Branco

Another incredible day, of course. We head straight to Gashon’s house and he has things to do, so we plan to meet him for lunch at 1 pm. Meanwhile, we head to the market and find all sorts of cool African treasures. The sellers are trying to give us rip-off prices but Mamadu stands his ground and fights for us over and over, amongst his own people! It was amazing. He fought one big battle with some guy who he thought was really ripping me off; I was getting worried at one point that there were even going to possibly be punches thrown. Joe and I have gained a ton of respect for this guy over the past week. He is genuine and has worked very hard for both of us.

We head to the restaurant and Gashon shows up, pays for our drinks we had started while waiting for him, and then we are off to another restaurant. We walk in and there are very large ladies in their typical African dresses and hair covers cooking home-made meals, for the restaurant that we walk into. There is no menu. We all get the same food, and it’s very good. Typical Senegalese food. Rice, meat and vegetables (all cooked well, of course). Joe and I eat too much again and Gashon won’t let us pay for our meal. His cousin comes too, he is also Lebanese and went to school in Texas. He is a shipper. Joe brings up that he still thinks something is really fishy about Gashon, and now his cousin. But we will try not to judge, he is giving us a free meal, after all! We were a little sad though… in America, we don’t really have “classes” in relation to people. When we went to the restaurant with the Senegalese food, Gashon came in the car with us, and we asked Mamadu to come in with us. Gashon promptly said no. We asked why and he said here, you never ever eat with your driver, or any of your “help”. If you invite them in to the restaurant, they will sit at a different table. We were sad for Mamadu, he seemed excited to eat. When we got back in the car, we expressed that we were sorry but he he had no problem with it. Then we looked back, and wondered; when we ask him to eat with us, he says no, but then once we all sit down and he figures out it’s fine, he orders something along with us. Maybe he feels privelidged to be asked to sit at our table with us!? Such a strange thought.

After lunch, I really really want a hand-made dress! We go back to the market and look at material, but we have a communication misunderstanding. There is the cloth, but I thought you could buy the cloth and then have them make it for you there, but I realized I didn’t think that was the case. You had to buy the cloth and then take it to a dress maker. Mamadu tries to bargain for me anyways and he can’t get the guy to go down to the price he thinks is reasonable. So, we walk to another market but soon find out, this market goes all the way back. This reminds me slightly of the market I went through in Morocco, but this one was worse. I almost gagged from the smell of stale trash, cooking food and diarrhea all in one. We made our way through but there was nothing here but junk and lots of flies.

We get back in the car and I am a bit discouraged. Oh well. We make a quick stop at Mamadu’s neighborhood and he beeps the car. Up walks one of his sons and one of the girls from his family (not sure her relation) with her little baby on her back, just like the other day. She hands Mamadu a bag and he opens it for me revealing two dresses. I tell him I especially like one in particular, but he motions that they are both a present from his family. I am nearly moved to tears! A dirt-poor family is giving ME a present, of something that I really wanted?? How kind-hearted of them. Way to make the day!

We head back into the city area and we notice down the street it’s absolutely full of all people. We weren’t going anywhere, fast. We park the car and head to the very center of town where thousands of people are standing around celebrating and promoting their presidential candidate. There is even a very, very unorganized parade trudging down the street – police/military were standing around telling people from different parties to head in different directions. We met one of them who wanted us to write down our mobile numbers, again; even though we didn’t speak any Portuguese. I really don’t understand what goes on in these people’s heads. Anyways, there are hundreds of large flatbed trucks packed with people yelling and dancing all around in support of the election. It really was incredible to see how many people were here for the event. We sat and watched all the people go by and every now and again we would get a “branco!” for someone which means white person.
I found it amusing at one point, Joe told one English-speaker that he spoke Chinese and the guy said, why? You’re not Chinese. Why don’t you speak French. It’s a very good language.

What a great, eye-opening experience here in Bissau. Moving on to Banjul tomorrow, via Dakar!