Sorry about the big gap between entries. Synthesizing new experiences can be an overwhelming task. So overwhelming you procrastinate on it.... Anyway, lets start with a scene from Guede-Chantier.
"We're so dusty," Sydney complains, running her hand over her gritty face.
I stop and grin. "Yes, we're dusty from the desert, and we're coming home to an oasis. How magical is THAT?" I exclaimed enthusiastically. Everyone stops to look at me, and chuckles. "You're so cute, Charlotte," says Sydney. I frown in puzzlement and made a "What? What? Why am I cute?" sort of grimace, and we continue on our way.
Guede. How can I descibe it? So many goats, so many children. Trees bearing exotic fruits like mangos and dates and lemons. A large green river for the fishermen. Birds with irridescent blue wings. I could hear miles of silence in every direction, and feel myself relax after the exhausting hustle and bustle and traffic of the city. You can walk along the canal through the rice fields in the early morning and feel so peaceful and happy.
I think Ousmane (the program director) really enjoyed showing us his home. When he's in the city, he seems so stiff and British (he was educated in England you know) but when we got into the country it was as if he relaxed and became a little boy again. When we were walking through the community garden, he cried joyfully, "Oh! A lemon!" and climbed up and got it for us. It was the biggest lemon I had ever seen: swollen like a grapefruit. The whole class shared it, ripping pieces away from its sweet flesh of juiciness. I don't know why, but even without sugar it was so delicious.
Also in the garden, we saw an anthill as tall as a man. It was like the ant Tower of Babel. If only human beings could be that organized in their collective efforts. There was also a gigantic bird's nest that Ousmane explained was made by a very tiny bird. Flamboyantly, he gestured at the nest, saying, "There is proof that meglomania also exists in the world of animals. What does such a tiny bird need with such a huge nest?" I really enjoy the way Ousmane expresses himself.
We visited the marketplace and saw a wide variety of local foods are grown. But you know, people sell the larger part of it to pay their debts, and then they don't have enough left to feed themselves. Debt can so easily become a vicious cycle. But despite the poverty, the children seemed happier to me than American children. Americans spend so much time with electronic entertainment devices, they become vacant-eyed, slacked-jawed, and fretful. These children were scampering around, boisterous and full of life. I saw a boy who had attached wheels and a stick to a plastic bottle, and turned it into a little truck he could push around. He made a toy out of garbage, that was every bit as entertaining as something you could buy at some fancy American toy store.
They rarely see white people in Guede, so great excitement (especially on the part of the children) accompanied our arrival. Whenever a child saw one of us, they would scream, "TOUBAB!!!! TOUBAB!!!!" Which means "White person! White person!" After awhile I started to feel like I was some sort of zoo animal or museum exhibit on display. I felt like saying, "Hello! There's more to me than the freakish color of my skin, you know. I'm a person; I have a name." We learned how to say good morning, good afternoon, and good evening in Pulaar (the local dialect) but whenever I used the words I knew, people were so astonished to hear me speaking Pulaar that they were struck speechless. White people are supposed to speak French!!! The children would run up and practice the French phrases they learned at school on me. They would want to shake my hand, or hold my hand, or kiss it. (Kissing hands here is old-fashioned, but not improper.)
We have this slightly abrasive guy in our class called Pete. When we discuss things like polygamy, he'll say stuff like, "Four wives! I have to say, Senegal is the PERFECT society to be a man. It's AWESOME over here," seeing if he can tweak any of our feminist noses by blatantly rejoicing in patriarchy. But anyway, when we were touring the community garden, a little child crept over to Pete and began holding his hand. Pete's confusion was a pleasure to see. He looked at the child; he looked around; then he held the child out to us, saying, "Ummmm, anyone want a homey?" But the child had fastened barracuda-like onto Pete and was not to be parted from him. The longer we stayed in the garden, the more children homed in on us. Soon I had three children clinging to one hand (each of them took a finger or two.) Pete looked at the little flock that had gathered around him and said, "Help! I'm being over-homied!" In fact it is very cumbersome to move with several little ones holding onto you. I was simultaneously inconvenienced and charmed.
But that was just on the first day. Later, I grew to be less enchanted with the children's enchantment with me. It made me uncomfortable that simply having a weird color of skin should merit all this fuss. The children didn't flock around our Senegalese classmates, who were also visitors-- why should they flock around me? I'm just a person like any other person. I decided my Mission was to convince my little niece in my host family that my name was not Toubab, my name was Charlotte. Whenever she wanted my attention, she would shout TOUBAB! I got someone to teach me how to say, "I am not a toubab," in dialect. I repeated the sentence several times. I also learned the words for yes and no. Whenever she said "Toubab", I would cry "No no no!" in her language, and make faces. Then, whenever she said my name, I would clap my hands happily and cry, "Yes yes yes!!!"
