Dear Mariama Bâ,
It is the 13th day of February of 2022 as I commence this letter - almost forty-one years since your passing, I pray it meets you in a better place.
Once, you wrote a letter to your friend. One so long it took me two days to finish it. Today, I am writing you a letter just as long, with hopes that it only takes you a day to finish its reading.
Times have changed since you knew it. Over the years, people have evolved and life is not as you knew it. So before I commence with the subject of this letter, let me bring you to the world I have found myself in.
While Youssou N’dour played in the background, my brother drove over parched lands and lonely roads, the sun hitting our skins - but not with its heat, for the air that blew on us was conditioned to release cool air. Senegal, the country where you were born, has evolved tremendously. It astonished me when I returned after nearly four years. You may not believe me when I say Dakar feels eerily similar to New York, and I don't mean to exaggerate. But once you've seen New York, Banjul, and Dakar, you'll understand what I mean.
The roads are large and the cars that drive past each other, luxurious. The buildings are tall, with fine finishing touches that soothes the eyes, and lovely palm trees along the roads. The internet here works so fast I downloaded eight episodes of a Netflix show in less than thirty minutes. The lights, in the night, are always on and bright. Not as bright as those in New York but bright enough and brighter than what I am used to. Oh and you might not know, Netflix is a streaming service where anyone with a monthly subscription is at liberty to watch whatever movie, show, or documentary is available on the online platform.
I was a complete tourist on my most recent visit to the city. I stayed in an apartment that my sisters and I rented, rather than with my family. We wanted the full touristic Dakar experience, but no one warned us about the financial distress that a student and individuals earning in Gambian dalasis would face.
For the first day, we had breakfast at a fancy cafe by Dakar Plateau - the bill, a lot more than we expected to spend on one out of three meals - and had lunch at Chez Louchas. This place, I’m sure you must remember. They say it is ancient and a classic. When one enters it today, you can confirm its veracity based on the setting's aesthetic.
Its walls are spectacularly built and painted in white, the doors made of the same wood used decades before I was of existence. The tiles on which we walked were cracked but clean nonetheless. At the very entrance, just at the reception (if I can call it that) an old white man now sits in the company of papers that hold receipts and pay information with a bottle of water, a glass, another pair in front of his eyes and a young boy - his grandson. But before you make an entrance, you are first advised by a man who should be no older than twenty-five to wash your hands in the blue basin that sits with a hand wash right at the door.
That afternoon, I discovered that throughout the years he lived in Dakar, my father frequented the same restaurant. How quickly time passes, yet the Loucha family has preserved the restaurant for countless generations. Its signature dish - thiebou theine - was expensive. Mariama, the price on the menu says that a plate of thiebou thiene cost 5850 CFA. How expensive! Still, for the purpose of legacy, we bought and paid for the dish. Needless to say, it was worth it.
We toured part of the city, driving through the Monument of Renaissance at least three times a day because it was only a short drive from where we stayed, staring at the mansions, houses and apartments that lured the attention of our eyes, roads so easy to drive it shocked me when our family friends - who live in Dakar - said the traffic problems in the city need to be fixed. But yes, in certain neighborhoods, there are roads far too small and built with zero parking space.
Oh, and the main roads are illuminated by light poles constructed alongside the highways, and in some areas of the city, colored lights adorn the poles on which they are constructed. There are occasionally turntable points, or round points as they are known. It is never chaotic, which is something I appreciate about it. Every driver is aware of and respects the round point's intended function, which prevents other cars from becoming perplexed and causes fewer traffic issues. I wish I could say the same for The Gambia's turntables. However that is a tale for a different day, my friend.
Mariama, on our visit to the Goree Island, which is now only a fifteen minute ferry drive from Dakar, we were welcomed by large figures of people. Some of whom were tourists like ourselves, others were Senegalese and others worked or resided on the island. We were unaware that the island had been converted into a commercial location until a man approached us and told us that we needed to buy tickets as we started to explore the island's scenery. There were two rates: one for Senegalese nationals and another for internationals. As you may expect, the internationals cost more. We hired a guide who approached us to lead the tour of the island - or rather, part of it.
The island is filled with beauty and art, history, and cool air found only in the presence of the sea. It is filled with so much history. The colorful houses look like they are made of mud of deep red or bright orange but are beautiful even in their dark origins. Many of these houses have been turned into stop shops, where local artists feature their arts and crafts. Of these, my favorite was the sand-crafter. He had sands of different colors from different parts of the world; Mauritania, Sahara Desert, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali. And to make his art, he makes a pencil design on a wooden board, covers the inner part of the design with a watery glue of white color before proceeding to pour the sand over it; going first with the darkest sand color and last with the lightest.
Goree is all pedestrian: with red flowers, lined up walls, crowning windows, wooden doors, sand all over. There is more to see, more to feel, when you are on foot. Bougainvillea adds to the color palette of the island.
We learnt, from our tour guide, that the island had over twenty million slaves passing through it between the mid 1500s and the mid 1800s. During this time, Goree Island was a slave-holding warehouse where men, women and children were severely jailed in execrable conditions before being transported to the Americas. Those captured were forced to live in a dismal state where they were chained with their backs facing the wall in an 8-square-foot cell with only a small slit of window facing outward. Once a day, they were fed and allowed to attend to their needs, but still they were prone to diseases and almost no medical help was ever given. They were kept naked, except for a piece of cloth tied around their waists.
