All Eyes on Senegal… A Road Trip Along the North Coast

I awoke the morning after Eid to a nearly empty house.  The chattering aunties and giggly children left before the first rains of the wet season arrived.  It was mind boggling just how much rain was dumped onto the roofs and sandy roads of Fatou's neighborhood in such a short time.  Fatou, Megan, and I waiting anxiously to see if our driver would decide whether or not to begin our coastal road trip to the capital.  In the meantime, I watched the neighborhood kids from the balcony, as they caught rain drops with open mouths and ran through the large puddles barefoot. 

By late morning, the waters receded and the rain died down enough that our driver finally made it to the house, and we were off for the seaside town of Lompoul two hours away.  The silence of the desert road was welcomed after the chaos of a house full relatives during Eid.  The natural scenery outside the window was disrupted by patches of plastic garbage everywhere.  We had booked a night on the coast at a place called African Roots Lodge, which is situated next to a long stretch of beige powdered sand with NO TRASH!

SEASIDE TOWN OF LOMPOUL

To our surprise we were all alone in the ample sized ecovillage made of thatched roofs and adobe brick.  The Senegalese owner of Reggae Roots personally welcomed us and showed us to our rooms.  The chef prepared a simple dish of chicken and rice.  It was already a bit late in the afternoon, so we decided to take a short excursion to some sand dunes a few kilometers away.  There we spend a couple hours walking the dunes while taking in the sunset over the Atlantic several kilometers away.

Once we returned, it was already dark.  Dinner was prepared.  It was eerily quiet in the camp.  We were quite remote, so didn’t expect much in terms of other travelers sharing stories over a bonfire.  It was futile to stay up.  The ocean waves crashing in the distance lured everyone to sleep like beautiful sounding sirens.

Up early, we headed to the commercial center in Lompour.  Don’t get overexcited.  The center is situated at a t-intersection where a long and lonely dirt access road meets the beach from paved highway.  There is kiosk selling used cell phones and sim cards and another selling bottles of water and simple snacks.  A couple weathered concrete stations equipped to clean fish and dozens of dilapidated wooded stalls stand empty under the oppressive noon sun.  Centered, along the stretch of beach, stands a simple rectangular concrete building, which acts as a community center.  Inside, it is half full of people sitting on chairs, chillaxing with no sense of urgency.  They just seemed to be hanging out, as if their workday ended once the temperature hit 80 F, which was at like 10am.  Near the shoreline are about a dozen colorful wooden fishing boats beached on their sides like seals… young boys camped out under the boats’ shade.  Nobody seems to be hurried.  Apparently it’s a Senegalese siesta.  I discovered later that this place is a bustling market in the evening and a fish market in the early morning hours where fisher men return with their morning’s catch.  Women clean and sell the fish from the wooden stalls. 

THE JAPANESE

This very fish market was financed by the Japanese government.  But before you think, “Ah… the generosity of the Japanese government”, understand philanthropy is rarely free in this global world without alternative motive.  It can be the political guise of gaining favor or access to resources.  Japan’s generosity to developing countries has come down to increasing global support for it's whaling industry.  Most of the powerful nations are starkly against whaling, but Japan continues to resist.  So, it should be no surprise to know Japan in known to give hefty aid packages to developing countries in order to secure the votes needed to continue whaling with the support of the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

THE CHINESE

Chinese construction trucks

Just outside the fishing village of Lompour, we came upon a Chinese construction site surrounded by high metal fencing.  Inside, you could see equipment, trucks, and even dormitories for Chinese workers.  All the equipment was Chinese.  I asked the Senegalese owner of the Reggae Roots Lodge what his thoughts were on the Chinese in Africa. He immediately responded, “It’s better than when the French invested”.  I asked, “Why? He replied, the Chinese don’t tell us how to live our lives or treat us in a colonial way.” He explains, for example, Chinese are building infrastructure like schools, highways, etc.  The very highway we are driving on is Chinese built.  In exchange, they are interested in Senegalese minerals and that is okay with him, because these are minerals that Senegalese could not use or exploit themselves for another one-hundred years.  However, he did add, it bothers him how Chinese do not really hire locally.  They segregate themselves in their walled compounds.  Sadly, Chinese are known to be quite closed off to outsiders in living abroad. 