It backfired a bit because she thought the horrible expressions I made when I heard the word toubab, were hilarious. So she started saying "Toubab," just so she could watch me make funny faces. But she also enjoyed making me clap my hands and dance around. So she said the word, "Charlotte," a lot too, and I think I eventually got the idea across that I preferred to be called Charlotte. What a cute little girl! She also taught me to sing a little song in Pulaar. I have no idea what it means, but she taught me how to sing it.
My host mama was gone for a wedding at a neighborhood village during the bulk of my visit, but when I first arrived here we had a really nice conversation. She didn't speak much English, but she said in English, "I want you to know, you are welcome here." It made me feel so GOOD to hear my own language. Nothing can give you a subconscious resonance of "home" like hearing your mother tongue. Mama explained she loved learning languages and was always trying to collect new words. "Each word you get is like a treasure," she explained. Later, she flipped through my English copy of "une si longue lettre", and sighed, "I love English! Next time you come, you must bring me a French-English dictionary."
We got to learn a little bit of the history of Guede from Ousmane. The village was actually started by the French, who grabbed and kidnapped people from a bunch of different villages and collected them in the Guede area to do forced labor. We looked at a big cage the French used to hold recalcitrant people. Ironically, one side-effect of the village being formed this way is that there are no "first families." In other African villages, the longer your family has lived in the village, the higher your status is. At the top of the hierarchy are the people descended from the villlage founders. But that kind of hierarchy doesn't really make sense at Guede, because there were no "founders," everyone was brought over at the same time.
Different subcultures exist within the village. For instance, all the fisherman live in one gigantic house that holds about a hundred people. But the herders and the farmers don't take communal housing to that extreme. According to local superstitions, it is dangerous to offend a fisherman because they might cast a spell to make a fishbone stick in your throat and choke you. They are also said to talk to crocodiles and have this sort of mystical connection with the river.
We made brief visits by a Naming Ceremony and a wedding. I was kind of oblivious to what was going on, just sort of drifting after the group, so when we entered the wedding I was just like, "Here is a big group of people standing around..... I wonder what is going on?" Then this LOUDLY dressed African lady makes this whoop-of-joy sound, and starts CLANGING these big silver dishes together like cymbals, to make a sort of beat. And then, oh my god, she comes dancing right at me! I flinch back at first, but then I smile a little and start swaying back and forth to the beat. A circle forms around the dancing lady. When she finishes dancing, she backs out of the circle, and Aisha pushes my American friend Benson into the center of it. One by one the visitors from Dakar are forced to dance. When I twirl around in my spinny skirt, everyone claps and cheers and I narrowly manage to avoid melting into a little puddle of embarrassment. I'll even confess that it was kind of fun.
The next day, somebody is talking about "the wedding we went to," and I'm like, "What wedding?" They stare at me and say, "Remember? The wedding we went to? Where we danced?" Oooooohhh, I exclaim. So THAT'S what that was! (Way to go, Charlotte.)
The Naming Ceremony was superficially similar to the wedding; big silver bowls of food, singing and dancing, people sitting on mats chatting with one another and having a good time. The mother of the baby was dressed in her best clothes and had pink glitter on her eyelids. The ceremony makes total sense to me. One week after a baby is born, everyone in the neighborhood assembles to give it gifts and learn its name. If we have funeral rituals to celebrate death, why don't we have corresponding rituals to celebrate life? Why don't we have "naming ceremonies" in America? Maybe we just keep things on a more informal basis, but in my opinion, the miracle of birth deserves a certain majesty and formality. Come, friends, let us gather together to herald the coming of a new life!
The baby at my host family's house is just starting to learn to crawl. Mostly, he lies down on the mat and wiggles like a fish trying to swim. You can see the look of frustration on his face, when his limbs aren't carrying him forward. He loves his grandma so much, his face lights up all over when she approaches. She told me, "Look, my grandson can dance!" Then she picked him up by his armpits so he was roughly in a standing position. He laughed and kicked his legs against the floor while she bounced him back and forth, and it looked like he was dancing a little jig. I'm so glad I'm not a baby. How infuriating to have to wait for others to help you do the things you want to do.
