This afternoon Lucy and I set out for Casino. There are lots of casinos around here near the fancy hotels of the Almadies neighborhood about a mile and a half away. But our Casino is the upscale French grocery store where one purchases Western supplies of dependable quality—familiar French brands and occasionally American ones. The many fruits and vegetables are imported, chilled, and crisp. Succulent meats and myriad French cheeses are artistically displayed, as are the beers, wines, and many champagnes that you won't find anywhere else. In a Sufi Muslim country, you don't run out to the liquor store.
Going to Casino means taking a taxi. Once outside the apartment building, it's easy to get a cab, even on the sandy street. Taxis seem to be much more abundant than passengers. Two Western women are bound to draw the attention of drivers who will toot their horns and follow as you walk along, even when you don't need them.
Lucy stuck her head in the open window to negotiate with the driver when he stopped. There is no metering of taxis; the market is wide open here. Drivers usually address Whites in French, though Lucy hastened to initiate the bargaining for a fare in fluent Wolof, the native tongue that is the first language on the street. As soon as drivers hear it coming from a White woman's lips, they know that she's not a tourist, and not about to fall for an inflated, Whites-only price. Lucy drives a hard, native's bargain and knows what a fair price for a ride to Casino should be. She refused the taxi driver's offer and we stepped away. He hastily made a counter offer and we were off for the kind of ragged ride possible only in a Dakar taxi, a vehicle with no springs, no suspension, a cracked windshield, dangling a horse's tail on the ground from the trunk—the last for good luck.
If it's culture shock to get out of South African Airways' Business Class to arrive at the basics-only Aeroport Leopold Sedar Senghor, it's very much the same to wrestle one's way out of the taxi and step into the frosty air-conditioning of the Dakar City mall where Casino sits opposite the Guess Store and Sports City. Everything gleams and invites the shopper with its array of fashionable and desirable goods for the fashionable, desirable-looking shoppers both Black and White. It's comforting, though, to be in Casino. It's just like home—the few times I feel extravagant and splurge on a trip to a gourmet market, one that isn't even part of a chain.
Lucy bought things she can't get (or can't get of sufficient quality) at the corner store--the boutique. We shopped for pasta, semolina for making foufou (a Congolese staple), toilet paper, toothpaste (Colgate), oatmeal, bottled pasta sauce, canned peas, fresh shrimp (in Dakar on the ocean, shrimp is very fresh!), fresh spinach, local melons, two stalks of celery (imported—a head is very expensive), and a few other things.
I bought us a bottle of champagne and a stuffed lamb loin for an extravagant New Year's Eve. It made me feel wonderfully, magnanimously like the elder generation to do it. Now I wonder if we will all be together at the table in their apartment on New Year's Eve, or whether Lucy and Yves will be celebrating at the hospital with their newborn.
We left Casino with six bags of groceries, carefully packed into the shopping cart by the bagging boy, who followed us to the parking lot. He even followed us through it to the curb of the busy street. He didn't have to help us hail a cab, though. As I said before, cabs materialized as soon as we hit the sidewalk. The first two were dismissed: One driver wouldn't negotiate his high price. The second couldn't make change for the bills Lucy and I had between us. The third worked out and the grocery store helper loaded our bags into the front seat while Lucy followed me into the squashy, sticky back seat. She called Yves, who met us at the door to ferry the bags into the apartment.
Yves is infinitely solicitous of Lucy. His courtesy, kindness, and concern for her well-being are heart-warming to see. The sentiment of uxoriousness is lovely; but to see love acted out in practice, in details of every day is beautiful in the present and bodes well for the future that's so close, and for the one that's years away.
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| The small shopping mall in Almadies, full of Western stores, where Casino is situated. |
Going to Casino means taking a taxi. Once outside the apartment building, it's easy to get a cab, even on the sandy street. Taxis seem to be much more abundant than passengers. Two Western women are bound to draw the attention of drivers who will toot their horns and follow as you walk along, even when you don't need them.
Lucy stuck her head in the open window to negotiate with the driver when he stopped. There is no metering of taxis; the market is wide open here. Drivers usually address Whites in French, though Lucy hastened to initiate the bargaining for a fare in fluent Wolof, the native tongue that is the first language on the street. As soon as drivers hear it coming from a White woman's lips, they know that she's not a tourist, and not about to fall for an inflated, Whites-only price. Lucy drives a hard, native's bargain and knows what a fair price for a ride to Casino should be. She refused the taxi driver's offer and we stepped away. He hastily made a counter offer and we were off for the kind of ragged ride possible only in a Dakar taxi, a vehicle with no springs, no suspension, a cracked windshield, dangling a horse's tail on the ground from the trunk—the last for good luck.
If it's culture shock to get out of South African Airways' Business Class to arrive at the basics-only Aeroport Leopold Sedar Senghor, it's very much the same to wrestle one's way out of the taxi and step into the frosty air-conditioning of the Dakar City mall where Casino sits opposite the Guess Store and Sports City. Everything gleams and invites the shopper with its array of fashionable and desirable goods for the fashionable, desirable-looking shoppers both Black and White. It's comforting, though, to be in Casino. It's just like home—the few times I feel extravagant and splurge on a trip to a gourmet market, one that isn't even part of a chain.
Lucy bought things she can't get (or can't get of sufficient quality) at the corner store--the boutique. We shopped for pasta, semolina for making foufou (a Congolese staple), toilet paper, toothpaste (Colgate), oatmeal, bottled pasta sauce, canned peas, fresh shrimp (in Dakar on the ocean, shrimp is very fresh!), fresh spinach, local melons, two stalks of celery (imported—a head is very expensive), and a few other things.
I bought us a bottle of champagne and a stuffed lamb loin for an extravagant New Year's Eve. It made me feel wonderfully, magnanimously like the elder generation to do it. Now I wonder if we will all be together at the table in their apartment on New Year's Eve, or whether Lucy and Yves will be celebrating at the hospital with their newborn.
We left Casino with six bags of groceries, carefully packed into the shopping cart by the bagging boy, who followed us to the parking lot. He even followed us through it to the curb of the busy street. He didn't have to help us hail a cab, though. As I said before, cabs materialized as soon as we hit the sidewalk. The first two were dismissed: One driver wouldn't negotiate his high price. The second couldn't make change for the bills Lucy and I had between us. The third worked out and the grocery store helper loaded our bags into the front seat while Lucy followed me into the squashy, sticky back seat. She called Yves, who met us at the door to ferry the bags into the apartment.
Yves is infinitely solicitous of Lucy. His courtesy, kindness, and concern for her well-being are heart-warming to see. The sentiment of uxoriousness is lovely; but to see love acted out in practice, in details of every day is beautiful in the present and bodes well for the future that's so close, and for the one that's years away.
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