Music

Yeenangiy noos ?

Have you heard of Akon, the Senegalese/American R&B singer currently on the charts and running with the likes of Eminem? I find the prospect of someone reigning from this small West African country commanding his fifteen minutes in the ‘cultural’ juggernaut known as the American media intriguingly random. But it seems that is what’s happening. I find this more appealing than the American commercial garbagio that the average kid here likes. It blows my mind how many 50 Cent t-shirts there are here. When the subject of American music comes up, I try to pitch the likes of Mos Def and Rakim, only to be answered with questions like “Where does Shakira live?”

Luckily it is far from all watered down American nonsense. The true school of Senegalese music is mbalax. Mbalax is driven by the tama drum, the pitch of which can be changed by the player. There are usually multiple rhythms going on at once, and often at a feverish pace. This combination sounded less like music and more like chaos at first, but the more I listen to it, the more it makes sense and the better it sounds. My lack of innate rhythm and the beats of hand-clap simplicity I learned on left me confused when presented with this more complex rhythm pattern. But as with many other things in this country, after a while things start to make sense, and you feel the rhythm.

Youssou Ndour is the biggest name to come out of this country (Akon included), and can wail to back it up. Mbaye Gueye Faye sings the hit- Bolokas- that gets my brothers and sisters egging me on to bust out the song’s namesake dance. I oblige by hopping up, circling fist over fist, crouching lower and lower to the delighted praise or unabated mockery (I seldom know the difference these days) of the onlookers.

Even more than the music, Senegalese can dance. The average mbalax video puts Thriller in its place. Michael Jackson could have learned a thing or two from the splayed arms and whirling legs that constantly blur across our television screen. You all know that I can’t dance. But here I cannot even attempt the rubber-legged whirling dervish act that the average guy can bust out at will. I stick to the Bolokas.

Babacar! Babacar! Babacar!

Language

Yaangiy lekk sa xaalis ?

Senegal is a former French colony and so the ‘official’ language of the country is French. TV is broadcast mostly in French, with the occasional théatre shown in Wolof. Schools teach in French (minus the Koranic schools, which teach Arabic), and so anyone that has gone to school for a few years speaks French. In big cities, and even in towns like mine, most everyone speaks French. Some French words are adapted into the local language, but they do not speak a form of Creole. Their ‘Wolof’ ends up being an njaxas (a mixture) of French conjunctions, numbers, days, etc. with the rest delivered in local dialect. There is a radio contest with a prize awarded to one that can speak a local language for 3 minutes without a word of French (or Wolof in the case of another local language). Yet there are those that don’t understand Toubab (as the language is lovingly referred to), and in rural villages the majority of people do not speak French. People that want to sound smart and educated speak French to show how much better they are than everyone else. People also speak French to me personally when they are too narrow-minded to realize that a Toubab can communicate in the local language. In short, I do not like it when people speak French.

That’s enough about that colonizer language anyway. On to the cool ish- the local dialects: Wolof, Pulaar, Serrer, Mandinka, Jahonke, Jola, and Bambara among others. Now (being a racist) I feel obliged to first explain the ethnic makeup of Senegal before dipping into the tongues. Being the racist that I am, I will proceed to make sweeping generalizations about each of the tribes. I have already rattled off most of the tribes. The Wolofs are the most prevalent, composing 45% of the population. They are all over the country, but the main concentration is in the Kajoor (the heartland), which is my ‘hood. The Wolofs may be best thought of as the big bad wolf. They are aggressive, they are next in line unless you push them back harder, and they are smack-talkers. But they’re all talk. The Pulaars (25%) are traditionally nomadic herders found largely in Northern and Eastern Senegal. When the car has to stop to let the cow herd cross the road, a chill, laid-back Pulaar is sure to follow with cloth covering all but his eyes to keep the wind and sand out of his face. Serrers (15%) are almost all Catholic, and it is rare to find a Catholic who is not Serrer. I believe that this religious persuasion is derived from a closer relationship with the French during their time of colonization. However, unlike Haiti’s Mulatto elite or Rwanda’s ‘more European-looking’ Tutsis, this relationship did not violently divide the Senegalese along ethnic lines. Alhumdullallah. In fact, although blatantly racist, Senegalese have achieved an impressive level of social harmony (the fact that people don’t hate each other because of differences in their ethnicities is noteworthy is a terribly sad reality). While people are far from ‘PC’ (e.g. Serrers and Pulaars call each other their slaves), they are beautifully tolerant when it matters. Few places in the world have a Mosque and a Church situated side by side, as can be seen outside of Joal on the petite cote. This outlook makes far more sense to me than pretending that everyone is the same. We are not and there’s nothing wrong with that. Why not give each other a hard time about it? It works for the Senegalese, why wouldn’t it work for the rest of the world? But I digress. Back to racial profiling.

The Mandinka, Jahonke, Jola, and Bambara each fall into the Pete has met no more than 3 category, and so therefore I know little about them. What I do know is that Wolof is eating each of these smaller dialects day by day, word by word, person by person. Muwahaha! Nu moo epp dole!

And finally arriving at the Wolof language itself- word on the street is that Klingon was based on Wolof’s subject-emphasis sentence structure (i.e. yow yaa war ma jox xaalis = it is you who must give me money). All you Trekkies out there are j-lous.

But what’s cooler about the Wolof language is jumping to certain etymological conclusions. For example- yow (pronounced yo and meaning you) could be followed by MTV Raps and enter the vocabulary of masses of young Americans. Or yaangiy degg? (rhymes with egg and means you hear/understand?) could easily evolve into ‘ya dig?’ of On The Road era hipsters. Anyone who wants to send me a book on such interesting etymological evolution, I would certainly read it ;) (that way I can increase my use of the word ‘etymological’ exponentially). The more liberal the interpretations the better, I don’t care about things being factual. That’s not the point.

Wolof lesson: Aasalaam Maalekum (Peace unto you. [Hello.])

Maalekum Salaam (Peace unto you as well. [Hello.])

Nanga deff? (How are you doing?)

Maangiy fi. (I am here. [I am fine.])

Ana waa ker ga? (Where are the people of the house? [How’s your family?])

Nunga fa. (They are there. [They are fine.])

Leegi degg nga Wolof! (Now you speak Wolof!)