In Pulaar (the village language) the word for child is "chookolell." Such a cute word. We visited one children's school that was in pretty bad shape; gaps in the wooden walls and thatching, not enough benches for all the children to sit. And the only reason they have enough chalk and pencils and things because Ousmane knows how to wheedle money for school supplies out of charity organizations. Sometimes the parents have difficulty paying the school fees. For instance, Ousmane told us the story of a kid who was extremely intelligent, who was getting some of the best grades in the school. When his parents didn't have enough money for fees, he was kicked out, and now he works as a tailor. "Maybe we lost a genius!" said Ousmane.
Since we were making the trip with our Senegalese classmates, each American had a Senegalese roommate. I was staying with Soda, which was wonderful because she is usually quiet and this gave me a chance to know her. She's one of the nicest people I've ever met. If I said I liked a food, she would try to give me her portion of it. If we came home hot and dusty, she would make me take my shower first while she waited. Frankly, it was slightly off-putting. I tried to argue, "No, no, you take the shower first," but she was firm and unswayable. I received an explanation for it later when I demanded the meaning of the word "baifal" (spelling uncertain.)
"Baifal" is a religious concept; it means someone who's trying to be without desires. I got curious about the word when they started joking that my classmate Cody was a baifal. It's because Cody wears his hair in dreadlocks; frequently baifals will wear their hair in dreadlocks to show they are above such worldly desires as trying to create pretty hairstyles. Baifals follow the teachings of Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba. Going to Senegal and asking, "Who is Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba?" is like going to America and asking, "Who's this Obama guy I keep hearing about?" Ahmadou is their national hero. There are stories about him facing lions and not getting eaten by them, and so on. (A lion is the national animal of Senegal, so you can see how symbolic it is if one of them refuses to chow down on you.) He was a marabout (religious leader) who lived during colonialism and made the French nervous because he was accumulating so much power. They worried he would persuade people to revolt against colonial rule.
However he was a very pragmatic as well as a very spiritual guy, and so he told his followers that the "greater battle" to improve their souls was more important than the "worldly battle" against the French. But even though he's preaching nonviolence against the French, he's still making the French very nervous. So they decide to exile him to Gabon. In those days, when you exiled someone, they would usually die. But not only does Cheikh Ahmadou not die, he manages to make it back to Senegal. For the Senegalese, that's like coming back from the dead.
He believed industriousness was good for the soul, and to combat the problem of joblessness, got his followers to start a recycling business. They would take the stuff city people threw out, refurbish it, and sell it. They made quite the pretty penny this way, and to this day, many of the stores you see in Dakar are owned by descendants of followers of Cheikh Ahmadou. So you free yourself from worldly desires, and then you become wealthy.......? I enjoy the irony. Also, his refusal to incite armed struggle reminds me of Jesus refusing to raise an army against the Romans.
Soda explained that she tried to be a baifal, but didn't always succeed. When she made me take the first shower and offered me her cheese, those were her attempts to be baifal-ish. If someone in the United States explained they were trying to live a more self-sacrificing life, everyone would laugh at them (or snicker behind their hands) and call them a flake. But Soda's efforts here win her respect. Why is the pursuit of goodness considered so foolish and naive in the U.S. of A? It seems to me making a conscious effort to improve your character is a pretty reasonable thing to do.
I still haven't told you about my service learning project, which is the most important part of this whole story! But its time to go to sleep, and since I've kind of been starving you guys of news, I'm going to post what I have and tell you the rest in the next entry. :-) I shouldn't forget to tell you about the 105-year-old lady we met either.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
In Which I Ponder Governmental Corruption and Observe the Washing of a Goat
Oussmane, the program director, narrated most delightfully our bus tour of Dakar. As we passed the Parliament building, he said humorously, "This place is full of fat, useless men, who earn huge salaries for doing absolutely nothing at all. Their numbers should be reduced down to seven." As we went down a nice highway he said, "This highway was built for ther International Islamic Conference, so that the visitors could speed along pleasantly from the airport to the hotel. But the main streets in town are nothing like so nice as this! People were furious at the use of funds; they said our real priorities were elsewhere." We stopped by the Millenium Arch, which was built by the current government to celebrate their rise to power. It was actually several enormous stone arches, one built under the other. Perched upon one of the arches was a big man made out of polished yellow material, playing some sort of musical instrument. ("The material to make the man came from my village!" One of my classmates said proudly.) A giant could have passed under the largest arch without bonking his head, but the smallest arch was human-sized. You had only to stand under the small arch to feel your ego inflate like a balloon. It gave you this wonderful feeling of being the center of the universe.
