Dogon Country

Sunday, July 27, 2008

Tonight it was time for cucumber salad and hommos, something light and refreshing for dinner after the intense heat of the day. I figured it was time to really unwind and had a d’jino Pamplemousse with vodka, my first drink of the entire trip. The grapefruit flavored carbonation of the d’jino mingled with the vodka made for a lusciously perfect treat. Other students seemed to have the same idea and pretty soon many of the others were enjoying vodka, gin, and rum. To Fahd’s delight his stock of gin and vodka were soon depleted, but several students had purchased their own liquor at the market earlier in the week and quickly brought their supply to the table. Several rounds of the telephone game ensued and ten fingers, as well as extreme laughter, and some drunkenness from Drew people, many of which left us quite surprised. Steph and I enjoyed our beverage and wisely kept in mind the drive to Bandiagara, a factor a few others seemed to have forgotten. A hangover in the heat on the bus would be an unpleasant experience indeed.

Monday, July 28, 2008

This morning the sunlight filtered into the garden through the countless spaces between the foliage. It was a sign of the intensity of the sun in the approaching hours. After a brief pause at Songo to view the men’s circumcision area and wall paintings we continued on our journey to the Bandiagara Escarpment. My only disappointment for the venture was that I carried my camera and water bottle up the climb into the area of the men’s secret initiation but soon realized I had forgotten to replace the batteries after recharging, thus I was unable to take photos of the amazing view and the incredible paintings. People are planning on posting their pictures to a photography site online for everyone to view, download, and enjoy and so I should be able to get a few images. It was still disappointing but once I returned to the bus I put the batteries in the camera so the same mistake wouldn’t happen again.

After a bus ride filled with more heat hallucinations, even the small curtain failed miserably at blocking the sun, we arrived at the Campement where the electricity is not turned on until six thirty. Thus, we have over three hours in the darkened interiors of our rooms without the use of the ceiling fan. There is no air conditioning and the windows are merely a mesh rather than glass so you can hear everything outside, as well as the myriad of smells, and the glaring heat. There are mosquito nets for our beds and already we are getting a sense of the large number of mosquitoes present in the area.

The inside of the Campement is rather lovely with flowers and dry dirt paths, a covered verandah area with carved Dogon togona posts, and a restaurant. It would be a lovely place with the addition of a pool. I would even say the room, minus the mesh windows, is a step above the Byblos, but nothing could compare to the hospitality and warmth of our place in Sevare.

It is extremely hot in the rooms, outside even worse without the presence of a gentle breeze. It is like we are chocolate bars of candy melting into puddles on the beds and the floor. I know you could fry an egg on the road! I am looking forward to dinner actually as the menu at the Byblos has become too familiar and the options a bit bland.

At four o’clock we left for the local market to get a feel for daily life. The market takes place once a week, every five days. After sampling some fried bread, reminiscent of gulab jamon I had in India without the syrupy sweet sauce, we headed into the village of Upper Ogol to see the sacred cult shrines of Lebe. We were given strict instructions to remain in a single file line and not touch anything, doing so would result in necessary sacrifices and rituals at a heavy expense. We were able to see the hogon, the eldest member of the community who is not allowed to wash himself until his death. Lebe, the snake and a part of Dogon cosmogony, comes each night to lick him clean. The sacredness of the village and its interior shrines heightened the experience although I was quite nervous to mistakenly defile or insult any holy place of the community.

Leaving Upper Ogol we walked to Lower Ogol to see the compound menstruating women live in for five days each month, a blacksmith, and a granary before returning to the Campement where electricity had been resumed for the evening. The fan does not make a huge difference in the temperature of our accommodations and I am told the electricity is shut off promptly at six o’clock in the morning.

Dinner is at seven thirty and tomorrow we are headed down the cliffs of the Bandiagara Escarpment. I can’t imagine a cliff with such a steep descent and I have to admit to a little apprehension.

