Occupy Khossanto*

I really didn’t want to get out of bed this morning. My breakfast porridge is coming later, now that cold season has kicked in nobody wants to get out of bed, even to make breakfast.  It’s SO cold - like all the way down into the 60s.  I get to snuggle up under all my sheets and blankets (Thanks Jay this is the only time of year I can use it), and I’ve always liked being under the covers.  It’s a welcome change to sleeping with no sheets and starfishing so that no part of my body is touching another.

Breakfast came nonetheless and I was forced to start my day, which was in fact a fairly rough start.  Roughness aside there certainly was a lot more noise than usual coming from the Case des Tous Petits (think pre-school then take away all the money) than the toddlers usually make.  That’s when I noticed host siblings had an urgency in them that usually isn’t there when they said they were going with the other students.

Turns out they went on strike!  I was annoyed at first because there are already so many reasons that the students don’t get enough time in school – teacher strikes, holidays, the whole affecté thing where teachers are not necessarily from anywhere nearby – but I had nothing better to do since everyone I work with was either taking part in the strikes or trying to resolve the situation so I went to check it out… from a safe distance.

I’m not going to lie and say I’m super informed about all of the Occupy Place demonstrations, but much like the “Arab Spring” the name seems apropos.  As I asked around to get the reason for the strike, that’s the word they used… well the French word, I got a few nonsense answers like because there’s no fence around the school.  I think that her dad was just talking about having to go cut bamboo for the school fence so she had it in her head. What the real reason the students took to the street was because of the dust. Give me a second, I’ll explain.

The road through Khossanto is just a dirt road, but it is heavily trafficked by transport heading to and from the gold mines.  Many of the vehicles seem fairly oblivious to the fact that they are going through a village and speed right through, even going so far as to swerve around the speed bumps.  Not only is this dangerous, I’ve been informed that someone was killed last month biking just outside of the village, but it also kicks up a lot of dust which gets everywhere – even when I have my hut all closed up an amazing amount of dust still makes its way in.  Another concern is the status of our lungs thanks to all the red dust in the air with all the schools (primary, middle, and aforementioned pre) are along that road… as is most of the village honestly.

By the time I got out there the students had stopped three tanker-trucks heading towards the mines and 3 pick-ups heading to Kedougou.  By the end of everything there were a few more bits of public transport and mine cars caught in the line.  I had seen a group of older students head to the meeting place with the PCR (local government official) so I decided to find somewhere high to get a good view of the street. Right when I got into position is when the Gendarme (police) showed up… with their riot gear.

I’m all about better safe than sorry, and the Gendarmes were definitely peaceful, as were the students, but I was worried their jumping into riot gear might scare the students into making a stupid mistake and throwing one of those stones they had used to build their road blocks.  They didn’t – everyone was very civil.  The students would yell and make noise ever so often, but it all seemed good-natured.  Villagers were let through the line if they needed, I heard one woman offer up an “Allah mu al deema,” “May God help you all.” That’s not in our sarcastic context but an honest wishing that the students be helped.

As I asked around everyone seemed to agree that the dust was an issue and that with this much traffic the road should be paved.  It would change Khossanto a lot – it’s just unclear how the project would be funded.  I’m fairly positive it’s not on the government’s short list of roads to pave.  Although the mines would benefit from the road it’s my opinion that if they were willing to pay for it the work would already be done.  Who knows what’s going to happen though, as the crowd dispersed I asked a friend if it was finished, “It’s not done yet, next Monday.”