"When the government first came into power, people were really happy," Oussmane explained. "But now the president is not so popular. People think he has misused funds, and is grooming his son to be the next president." At first I was puzzled by this; if the son's competent, what's wrong with promoting him? But then I thought about it some more and I realized that the passage of power from father to son reeks of dictatorship. I mean, look how well its worked for America (cough cough.)
The presidential palace was really splendid but we sort of zoomed past it because we had only paid for the use of the bus up until noon. I was left with this vague impression of white towers, golden domes, and waving palms, all behind black, high bars. But at the UNIVERSITY we stopped to linger for a nice long visit. I guess Oussmane has his priorities straight. The university library had a roof shaped like a giant open book. Oussmane teaches in the English department, so we went to visit that building and I was struck by the pleasant, cheerful corridors open to the sun. "What a pleasant place to study!" I exclaimed.
At this, Soda (who probably does not think she is named after an American beverage) took me aside. "In this lecture hall sometimes we run out of seats," she explained, "so people sit on the floor, or stand in the back. Sometimes you cannot see the professor even, if there are too many people standing in front of you. So you see, it is not a very pleasant place to study. But we come because we think it is important."
We will be doing our community service projects in Guede-Chantier, a little ecovillage in northern Senegal, Oussmane's home town. He gave us a presentation on it today, to prepare us for our visit there. "There is a community garden there," he said, "which has been there since 1912. I remember in my childhood I would go there to rest in the shade and eat the mangos. You could get plenty pineapples there, plenty dates." He smiled in pleasant reminiscence. "But then," he said, his expression darkening, "The government decided they wanted to build a dike. In building the dike, they destroyed 2/3rds of the garden. But nobody needed the dike; building it was a mistake. It doesn't do anything. It cuts the village in two!"
For some reason this reminded me of the European partioning of Africa into nations. European powers divided Africa into nations according to their whim, heedless of where the cultural and linguistic boundaries actually lay. Ethnic groups were cut in two by new national boundaries, just as Oussmane's village was cut in two by the dike. This causes a lot of war and conflict in Africa, because many groups are part of nations in which they don't really belong. Politicians, whether they be European or African, have a fondness for the setting of arbitrary boundaries.
I imagine well-fed men in well-tailored suits sitting comfortably in a room somewhere. Before them is a map. One of them takes out a sharpie and draws a line on the map. The other men grunt and nod in agreement. Another man takes out a sharpie, and draws another line. The others applaud. They sit there all day, drawing lines, lines, lines, creating an orderly world, and congratulating themselves on how intelligent they are.
Then they give the map to the captain of the guard. The guard nods earnestly, his red earnest face shining with sweat. When he looks at the map, he winces, and shudders. The guard talks to the common people. He knows a little bit about what drawing those lines will mean. But he knows better than to question his superiors. Rubbing his aching head, he goes off to give some unpleasant orders.
His soldiers mobilize the people. And then the people, driven by kicks and curses, go to build the lines that the politicians have drawn. They go forth to bring reality into the dreams of the powerful. But the real world is not black and white like the map. The tame, humble little dots on the map are actually cities and villages teaming with activity. Cars speeding down the roads, animals shitting all over the roads. Vines climbing over the walls, flowers holding up their skirts and sticking down their tongues. Hundreds of laughing shouting fighting people, advertising their wares, shaking hands with one another, burning incense, bowing in prayer, dancing in the discotheques, plowing their fields, making love.
People cannot be organized like the numbers in an Excel Spreadsheet. They are alive. If you put them in a box, they get restless and wander out of it. So how can it be that a line drawn by a politician in a shady, pleasant room, can have so much power?
"When I came back to my village and saw the garden was gone, I was just devestated," Oussmane said. "People like my father protested against the building of the dike, but it didn't do any good because the central government......" he shrugged in despair. "Later some MP's came by the village and we complained to them. We said, look at how some of the children are suffering from malnutrition as a result of the dike you have built. And the MP's promised some recompensation, but we wait and wait and still there is nothing."
Every day when I go to school I have to cross this really busy highway. Between the two lanes of the highway are two concrete barriers, maybe a meter high, with sand and garbage lying inbetween them. There is no crosswalk, no gap in the barriers, nothing. You have to wait for a pause in the traffic and then dash across as fast as you can. Then you swing yourself athetically over the first barrier. Then you sit waiting on the second barrier until there is a gap in the traffic of the second lane. Sometimes taxis pass within inches of your dangling toes as you sit there waiting. If dad had to watch me crossing this road he would probably have about nine heart attacks. I think it's exciting, but maybe a little too exciting.
