The first stop in Africa was Dakar, a city of about 1.5 million on the western-most point of Africa.
We found it hard to find peace in Dakar. Money changers, shop owners, guides and touts are not shy about approaching tourists. Most, but not all, would retreat after a few pleasantries in French. The phrase "le prochain temp," means "next time," and anyone visiting Dakar without knowing that phrase will have a miserable time indeed.
The museum in Dakar is the best in West Africa and we enjoyed a peaceful hour there before diving back into the streets and finding our way to the market. The market is Dakar at its most intense. The sidewalks are crowded with wares, and even a sideways glance at something gets the shopkeeper into a fever pitch of sales talk. The overall impact is that browsing is impossible, customers are driven from the market, and fewer goods are sold. With the help of a guide, we found the deepest part of the market, a dark and low three-story maze where spices, vegetables, meat and fish were spread out in innumerable stalls, sometimes with the owner asleep on the wares. The meat, we learned, is held for two days, the fish for one . . . whatever left is sent to the prisons.
We took two pleasant day trips out of Dakar. Goree Island, one of the first places in Africa to be colonized (1444 by Portugal) is a short ferry ride from downtown. It has quiet streets lined with colonial-era buildings, and several informative sites related to the slave trade.
Certainly slaves were deported from Goree in some numbers, but there is debate of whether Goree was ever a significant slave trade site. Nonetheless it is being promoted to those on the slave-history circuit and politicians (Clinton, Carter, Madela and many others) have used Go
ree for photo-ops.
There are two museums on the slave trade in Goree. One is in a former fort at the tip of the island and the other is in a former home of a slave trader. The displays, together with the quiet streets and colonial architecture create a contemplative mood.
From Dakar we proceeded to visit other sites in Senegal, and then returned for a day before flying to Mali. It was Sunday, and we visited the Benedictine monastery at Keur Moussa, where the mass combines African instruments and Gregorian chants.