“Where do you want to go?”
“I don’t know,” Alice answered.
“Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.”
-Camano Island, WA
Portraits
Sometimes you scan the horizon for your vanishing point and just dream.
i saw muslims worrying their prayer beads, lips moving soundlessly. I saw talibés with their tomato cans, mostly empty. i saw a porter carrying flats of eggs balanced impossibly atop his head. i saw women carrying babies; cats, chicken bones and i saw seagulls with silver flashing fish. and i saw a man with nothing, his arms were outstretched and empty but he carried the weight of the whole world.
I blog about Africa because I was raised by one of her tribes. And because here things that are ragged are patched and cherished. Because sub Saharan thunderstorms are so deafening you have to believe in heaven. And mostly I blog about Africa because I want you to come, and fall in love.
Thanks awfully to whiteafrican for tagging me. You inspire me. Go read about all that he does for Africa.
I hereby tag Szavanna from South Africa and Esther Garvi aka Ishtar from Niger.
you avowed young that with suspiciously guarded land borders and territorial waters you could prove John Donne wrong. but you never anticipated pursuit from above.
and so it begins…
From this post:
John Donne
all is well in your comfortable life and you cannot sleep most nights. so you move closer to the equator where the sun and the struggle knocks you flat on your back like a fallen goliath and your alarm clock is the bustle of the street waking up and an occasional early dawn riot.
There are 10,000 talibes on the streets of Dakar, taken from their rural villages at a young age by a marabout, a Muslim religious leader with credibility elsewhere but in Senegal is using the ancient practice to exploit.
Talibes go barefoot onto the streets of Dakar to beg for their food and for money. If they do not bring a sufficient sum to the marabout at the end of the day they are beaten. They also are isolated in that they often can only speak their tribal language, of which there are 36 spoken in Senegal alone. Read more about them here.
he ran to me and asked for my Kirene bottle, one quarter full. they passed it around in a circle, taking careful mouthfuls until the water is gone and i’m no longer my own. some days you cry so hard your ribs might break.
West Africa has a joie de vivre that trancends circumstance. If only I could learn as much. Senegal, you have a beautiful smile. Alhamdulilaay.
