Zigui's laid-back charms could hold you for a lifetime, slowing your pulse in the torpid heat, smilingly offering you a beer by the river as the sun settles down for the night. Yet we wanted to see a little more of the Casamance, and head a bit off the beaten track. Initially we had planned to head to the empty white sand beaches of Cap Skiring, but we decided to check out the seat of the Jola priest-kings, Oussouye, instead. The road winded past crocodile farms and dense hardwood forests to a town that for the first time felt entirely African, a village grown large, with a dilapidated Hotel de Ville the only sign of colonial influence. We settled into our very own Case à Impluvium, complete with pet monkey and crocodile, and sampled a more traditional way of living.
Nature beats park ranger every time. Off the wide dust roads, tracks wound through the bush on a wanderer's whim. Nature seemed very much in charge round here, with people quite literally in its shadow. There was also a mystical feeling to the place. We would wander past huts hung with drums, drawn by the sound of far off music. The Jola have a very different musical tradition to much of the rest of West Africa, having no griots, the wandering minstrels who play the pentatonic scales that came through blues to form much of the rock music so familiar to us today. Instead their music has a lamentative air, playing out over a crazed percussive bed that sounds almost like gamelan. When we found the source of the music, a house full of and surrounded by smartly dressed people, it was impossible to tell if it was a religious event or a Saturday night house party. The keening women's voices gave it something of the feel of a funeral, and as we were resolutely ignored and not invited in, we decided to keep walking.
Sunshine pervades the Sept Place
| That night we sucked greedily on prawns and fish. Our host was clearly of some fair repute in the region, as older French people, with their nose for a good meal, piled into the rough shack from God knows where to share in the finger licking fun. This was some traditional culture we could get whole-heartedly involved with, though when we asked if there was any palm wine available after the meal, our hosts thought it was hilarious that a Westerner should want to drink such a thing. Oussouye was fascinating, but it also felt quite closed to tourists. I think if you spent some time here you could start to make friends and peer beneath the surface, but as it was, it felt like a fleeting glimpse of something that remained tantalisingly out of reach. Clearly there was a Jola identity that hadn't been entirely subsumed by Western ideals and smart phones, but to fully understand it would take far longer than a flying visit. Still, it motivated us to head to the more traditional beach at Kafountine rather than the resort of Cap Skiring. |
| Kafountine was a traditional fishing village with miles of untouched beaches. This had led to lots of little campements opening along the coast. Ours was a perfect little compound run by a French artist. She tended the explosions of pink and red flowers fag in hand, and cooked us French wonders using local ingredients. This we would eat sat on sculptured furniture before taking the time to lounge in hammocks, digesting and watching birds frolic in the bird baths. We had our own little toukul, or thatched roundhouse, to retire to when the sun got a bit too bolshy, and it was but a short wander down sandy lanes, past what seemed to be a permanent football match, before we reached the beach. | 
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The EU had invested in fishing in Kafountine, and boats stretched as far as the eye could see. The men working here were happy for us to lend a hand, hauling boats in to get fixed and painted up, and then back out again. On the busiest part of the beach, where catches are sorted and sold, huge fields of drying racks made out of sticks hold the pungent remains of that which cannot be sold. I wish I had taken some photos of this seemingly endless spectacle, but the occasional brightly coloured groups of women laying out the catch looked at us askance as we made our way through their place of work. Fishing has overtaken tourism as Kafountine's raison d'être, a fact starkly illustrated by an abandoned campement right next to the drying racks. It had clearly been quite an important one back in the day, but sweeping balustrades and sun decks couldn't beat out the smell of millions upon millions of desiccating fish.
