Atlantic crossroads — cachupa on the plateau, Cesária Évora on the wind, and an African-Portuguese soul the rest of the world is just discovering
Praia is the capital of Cape Verde, sitting on a dramatic plateau (the Platô) above the Atlantic on Santiago island — the largest and most African-feeling of the ten volcanic islands that make up this archipelago 570 km off the coast of Senegal. The city has the relaxed, windswept energy of a place that has always been a way-station between continents: Portuguese traders, enslaved Africans, and Atlantic shipping lanes all crossed through, and the culture that emerged — creole language (Kriolu), cachupa (the national stew of hominy corn, beans, and whatever meat or fish is available), and morn…
Santiago was the first island settled by the Portuguese (1462) and Cidade Velha (then Ribeira Grande), now a suburb of Praia, was the first permanent European settlement in the tropics — the oldest colonial city in sub-Saharan Africa. The island's position in the Atlantic made it a critical node in the transatlantic slave trade from the 16th to 19th centuries; the enslaved people who passed through contributed the African linguistic and cultural foundations of modern Kriolu culture. Praia replaced Cidade Velha as the capital in 1770, partly because its plateau position made it more defensible…