November 23, 1980

DAKAR, SENEGAL
Despite a very strong natural tendency to stay in bed all morning, I've been trying to get out early, because the markets and the coast are most enjoyable then. There's a good, inexpensive bakery a block away that has the first solid, bulky bread I’ve seen in ages. The meat and the fish in the market have practically no rancid odor at 8am and there's loads of fresh fruit.

I spent the entire morning walking along the coast road with a view of all three sides of the peninsula. I don’t know where the "largest port of west Africa" is, because I only saw a couple of ships. Most of the coast, not surprisingly, is lined with private clubs, very fancy restaurants and elegant houses. The posted beaches are tiny little things, though there's supposed to be a big one a couple of miles away. Returned to the hotel at noon, exhausted, with my things already moved to my new room, which is just as big and has the same view, only lacks a shower and toilet, which are nearby.

For lunch, I went back to the restaurant I'd been to last night and had a big plate of fish and lots of rice with sauce, for $1.25. With this place, it'll be easy to spend only $4.00/day on food.

After a rice-and-fish dinner (the national dish of Senegal), I sat in the mid-town plaza for a while. It's a Sunday evening and the city seems deserted. There’s a steady breeze coming from the sea and for the second time this month, I had the absurd thought that it was cool enough to seem like autumn, before realizing that it had actually been autumn for two months.

I talked for a long time to another guy sitting in the plaza. When I told him about the hooker in my room, he said he preferred boys because they didn’t have diseases, but he wasn't on the make or anything-- even showed me a picture of his wife. Homosexuality isn't treated with much horror here.

He also showed me his gri-gri, a length of snake skin used as a charm, and he swore very sincerely that someone carrying it could not be pierced by bullets or blades and that they would survive auto wrecks unharmed.

The friendship ended when he finally asked me for cigarette money. It's not that I couldn't spare it and it’s not that it had all been a con-- it's just that after two months of never talking to an African who didn’t eventually ask for a handout, I’m sick and tired of it.

PHOTO CREDIT 1
PHOTO CREDIT 2