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Published: August 26th 2006
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The wait
As usual...everything starts fashionably late in Senegal. The crowd waits...waving the occasional flag. Farewell, Senegal.
OK, so I left months ago as most of you know. I’ve returned. I’ve come back. Physically, anyway. But it will be a while until I feel Senegal is no longer my home. Especially since I can almost guarantee most folks I know will still be sitting in the same place 20 years from now. Physically, spiritually, economically, that is.
I never posted my last entry - some sort of denial, I guess. NOW, here it is:
On one of my last days there, I went to check out the Independence Day festivities. When rallying (desperately seeking) friends to come with me to ‘the parade’, I was met with laughs ands shaking No’s of heads from both western and Senegalese comrades.
Senegalese people of all ages seemed to think that the celebrations weren’t ‘for them’ - that they were for the military to march around saluting one another (mimicking soldiers to me in Roberto Benigni fashion)….the younger kids I talked to felt there was nothing hip or cool about it. But my romantic self COULD NOT UNDERSTAND - military parade or Macy’s floats, this is a time to celebrate freedom from the colonizers… Freedom to
All dressed up...
All I could think about was the money that must have been used to make the school kids' outfits...Note: the guest Libyan army in beige stands watching... express your independence - however artificial or imperfect that may be - whatever the role colonizers still play - there is still sovereignty. And middle-aged freedom at that, Senegal got its independence in 1960…like most other West African nations.
I mean, Senegal has something to celebrate - as BCC online so rosily paints it:
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And for Independence Day, 2006 - when across the world's instability seemed to be rising as fractions fight for their ‘independence’ - Senegal invited Khadafi to come participate in the celebrations! What irony! Either viewed as madman or revolutionary - he was to be an inspiration to the Senegalese. Once loved, then loathed by the USA, he seemed to be back in good light - for USA and Senegal are now somewhat closely and very amicably linked, I’m sure W approved Khadafi’s presence.
I did, in the end, convince two friends to go with me - still flinging false salutes in my face as we scurried out the door and that little voice from the embassy’s warning emails flashed briefly Animation
Arms beginning to wave a bit...the limo with president Wade passes by before the demonstration begins... behind my eyes….do not go to large gatherings…do not attend demonstrations…yaddah yaddah.
A calming glance at a palm tree - and off we went.
I stayed an hour at the ‘demonstration’, but never did get to see Khadafi’s face - I may have perhaps seen his limo - but that was it. Disappointedly, the revolutionary spirit wasn’t really there - I had the sense I was one of the most nostalgic there, with the most fire inside of me - other than my other western friend with me! Don’t get me wrong, the Senegalese crowd was animated…heck, the Senegalese still just like a good party - so parade sounds good! Come wave a flag. Climb up buildings. Laugh. It was all in good spirit with a good vibe, as usual.
The point is, all I could think about - was hoping that the country, and the people, would embrace their freedom. Do something with it. Run with the entrepreneurial spirit. And not fall as the other countries around them have been - and are - doing.
While always yearning to have been ‘doing something’ for my Senegalese community while there - always wishing (and still wishing) that I could contribute more - just do something…feeling difficulty in getting past the language barrier, the color barrier, the cultural barrier (hindsight: shoulda gotten me a Senegalese boyfriend the second go-around). There was always difficulty in not being assumed to be one of those ‘I’m here to save you’ westerners…but looking instead to be viewed as ‘I’m here to learn, and to contribute in some small way to the community which is also mine”.
Being their Independence Day, I was getting teary-eyed at the idea that now it’s the Senegalese who have the ‘freedom’ to organize themselves…after years of colonization. But does the individual recognize this? Or is the individual too pessimistic? Still too oppressed? Uneducated? Uninspired? Trapped? Complacent? Forgotten? To all the Senegalese people I met already organizing…already working to make their country a better place, I was pleased to have met you and support your efforts - if only as a bystander.
MY LAST FEW HOURS in Senegal…I just hoped to see its face again frequently - maybe on BBC. Hoping to hear about this demonstration or that - this organizer - or revolutionary - or that. If even just for the spirit of fun, and should some people get a little overzealous at a demonstration and get carried off - well, the point is, THEY ARE ALLOWED to do it. They are allowed to organize and take to the streets. That in and of itself feels like something. That Independence Day experience made me vow to be more vocal and politically active in the States…just because I can.
But now being back in the States, I feel my independence, too, is hypocrisy. How free am I really? But I am determined, to do something more, to extend myself just because I can - while the bigger system may have its ways of keeping me down, while the administration supports poverty and keeps wily people with strong ideas suppressed, while they pay researchers to NOT publish on everything from effects of dairy consumption to noxious combative gases to the technology of the electric car - well, I will continue to at least talk about these things I see as wrongs, I will continue to understand each of my actions has an impact, I will use my voice.
And I have already started. I just hope that as years pass, the Senegalese start organizing themselves - whether to throw better, hipper independence day celebrations, or pull together their voices to better their conditions - I hope next time I return there - those are the types of changes I can report back on - not just improved roads and buildings and more computers, which I know, is also leading the path to freedom.
I leave Senegal finally...on this rainy, Brooklyn morning...five months later...and I want to ask you:
Where do you see freedom? How do you exercise yours?
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