The funny thing is that on both sides of the street, there are staircases to nowhere. These nice, well-constructed concrete staircases that go way up high and then just stop. They are the beginnings of a pedestrian overpass that was planned for the street, but when the funding ran out for them, construction stopped. So there they sit, symbolic of man's futile quest for progress..... (she says somewhat pompously.) Once I saw a little boy and his friend go to the top step of one of the staircases, and sit there above the city, happily trading cards.
Another thing about Africa is that everything tends to take much longer here. For instance, we had a group project on Sunday. To get up to the computer lab and start work, first we had to wait for the guy with the key to arrive, who was late because of the bus (more on Senegalese buses later.) Then, when we got there, a man was sleeping on a big mattress on the floor of the computer lab, (don't ask) and we had to wait for him to wake up. THEN the internet didn't work. We made some inquiries, and it turned out the technician in charge of the lab was still asleep due to having seriously partied on Saturday night. So we messed around on our own for a little bit, and finally Big Dave (my hero) managed to make it work on his own. And we danced around happily and finally did our project. But just getting access to the internet on a Sunday was an hour-and-a-half-long project. I've got to learn to relax and be patient, or this country will drive me crazy.
The mattress on the floor of the computer lab puzzled other people too. Someone asked, "who was sleeping there?" and we joked that Sydney and Big Dave had been sleeping there together all night. Africans love to joke, especially about love and marriage. The other day Youseff was saying Aissetou had to join his group because she was going to be his wife. Aissetou primped up her mouth and swatted away his remark as if the was brushing away a fly, while everyone laughed at them. Youseff made big eyes and said, "What, you don't want to be my wife, Aissetou? Why don't you love me anymore?" and the laughter swelled further.
Then this fascinating discussion about gender roles got sparked. Aissetou said, "Why, why is it always the woman who cooks the food, and cleans the house? The men are so lazy! They are always yelling at their wives to come and do things for them. Why don't they do things for themselves?"
"But the men are not used to cleaning," objected Yousseff feebly.
"Why, why, why, are they not used to cleaning?" Aissetou exclaimed. "Me, I think this is the way it should happen. If a man sees his wife his sleeping, he should walk very quietly to the kitchen and make something for her to eat. Then, when she wakes up, he can say, 'Surprise! Here is some breakfast for you.' The husband should be kind to his wife like that."
Of course the men of the class weren't going to take this lying down. There was great uproar and tumult. Everyone joined in the debate. Then it was time for lunch. Namuri went down the stairs singing at the top of his lungs, "Men rule the world, men rule the world!" just to see if he could annoy anyone. I think as long as there are women like Aissetou around, men will not really rule the world.
I went to the market yesterday, an overwhelming onslaught of sounds and colors, dresses and pants and shoes dangling on strings, swaying in the breeze from the ocean. I managed to buy a pretty dress for 2500 CFA (about 5$ American) and it was my first experience with bargaining. But look, here's the irony. I knew Senegal wasn't a wealthy country, so I packed very plain clothes, hoping to fit in. That was completely the wrong move. The Senegalese dress like kings and queens! Even the poorest man will make it a first priority to buy a fine suit of clothes. Its a matter of pride. I've never seen so many bright colors, gleaming fabrics, sparkly embroidery, gold bracelets. If I wanted to fit in, I should have brought along all the bling I could find. Its embarassing, it really is. Youssef and Alassane, Namuri and Big Dave and Emmanuel, will show up in these perfectly ironed, pinstriped shirts with neat collars. Ro-hai will drift in dressed like a rainbow with a scarf of sequins over her shoulder. Soda will have enormous gold earrings dangling from her ears, and Aissetou will swing her zebra-patterned purse. And here are the Americans with their battered T-shirts, and beat-up backpacks, looking like total slobs!!! That'll teach me not to make assumptions.
For all that the streets are covered with garbage, the Senegalese are very uptight about personal hygiene. It makes sense when there are such crowds of people rubbing up against each other all the time; if you're dirty or smelly, it's a public disservice! We took a bus to the bookstore so that I could buy a Wolof dictionary, and people were jammed together tighter than I thought people could be jammed. Everytime anyone wanted to get out, you had to wiggle and suck in your stomach so that they could slither like an eel past you, through the mass of people, and pop out the door. They didn't even bother trying to shut the doors of the bus; the doors were too crammed with people. Occasionally you would hit a bump in the road and the bus would hop like a bunny. Poor Big Dave was half-in and half-out of the bus, feeling the wind whistle past his ears I guess. Then when I finally got to the bookstore, they charged me a fortune for two tiny books. Even though food and clothing is 1/4th as expensive here, books are about 4 times as expensive. Bad luck for Charlotte the bookworm!
