Welcome

It is a deeply rooted, widespread tradition across many African cultures to be welcoming, hospitable, and respectful towards strangers. This practice is often rooted in indigenous philosophies like Ubuntu and others similar to it, where greeting and assisting anyone, regardless of whether they are known, is considered a duty, showing respect, and extending community kindness.

Key aspects of this tradition include:

Proactive Greetings: In many communities, it is customary to greet everyone you pass, even strangers, to show acknowledgment and respect.

Hospitality as Duty: Historically, travellers could rely on being offered food, water, and shelter in villages.

Formal Welcome: In some cultures, villages had specific, designated people or, in some cases, specific homes in the centre of the village, to receive and welcome visitors.

Shared Resources: Visitors were often treated as part of the community and permitted to use available resources. 

Cultural Significance: This, in part, stem from a belief that hospitality is good manners, enhances social reputation, and brings potential blessings.

It is this proclivity that was misinterpreted as timidity by early European visitors to the continent, for the Europeans were themselves more inclined towards aggressiveness. This clash of attitudes between Europeans and indigenous communities is repeated around the world wherever Europeans arrived for the first time. 

My own interpretation of the attitudes of indigenous African societies is that those attitudes reflected the fact that at the time of first contact with Europeans, indigenous African societies were socioculturally more highly evolved than their European counterparts. Anestral Africans had attained a high level of socio-cultural advancement, there was a high degree of social harmony. 

PS: I have a funny story to tell about what happened when I brought my Africa with me to London, and was greeting strangers that I passed on the street.

Image: Sign at the London Zoo.