In Which Johanna Has Four Adventures in One Day, Part Two (Mashallah)

After dinner, we piled into the bus (of course) and drove of to the middle of Toubacouta, and this is after dark, maybe around 9 or 10, to see the "theatre folklorique" which I guess means DANCE PARTY. Some local kids were playing usher, taking us by the hand as we got off the bus, leading us to plastic chairs that were set up in a huge circle around a dusty lot outside, there was one very bright light coming from the corner boutique (this is the Senegal version of side-lighting)(the light went out a few times during the night, someone would get up, walk inside, and after lots of comical mechanical sounds and buzzing, it'd flicker back on.)

And then they started drumming. Ohhhhh wow did they start drumming. Lots of drums. Lots of sound, lots of very muscular men with neatly trimmed dreads and baggy pants. Their hands were a blur, you couldn't even make out individual movements, it was like the musical equivalent of cardiac arrest and an epileptic seizure, but in a good way, and I have never been so awesomely intimidated in my entire life. And then they started dancing. Sorry, not the drummers. They kept going, and then two women and two men started dancing and I realized my jaw had dropped open sometime in the last I don't know how much time had gone by since they started playing, but it was a long time since I had last been calm and composed. And it didn't stop. They kept drumming and dancing and occasionally the two women would stop to sing and their voices were about an octave higher and two notches more nasal than any kind of singing I'd ever heard, it was piercing and yes foreign and yes powerful and these girls were tiny, they looked like acrobats and the way they threw themselves into the air it was no wonder.

And then they brought out the fire.

Yeah, one of the drummers started breathing fire. It looked like a stick wrapped in a rag doused in lighter fluid that started the giant fireball that issued from this man's mouth, and we could feel the heat. Then he very slowly showed us exactly how tolerant of the heat these dancers can be, running the flame over his hands, and arms, and feet, before dousing the flame in his mouth. A while later these tiny balls of I don't know what were also lit on fire, a few were swallowed, one of the women even swallowed one, letting it rest on her tongue for what seemed like forever beforehand. The last flaming ball went down the male dancer's pants, which is a sentence I never thought I'd ever write on a blog or anywhere else. And then they danced some more. One woman had braids down to her waist, started flipping her head around in a way that makes heavy metal fans just look lazy.

This is Troupe Allah Laké- in mid-March I'm starting a six-week internship with them.

There were about eight drummers and four dancers, and they were doing flips and jumps and even if you slowed them down it was still such a different way of moving, they were so grounded you could tell but then the way they were moving their arms and legs and backs and necks was so unlike anything I've ever seen before, it was like fire, it was exactly like fire, and I am so excited and so scared and I realized this is why I came here, this is why I'm here, I haven't even been here that long but I'm sitting in a village watching the dance troupe that Waly found me an internship with. Inshallah.

Well, after a while they stopped to make room for the next group which when I say they weren't as impressive as the first group, means nothing really because they were also incredible. It was a less formal performance, and while the musicians were playing (all drums, it was all different sized drums and a few women singing, maybe the drummers would sing a call-and-response for a while too) anyone could get up, run into the middle of the circle, and start dancing. And they did, all sorts of people, old women would hike up their skirts and prance with more energy than the groups of laughing children that would follow, a couple young women pulled an old man onto the floor to dance, it was all the same kind of amazingly energetic movement, few people danced for long, but there was always someone else running up when they couldn't just watch anymore. And yes, we toubabs did dance. We got pulled up a few times, where we would crowd en masse into a small corner and giggle nervously and fail miserably and it was so much fun and again, this is why I'm here, this is why I'm here.

This is why I'm here.


On the bus ride back to the hotel Waly told us that the local students had invited us to a party. We asked when. He said now. A dance party. Near the hotel, so if we wanted to go one of the students would come walk us over.

Now, at this point I'm already falling asleep where I sit. It is at this point that I'm very glad to have the friends I do. And by that I mean all of you. See, at this point a few voices popped into my head- Linda said "are you KIDDING? You're in AFRICA! Go to the frikkin dance party already!" and Julie agreed, in French, and then Disa just threatened to smack me if I turned this down, Addy just gave me a look, and even Becca told me to go out which I took as a sign that I better go to this soirée. So thanks, you guys, and many others who I polled in my head, because then at what was about two AM, Karamba and Idy met us at the gate of the hotel and we walked in the PITCH BLACK, you could see so many stars on the way there, to the military base that was hosting this regular Saturday-night dance party. You pay a dollar to get in the door, they play everything from Youssou N'dour to My Humps. And there are twelve of us, I know because every few songs I look around and count to make sure there are still twelve of us, we're all dancing in two circles, making sure that if someone's dancing with a guy that she *wants* to dance with that guy, and Karamba's making sure we each have partners for what I guess is a slow dance. He introduces me to "Wonderful Ibou" who is very very very tall and I wouldn't mind dancing with him except for the fact that after a while my neck hurts so I excuse myself and go out for some fresh air- with a friend, of course, we don't even go outside without a friend because this is after all a military base and we have been warned about I don't know what but we're being smart after all, and outside I meet this Swiss woman who's taking a vacation through francophone Africa.

And I get a lot of practice saying "oh, you're very tall, just like my husband" or "oh, your name is what? Mar? Mor? Mërr? (whatever he said) oh, I can remember that, it's like my boyfriend's name" and of course "no, I don't want someone to show me around, I don't need a Senegalese boyfriend" because for some reason even if you say you're unavailable, if your improvised husband or boyfriend or fiancée isn't here in Senegal, you still need someone. But it's all good, we're used to that by now, and the party was so much fun, and after a while I start to get really really tired, not just the really tired I was before I started dancing, and we do still need to get up by eight tomorrow, so I tell Karamba that we need to leave by three, which he takes to mean we need to leave *now*, and with a lot of confusing exchanges in French in a very loud crowded room, we get everyone together and after a lot of talking and confusing looks and getstures somehow all walk out the door, and back to the hotel.

Dear Felix. Just because I went to a party, that doesn't mean you get to throw a party in our room. And by our room I mean MY room, because it isn't yours. We don't share this room, and we certainly don't appreciate you leaving a friend behind in what I guess is the arachnic equivalent of "passed out on the couch." He looks to heavy to carry outside, but seriously. Stop bringing friends over. Love, Johanna.


There are a few other days to this trip that I may or may not blog about later. They weren't as interesting to write about, though very interesting to live through, in which we visited more villages, swam in the pool some more, and drove back seven hours to Dakar. Maybe later.