A visit to Bakassouck 22 – 27 March 2012

For some time I have wanted to visit Bakassouck, the remote island in Casamance (southern Senegal), where Lamin, my husband, grew up. Lots of his family still live there, but the journey is long and difficult, so it hasn't been possible to go until now. To get there involves travelling to Brikama then to the border crossing at Seleti, and then on to the fishing village of Kafountine. There you need to take a boat (there is only one direct boat a week) and travel for about four hours – there is no other way to get to Bakassouck, and as the boat departure depends on the tide, you need to be there early so you don't miss it. Last week we finally made the journey.

Day 1

6:30 am

Standing in the darkness in the Gambian bush, drinking palm wine with Lamin's uncle Antoine. He has been in the bush all night, sleeping in the shelter made of palm leaves, and he got up very early to go and tap palm wine, because he knows I like fresh palm wine. He is travelling to Bakassouck with us, and has promised to teach me some more Karoninka – this is the language spoken on Bakassouck.

7:00 am

We collect Lamin's great uncle, who lives on Bakassouck but has been visiting Lamin's mother in Marakissa. He has walked some miles to get to the main road, and Lamin's mother has already travelled on to Brikama to do her shopping in the market.

7:30 am

We arrive at Brikama. The market is already teeming with people, and the road is busy with cars, all hooting and rushing about. This is mixed with people on pushbikes weaving in and out, donkey carts transporting wood, and of course many pedestrians doing their best to avoid being mowed down! We meet Lamin's mother briefly, and also buy a 'bread' for breakfast. This is a french stick filled with dried fish, sauce, vegetables and spaghetti – it. I eat half my stick, and re-wrap the other half in the newspaper wrapping for later – a very good plan as it turned out!

8:00 am

We are stopped at one of the many police check points, and asked for our ID. I show my passport, but there is some kind of altercation between the official and Antoine, and the official then demands angrily that we all get out of the car. I get out, but hide on the passenger side to avoid the angry exchanges going on on the other side! However, finally we are allowed back into the car, and we continue on our way.

8:30 am

We arrive at the border crossing at Seleti. We have to get out of the car three separate times to show our ID. Mine always takes longer, as they record my name in a register as I am from the UK, but the Gambians only need show their ID cards. We then continue towards Kafountine, initially on a tarmac road, but then on a very dusty and bumpy track, passing huge lorries throwing up even more choking dust as we go. We have to keep the windows wound up in order to breather, but it makes the car quite hot!

9:30 am

We approach the outskirts of Kafountine, and get caught up in some kind of traffic jam. It turns out that this is a protest march to accompany a strike involving students and teachers. We are anxious to get to the boat, but it takes us quite a while to get through to the turn-off we need to take. Finally, however, we arrive at the place to take the boat. This is small and virtually deserted – there is a small shelter (built of wood and palm leaves), with some wooden benches for passengers to use when waiting. We unload our bags, and leave Lamin's uncle to watch them whilst we return to the main town to park the car at a relative's compound, and find out about today's departure time. However, we discover that the boat driver has heard about the strike, and so it seems he not running his boat today (although no-one is sure) – the next direct boat will be the following Thursday. We could get a boat to one of the nearer islands, but we would then have to walk for several hours and wade across a creek to get to Bakassouck. We return to the boat station, and wait to see what happens. After a very long wait, and some animated discussions with a different boat driver, Lamin and Antoine persuade him to take us to Bakassouck, if we pay for the fuel and also pay him a fee.

2:15 pm

The boat is now ready to depart. There are several passengers, and a lot of 50kg bags of rice have also been loaded into the bottom of the boat. We wade through the creek (with water up to my thighs!) and clamber on board, sitting on a three-inch wide plank; this is to be my seat for the next five hours. Antoine, clearly a seasoned traveller to Bakassouck, promptly lays down across the boat with his legs dangling over the side and falls asleep. I don't want to miss anything, so I stay awake, watching the amazing wildlife (especially the birds), and marvelling both at the narrow 'bolongs' (creeks) where the mangroves touch the boat on both sides, and when we reach it, the very wide river. We stop to take on more passengers, and also 12 bags of cement, which are also loaded into the bottom of the boat. On the way we call at several islands to drop passengers and goods; each stop take a long time as people like to have a chat and goods need to be unloaded. Finally, we are the last remaining passengers and we head for Bakassouck, and 90 minutes later we arrive. Again we have to wade through the water to get ashore, and we then have to walk about a kilometre to reach the village.

7:30 pm

We enter the settlement to great excitement from the residents. It's only a small settlement (the only one on the island) and everyone is related in some way. The children rush up and offer to carry my bags and water bottles, and one old woman starts an impromptu dance – everyone is delighted when I do my best to join in! We meet our hosts, Neena and her husband Sang-Marie, and are taken to our our rooms in her house. There are about ten rooms in the house, each occupied either by a couple or shared by older children – the younger children share with their parents. The floor is sandy; the whole island is covered in sand, but it seems unusual to get out of bed and feel as though you are walking on a beach! After a meal of tilapia (the local river fish) and rice, we are glad to get to bed!

Life on Bakassouck

We stayed at Bakassouck for nearly a week, and I had the most amazing time. On the first day they held an initiation celebration – last year Bakassouck hosted a huge tribal initiation, which only happens every 26 years. For the men, it's important to take part, as you are not considered to be a full member of the family if you have not been through initiation (women have their own initiation too). However, not everyone could come last year, so some are still arriving at the island to take part. They asked me to take photos for them, and so we walked to the old settlement (about a kilometre away) and I took so many photos my battery ran out. As there is no way to charge it on the island, I could only take a few photos on my phone after that!

