A Short Stop in Dakar, Senegal - 24 April 2008

A very brief stop in Dakar, on the westernmost tip of Africa. Only 6 hours, I wish I knew why it's such a short stop.

Just enough time to see a little of the port city, no time to go inland.

And yet, it is enough to get a sense of the strangeness. Strange sights, strange people, strange birds, strange trees. Enough to remind me that there are many other people leading perfectly fine lives that are totally different than mine in places totally different than any I have visited before.

Some of the streets look like a normal American city with cars and taxis, and then you turn around and there is a crazy colored bus coming, or someone is leading goats across the street.

A trading center, ships from all over the world, and many handcrafts. Juxtapositions of wealth and poverty, modern and old, color and monochrome, sea and land.

This is the edge of Africa, any further west and you are in the Atlantic Ocean.

I buy a few mementoes, little teak and ebony carvings, a colorful doll, some fabric, pictures done with feathers, and a necklace. I hope they'll help me hold onto my memories until I can return again.