Watering the Fetishes

We're on the cusp of rainy season. The heat builds up until we think we're going to suffocate, and then the Western sky boils black and comes riding in on sheets of wind. I run inside and watch eagerly as the rain pummels the parched, thirsty earth, giving life, giving food, giving green.


M'Pedougou is not a Muslim village. They call themselves "josonnaw," which translates to "fetish waterers." It is what Westerners loosely lump into the category of animism. What I've gathered is that they give sacrifices to the genies and the ancestors, and each year they kick off rainy season with a giant village festival to give offerings and to dance until they ancestors too must get tired from watching. It is called a "dugu son," which might mean "watering the village," and people come from villages near and far to take part in the fun.

DAY 1

We've finished hauling buckets and buckets of water (carefully perched upon our heads as we weave through the maze of pathways connecting pump and hut), and the rice and sauce have been cooked in the light of a hazy orange sunset. My host mom Alimatu thrusts a bowl of rice at me and says "Wu si!", lets go! My host moms, host sister Nawa and I each take a bowl and scuttle down the road that winds past the mango groves and towards the great sacred tree where the genies live. They gracefully balance their bowls atop their heads, hips swaying, heads perfectly motionless, while I must hold on to mine with a hand. Other groups of women and children join us, and as we reach the mango groves, more women come running towards us, their bare feet flapping on the dusty earth, their mouths carved open into giant grins. They grab handfuls of rice out of our bowls and eat some, then throw some into the air. We pick up the pace and snake our way along the edge of the old cotton field towards the tree.

The tree is a giant, its roots curling up out of the ground and its pale skin stretching skyward before slender arms emerge and twist and tangle into each other. At its base, we approach one by one and throw our few remaining handfuls of rice (most of it having been eaten on the way there) upon its smooth, exposed roots. We say our prayers to the ancestors and to the genies, "May we have a good rainy season," "May all of our children be fed," then turn and work our way upstream through the incoming swarms of women, grabbing handfuls of rice out of their bowls and sharing smiles and moments of laughter.

Back in our compound, we fill more bowls of rice and take them to the Bengaly family meeting house, placing them in the midst of a circle of people. Dusk has swept the harsh African sun past the horizon, but a few men hold up flashlights, so I can make out some old men sitting around with a crate of chickens beside them. One man starts uttering blessings in Senoufo and another slits a chicken's throat over a calabash of fetishes and other mysterious, secret-society things. Once the blood has drained, he tosses the limp creature into the middle of the circle, where the crowd watches in anticipation. The scrawny bird lays still for a moment, then its body leaps off the ground, flailing and flopping. There is no "running around" of the proverbial chicken with its head cut off, as these chickens are too weak to run in the post-life. The best they can do is flap their wings and make a few desperate hops. After watching about a dozen chickens die, some of whom manage to flop their way into the bowls of rice, the crowd lets out a roar and the women start shaking their chichara gourds, and a few burst into song. I turn to my host mom, "Mun kera?" what happened?. She responds, "It landed on its back. If it lands on its back it is a good sign, it means it has pleased the ancestors." ah. of course.

DAY 2

I get up late, exhausted by the night-after-night of balafon dancing. My legs hurt, I've got ghiardia again, and a cold. But eh, that's life here, so I haul water from the pump, water my tree nursery, take a bucket bath, and head over to my host family's house. Today is the 'big day.' All the women in my extended family bought matching fabric, so today we gather and don our outfits for the first time. In the distance we can hear the deep echo of the "bum-ba" drum, literally 'big boom,' a fitting name I think. Two black masked creatures appear - hunched over like old men, leaning on canes, dancing a slow knee-lifting side step. Wiry 'hair' flows down from the masks over their backs, and someone sticks corn cobs into the extended carved mouths. One of them apparently has bad vision; he's got funky black glasses perched on his pointed nose. They chase the swarms of children, who run screaming in terror and delight.

A balafon mysteriously appears and soon the drums are wailing. After a song or so they pick up, the instruments float up onto the tops of womens' heads, and the whole crowd is moving along towards the sacred trees. Behind us more people are gathering at the Boom-ba.

Once we reach the sacred grove, tucked into the lush greenery by a stream, the musicians set up post and start pounding out rhythms, and groups of women tap-shuffle their flip-flopped feet, kicking up clouds of dust that we cough on and laugh at.

We don't spend long before the instruments are hoisted up again. There are still hordes of new musicians and dancers arriving, but we're the first wave, so we move out through the forest, traipsing across dried out crop fields, picking over millet and sorghum stalks. We pass by the giant tree, give it our blessings, and move into the fields to dance.

Like transient worshippers, we soon pick up and wind single-file back towards M'Pedougou, skirting around the mango groves towards the dugutigi's house (the village chief). We all remove our head wraps and bow before the chief, who is blind and mostly deaf, but still a smiley old man who showers us with blessings and chews on bitter kola nuts. We dance for him and then dance outside as new groups move in, dancing until our feet hurt and we're thirsty and tired. Women start slipping away, to get water, to wash, to cook the evening meal of rice and sauce. The sounds of pestles pounding sprinkles the air, already thick with shaking gourds, hands thumping leather, and agile drum sticks dancing on the resonant planks of the balafon.

DAY 3

In the morning, again exhausted, I come to greet my host moms. We sit down to eat rice and sauce, and Fatimata seems tired. She has been pregnant for months, and I wonder at how she got through all the festivities. We don't talk much, and then when we have finished eating she says "A be so kono," it (or he or she) is in the house." I look at her blankly. She nods at the house. I look at her stomach, and a wave of comprehension slides over me. "FATIMATA!" I shriek, "You gave birth!" She nods, and smiles towards her hut. I leap up, then slow down and cautiously enter the dark hut, pushing back the curtain in her door. I look on her bed, seeing only piles of clothes, pieces of fabric. I make out a bundle, then a tiny face, its eyes closed, its face scrunching up as it stretches. I sit down softly. The doorway darkens and Fatimata enters. I look at her tired slender body and the miniscule human being, and she picks him up and places him in my lap. She shrugs, profers a wan smile, and I wonder what she's thinking. What does this kid mean to her? Her eldest son is 18, a grown man, and here she is with a newborn, its fingernails barely visible, getting ready to nurse it into toddlerhood and strap it on her back as she heads out to the fields.

Soon it will be time to plant. To watch the skys and hope for rain, to sow the seeds for next year's food by the force of muscle and a hoe. To hope that this year will be better than the last.

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