Bamako-Dakar express

I got to Dakar from Bamako by bus. The bus is cheaper than flying, but this is not why I chose to travel by land. I decided to bus down to Dakar mainly because the physician I was working with in Bamako told me that on the road you get to look at the villages, meet people at the stops and cross the entire length of Senegal. Flying is fast, impersonal and it lacks the authentic feeling of travelling through space and crossing borders. I listened to him, and felt suddenly adventurous. I was ready to depart and arrive to the most western point of the African continent; pointe des Almadies in Dakar.

At 5 am, I reached the dark bus station in a popular neighborhood of Bamako. On colorful, thin, and damaged mats laid on the cold bitumen, travelers were sleeping with their eyes half-shut. To make my way to my bus, I had to carefully step between their heads, or just next to their sleeping children bundled up in blankets. The sleeping passengers arrived from Niger, Mauritania, or Guinea, and stopped in Bamako. As I reached my bus, I heard the Adzan-the call to prayer- and the sleepers rose unhurriedly, the moon shining on their tired bodies. They started praying in unison, surrounded with old European buses, piles of cardboard boxes, and gigantic plastic bags. The station was packed yet felt serene.

Many women about to get on my bus arrived with 5 or 6 enormous cardboard boxes, sometimes 4 meters high and 6 wide, taped sturdily. I would later understand that they were bringing bazin textile into Dakar, a shiny weaved fabric that Malians and Senegalese love. They wear their boubous (outfits) made of bazin for weddings and parties, or at the Friday prayers. The best bazin comes from Mali, and these women make some profit on the Senegalese market. The women and the bus company employees were pushing on the boxes, pilling them up inside the bus or on top.

Yeumble
When I left Mali I had the feeling my research was going well, I had made valuable contacts and was kept busy all day collecting data and gathering new information. However, when I arrived in Senegal, I had to call people, introduce myself here and there, and try to understand the city of Dakar. I had slowed down and lost the good pace I was on in Mali. My contacts at Intrahealth were busy with new projects, and were sent on missions outside of Dakar. They referred me to a partner organization deeply rooted in the community, Enda Santé. Enda Santé led community campaigns against AIDS and Malaria in Senegal, especially in Dakar’s suburbs. The Dakar region is divided in three arrondissements: Dakar, Pikine and Rufisque. Pikine and Rufisque are the suburbs (banlieues). I was sent to a specific part of Pikine named Yeumble. Cirè, Enda Santé’s nurse and community worker based in Yeumble became my assistant, he contacts community partners, schedules interviews, visits health centers with me, translates and tells me about the social dynamics of Yeumble. His help is incredibly precious, and I hope my findings will also be precious for Yeumble.

A third of Senegal’s population lives in the Dakar region, and most of them are in the banlieues. Yeumble is one of many subdivisions of Pikine, and is in expands exponentially every year. Over the last 7 years it grew from a population of 50,000 to 130,000. Pikine is sprawling in all directions, with populations coming from the rural areas, but also from neighboring countries. Last year, the rain season lasted longer than usual and the rains were stronger. Many of the houses in Yeumble were flooded, some devastated. The inhabitants, and occasionally the government tried to get the water out of the foundations, but the houses were poorly built, and the ground was so inundated that the operation was unsuccessful for the most part. When one walks through some of the parts of Yeumble, it looks like a ghost town. Some managed to flee to others neighborhood, but the ones who had no relatives to movie in with had to stay in the houses filled with 20 to 40 centimeters of dirty water. One time, I passed by this flooded house were one tiny room was still dry, and the family uses it used to sleep 10 persons at night and cook in the day. These who stayed are referred to as the fishmen – hommes poissons- by others in Dakar.

I talked with Cirè about the work of Enda Santé, their collaboration with Intrahealth and their aims. We tried to determine together the important persons to interviews, the ones who have influence on women and their reproductive health in the neighborhood. We are presently conducting these interviews, meeting youth groups, mayors, doctors, midwifes, women, marabouts, imams. I will update you on the results soon.