Dakar - Senegal

Dakar the bustling city of the West African country of Senegal. Dakar is the most western city of the African continent and its located on te Cape Verde Peninsula. Due its location it grew to become one of the major ports in this part of Africa. The metropolitan area of Dakar comprise around 2,5 million inhabitants. Historically the Lebou people lived around the peninsula and four of the original villages still exist, okay they evolved over the centuries. Those villages are nowadays neighborhoods of Dakar, namely Ouakam, Ngor, Yoff and Hann. In 1444 the Portuguese came at first as slave-raiders and in 1456 there was peaceful contact with the locals, and the area became in important stopover for the fleets to India. They Portuguese take control of the small island Bezeguiche close to the peninsula. Then came the Dutch in 1588 and take the island and renamed it to Gorée. Portugal take it back, the Dutch again, England, France, Great Britain and finally France. All those years till 1815 the island was used for the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. In 1857 the French annexed the mainland from the Lebou people and established an fort in Ndakaaru, which the French called Dakar. Since it independence in 1960 Senegal experienced the typical problems. that newly African has faced like revolts, corruption an economical unease but also some prosperous things. Lets take an look at the flag. 

An white background with an shield and in French "city of Dakar", the vexillologists big no letters on an flag. An mural crown an symbol of an city in an republic. The two branches are from the tamarind tree, in the local Wolof language the called the tree "dhakar"'. In the shield we see an lighthouse in the red part, i think it has something to do with the Cape Verde Peninsula. The name of that lighthouse is Mamelles. The two canoes with sails in the blue parts has something to do with sea and port of Dakar. In the yellow parts we two green chevrons and that symbolize two hills of volcanic origin on Cape Verde Peninsula. The one close to the sea has that earlier mentioned lighthouse on top. The other one has the African Renaissance Monument to commemorating the 50th anniversary of the country's independence from France. The hills called the Deux Mamelles and thats can translated to "two teats", if you see the hills you getting the similarities. Clever use of branches but to much text.