Big Dave and Sydney and I took a walk on the beach after we finished with our group project. There are lots of dead little fish washed up on the beach, because the fishermen throw back anything that is too small. One fish started flopping when we came near. Sydney and I screamed and clung to one another, acting like typical toubabs I guess. Big Dave started to throw the fish back, but two little boys playing in the sand nearby ran up and said they wanted the fish. "Oh no! Don't give it to them! They'll kill it!" cried tender-hearted Sydney. Heedless of her words, Big Dave handed over the fish. But when the boys felt it flop in their hands, THEY screamed and dropped it. So we returned it to the ocean.
And yet all this was nothing compared to the Washing of the Goats. This is how they do it in Senegal. Apparently salt-water is good for goat's skins (or at least that's what Big Dave tells us) and so they will take groups of goats down to the ocean and wash them. It is both comic and pathetic to see them grasp the poor goat firmly by one leg and drag it down the beach, bleating and struggling. I couldn't stop laughing. I've never seen such an unhappy-looking goat. Sydney got lots of pictures.
On the way back from the beach we started chatting about Senegalese standards of beauty. Sydney and I were confused because weight is considered to be a good thing, beauty-wise, in Senegal. And yet slender woman can also be considered beautiful (although its definitely a good thing to have a big butt.) Sydney thought perhaps there were multiple conceptions of beauty, rather than one central ideal. Worried that Big Dave was being left out of the conversation, I asked him in French what his ideal of beauty was. But he was no help to our philosophical discussion. All he would say was, "Moi." (me.)
Personally, I think beautiful means being full of energy and having fun. It doesn't matter what size and shape you are. What matters is that your face and body be animated by the liveliness of your spirit. I hope my spirit stays lively in this coming visit to Guede-Chantier. Tommorow morning, we begin our visit there, and we won't be back until Thursday afternoon. So I'll be out of touch with the internet for about a week. I'm a little nervous about the community service project, and I seem to be coming down with a little cold or something. Wish me luck. I'll be sending loving thoughts to you, testing for the existence of telepathy.
"When the government first came into power, people were really happy," Oussmane explained. "But now the president is not so popular. People think he has misused funds, and is grooming his son to be the next president." At first I was puzzled by this; if the son's competent, what's wrong with promoting him? But then I thought about it some more and I realized that the passage of power from father to son reeks of dictatorship. I mean, look how well its worked for America (cough cough.)
The presidential palace was really splendid but we sort of zoomed past it because we had only paid for the use of the bus up until noon. I was left with this vague impression of white towers, golden domes, and waving palms, all behind black, high bars. But at the UNIVERSITY we stopped to linger for a nice long visit. I guess Oussmane has his priorities straight. The university library had a roof shaped like a giant open book. Oussmane teaches in the English department, so we went to visit that building and I was struck by the pleasant, cheerful corridors open to the sun. "What a pleasant place to study!" I exclaimed.
At this, Soda (who probably does not think she is named after an American beverage) took me aside. "In this lecture hall sometimes we run out of seats," she explained, "so people sit on the floor, or stand in the back. Sometimes you cannot see the professor even, if there are too many people standing in front of you. So you see, it is not a very pleasant place to study. But we come because we think it is important."
We will be doing our community service projects in Guede-Chantier, a little ecovillage in northern Senegal, Oussmane's home town. He gave us a presentation on it today, to prepare us for our visit there. "There is a community garden there," he said, "which has been there since 1912. I remember in my childhood I would go there to rest in the shade and eat the mangos. You could get plenty pineapples there, plenty dates." He smiled in pleasant reminiscence. "But then," he said, his expression darkening, "The government decided they wanted to build a dike. In building the dike, they destroyed 2/3rds of the garden. But nobody needed the dike; building it was a mistake. It doesn't do anything. It cuts the village in two!"
For some reason this reminded me of the European partioning of Africa into nations. European powers divided Africa into nations according to their whim, heedless of where the cultural and linguistic boundaries actually lay. Ethnic groups were cut in two by new national boundaries, just as Oussmane's village was cut in two by the dike. This causes a lot of war and conflict in Africa, because many groups are part of nations in which they don't really belong. Politicians, whether they be European or African, have a fondness for the setting of arbitrary boundaries.
