Dakar

I slept.  Waking up to the bleating of goats beneath my window, laundry flapping in the wind, the sound of the sea. The sounds of lives being lived.  The sun streams in my window, the bed is warm.  The breeze is cool. It's 11 am.

Saliou hails a taxi and starts the bargaining  The offer: 2500 CFA ($4.29) to downtown.  The driver eventually backs down from his offer of 3500 CFA.  I laugh.  It's a long drive.  We stop to visit with his big sister, a seamstress.  If I bring her fabric, she will make me a dress.

Saliou's dad in a crowded office supply store, a room really, packed with copy machines and ink cartridges that Saliou had shipped from China.  No love lost here - not a cent passes from father to son.  Saliou is a self made man, selling ink cartridges, building a client base.

The other accomplishments of the day:  Getting CFA, finding a bank to change to small bills, getting a SIM card, finally eating lunch in a small restaurant, a broiled fish, rice and cooked vegetables.  I'm exhausted, dodging cars and street merchants - the air is thick with particulate pollution.  The same bargaining applies for a taxi.  I explain to Saliou about space junk and the driver asks Saliou in Wolof for a futher explanation.  He understands French, he listens but cannot speak French.

And finally, my sons join me at my room and we eat grilled meats, them standing over the papers of food, no plates, no silverware, we all gorge ourselves.

Their T-shirts from Boulder fit well, the "boys" set up Saliou's computer (gift from Jacques).  We are all very happy.  11 p.m. and I fall into a deep sleep.