Strange Days

 Yesterday morning I ate the mango I picked on my last walk in Mali with Karen, on the 11th of March. It was hard and green then. The experiment worked and it ripened. To say that things look much different both in Mali and here today would be the understatement of the day...

Mali was able to boast  for a week or so that it was  the last bastion of uninfected Africa, but  has now joined its neighbours and has 18 reported cases  of Covid19, but not any deaths as yet. The diplomats and other expats are being evacuated back to their own countries which all have many more reported cases.  The underlying idea  must be that to catch the disease in Mali would be disastrous should one need respirators or intensive care.
Today Mali goes to vote in the legistive elections which have been postponed for two years for security reasons. Some have now questionelad the wisdom of having the whole population queuing up next to one another for hours at the polling booths in the current state of affairs when the government are at the same time telling people to try and stay at home and keep away from each other... and the opposition leader Soumi (Soumaila Cisse) has been kidnapped on the 25th of March in the Timbuktu area, most probably by Amadou Koufa's  Macina group. His URD party nevertheless wanted to press ahead with their leader in absentia and with no communication received from him.

In London we are all told to stay in of course, and we do, listening to the ambulances passing on the streets below and tuning in to the press conferences and gloomy news. We hold onto the jealously guarded possibility we have of going for one walk a day. This walk takes me to Holland Park, which I am discovering in all its springtime glory: a romantic tumbledown  sanctuary where nature is carefully manipulated into fooling us that we are lost in a mysterious fairy tale forest where anything could happen..

 And there is the wonderful Kyoto garden where the Japanese have perfected their own variety of   strictly calculated formal informality.

A flight of  doves are enjoying a get-together amongst the apple blossoms in transgressive proximity..

While one of the  peacocks  is surveying the scene with some disapproval from his solitary perch ....

                                                                          

It seems like a long time ago...

Well, things are moving so fast here that it is impossible to say where we will stand tomorrow... this little film was taken by Jeremiah last Saturday at Pia and Henrik's jolly  and delicious lunch before we all went off to see the Marriage of Figaro at the English National Opera- something which would impossible today since all theatres and concert halls are closed...
 Pia and I are singing what we can remember of a famous Swedish folk song Visa Vid Midsommartid and Henrik is accompanying us on my father's somewhat cracked old violin! For another version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vvgv5tZeBg

Last night a depleted  Dante group did meet up here, but we were missing a few very important members so it all rather fell apart and we ended up watching Jeeves and Wooster instead to cheer ourselves up...
We came to a decision regarding the groups continuation during this time of trial.. We will put the difficult (and in my opinion frankly, boring...) last part of the Paradiso on the shelf for a while, and start meeting once a week for as long as it is allowed. The new reading matter will be LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA.  For those in the group who want to stay at home they can still contribute by sending in recordings of themselves reading or commenting or emails with their chosen sections of the chapter we are reading- next Wednesday the first chapter...some will still want to come here, but will they be allowed to, or will the police start to enforce measures to keep people in?

I am still going to my gym for my afternoon swim, at least tody..I am still planning a Sunday lunch here this Sunday, but there is no doubt is is all closing in on us... Tomorrow by this time we may be ordered to lock down. People are out buying groceries to prepare for the lock down which seems inevitable.. The schools are closing this Friday.
Unprecedented, strange times of course...

but Hey! it will be OK!
and here, again courtesy of Jeremiah who just sent it to me, is 
A LETTER FROM F. SCOTT FITZGERALD, QUARANTINED IN 1920 IN THE SOUTH OF FRANCE DURING THE SPANISH INFLUENZA OUTBREAK.
Dearest Rosemary,
It was a limpid dreary day, hung as in a basket from a single dull star. I thank you for your letter. Outside, I perceive what may be a collection of fallen leaves tussling against a trash can. It rings like jazz to my ears. The streets are that empty. It seems as though the bulk of the city has retreated to their quarters, rightfully so. At this time, it seems very poignant to avoid all public spaces. Even the bars, as I told Hemingway, but to that, he punched me in the stomach, to which I asked if he had washed his hands. He hadn’t. He is much the denier, that one. Why, he considers the virus to be just influenza. I’m curious of his sources. The officials have alerted us to ensure we have a month’s worth of necessities. Zelda and I have stocked up on red wine, whiskey, rum, vermouth, absinthe, white wine, sherry, gin, and lord, if we need it, brandy. Please pray for us. You should see the square, oh, it is terrible. I weep for the damned eventualities this future brings. The long afternoons rolling forward slowly on the ever-slick bottomless highball. Z. says it’s no excuse to drink, but I just can’t seem to steady my hand. In the distance, from my brooding perch, the shoreline is cloaked in a dull haze where I can discern an unremitting penance that has been heading this way for a long, long while. And yet, amongst the cracked cloudline of an evening’s cast, I focus on a single strain of light, calling me forth to believe in a better morrow.