After onion soup, rice, beef, and mangoes I went back to my room for sleep. It was roughly nine thirty but I knew I would be getting up at five o’clock for an extremely busy day. Promptly at six o’clock in the morning we will head out to hike the cliffs and by late morning return for lunch. After a masquerade performance in the afternoon we will witness the first part of a fox divination ceremony before dinner. The following day before our departure to return to Sevare one last time we will attend the second half of the divination.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

The alarm sounded at five o’clock announcing the start of the day. After a cold shower, I pulled my hair up in a pony tail and threw on my olive cropped pants with a racer back tank top. Two granola bars, a piece of bread, and a cup of tea later it was time to trek to the cliffs. The landscape was immensely beautiful, so majestic in the light of the early morning that I imagined myself as Karen Blixen with a farm in Africa and the graceful notes of the opening theme song from the movie playing regally for my journey down the escarpment.

The Bandiagara Escarpment reaches a height of six hundred meters and is roughly parallel to the course of the Niger River. The vast sandy plains below are known as the Seno where baobab, acacia, and kapok trees are abundant. It looked like a vast expanse of verdant green foliage, sandy dirty paths, and rocks.

It was a four hour grueling climb I never anticipated. At points there were small passages with steep drop-offs and I was absolutely fine when Amadou, a Dogon guide decided to take my bag and camera and help me along the path. There were many points his guidance and quick hand was a blessing. I never fathomed I would do anything like this in my entire life, and I doubt I will ever again. Honestly, it was liberating in the splendor and dignity of the pays de Dogon, or Dogon country. I couldn’t help but imagine myself on the Amazing Race at some arduous challenge along the route. Overall, it was absolutely incredible and utterly terrifying all at the same time.

The four hours surprisingly seemed to elapse rather quickly. Along the route there was mangosteen and our guides brought them down from their branches for us to enjoy. It is a sour fruit, rather like eating a sour skittle, but the cool juices were a welcome treat. At the village we were able to see the Tellem caves and burial chambers with a large grouping of vampire bats soaring in and out of the darkened crevices. Once we returned to the hotel after ten I thanked my guide and gave him five thousand francs, more than generous for his aid.

I quickly purchased another one and a half liters of water and went to my darkened room to get relief from the sun. The heat rash is back on my hands and spreading from the arch between the thumb and forefinger to the second finger as well. Even in the unlit interior of room thirty eight my hands radiate an intense heat and I constantly rub them on the cold bottle of water.

After my second shower of the day, and unlikely to be my last, I was more than eager for lunch. Lunch consisted of frites and roasted chicken, a dish that seems to be quite typical. The afternoon was spent in the confines of my room where I desperately tried to escape the heat. With a two and a half hour nap I was ready for the remainder of the evening and headed out around four o’clock for our Dogon masquerade.

The masquerade, while certainly a tourist spectacle, was absolutely amazing. The men of the village, having finished their farming for the day, donned their raffia costumes and masks and the elders dressed in indigo dyed bogolan played drums and chanted. The movement of the Kanaga had me breathless and it was incredible to witness the grace and skill of the dancers performing with such heavy structures on top of their heads. The Kanaga would bend and twist, the tips of the masks slapping the group in a wide sweeping motion.

After the performance we trekked down to the diviner’s field where he prepares the questions in the sand for the fox to come and walk across, his prints revealing the answers. The old man reminded me of Rafiki on the Lion King, moving small twigs and stones in various patterns in the earth. Several students asked personal questions, including myself. As a group we decided to have the diviner answer whether age and experience would win over youth and energy in the next presidential election. Apparently, he was able to read the fox’s prints and divine that Bush would be re-elected when a political question was posed previously. The last three political questions posed for the diviner have all been accurately foretold.

After the diviners we stopped at a bar and restaurant for some drinks. I took the opportunity to browse a small shed of carvings and found the most amazing Kanaga mask complete with raffia headdress. The patina and age of the fibers and wood is incredible and it is a piece that has been performed for years by the men in the village but no longer needed so it has been hidden in some dark corner for a willing tourist to purchase. Many of the people in my group were astounded at the genuinely utilized mask and my price of twenty thousand francs. At the moment it is wrapped in an old sack the man thought served as a decent bag. I’m not sure exactly how to get my largest purchase home but I figure it isn’t worth stressing over. I will try to keep it separate from my luggage during our drives back to Segou and Bamako and then wrap it in all my clothing extremely well and layer on all sides with textiles. In the bottom of my luggage it should be fairly secure.

