Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Into the city alone

Yesterday my roommate, another American in the same program, and I ventured out on our own. Both of us have traveled extensively. Her: backpacked Europe for four months by herself, travled to Morocco most recently. Me: France at 16, Germany twice, West Africa. We're both used to exploring countries and cultures, and this was the first time we'd traveled into Dakar on our own. I put emphasis on this simply because it's not easy to be white and to be female here. We attract attention everywhere we go and are constantly warding off advances from men, and if not men seeking American brides, then peddlers or vendors.

It was a relief to be away from a large group not just for ease of moving around but for the sweet taste of freedom. Picking up Lonely Planet and deciding to head to le Marche de Soumbedioune was the first independent decision we've made since we've been here.

We took the car rapide to the Medina, an older and poorer part of the city that you enter right before getting into the thick of downtown. Then we walked for several blocks to get to the edge of the peninsula to wear the fish market is and the adjoining art market. It's hard to sum up all that we saw. There's activity everywhere. Rows and rows of shacks with people selling everything one could possibly find used and new in this part of the world (bras, shoes, towels, underwear, peanuts, electronics). Then there's cars: SUVs, taxis (about every two cars), rundown autos, motos horse-drawn wagons. Then there's people fixing cars in the street, building statues out of wood, cooking food. And quite often there's usually just people sitting around doing nothing (usually younger men).

And it stinks. I'm not going to romanticize the smell. I think I took one breath the whole time I was downtown and that was only when I lost my footing and fell into a knee-deep hole in the sidewalk. There's rotting garbage, fish guts from the morning cleaning, sewer smells, fumes fumes fumes, and at one point, the fresh scent of newly-washed clothes blowing politely and innocently in the wind.

On our way back we heard drumming coming from down one of the streets, so we went to check it out, and found a group of teenage boys teaching younger boys how to play the drums. But mostly it was just an occasion for all the kids within hearing radius to come out and play and dance.



This is the drumming party.


My roommate, Zodiac, trying on a pagne (sarong) at the market.


The Grande Mosque of Dakar in the background.


A view of the point of the peninsula.


Trash, because it wouldn't be right without it.


Land of the car rapides.

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