The Lovely Normality of Mali

 The Library business was successfully organized- The new project is up and running, and the mini project- my commission of two calligraphers to copy two of the library's newest and most stunning aquisitions- is also on its way.
 In Djenne not much changes, apart from the tragic degradation of the public buildings such as the post office, ( this gate below leading to the square in front of the Mairie a good example); the relatively new enormous Maison d'Artisans- a gift from the Danes to Djenne- and just about everywhere else is falling apart for lack of maintenance. The  Mosque and the Library are the exceptions, those buildings are still receiving their yearly Crepissage.

Before leaving I was once more privileged to attend the opening ceremony for the cataract operations which my cousing Pelle and his wife Nanni sponsored for the 7th year running.

 People had come from the villages and slept the night before in the hospital court yard, just to be sure that they would be seen- and they all were. This year over 200 people received free operations in the week-long campaign by Dr. Faira Keita and his devoted team.

This young Dozo, or traditional hunter was waiting his turn to be examined. During the last couple of years, these hunters have formed the militia which has kept the Jihadist threat at bay in the Circle of Djenne, and they have done so relatively successfully, in the absence of either UN forces or any real Malian army presence. This situation is quite unique in Mali and whatever one might have to say about unauthorised grass roots militias, in this case, and for the moment at least, the situation is calm and peace is continuing in the large part of the Circle de Djenne- the area towards Mauritania including the towns of Mourha and Kouakouro on the eastern shore of the Niger is not included and those towns are out of bounds, in the hands of Koufa's men and apparently suffering great hardship.

The French Barkhane troops, the Sahel force which, in contrast to the UN troops, has offensive power in the fight against the Jihadist are expanding to over 5000.  They are also going to be joined by soldiers from other nations, including Sweden to try and tackle the escalating security threat in the area it has recently been announced.

 

The last days in Mali were spent with dear Karen, and once more we went for long morning hikes with her dogs in the lovely hills around Bamako. Those days seem idyllic now, and so normal...
Mali, with all its problems is a haven of normality in comparison to the chaos of London and Europe into which I flew on Wednesday. I cannot quite fathom how we have arrived at this mass hysteria in such a short time!
I am not personally worried in the slightest about catching this Corona virus.  I have to die of something, but I think it fairly unlikely that it will be this, statistically.  My age group has apparently about 3% risk of fatality. I am much more worried about dying of boredom if I am not allowed to go out or see anyone or have anyone coming to visit me... I am going ahead with the Dante evening on Wednesday- let's see how many will dare to come!
And last night I went to the opening night of The Marriage of Figaro at the English National Opera:

Tomorrow to The Print room at the lovely Coronet theatre for a play- trying to squeeze as much in as possible of human interaction before it is all closed down, bolted and the keys thrown out!

Bamoye

Death is too close in Mali. And when someone dies, everyone throws their hands up in the air and resigns themself to ‘C’est la vie! C’est la volonte d’Allah!’

Tonight, at the Hotel Campement in Djenne,  as I was eating the ‘spahetti vegetarien’ that Papa had brought me (not quite like the old days, I have to say, he’d used Chinese noodles!)  Boubakar my old gardener whom I had just seen, phoned me to say that Bamoye had just died.

 Now that did rock me a bit... 

Bamoye was a great friend of Keita’s. He was a welder and a blacksmith. In the very early days I had commissioned him to make  some chairs copying the famous bent metal chairs of Mies van der Rohe. He did one beautiful sample, and then when I agreed to let him do 16 of them, he handed the job over to his apprentices who made a dog’s dinner of it. I was furious. Bamoye was also a music lover, and a guitarist. We had one deeply bonding characteristic: we both loved the music of Kar-kar, or Boubakar Traore, and we both cried when exposed to it. One night before we fell out he had stayed up all night at the hotel, playing guitar with an American tourist. This tourist was so thrilled with this experience that he presented Bamoye with his guitar as the sun rose. This became Bamoye’s most treasured possession, and when we fell out over the chairs he wrote me a song called ‘Sophie, ya fama’ which means ‘Sophie, forgive me’ in Bambara. He came to the hotel and played it for me, and I melted, of course.

Some time passed, and Bamoye had to travel for a few days. He told his wife no one was allowed to touch his guitar. When he came back from his journey the guitar was gone- his wife had let Bamoye’s  friend borrow it after all. When Bamoye found it, it was destroyed. This caused a marital crisis, and Bamoye threw his wife out and was going to divorce her. Le tout Djenne got involved, and everyone had an opinion about it. My Keita felt that he couldn’t divorce his wife for the sake of a guitar, but Birgit disagreed. ‘It was the most precious belonging he had, so why couldn’t he divorce her for not looking after it?’ she felt. I was undecided and wavering. In the end he gloomily let her stay.

At Christmas that year Boubakar the gardener, who always played the part of Father Christmas at the hotel, presented Bamoye with a large guitar shaped parcel. It was the hotel guitar... one I had brought out from England when Keita thought he would like to learn to play- this never came to pass. Of course Bamoye was delighted and played Sophie ya Fama again.

