Dancing in the Streets

You can see how enthusiastic I am about this dance. The town mayor is on the left.



An impromptu hoe-down in Adele's courtyard.



I’m not a big fan of traditional dancing. It’s not that I hate it, or am against people dancing; apathy is a better work for it. I’m glad people have their culture and that they’re having a good time, but I don’t see why I’m supposed to get all excited about it. “Go home, put on some nicer clothes without holes in them, come back and we’ll watch the Lilouaga!” my colleague Maurice once said to me. Are you kidding me? There’s a correlation between Africa and America here: The tendency to get dressed up to be bored.

I’ve seen all the dances now, Rasandaaga, Lilouaga, Kiegba, Kiema, and more. It’s difficult to keep all the names straight, and they aren’t overly descriptive to an Anglophone, so I’ve given them my own labels: line dance, circle shuffle, butt bump, arm swing, ground hump, and duster swish. They’re all pretty boring, but in fairness, the ground hump, in which young girls undulate suggestively on their hands and knees, does have a way of gripping one’s attention.

Worse than standing around pretending to be entertained is the constant pressure to join in. They got me into the very first Rasandaaga I attended, where a mass of people twenty wide and dozens deep slowly marches across the terrain, one step at a time, waving their arms as if flipping crumbs off an apron. It was thrilling, let me tell you. That’s what I get for trying to embrace the local culture instead of following my better instincts. Ever since, people ask me why I’m not jumping in whatever dance is ongoing at the moment. And the Kiegba, or butt bump, the one dance that looks like it might actually be fun, is reserved exclusively for females. Inside a circle of swaying women, two contestants take a few fancy steps to approach each other, then crash their behinds together. A winner is determined in some mysterious manner and stays in to meet the next challenger, while the loser retreats to the perimeter. Perhaps it’s for the best that I’m not allowed to participate, given the amount of padding on some of the women. It’s possible that I could be launched out of the circle and beyond, into a low orbit, maybe.

The women love it, and that’s one thing the traditional dances do have going for them: It’s one of the few times women really seem to be having fun. I remember one evening, an impromptu, dolo fueled kiema, or arm swing dance, started up outside Maurice’s courtyard. One guy freestyles lyrics and bangs a metal rod against a thumb ring, while the rest swing their arms to and fro in a tight circle and join in the chorus. Maurice’s wife, happening by, got a huge smile on her face, put down the bundle of firewood she was carrying on her head, and showed us some moves. Even Maurice’s mother, not known for quick movements or agility, came over and swayed for a few rounds.

Another time, I was looking for a woman with whom I was going to build a mud stove. She wasn’t home, but we tracked her down elsewhere in the neighborhood, in a courtyard with nine other women. She was delighted to see me. “This is where we were!” she said excitedly. “We sleep here sometimes!” Before I could ask why, someone went in a hut and out came the maracas, and next thing I know the courtyard was filled with singing, dancing old women. I never did figure out exactly what they were doing there.

Back at the first Rasandaaga, someone translated the lyrics for me: “This is not the joy,” a sentiment I certainly agreed with, “the joy is yet to come,” referring to the “dance moderne” to take place later in the evening. While it is mostly older people who enjoy the traditional dancing, it is the youth that swarm to Bar-Dancing Neerwaya, or “Chez Macaire,” Zogore’s answer to a nightclub. There, a generator powered sound system blasts the latest West African hits: Seka-Seka, Tappez Sur Mon Dos, Boobarraba (Djiola for “big ass.” See the trend here?), loud enough to be heard all over village. First, the kids, almost all boys, crowd the concrete dance floor. They shake and twist, do all kinds of crazy moves with their legs, and occasional back walkover or snake. Ousmane, the guy with downs syndrome, always makes an appearance and does his unique routine, head thrusting, arms shooting forward, leaning backwards and forwards with an occasional leap for good measure. Idrissa, one of the village’s leading dancers before he went crazy, who now does little but wander the town aimlessly asking people for cigarettes, always shows up as well and displays flashes of his former brilliance.

Around 9 PM the bar clears out, re-admittance at the price of 100 CFA. In a place where no one ever has any money it is curious how everybody manages to come up with it, including the kids, making me wonder, did they beg, borrow, or steal? Even Ousmane usually finds his way back in. These parties, in fact, are a good income generating activity- One group sponsors the event and takes the door charge, with a fixed amount going towards equipment rental for the sound system. Macaire, the bar owner, has a busy night selling drinks, mostly inexpensive liquor shots, as cheap as 25 CFA for locally made sopal, which is rumored to be produced in a rubbing alcohol distillery, and smells exactly like it, too. Some of the more spendthrift attendants even spring for the 500 CFA bottled beers. Outside the bar, a lantern village springs up, comprised of women selling dolo and gateaux, the oily, local donuts.

As people filter back inside, the action heats up again, kids still around but generally a slightly older crowd now, people in their twenties and thirties. Guys and girls dance separately, for the most part, forming small circles of friends. Guys here love dancing, they love dancing with each other, and they aren’t afraid to show it. Improvisation reigns; one contestant will enter the circle and show off some moves, then retreat to let in another. The girls seem more subdued, apparently restricted to only one dance, bobbing up and down while swinging their arms forward and back, elbows bent, but seeming to enjoy themselves nonetheless.

Occasionally, when a slower song comes on, the sexes do mix, in a swaying awkward slow dance, while the leftover men, victims of the gender ratio, continue hopping around like maniacs. These slow songs do not come often, though, and there are only two or three options. The music catalog is not large, and people’s tastes don’t trend toward variety anyway. The soirées can last until four in the morning, and Seka-Seka might get played a dozen times or more. I know, because it’s clearly audible at my house, on the other side of town.

At clubs in the cities, the variety of music is expanded somewhat. The Baobab, in Ouahigouya, for example, still plays all the village hits but also hip-hop and Latin music for a more urbane crowd- Sean Peal, Shakira, “Gasolina.” Hip young professionals go out with their dates, Europeans staying at the stylish Hotel Dunia across the street come in groups, and prostitutes work their trade, wearing clothes you would never see on women in the light of day. The Baobab, filled to capacity with writhing, grinding, sweating bodies, is a sight to see, with far more of interest and intrigue, and a lot more illustrative of the prevailing culture and atmosphere, than those silly, boring, yet much hyped traditional dances.