What do they do with all the dried fish, you might ask. This is where one local delicacy comes into play. Ditakh juice takes a rather meagre local fruit and bulks it out with dried fish. We went to a local café ran by a religious brotherhood, where religious songs mixed with billowing white cloths to create a sublime atmosphere, and tried some out. The results were somewhat predictable:
Move over Magritte! The fact that tourism isn't the only game in town makes Kafountine feel a bit more genuine than some other beach resorts. Sure, occasionally an old man in a beach buggy would buzz down the otherwise empty beach, a worryingly young, bikini clad babe riding pinion, but most of the time the only other inhabitants on the beach were cows. We also met some locals who told us what things were like before the fishing came. Apparently there was some tension because a lot of the fishermen weren't from the Casamance, or even from Senegal. Still, they were trying to do up their part of the beach, and we'd always find them tidying up or building beach furniture, though they were always happy to stop for a beer and a chat.
We had met them as they sat round a fire on the beach, drumming. Sometimes I felt that all the drum circles advertised up and down the coast of West Africa were a bit tourist driven and over the top, but these guys were playing for their pleasure alone. They invited us to join in the singing and dancing. Kicking up African sand under a full moon to a range of rhythms and the deep bass of the ocean should be prescribed on the NHS as rejuvenative for the soul. The eternal blue of the sea becomes gilded in silver by the moon, and as the poly-rhythms pounded we spun circles in the sand, our spirits soaring heavenwards alongside the sparks from the bonfire.
We had met them as they sat round a fire on the beach, drumming. Sometimes I felt that all the drum circles advertised up and down the coast of West Africa were a bit tourist driven and over the top, but these guys were playing for their pleasure alone. They invited us to join in the singing and dancing. Kicking up African sand under a full moon to a range of rhythms and the deep bass of the ocean should be prescribed on the NHS as rejuvenative for the soul. The eternal blue of the sea becomes gilded in silver by the moon, and as the poly-rhythms pounded we spun circles in the sand, our spirits soaring heavenwards alongside the sparks from the bonfire.
| I had forgotten that we were to be out here for the prophet's birthday, but one night after dinner a great singing went up that could be heard around the whole village. When I've experienced the prophet's birthday in Egypt there were great street processions and flag waving, but here it was far more solemn. The heads of the brotherhoods were sat in their finery, unflinching, on a raised platform under fluorescent lights. Occasionally someone would approach to pay their respects, but little was said, or could be presumably heard over the endless lament they were broadcasting out over the whole of Kafountine. It was otherworldly, yet bathos was provided among the little children who were meant to be sitting cross legged and austere, but who couldn't help frolicking and bringing a little joy to the situation. | 
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Eventually all good things must come to an end, though, and it was time to bid farewell to Soph. I was continuing on for another month, heading North to fly home from Morocco. Travelling with Sophie had been a real pleasure, and one of the funniest fortnights I'd had in a long time. It's pretty incredible to be able to spend two weeks in constant company with nary an argument or disagreement to show for it. Our dry run-eymoon has set high standards for a real one to match up to.
A constant joy, much missed...
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Also missed, home-made papaya jam, captured in true food porn glory by Soph in this shot
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I returned to catch the ferry from Ziguinchor to Dakar. Zigui's languid decay suited my soft mood perfectly. My hotel wasn't quite as plush as the one I'd shared with Soph, disgracefully lacking a swimming pool, but it made up for it by the great gaggle of birds that lived in its trees and by the fact that it overlooked the river. The deep peace of the Casamance stilled my soul and prepared me for the journey ahead.
| After raising a sunset beer to Soph in our favourite restaurant (the staff worriedly asked me if my wife was fine), I headed somewhere a little less salubrious for dinner. Whilst the food was generally great everywhere, I found less French influence in the cheaper places. Indeed, the best meal I'd had had been in a shack for fishermen down by the fish drying racks in Kafountine. Whilst eyes had popped when we'd walked in, everyone was welcoming and happy to serve us the one item on the menu for a few francs. The menu was slightly more extensive and expensive here, but to my pleasure a guitarist wandered in and started playing loose interpretations of popular hits. See if you can guess what he's playing in the video to the right (there's not much to see, apart from the polychromal decor, so you might want to have it as background whilst reading the rest of the post). | |
I was intending to call it an early night so I was up in time for the ferry, but as midnight hit, a tremendous drumming started. Thoughts of sleep were banished so I set off to find its source. It appeared to be coming from some nearby tennis courts, home to a bar that Soph and I had visited once before but left without drinking anything because we found it ineffably weird. There was just something off about it, nothing to do with the purple lighting or the fact that it was a bar in a tennis court. Tonight, though, the tennis court was full of chairs for visiting dignitaries, flapping themselves with fly whisks and settling down to watch the Ballet National du Senegal.