Chinese construction compound 

THE AMERICANS

The two-day road trip south to Dakar, provided plenty of instances to witness the tapping of resources in Senegal and its potential for rapid development.  Dusty farming towns straddle the lonely paved road along the coast.  From the car window, the scene looked like a moving panoramic across the Sahel with dry brush intermingled with various sizes of impressive boa bab trees.  As we got closer to each village, the amount of trash would quickly pile up along the village’s edge.  This was about the spot we’d see a giant white sign, showing a wealthy foreign donor’s flag with a statement of the humanitarian project they partnered or financed for that particular village. 

At one village, we ran into a group of young Americans in Senegalese dress, being given a local tour of the village.  After, introducing ourselves and inquiring why they were in Senegal, they reluctantly told us, they were doing missionary work in Senegal. Twelve wealthy White Americans doing their Christian duty to help the poor and convert nonbelievers to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  Can you imagine, Saudis proselytizing Islam in rural poor towns around Alabama and Mississippi?  Well, wouldn’t you know, wealthy governments from the Gulf States do promote their conservative brand of Islam throughout the Muslim world in the form of religious charity, such as money for people to buy religious clothing and construction of more mosques.  So clearly, there still remains this colonial feel in Senegal when certain foreigners view the indigenous as a people needing saving.  

THE CANADIANS

The next village we drove through, I learned even our neighbors Canada are in on the action, supplying power to the village with donated solar panels.  Witnessing the role wealthy states play in the developing world is a fascinating aspect of my travels.  The global reliance countries have on each other for soft power, economic opportunities, and resources never stops and continues to shape the attitudes we form of one another.

In each of these road side villages the scene played out the same.  Children everywhere, crisscrossing from one side of the road, to the other and back again.  Adults lay on straw mats under the canopy of low lying shade trees. Despite being in rural communities, the village centers seemed busier than most American suburbs. The people live their lives outside.  Their fashion is mixed with boys rocking the jerseys of a star Futbol players and older men wearing traditional Islamic dress.  Most women wear the most vibrant colors and designs on their dresses while shopping or tending to a stall selling sweets of Chinese goods.

LAKE ROSE AND SENEGAL’S MIGRANT WORKERS

We were getting closer to the capital of Dakar and Fatou decided there was one last place we had to see before we arrived to Dakar.  This unique place is a rarity in the world.  Known as Lac Rose or Pink Lake.  The lake is just three-kilometer square and separated by the Atlantic Ocean by a thin strip of sand dunes.  The lake is known for its pinkish waters, which is caused by the red algae that calls this lake home.  The salinity is up to forty percent which is why people have mined the salt here for centuries. 

It is primitive and backbreaking labor.  Many of the men and women are migrants who come here from poorer neighboring countries like Mali, Mauritania, and Guinea.  Upon arrival to the lake, you just see these enormous mounds of raw salt piled along the banks of the river.  Hundreds of bags filled with salt ready for pickup.  A steady stream of people covered in shea butter marching to from the lake's edge with buckets of salt on their heads, steadily walking up the salt mounds where they dump their load and return to the lake to take the next bucket. 

Each trip they make from the lake to the dump site is the equivalent of five cents.  Most work is done in teams because they can accomplish more this way.  At the end of the day, they are paid and they split their earning evenly.  If you aren’t transporting the salt, you are shoveling the salt from the bottom of the lake with a shovel into a wooden boat.  Each boat can hold a ton of salt.  Filling a boat with one ton of salt is equivalent to about $5 USD.  Anyone can show up and work for as long as they want.

I asked the foreman, what do they use the salt for and he said there are two types of salt.  The big salt is used for preserving fish and sold all over Africa.  Europeans also buy big salt for deicing wintery roads back in Europe.  The smaller salt is sold as table salt.

The three-hundred-kilometer road trip along the north coast of Senegal provided an opportunity to see a glance at the rural side of Senegal and the foreigners who come here for opportunity.  As I said in earlier posts, Senegal is doing really well economically.  It is growing twice as fast as most economies in Latin America and three times faster than the USA.  Everything is relative.  I predict Senegal will look incredibly different a generation from now.  Like China from the 1970s to the 2000s. Post-independence for Senegal has never looked so good!