It’s another day of “What’s going to happen?” here in Dakar. As it turns out, we are feelin’ style on this lovely weekend afternoon.
First off, we were up a bit late last night. A pick-me-up serving of café touba purchased from bemused Senegalese gawkers is in order.
We wander down to Gueule Tapée, a neighborhood located next to Soumbedioune (the fish market). There’s always stuff for sale on the main road- it’s kinda like Aladdin’s crazy aunt emptied her cave out onto the road median.
We try to divine the origin of the wares- an excessive amount of colorful sari-like scarves make us think that this pile originated in India.
Nothing is wasted in Africa- everything is used and reused in perpetuity. Here you can see how Thai rice bags now serve as tarps on which these hand-me-downs are resold. Only 300F CFA an item! (that’s less than a dollar by the way)
You know, these fancy hand me downs are nice, but we really need are some new kicks to compliment our purchases (okay, all I really bought in the market was a knock-off Puma Senegal Soccer shirt- Allez Les Lions! – mais comme même…)
This actually the point of our afternoon mission; someone else had a pair of shoes made here that are reported to be nice. So we went and hopped on the word of mouth train and wandered till we found someone who knew someone else who knew where this place could be found.
You know why I like this shoe store already? No, not the Koranic text (although that’s fine too)- it’s rather the fact that Rien ne me dérange– Nothing bothers me- is scrawled on the door.
Once inside, the model in question is described, and then suddenly produced from a plastic bag stashed under a table. This example is our starting point.
Deciding you want to have something made is the easy part. It’s contending with the decision tree that gets challenging. The cordonniers have much at their disposal, and as such we are opting to have our shoes made with leather. This complete freedom of choice is great- but now it’s a matter of picking a color from this massive color book. I found this to be the hardest part. Do I want pink or blue? Pink- no wait- blue. Can’t I have one in every color?
Our feet are traced in a notebook and then circumferential measurements are taken. (I just wanted to work the word “circumferential” into my blog entry.)
After our orders are put in, we provide a down payment and are given our receipt with pick up date. As you can see, my name is Ngmegane. Somehow this seemed about correct.
And here they are, just over a week and $30 later- I’ve got another pair of shoes to add to my overflowing collection of footwear. You’ll have to excuse my mosquito-bitten Africa feet- but these babies have earned this level of abuse.
The other thing that we did while out in this part of Dakar was go and visit my man Babacar and his boutique of tin can treasures. Unlike my woefully incompetent building manager, I love this guy, and I buy way too much tin can art. I blame it on the sun, but I did stumble across a new creation that I was completely powerless against resisting.
I always said that I’d never buy an African mask, but this one spoke to me. I blame it on all those rev watches on the bridge where I’d show up for watch with a can of Diet Coke. I don’t care if you hate it, this is totally going into my workspace when I get back to Washington.
So this was a rather entertaining, if not pointless excursion, but it gives you a pretty fair indication of the average days that find you meandering about with slight a hangovers.
What I’d really l like to say in this post is ba beneen yoon to my favorite toubab ever- she’s the chick drinking crazy-ass West African coffee up above with me in the middle of a traffic circle. Sadly, she’s leaving this magical land for good tonight- and is off to bigger and better things. I can’t wait to meet up with her again- and that’s not just because we are both tall, white and female (and consequently get mistaken for one another here in Senegal). No, I’m going to miss her because she has fabulous taste when it comes to figuring out what I’d want brought back for me from Cameroon:
Words cannot describe how much I love these shoes. Cole Haan, Jimmy Choo and Rex King of Mardi Gras- eat your hearts out.
See you soon KG! Profite bien de la vie normale! Nama nala déjà!
