This is What Hatred Did

Photo Essay by Cristina de Middel Spanish photographer who dazzled us with her Afronauts project, a photography series inspired by the Zambian space program.

In the 1960s, a five year old Nigerian child’s village was attacked by soldiers. His mother had left him home alone and he had to run away, escaping the bombs and the fire. He saved his life entering the Bush, this magical territory where no humans are allowed and where all the Yoruba spirits live and fight. Our kid spent thirty years lost in the Bush trying to find his way back home amongst the spirits and the dead. He got married two times, became a king, a god, a slave, a cow, a jar, a horse, and a goat. He ate gold, silver and bronze, snakes and snails. He fought two wars and was sentenced to death half a dozen times… all that in just one hundred pages.