I imagine well-fed men in well-tailored suits sitting comfortably in a room somewhere. Before them is a map. One of them takes out a sharpie and draws a line on the map. The other men grunt and nod in agreement. Another man takes out a sharpie, and draws another line. The others applaud. They sit there all day, drawing lines, lines, lines, creating an orderly world, and congratulating themselves on how intelligent they are.
Then they give the map to the captain of the guard. The guard nods earnestly, his red earnest face shining with sweat. When he looks at the map, he winces, and shudders. The guard talks to the common people. He knows a little bit about what drawing those lines will mean. But he knows better than to question his superiors. Rubbing his aching head, he goes off to give some unpleasant orders.
His soldiers mobilize the people. And then the people, driven by kicks and curses, go to build the lines that the politicians have drawn. They go forth to bring reality into the dreams of the powerful. But the real world is not black and white like the map. The tame, humble little dots on the map are actually cities and villages teaming with activity. Cars speeding down the roads, animals shitting all over the roads. Vines climbing over the walls, flowers holding up their skirts and sticking down their tongues. Hundreds of laughing shouting fighting people, advertising their wares, shaking hands with one another, burning incense, bowing in prayer, dancing in the discotheques, plowing their fields, making love.
People cannot be organized like the numbers in an Excel Spreadsheet. They are alive. If you put them in a box, they get restless and wander out of it. So how can it be that a line drawn by a politician in a shady, pleasant room, can have so much power?
"When I came back to my village and saw the garden was gone, I was just devestated," Oussmane said. "People like my father protested against the building of the dike, but it didn't do any good because the central government......" he shrugged in despair. "Later some MP's came by the village and we complained to them. We said, look at how some of the children are suffering from malnutrition as a result of the dike you have built. And the MP's promised some recompensation, but we wait and wait and still there is nothing."
Every day when I go to school I have to cross this really busy highway. Between the two lanes of the highway are two concrete barriers, maybe a meter high, with sand and garbage lying inbetween them. There is no crosswalk, no gap in the barriers, nothing. You have to wait for a pause in the traffic and then dash across as fast as you can. Then you swing yourself athetically over the first barrier. Then you sit waiting on the second barrier until there is a gap in the traffic of the second lane. Sometimes taxis pass within inches of your dangling toes as you sit there waiting. If dad had to watch me crossing this road he would probably have about nine heart attacks. I think it's exciting, but maybe a little too exciting.
The funny thing is that on both sides of the street, there are staircases to nowhere. These nice, well-constructed concrete staircases that go way up high and then just stop. They are the beginnings of a pedestrian overpass that was planned for the street, but when the funding ran out for them, construction stopped. So there they sit, symbolic of man's futile quest for progress..... (she says somewhat pompously.) Once I saw a little boy and his friend go to the top step of one of the staircases, and sit there above the city, happily trading cards.
Another thing about Africa is that everything tends to take much longer here. For instance, we had a group project on Sunday. To get up to the computer lab and start work, first we had to wait for the guy with the key to arrive, who was late because of the bus (more on Senegalese buses later.) Then, when we got there, a man was sleeping on a big mattress on the floor of the computer lab, (don't ask) and we had to wait for him to wake up. THEN the internet didn't work. We made some inquiries, and it turned out the technician in charge of the lab was still asleep due to having seriously partied on Saturday night. So we messed around on our own for a little bit, and finally Big Dave (my hero) managed to make it work on his own. And we danced around happily and finally did our project. But just getting access to the internet on a Sunday was an hour-and-a-half-long project. I've got to learn to relax and be patient, or this country will drive me crazy.
The mattress on the floor of the computer lab puzzled other people too. Someone asked, "who was sleeping there?" and we joked that Sydney and Big Dave had been sleeping there together all night. Africans love to joke, especially about love and marriage. The other day Youseff was saying Aissetou had to join his group because she was going to be his wife. Aissetou primped up her mouth and swatted away his remark as if the was brushing away a fly, while everyone laughed at them. Youseff made big eyes and said, "What, you don't want to be my wife, Aissetou? Why don't you love me anymore?" and the laughter swelled further.
Then this fascinating discussion about gender roles got sparked. Aissetou said, "Why, why is it always the woman who cooks the food, and cleans the house? The men are so lazy! They are always yelling at their wives to come and do things for them. Why don't they do things for themselves?"
"But the men are not used to cleaning," objected Yousseff feebly.
"Why, why, why, are they not used to cleaning?" Aissetou exclaimed. "Me, I think this is the way it should happen. If a man sees his wife his sleeping, he should walk very quietly to the kitchen and make something for her to eat. Then, when she wakes up, he can say, 'Surprise! Here is some breakfast for you.' The husband should be kind to his wife like that."
