In 1848, a law was passed that abolished slavery in the French colonies, and Schœlcher is widely credited with playing a key role in this achievement.
“There is a museum on Guadeloupe named for him, the Schoelcher Museum, because he was the main advocate of abolition of slavery and instrumental in the passing of the 1848 law that abolished slavery in the French colonies. The museum is dedicated to preserving the history of the abolition of slavery in the French colonies and the cultural heritage of the people of Guadeloupe.” ~ ChatGPT
Near the musee is une bibliothèque housed in a very old mansion. The books are all in French, of course, but the library itself with its airy spaces and natural light was more than enough to make the visit worthwhile. As a bonus, we found a book with old photos of Pointe-à-Pitre that required no translation.
Pointe-à-Pitre back in the Day
Next, we walked about a mile to a strange looking, huge building across the harbor. It was the MACTe Musee, which is a venue that honors the victims and survivors of slavery. Unfortunately, because we were still in France and still had no Euros, we couldn’t get past the admissions desk. We had passed a bank near the Spice Market, but it was closed when we tried the door. A guy said they were out to lunch “probably.” We figured if we walked back they’d be done eating by the time we got there. Then we could buy some Euros and try the MACTe Musee again. Alas, they were still closed for lunch, or possibly for the day. The guys standing around outside weren’t sure if they’d even opened at all that morning. We were beginning to get the feeling that this town was extremely laid back, and it wasn’t just the bank or these guys.
Did we mention that quite a few buildings right in the center of town seemed abandoned? The NYC mentality that every last square inch has to be rented, sold, or squatted on seemed like an alien concept here. Imagine a building on Union Square, damaged in a fire and then just left to slowly collapse over the next fifty years or so. That’s what a lot of blocks here felt like. Something, a fire or maybe a hurricane, had hit a building and that was it. Nobody was going to lift a finger to fix it up or tear it down. They’d just watch it slowly deteriorate or maybe just ignore it as they passed by it every day. And we mean *s-l-o-w-l-y* deteriorate. There was a full-sized, big tree growing out of one that must’ve been decades old. Others also had trees or various plants growing out of them, even as their rusted iron balconies drooped lower and lower as the years slipped by.
It was kind of beautiful in a weird way, just seeing how Nature always wins in the end or something like that. But still, coming from the land of million dollar parking spaces, it was baffling to see what we’d consider ‘prime’ real estate back home lying fallow like this. À chacun son goût, non?
Graffiti
There’s a lot of high grade street art in Pointe-à-Pitre these days. On one block after another there were gigantic murals that sometimes covered a whole building. More often they were the size of a storefront. The artistry was top notch. There appears to have been a festival that drew all these talented artists here, possibly one called the Kreyol Art Festival. Most of the work appeared to be in fairly new condition. Here’s a few that stood out.
We hit one more spot, a funky art gallery slash cafe, but the works of artist CeDo deserve their own write up and so we’ll cover that in another post. One thing about this town: it’s very laid back as you can see from the deteriorating buildings. But you also pick it up from the complete absence of the sort of street hustlers who can usually spot a visitor from a hundred yards away and then give them the pitch until they buy something. Not one person tried to sell us a trinket or a tour, or tout a restaurant, or even ask for a handout. It was nice. Everybody we passed said ‘bonjour!’ in a delightful, sing-songey kind of way that made us smile. This place was very intriguing, to say the least, and definitely worth a follow up visit someday when we can spend some more time.
Schoelcher Museum