Togoland, consisting of what is now the nation of Togo plus a small part of Ghana, was a protectorate of the German empire between 1884 and 1916. While travelling there I read  the fascinating book “Skandal in Togo” by Rebekka Habermas. The book paints a vivid picture of my county’s colonial lunacy and painstakingly describes how German Catholic missionaries accused German colonial officials of mistreating girls. The scandal even had reverberations in German politics in those days. When I  was visiting Togo in 2016 I was glad to find on Lomé’s Marché au Féticheur way more Voodoo requisites than remnants of Germany’s colonial past.

As in neighbouring Benin, Voodoo is in Togo, on par with Christianity and Islam, adopted as an official religion. Among the colorful and sometimes bloody array of Voodoo rites,  sacrificing animals is central. Correspondingly I could almost find anything to create a nightmare: Animal skins, bones, stuffed monkey skulls and various crocodile heads, tortoises dead and alive, feathers, powders, stuffed snakes of all kinds. Al tremendous but strong-smelling experience. To appease the ghosts, my wife and me purchased two lucky charms, made out of the wood of a dead sacred tree. At least no animal needed to be killed. Since God is too daunting in Voodoo to be contacted on a face-to-face basis, we need to hand over the money to an intermediary. It was worth: Just a bit later we learn that a dream will come true: Next stop Nairobi!  All Voodoo?