Albina

Albina was founded on 13 December 1846 by August Kappler, a German former army corporal, on the site of an abandoned Carib village on a bend of the Marowijne, about three metres above the river's highest level. He named it after his fiancée and later wife, Albina Liezenmaier, and settled with the permission of the Indigenous and Maroon people nearby to collect insects, cut timber and trade. At first the place could only be reached by river.

Gold found in the Lawa area in the second half of the 19th century made the settlement grow, and in 1876 it became the seat of the district commissioner. By 1913 it had a medical clinic and was home to 349 men and 266 women. After the First World War Albina became known as a holiday town: Emmastraat along the river was lined with white wooden houses like those of Paramaribo, and people from the capital came for short breaks. A road from Moengo, now part of the East-West Link, was built in the late 1920s, and a ferry to Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni opened in 1969.

The interior war began here on 22 July 1986, when the Jungle Commando attacked the army barracks in Albina. The town was repeatedly plundered by both sides, and in December 1986 the National Army set it on fire; large parts were destroyed, and many people fled across the river to French Guiana. After the war the riverbank was repaired with Dutch aid and rebuilding began. In December 2009 riots broke out in which local Maroon residents attacked Brazilian and other foreign gold prospectors. Plans have been made for a bridge to French Guiana, but as of May 2020 no action had been taken.

Albina sits where several of Suriname's peoples meet. Alfonsdorp and Marijkedorp nearby are Indigenous Lokono villages, Bigiston is a group of Ndyuka Maroon and Kalina villages, and further north the Kalina villages of Christiaankondre and Langamankondre at Galibi chose not to be linked by road, to keep their peace and quiet. In the Eastern Maroon Creole spoken by many on the river the town is called Alimina or Alibina, and the river itself is a shared space rather than a barrier: Maroons are the largest group in Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni on the French side.

The town has an Indigenous monument made in 1996 by the sculptor Jozef Klas, whose Kwakoe statue is one of Paramaribo's best-known landmarks. Musicians and politicians born in Albina include the singer Oscar Harris and Henk Chin A Sen, who was president of Suriname in the early 1980s.

The interior war hit the area hard. At Moiwana, a Ndyuka village near Albina, at least 35 people, mostly women and children, were killed by the army on 29 November 1986, and the survivors fled with thousands of others across the river into French Guiana.

About 5,200 people lived in Albina at the 2012 census. It is the capital of the Marowijne District and Suriname's main border crossing to French Guiana — and so to the European Union — and much of the town's activity revolves around the river: the car ferry, the boats that shuttle passengers across, and the boats that carry goods and people to villages upriver.

Small-scale gold mining has grown in the region since the 1980s. During the interior war, Maroon communities were cut off from Paramaribo, and a currency reform in 1986 left cash in the interior worthless, which gave small-scale gold digging a boost; Brazilian garimpeiros were recruited for their experience, and by about 2009 an estimated 14,000 people worked in the small-scale gold sector, most of them Brazilians.

Eastern Suriname has seen little government investment since the war. In the Galibi villages to the north, life rests on fishing, subsistence farming and tourism, and across the river Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni, with about 54,000 people, is a much larger town on the opposite bank.

Albina is a place for simple meals rather than a food destination. A few basic places to eat serve everyday Surinamese food, and snacks can be found at the local market.

The dishes are those of the wider coast: Hindustani roti, a flatbread served with curried chicken, potato and long beans; Javanese bami and nasi goreng from warungs; and Creole dishes such as moksi alesi, rice cooked with salted meat or fish. Street snacks such as telo, fried cassava, and bakabana, plantain fried in batter, are common across Suriname.

Fresh tropical fruit and juices are plentiful, as they are all along the coast, and grilled skewers are a common street snack. Parbo beer, brewed in Paramaribo, and Surinamese rum are the usual drinks, and strong coffee is a daily habit. On the far bank of the river the food is that of French Guiana, and prices there are in euros.