During the day the men and women do separate tasks – I spent a lot of time with Neena helping with the cooking, washing, and tending the garden. I also played a lot with the children, and practised my Karoninka – everyone wanted to help me learn, and often someone would teach me a phrase, and then signal that I should get my book to write it down. This backfired slightly one day, when the older women decided to teach me insults – I dutifully wrote them down, but I don't anticipate telling anyone they eat like a hyena!

Sometimes we went to the 'bush' and spent time there drinking palm wine and eating fresh-caught tilapia and rice (the staple food which is eaten for every meal).

On the last evening I set up my laptop (having carefully saved the battery) to show them video and photos Lamin took of the initiation last year. We set it up outside, and started with just Neena's family watching, but in the end the whole village was crowded round excitedly – many of them will not have seen TV or anything similar, so they really enjoyed watching the video.

The journey home

As on the journey there, we need to be sure to be ready when the boat arrives, as there will not be another one for a week. We visit several compounds to say goodbye to family, and several of the girls in the family come with us to carry our bags

10:30 am

We set off for the fishermen's hut where the boat would arrive. The teenage men live there all through the dry season, catching fish and smoking them to sell. We arrive at 11:30 am, and settle down to wait. The boat is due about 2:00 pm, but they were worried that I might not be able to walk fast enough to be sure of getting there(!) so we have arrived early. Neena has brought rice (wrapped in a cloth) and vegetables for lunch – the 'boys' will go and catch fish for us. I am seated on one of the beds, drinking palm wine of course, and watching as the boys prepare fish for smoking. This involves layering the fish in cardboard, and putting on a large platform; a fire is then lit underneath and someone sits and throws water on it regularly to create the smoke. The hut has a hole in the roof, so the smoke goes out through the roof and doesn't affect my side of the hut. When the boys return with fish, (which includes an 'eel fish' with fearsome teeth) Neena and the other women passengers (including Lamin's sister Khadi) prepare it and cook it. One large one is just thrown on the fire to grill, then given to me as a snack. When I first came to The Gambia I didn't eat fish with bones, but I am gradually learning to manage it, and have even graduated to eating the fish head, a delicacy here.

12:00 pm

We discover that the boat driver has to deliver a body 70km up river, and then return to us. He may not arrive till the following morning There is much discussion about whether to return to the village for the night, or to stay and wait – we can't afford to miss the boat. We decide to wait; Lamin and Antoine lay down on one of the beds and sleep, whilst Neena and I go for a short walk to look at the river. During the afternoon Antoine speaks to the boat driver several times, but can't get a clear answer – in the end I think the driver got tired of the hassle and switched his phone off!

6:00 pm

Someone returns to the village to get more rice and vegetables, and the women cook another meal. By now it's getting dark, and again we discuss whether or not to return to the village before it gets totally dark. Everyone else would manage it easily, even in darkness, but they are concerned about me. Lamin warns me that if I miss my footing and fall in a rice field he will leave me there and let the women carry me back – I think he was joking. However, we decide to wait it out.

10:00 pm

Now it's very dark, and we are all tired (although no-one has complained – waiting is just part of everyday life here), and we have no idea when (or if) the boat will arrive. One of the women goes to the next fishing hut, which is much larger, to ask if the women can sleep there until the boat arrives, as they have more beds and even a mosquito net! This is arranged, and so we set off in the dark through the 'bush' on narrow paths between the rice fields, leaving the men at the first hut. When we arrive the men are brushing off the beds and they even find me a piece of cloth to use as a pillow. Whilst we are waiting I try out my Karoninka on the fishermen, occasionally reverting to broken French when all else fails! Finally, after a drink of ataya (green tea), and much laughter and chatter from the women, we settle down, Khadi and I sharing a bed. I am just drifting off to sleep when, in the distance, I hear an outboard motor!

11:30 pm

One of the boys arrives at the hut to tell us the boat is coming. We trek back through the bush, and get ready to board. This boat is much bigger then the previous one, and I am put into a small, and very wobbly dug-out canoe, and one of the crew pushes me out to the boat. The boat man lifts me into the boat easily, and I find a plank to sit on. I am just about to throw my rucksack onto a tarpaulin on the bottom of the boat when it moves – I realise that there are two women and two babies asleep on the bottom of the boat! Once we get underway, everyone settles into the bottom and goes to sleep – only Lamin and I are left awake (apart from the crew), and the 17 year old driver navigates by starlight, only using a torch occasionally when the bolongs get narrow. A couple of times we scrape along the river bed, and once we have to stop to untangle a fishing net from the outboard motor, but overall it's peaceful journey.

3:15 am

The boat driver takes us as close as he can to Kafountine, but by now the tide has fallen, so we have to get out the boat and continue on foot, initially wading through ankle-deep mud, then wet sand, and finally on dry sand, carrying all our belongings. Still, no-one is put out, and there is much laughter as we walk. At 4:30 we reach the outskirts of Kafountine, just in time to hear the first cockerel crowing. The relatives seem completely unconcerned to be woken at 4:30 to prepare beds etc, but it's 5:00am before we finally settle down.

9:00 am

After a breakfast of bread and peanut butter, and my first cup of tea in a week, we finally set off in the car for home. I have mosquito bites up my legs, and a sore bum from sitting so long on a plank, but it's an experience I will never forget, and I have some amazing memories of a fantastic visit.