The "Real" New Years

NEW YEARS

I feel it is only fitting to follow up my Tamxarit experience with the story of the conventional New Year. Just for comparison. And don’t be mistaken; this holiday is celebrated with just as much zeal as the Muslim New Year. This can only be explained by a Senegalese -c’est Senegal, dafa chill, waaye. –This is Senegal, it’s chill, you know?

The evening of Dec 31 saw me in the middle of chaos. The cousins had decided to visit, and I was upstairs with the kids, trying to maintain a semblance of peace and order. While I was failing miserably at the order part, I found it an accomplishment that nothing was broken, there were no serious injuries, and all messes could easily be cleaned up later. The attendance was as follows: 1 bedraggled and harried 20 year old American (me), my brother (11) and sister (16), my cousin Khady (13 years old), my 5 other cousins (3 boys and 2 girls, 14, 12, 11, 5, and 3 years old), and some little boy who I’m not related to, but was nonetheless thrown in for good measure (about 7 years old). That’s nine kids. And me, the endlessly fascinating tubaab.
To describe the bedlam, I present my typical scenario when I’m hanging out with these kids. I managed to organize a passing circle with the soft UO football I gave my brother for Christmas. I had one eye on the ball, making sure no one pegged me in the head when it was my turn. When I wasn’t giving them tips on how to throw a football, I would paint my cousin’s nails with the polish she found in my room. When her nails needed to dry between coats, and I had just passed the football, someone would yell at me to take my turn on the FitLife player (like a wii player) that my siblings got for Christmas from their dad. After I had played a quick game of virtual rope-skipping, I would turn around and catch the football, then go back to painting nails. All the while my brother Momar would tear through the group, causing the most damage he could. While outdoors, he enjoyed terrifying the others with his fireworks- and exploded one near my head, making me go deaf in one ear for the next hour. While indoors, he enjoyed catching the football when it wasn’t his turn, only to throw it at the head of his 3 year old cousin, pushing someone off the FitLife to ruin their score, or going into my room and trying to take my things. The random child who tagged along with my cousins appointed himself my room guard, and did his best to fight Momar out of my room. When he got close to losing (because he was several years younger than Momar) he would start screaming to get my attention. Such a sweetheart. My oldest cousin, Papi, who is 14, was not content with the screams of his siblings and cousins, or the theme music of the FitLife. Thus, he cranked up the music on his blackberry (yes, he is 14 and has a blackberry) and would dance around the room to American hip-hop and rap. As much as I love these kids, I was exhausted, and it was just 10 PM. These are also the same cousins who, during a previous visit, sat me down and begged me to do some math with them. That was not a typo. I was handed a chalk board and got the laser power of 2 pairs of big brown eyes. So there I sat, for an hour. I gave them basic math problems while they happily sketched numbers and refused to accept my attempts to change our activity. You see? These kids are too good to be true.

After they left, it felt like the stunned aftermath of a windstorm, and it looked like our upstairs had experienced a minor tornado. My family and I picked up the chairs, bottles and other litter that had been knocked over, and headed down for dinner…which didn’t take place until 11:30 PM, it was the New Year, after all, who eats at a normal dinner time? At 10 minutes until midnight, my friend Katie (another student from UO staying for a whole year, and my old bird watching companion) came over. We were going to head over to our friend Sarai’s host family’s house after the fireworks.

A separate note about fireworks. It may not surprise many of you to know that fireworks are not regulated in Senegal like they are in the US. Here, there is no sneaking up to Washington to Native American reservations to obtain illegal explosives. You can get them from any vendor walking along the street, ranging from cracklers to the huge ones that require a small rocket launcher. And everyone had them. Midnight in Dakar, from a terrace, was like watching a layer of fireworks across the city go off. 360 degrees of explosions. Every neighborhood, every street, had different groups of people determined to create the best display. Walking the streets with Katie just after midnight kinda felt like a war zone. You had to peek around buildings to make sure no one was setting something off, and we learned to stick close to parked cars, because people tended to throw explosives on to street from windows. Arriving at Sarai’s, she discovered that she had yet to eat dinner. So, of course, we could do nothing but indulge in dinner #2, followed by dessert. Sarai, unlike me, has a lot of host siblings that are all around her age-25 to about 15. Her sisters never think she is dressed up enough to go out, and that night lent her a slinky, strapless, skin-tight dress that definitely defied the “cover the knees” rule for skirt length. We chatted with her family and ate until about 3 AM, when we decided it was probably about time to go dancing. With her siblings headed off to parties all over Dakar, we decided to go to the tried and true night club area of Les Almadies. However, getting a taxi was nearly impossible. Thanks to the New Year, taxis were ridiculously expensive. We were buying coffee from a street stand, waiting for the taxis to get frustrated and lower their prices out of sheer impatience, when another guy getting coffee started speaking to us in slightly broken English. He asked if we were going to Les Almadies, and offered to give us a ride, with his American friend, since he knew that taxi prices were so steep tonight. American friend? That’s not normal, we thought. Turns out it was a Senegalese who had lived in America for a while, and they were driving a fairly nice car. We looked at each other. What the hell? we thought, this might make a pretty funny story later. So we three hopped in the back (I muttered words like “kidnapping” and “human trafficking” to myself) and took off with the two guys. They were actually going to a bougie party at one of the nicest hotels in Dakar, the Meridian, which was also in Les Almadies. We chatted about New Years, partying, politics, and US culture before we swapped numbers and they dropped us off, as promised, close to the club we were going to. Entering one of our most frequented clubs, Le Patio, we felt something odd. There was only 3 of us. Usually we mobbed this place with about 10-20 of us, creating safety dancing circles and drinking together. With 3 people, however, the dance floor was like a divide and conquer war strategy. I don’t usually blog about clubbing in Dakar, but my friends and I go almost every weekend. The guys are pretty pushy and not shy about just coming up to you mid-move and trying to grab you. Since being here, we’ve learned to come in strong groups and sometimes throw out and elbow or knee as defense moves disguised as dance moves. However, Sarai, Katie and I were wielding all the elbow defenses we could, but didn’t have the strong numbers. We were quickly divided and conquered. Then I found and unexpected island of safety. It was by the mirrors (one side protected) and some Senegalese man who didn’t try to dance with me, but kept the others from getting all nasty. I reached through a sea of bodies and tugged Sarai and Katie to my side. We stuck close with the cool Senegalese guy and his friends. At 6:30 AM, we had had enough. However, taxis were twice as expensive as they had been earlier that night. I was willing to pay, just to get us home and in bed, but the others were scandalized at the thought of paying over $6 for a taxi. Then, that cool Senegalese guy, who I had learned was called Si Lamine, waved me over. He had got a taxi for us, since he lived close to us. I told my friends that we might as well go with him, because he probably was able to bargain for a taxi better than we could have anyway. So we pile in, and Katie promptly falls asleep on my shoulder. We drop her off at home, then Sarai and I continue on to Sacre Coeur with Si Lamine. We learned he was an English major at Cheikh Anta Diop University, and lived around our neighborhood. Isn't that nice...When it came to our street, we asked how much we owed, and he waved it off, despite our insistence. Such nice people tonight! By now it was 7 AM, the call to morning prayer had already taken place, and the sun was already brushing the tops of buildings. I went home to my teasing door-guard, and my maid telling me she wouldn’t give me breakfast since I should sleep until lunch anyway.

All in all, it hadn’t been too bad of a New Years… we didn’t pay for one over-priced taxi, and we got the meet some pretty awesome people. Next time though, we have learned to always go dancing with more than 3 people. 

The story of our lives in Senegal-found this shirt with mom-but it applies to our New Years....