In the house of slaves, or Maison des Esclaves as it is called, there is a door that leads directly to the sea. They called it, the door of no return. It is through this door that the captives that have been chosen go to the slave boat to be taken to a land they did not know of. Mariama, you can only imagine the emotions that sprung from hearing these things.
But it wasn't the story of how our people were treated that was the most upsetting part of the trip; it was seeing white people on the island being told these things and watching them take pictures. My sisters, for one, became so enraged that they cursed them.
As he explained, the tour guide's face was drenched in sweat. We were in anguish there. Sadness poured over the joy we had felt when we first arrived. Life is truly unjust.
But here’s the thing about pain: it binds those who share it. Even with friends you adore and have known for a very long time, you might not feel particularly connected to them.But agony, sharing pain, feeling the same kind of pain, sometimes to a different degree than the other's but because it's so similar, and you both know how it feels, and you both know the other knows that you know how it feels, that you share their pain. That binds you.
On a more positive note, there is an institution on the other side of the island, far from the slave home. There is a boarding school named after you, built by Leopold Sedar Senghor, for what you stood for, spoke about, wrote about, and advocated for. They say it admits young girls who score the highest on the annual national secondary school entrance exam. Each year, approximately 25 female students from Senegal's eleven regions are selected to attend Mariama Bâ boarding school for the remainder of their high school years. Only the best of the best are allowed to enter. I'm thrilled at this: a prestigious institution named after you. I admire you greatly.
Over twenty years before I was born, you left this world's troubles and woes, but you continue to exist. In the school where your name is on the gate, in the books you wrote, the lives they touched, the ideals you upheld, and the artistic beauty of your creations. You have withstood to the point where I am writing you a letter on my mother's couch, covered in a scarf to protect me from the cold that is not so cold but cold enough for my Gambian body to seek extra clothing, as though I can simply print it, mail it to your address in Dakar, and anticipate receiving a response in a month.
I am very curious when you realized you were a writer, as well as when the realization came to you, where you were, what you were doing, what you were wearing, and who you were with at the time. I'll share mine with you in a later letter. But I'll tell you this for now:
I sometimes like my phone's company. Really, nothing happens in it. I scroll through my photos or social media, remembering moments that have long since left my possession. The memory of those moments remind me that the time I am currently spending on my phone, scrolling through social media or doing nothing significant, is also passing from my possession. But Mariama, I often need a break. Sometimes I need a pause from my relentless need to be efficient and productive. I sometimes need a break to take a breath and relax. One cannot function without rest. Yet still, even when I convince myself that the break is well-deserved, I can't help but think of all the words I could be writing in its place. My daily thoughts could have filled a book if they had been expressed in words.
Every now and then, I have trouble writing. My hands remain on the keyboard as I stare at my laptop's blank screen, wondering what word or statement would prompt the screen to fill up. I wonder what that word is for you, and other writers. What word is it that causes someone to repeatedly tap on the keyboard in an act of inspiration and creativity? Oh, the pen has such immense power.
More often than not, I put the computer away and find my journal. Holding a pen in front of a book creates some kind of link between my mind and body. I am still unable to understand it. I doubt that I want to. Nobody should have access to too much information. In his ‘If Beale Street Could Talk’, James Baldwin wrote, “I think it’s better to know that you don’t know. That way, you can grow with the mystery as the mystery grows in you. But these days of course, everyone knows everything, that’s why people are so lost.” Isn’t it warm to know that within you, in the forms and ways you are who you are, is a mystery to all but God? Because I think about it every once in a while; how knowing too much creates a mess in our minds, and eventually, our lives.
My readings taught me that the French colonies of Senegal and French Sudan were combined in 1959 and awarded independence as the Mali Federation in 1960. Within a short period of time, the union disbanded. The nominal confederation of Senegambia was created in 1982 when Senegal and The Gambia joined forces. The union was dissolved in 1989 because the two nations' planned unification was never carried through. Imagine if our countries had united. Senegambia
You may already be aware that our two counties are identical. We share the same cultures, customs, languages, religions, and behaviors.Regardless of one's affiliation with a particular religion, it is customary for everyone to say ‘Assalamualaikum’ as a form of greetings. Because Muslims make up the majority in both of our nations, we both practice polygamy. They are all so similar, down to how we even prepare our meals. We uphold chastity and respect for elders. It is extremely uncommon to meet a Gambian or a Senegalese without any relatives in the other country.
Mariama, our woes are still with us. There are still men in the strangest clothes roaming the streets, following cars until the passengers are compelled to make at least one purchase from them. In the local market areas, the women continue to establish friendships and build homes. If they are lucky, their offspring will not follow in their footsteps. If they aren't, their table stalls will be inherited by their children. Like many things in life, things do not always go the way we would have liked them to.
I could go on for a long time, writing about our countries' aspirations and prayers, miseries and joys, but the year is 2022, and I'm afraid it's a year where time is vital. I'm afraid I'll have to cut this short, possibly until another day, another year, when time will be nothing but an illusion.
I'm ending this letter knowing that, despite my desire to contact you more, it is one of those things that life just does not grant you. But if there's one thing I've learned as a writer, it's that our work, no matter how long or short, public or private, is never intended for a single person. Our works, as writers, go far beyond us.
I pray for your courage and spirit.
Love,
Maryaam