Dakar is one of those cities that has a superhuman energy all of its own. It sits on the westernmost point of Africa, at the intersection between desert and savannah, between land and sea, Africa and the New World, Islam and Christianity, paganism and post-modernism. It sucks in all those energies and transforms them into a single-minded and unflagging beam of vitality. You never know what’s going to come at you in Dakar.
I had just come out of the bank, thinking I was looking cool and unremarkable, but obviously giving
off all the vibrations of a man who has just cashed a thousand dollars in hard currency. I was on my way to buy an airline ticket.
Before I was halfway down the block, a voice behind was saluting me in the usual bad Senegalese/American English. “My friend, how you are?” it said, catching up and falling into step. “Fine,” I said, not looking round. Even when you don’t have serious cash in your pocket, it doesn’t pay to get into conversation with anyone who accosts you on the streets of Dakar. They will wear you down, and as a last resort, because you are black, they will even pull the race card, telling you not to be so stingy “because we are all Africans”. In Africa, everyone shares. That’s what makes us different from the whites.
That’s why you have to just walk on. Don’t even let them start.
But this man was able to persuade me that he knew me from a previous sojourn in Dakar. I couldn’t tell whether he was genuine. It is flattering to be remembered in a foreign town.
So before I knew it, I found myself following him into the dim interior of a sparsely furnished restaurant, tucked away down a side street.
The landlord was with us in one bound. He ushered us to an upstairs terrace, where several mynah birds and parrots were strutting glumly up and down in their cages. The landlord insisted on bringing us beer. Abdou and I were grinning warmly as we started exchanging addresses. I was trying to keep an eye on the time.
Two men at a neighbouring table had pricked their ears up ostentatiously when they overheard our conversation, particularly the bit where I had said I was from South Africa. One of them leaned over and immediately took over our conversation.
He dispensed with his life story in a few minutes and then launched into the present, telling me that, at last, after four years of marriage, his wife had been delivered of twins two weeks before. It was a time of great joy. I congratulated him, still looking at my watch.
With joy, he went on, comes responsibility. He told me about the three sacrifices that have to be made when a child is born. One is to pour a sacrifice of milk into the ocean, so that the mother’s breasts will flow with an ocean of milk; the second is to give gifts to a stranger, to bring goodwill on the children from outside the walls of the home; the third is to slaughter a sheep.
The two litres of milk had already gone into the ocean. That very afternoon he was to buy a sheep for the slaughter.
Before I could ask him about what had happened to the middle sacrifice, he was on his feet and heading my way. “I have decided that you are the stranger to whom the second sacrifice will be given,” he said. “You are a stranger. You come from Mandela’s country. We like Mandela.”
With that, he pressed a small package into my hand.
I was moved almost to tears. He had made me godfather to his twins.
The man had told me that he was a master goldsmith, a profession for which certain Senegalese families are renowned. Inside the little package were two large lumps of what appeared to be raw gold. The only thing he begged, in return for my accepting them, was that I would never sell the gold, but keep it in my own family.
The other guys in the restaurant seemed to be as impressed as I was by my good fortune.
But then the man who had initially brought me to this place took me aside. “They are all watching you,” he said, which indeed they were. “In our custom you have to give something in return.”
“I was thinking of that,” I replied.
“What have you got?” he asked.
“About R100 in local currency,” I lied, sensing something was not right. He looked at me with tragic eyes. “At least make it 500,” he advised. “He needs to buy a whole sheep.”
That is when I looked at the whole bunch of them and decided that all was not as it seemed. The packet of gold in my pocket was starting to give off a cheap, tinny ring. I handed over the R100 I had offered, said nothing about the hefty airline money that was singing a loud and guilty melody in my wallet, and backed out into the street. I didn’t even finish my beer.
Yes, Dakar is something else, I thought, as I hurried away, my senses more vigilant than ever. It’s gorgeous and entertaining and filled with charm. But when you shake hands with it, you should always count your fingers when you get your hand back. Things are not always as they seem.
Archive: Previous columns by John Matshikiza