Of course the men of the class weren't going to take this lying down. There was great uproar and tumult. Everyone joined in the debate. Then it was time for lunch. Namuri went down the stairs singing at the top of his lungs, "Men rule the world, men rule the world!" just to see if he could annoy anyone. I think as long as there are women like Aissetou around, men will not really rule the world.
I went to the market yesterday, an overwhelming onslaught of sounds and colors, dresses and pants and shoes dangling on strings, swaying in the breeze from the ocean. I managed to buy a pretty dress for 2500 CFA (about 5$ American) and it was my first experience with bargaining. But look, here's the irony. I knew Senegal wasn't a wealthy country, so I packed very plain clothes, hoping to fit in. That was completely the wrong move. The Senegalese dress like kings and queens! Even the poorest man will make it a first priority to buy a fine suit of clothes. Its a matter of pride. I've never seen so many bright colors, gleaming fabrics, sparkly embroidery, gold bracelets. If I wanted to fit in, I should have brought along all the bling I could find. Its embarassing, it really is. Youssef and Alassane, Namuri and Big Dave and Emmanuel, will show up in these perfectly ironed, pinstriped shirts with neat collars. Ro-hai will drift in dressed like a rainbow with a scarf of sequins over her shoulder. Soda will have enormous gold earrings dangling from her ears, and Aissetou will swing her zebra-patterned purse. And here are the Americans with their battered T-shirts, and beat-up backpacks, looking like total slobs!!! That'll teach me not to make assumptions.
For all that the streets are covered with garbage, the Senegalese are very uptight about personal hygiene. It makes sense when there are such crowds of people rubbing up against each other all the time; if you're dirty or smelly, it's a public disservice! We took a bus to the bookstore so that I could buy a Wolof dictionary, and people were jammed together tighter than I thought people could be jammed. Everytime anyone wanted to get out, you had to wiggle and suck in your stomach so that they could slither like an eel past you, through the mass of people, and pop out the door. They didn't even bother trying to shut the doors of the bus; the doors were too crammed with people. Occasionally you would hit a bump in the road and the bus would hop like a bunny. Poor Big Dave was half-in and half-out of the bus, feeling the wind whistle past his ears I guess. Then when I finally got to the bookstore, they charged me a fortune for two tiny books. Even though food and clothing is 1/4th as expensive here, books are about 4 times as expensive. Bad luck for Charlotte the bookworm!
Big Dave and Sydney and I took a walk on the beach after we finished with our group project. There are lots of dead little fish washed up on the beach, because the fishermen throw back anything that is too small. One fish started flopping when we came near. Sydney and I screamed and clung to one another, acting like typical toubabs I guess. Big Dave started to throw the fish back, but two little boys playing in the sand nearby ran up and said they wanted the fish. "Oh no! Don't give it to them! They'll kill it!" cried tender-hearted Sydney. Heedless of her words, Big Dave handed over the fish. But when the boys felt it flop in their hands, THEY screamed and dropped it. So we returned it to the ocean.
And yet all this was nothing compared to the Washing of the Goats. This is how they do it in Senegal. Apparently salt-water is good for goat's skins (or at least that's what Big Dave tells us) and so they will take groups of goats down to the ocean and wash them. It is both comic and pathetic to see them grasp the poor goat firmly by one leg and drag it down the beach, bleating and struggling. I couldn't stop laughing. I've never seen such an unhappy-looking goat. Sydney got lots of pictures.
On the way back from the beach we started chatting about Senegalese standards of beauty. Sydney and I were confused because weight is considered to be a good thing, beauty-wise, in Senegal. And yet slender woman can also be considered beautiful (although its definitely a good thing to have a big butt.) Sydney thought perhaps there were multiple conceptions of beauty, rather than one central ideal. Worried that Big Dave was being left out of the conversation, I asked him in French what his ideal of beauty was. But he was no help to our philosophical discussion. All he would say was, "Moi." (me.)
Personally, I think beautiful means being full of energy and having fun. It doesn't matter what size and shape you are. What matters is that your face and body be animated by the liveliness of your spirit. I hope my spirit stays lively in this coming visit to Guede-Chantier. Tommorow morning, we begin our visit there, and we won't be back until Thursday afternoon. So I'll be out of touch with the internet for about a week. I'm a little nervous about the community service project, and I seem to be coming down with a little cold or something. Wish me luck. I'll be sending loving thoughts to you, testing for the existence of telepathy.
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