I think it's fair to say that their ballet is a little more, energetic, than that on offer in the West. Drummers pounded, old men wailed terribly off-key, women ululated and sang choruses, whilst the dancers span and stomped their feet, flailing their arms in practised spasticity. Soloists would body-pop, before things got really hectic and the gymnastics started. At one point someone dressed as some kind of archetype put on a bit of a show before flipping and tumbling for the audiences pleasure. It was a real joy to behold. Again, I apologise for the video being dark - this is the last one before I worked out how to resolve that - but after 2 minutes the soloists come down into the bright lights and it gets a little more interesting anyway.
I think it's fair to say that their ballet is a little more, energetic, than that on offer in the West. Drummers pounded, old men wailed terribly off-key, women ululated and sang choruses, whilst the dancers span and stomped their feet, flailing their arms in practised spasticity. Soloists would body-pop, before things got really hectic and the gymnastics started. At one point someone dressed as some kind of archetype put on a bit of a show before flipping and tumbling for the audiences pleasure. It was a real joy to behold. Again, I apologise for the video being dark - this is the last one before I worked out how to resolve that - but after 2 minutes the soloists come down into the bright lights and it gets a little more interesting anyway.
The next day I was relieved to find that the ferry was modern and Western, not the clapped out rust bucket I feared. This was particularly important because the currents off the coast of West Africa make travelling North exceptionally hard. The difficulty of going North kept most of West Africa isolated from the rest of the world, as it was only when Chinese technology reached Portugal in the fifteenth century that anyone was able to sail down there and actually come back. Over time this led to the increasing irrelevance of the trans-Saharan caravans and the mighty African Empires based around them, and opened up the slave trade and the eventual colonisation of Africa. This fierce sea had been West Africa's defender for millennia, and I was glad to have a solid ship to rely on as we faced its rolling troughs and peaks.
I was also lucky to have met a fascinating American girl as I embarked. Kathryn had written articles and made documentaries about Malian music, and divided her time between Dakar and Berlin, peppering her enthusiastic chatter with outbursts in German and Wolof. We stood on the top deck as we sailed down the wide Casamance and watched dolphins dance in the bow waves, the sun setting behind us. I had never seen so many dolphins at once, as pod after pod would come and jump friskily in the golden waves. As we turned to the open sea they finally left us, and as the waves started to grow in stature and we seemed to move more vertically than horizontally, more than half the passengers seemed to break out in sweats and had to lie down. It was a good time to count your blessings if seasickness were not a personal affliction. Dinner was rather unsubscribed for such a large ship, and it made sense to keep your glass more than half empty if you didn't want it to scale the sides.
I settled down for the night and looked forward to what the North would have to offer...
I was also lucky to have met a fascinating American girl as I embarked. Kathryn had written articles and made documentaries about Malian music, and divided her time between Dakar and Berlin, peppering her enthusiastic chatter with outbursts in German and Wolof. We stood on the top deck as we sailed down the wide Casamance and watched dolphins dance in the bow waves, the sun setting behind us. I had never seen so many dolphins at once, as pod after pod would come and jump friskily in the golden waves. As we turned to the open sea they finally left us, and as the waves started to grow in stature and we seemed to move more vertically than horizontally, more than half the passengers seemed to break out in sweats and had to lie down. It was a good time to count your blessings if seasickness were not a personal affliction. Dinner was rather unsubscribed for such a large ship, and it made sense to keep your glass more than half empty if you didn't want it to scale the sides.
I settled down for the night and looked forward to what the North would have to offer...
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