Portfolio
2024
3.
In the Rubbles of Langma Beach
2023
2023
The easiest way to get to Langma Beach is going on the back of a motorbike with a local driver. As you come closer the resorts thin out and the land opens into a green field with palm trees and rubbles of unfinished or half destroyed houses. On the green field along Langma beach, six horses are grazing, and in the ruin behind the palm trees one of the window holes is covered by a mosquito net. This is where Aikins lives with his 3 sons and the six horses, he takes care of.
When you stand on the hill tops of Kokrobite and look west towards the coastline the houses thin out where the land meets the ocean. This place is called Langma Beach. In the rubbles of Langma beach lives a former horse jockey called Joseph Aikins with his three sons, Nathanial, Nicolas and Amos.
There is a 5 km distance from Kokrobite to Langma Beach. You can either walk there or go on the back of a motorbike via the sandy roads. At some point there are no more beach resorts but only open land with tall palm trees and remains of either half build or half broken houses. Among the rubbles six horses come to grass every day. These are the horses Aikins takes care of. Not many people visit this part of the beach, a noman land where broken dreams and aspirations for future greatness meet under the Ghanian sun.
Aikins moved to Langma Beach with his three sons in October 2022. His pregnant wife still lives in Accra with their 2 daughters. Aikins moved into the ruin on the land that his boss the land fighter Nii owns. There is a roaming uncertainty of who actually owns the different land areas. When the house was half built a group of rivals came and partially destroyed it with a bulldozer. One of the back rooms remains slightly intact. Aikins covered the gabbing windows with mosquito nets. This is where Aikins, his three sons, his assistant sleeps. Sometimes his wife and daughters as well when they come to visit.
There is not much shade to be found under the hot sun, but at noon when the sun is at its highest the palm trees in front of Aikins house offer a great spot for daytime rest for both horses and people.
The second time I came to visit Aikins one of the stallions had broken loose from its robes and attacked the older stallion. It had bitten his neck until the mussel fully snapped, and then moved onto impregnating the youngest mare. Since Aikins boss refused to pay the vet to put the stallion down, and Aikins couldn’t find it in his heart to shot him, he slowly and painfully died over the course of the next 4 days. When he died Aikins’ boss called and asked him to cut of his tail so he could keep it as a trophy. Keeping the tail of one´s dead horses is costume in Ghana.
Throughout the day the horses walk around in the red soils or on the trash covered beaches. Sometimes Aikins takes them to the beach next to the resort area. This is where he earns his only form of income either by taking people on beach rides or letting them take photos on the horses. At night he takes all the horses into the ocean and where he scrubs them clean from the hardships of the day.
Apart from being a former jockey Aikins also does acrobatics and traditional Ghanaian dancing. He teaches his 3 sons everything he know from horse grooming, construction, cooking, cleaning to acrobatics and dancing. Here two of his sons demonstrating ground moves at the beach.
In the late hours of the day the large crabs come out of their caves. Aikins doesn’t really like to eat crabs, but his boss does. When dawn break, he goes hunting along the beach with a metal bucket and collect a nice meal for Nii.
One of the mares, Rose, was pregnant with the foal of the late stallion. On the 6th of April rose gave birth to a stallion. When I came to visit, I discussed different name option with Aikins and I agreed that Supernatural would be a suitable name. Later in the evening Aikins boss arrived to break fast, as Aikins and his boys cooked for the boss and his 20 men, Nii named the foal Ramadan Blaze.