And now, this afternoon  he is gone, apparently taken by diabetes.Below is a picture of how Djenne says farewell. The body is laid out on the place in front of the mosque and the people stand praying the mortuary prayers, all turned in the direction of Mekka.

Allah Ka Hine ala.

DJENNE

The journey to Djenne was taken in some comfort this time, as I sped northward in Ga’s new  air conditioned  Land Cruiser. The landscape has now taken on the familiar dusty ochre shades once more, and temperatures are soaring to reach about 40- the lovely oven heat of the of the dry season- not to everyone’s liking of course, but I revel in it...

The baobabs are plentiful around Segou and beyond towards Bla and San. I never grow tired of looking at these marvellous trees, seemingly from another epoch or another world, the very emblem of West Africa.

                                                                         

After two days the team in the Djenne Manuscript Library  have managed to photograph successfully the first manuscript in the new project, with the help of two Timbuktu workers who came down from our project there to instruct the Djenne team how to go about things in the way our new sponsors, Father Columba’s HMML (Hill Museum and Manuscript Library) want to do things- the Djenne team is more or less unchanged  since I lived here and we worked on the projects for the British Library’s EAP projects. They were happy about some more work of course. 

                                                                          

Agaly and Youssouf from Timbuktu were also excited to visit their ‘twin sister city’ Djenne, and have been happily strolling around discovering  and praying in the Great Mosque, as well as making a courtesy call to Iman Yelpha, who was instrumental in arranging the signing of the peace accord between the warring factions in the Djenne region last August. Here we are with Yelpha and his closest friends and collaborators.     

                 

They sit together on the mats in front of his Koran school in the early evenings before the prayer of sunset. People come and sit down with them and ask their advice on various matters- if of a delicate nature they can ask for a private  audience with Yelpha who will then invite them to sit on the sand floor in the Koran school where they can talk one-to-one. This is what I did, because I had some money to give him from the project- he was the archivist in the library before becoming Imam and he is still helping in many ways. It is of course not very elegant to hand over money in the view of others. 
Yelpha has many mouths to feed. Apart from his four wives and 23 children there are almost every day strangers arriving at his doorstep seeking somewhere to stay and something to eat. He will always take them in- it is expected of an Imam. Even so, having just told me how he found that something of a struggle to manage, he went straight out to his friends and distributed the sum equally to his whole entourage! I think the role of Imam has made Yelpha grow more saintly... it could of course have gone the other way, it could have gone to his head. 
To be the Imam of Djenne is a powerful position because everyone in Mali believes that he would have the power to exercise magic if he chose to. And Yelpha is of course a marabout...The previous Imam used to roll up at any of the Ministries in Bamako and just walk straight to the Minister’s office without an appointment - no one would dare stop the Imam of Djenne. But Yelpha is a gentler spirit, and he doesn’t abuse his position. The Prime Minister – who comes from Djenne- invited him to stay in Bamako at one of the rare visits there, when the Djenne population who live in Bamako would take the opportunity to see him. 
‘Oh, that would have been nice! You would have had a lovely bed and all the luxury possible!’ I enthused. But Yelpha had refused. ‘The people would not have been able to come and see me there, and they would have thought that I had become too grand for them. I am of the little people (his very words) and I must stay where they can find me.’  
    

                                                                                  

I am staying at the Campement Hotel again, and I am looked after by Brin who was Keita’s friend and who is the Man Friday of this old hotel. Here is is, sweeping up the inner court yard and chatting to me this morning when I had breakfast. Every time I come here, there is an old deaf mute man who comes and salutes me with a big smile. He remembers Keita and this morning he came up to me as usual and uttered a sound that must have been an attempt to say Keita, and he shook my hand and bowed deeply. That moved me... 
I remembered then the poor man everyone  used to call ‘Le Fou’, he worked for years at my land in our mammoth task of bringing earth to raise the level of the land. He worked with a wheelbarrow, digging earth from the riverside and bringing it to the land, mumbling to himself on the way, and sometimes laughing at some memory perhaps. He was very skinny and tall and he would not stop working until he was physically stopped and turned in the direction of home, where his mother lived. Then he would walk home. 
The story went that he had not always been like this: he had left a l’aventure’ as they say here- it means that a young man leaves home to find fortune. He will only ever come back if he can at least give some presents in his home village on his return, even if it is only some fabric for his mother. Otherwise he will never come back, he is too ashamed. Now I was interested in finding out about Le Fou. Brin was not sure whether he was still alive, but he told me that it is rumoured that the mother of le Fou had consulted a Marabout when her son had been away several years. There had been some sacrifices made and this had brought her son back to Djenne, but when he came back he was Le Fou. Noone knows what happened to him and how he became the way he was. There is now a theory that it is wrong to do maraboutage in order to bring back sons that have gone a l aventure, Brin tells me. If these men  are not ready, if they have not ‘made it’ and cannot bring anything back, the shame can destroy them.

Ah, Africa...