Dinner included vegetable soup, beef, couscous and mangoes, and after nearly falling asleep in the plate of food I went to the roof of the hotel to look at the stars. The darkness of the environment makes it seem like the stars are barely a foot away on their heliocentric path across the night sky. Zach, Steph, and I decided to walk away from the hotel and its numerous lights where we found a large empty rock, still warm from the day’s heat. We laid down on its tepid surface and stared up at the stars for several hours before returning to the hotel.

We were all extremely exhausted and the rooms were still ungodly hot so we decided to be adventurous and carry our mattresses to the roof to sleep. Under the light of the stars and the area of the roof with a ceiling we conversed and laughed until after midnight, watching several bats come and go in their search for their nightly feast.

Overall, today was a day of countless firsts – climbing down the Escarpment, trekking five miles in the blazing heat, lying out under the stars, and sleeping on the roof in Dogon country. I don’t think I will ever forget how incredible this experience has been. Today, more than ever, I wish I could call Heather to share my stories, especially when it would have been so amazing to share with her. The climb was so arduous and I believe everyone should experience the beauty of Dogon country once in their life, although the heat and the laborious trek I think are best for able bodies, it is surely worth every ounce of sweat I had cascading off my flesh.

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

I awoke to the light of the morning, the sounds of animals, and a cool gentle breeze. Once I realized I was on the roof I decided to watch the sun finish its ascent and then headed for a cold shower. In several hours, after returning to the diviners, we will be driving back to Sevare and I can’t wait to get there and resituate some of my luggage, take the Kanaga mask out of its sack, and hopefully go to the Cyber Café once I’ve managed to download my amazing pictures of the masquerade.

The diviner in his clay colored bogolan garb kneeled on the earth beside the pit where a maze of fox prints marked the interior. Reading through the various questions, even from Dogon dialect translated to French most of us were able to gather that youth and energy would be victorious and age and experience would lose the election. While it has been foreseen in the divination pit that the race will be a close margin, Obama will win the presidency. I guess we have only to wait until November to find out if the diviner was accurate. We were all given the news that we would return home safely to our families, however one person will be given news of a death, not of a family member, but someone they knew. My question, while not a specific answer, is one I shall have to give a great deal of thought in the next several weeks.

We stopped at a traditional medicine center on the way back to Sevare and then continued on in the most concentrated heat yet. Upon arrival home at the Byblos Steph and I returned to chamber neuf. A lot of people seem on edge today, especially with the nabbing of smaller rooms. It wasn’t until three o’clock that we were finally served lunch and perhaps after rest and a decent meal people will return to their upbeat dispositions. It is the last seven days of the trip and I believe this is the time we should be bonding the most and remembering our time in Mali.

It would seem the remainder of the day is at our leisure and the sky is becoming quite overcast. If I were Malian I might be correct in predicting an approaching storm. This has me a little concerned on being able to go to the Cyber Café, especially if electricity goes out. My Kanaga mask has made it safely to Sevare where I will wrap it much better and put it inside my luggage, after that it is up to careful packing and fate. I am still hopeful to purchase a few pieces of bogolan and otherwise am not certain what opportunities there might be for smaller masks. I am expecting a delivery tonight of my purchase from the Tuareg leatherworker here in Sevare and hope all of my design choices were executed to my taste.

I guess I predicted a storm only slightly accurate. In a matter of minutes a huge sandstorm arrived. The sky was nothing but a vast wall of orange dust. Inside our room we are waiting out the phenomenon. After the storms passing a heavy deluge of rain replaced the sand followed by massive amounts of lightning and thunder. I am keeping my fingers crossed that it passes within a few hours. Of course, as I type this the power goes out and I am surrounded in a sea of darkness, which I prefer to the sea of sand and rain.