True Ease in Writing comes from Art, not Chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance. - Alexander Pope

Law

The Reunion (or “Three Girls Around a Table”) [FICTION]

 

- Hey bro baalal ma nak - awe ma...
- Kee kan la nii? 
- Daf maa nyaan di - hamute neh maa ko gaynaa broke... hey dimbaleh ma bro - hanaa nga ute nyowe nyu borka..
- Hahaha - woye! 
- Turnal rek - bull am eye contact ak morm...
- Narr baang kore daaha...
- Hayy yowe lii russ lu na deh - haa ma seht ndah am naa dara...
- Waaneh dot com. yowe dinga ever change?
- Nee la mel deh - hanaa danga faateh timey school - sarahtu kat bunj rormba..
- Jang ha bi joh ko haalis! Wah nga dayga! Nyorm Matarr One Eye..
- Heeeei! Ana koe ku?
- Deyorn na di!
- Hai! Kanj!
- Like three years ago - dama call kerr suma yaaye di ma ko wah..

"To The Gambia Ever True"

Another winter, another trip to Gambia. I left in December, planning to take a month before school re-opens - just enough time to renew my love affair with the country, but not enough time to do anything about it. The countours of the trip are familiar now - the welcome home, the standard questions from people you meet on the street ("When did you come?", "How is it over there?", "When are you going back?"). It was the same everywhere I went. People looked at me like I was crazy when I announced that I didn't want to go back, that I in fact wanted to stay in Gambia and not leave again. Either that or like I was punking them, toying with them at their own expense. And then at the end leaving again, the looks of barely concealed envy in their eyes as they watch you get into the car headed for the airport.

Nov 09, 2012

Day Six: A Stranger

Posted by Linguere | Tags: Linguere, Non-fiction, Gambia, Business, Law | 0 Comments

 

Mon ami,

My readers would wonder why I chose to call you my friend when you’re supposed to be a stranger to me. They might not understand, but I bet you are smiling at the term, for we both know what it means and why it was my ‘endearment’ of choice.

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Yellow Blue Nonsense - "Proudly Gambian??"

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I’ve taken a week and a day since the incident to write this piece because I did not want it to be a “red, black nonsense” like my brother Latirr Carr would have. I wanted to make sure my “anger” was toned down from “red” to “yellow and the “black” to “blue” . I hope I’ve toned it down from an angry piece to an appeal to those concerned so effective changes can be made.

Apr 13, 2012

Red Black Nonsense - Yal na sutura yaaga

A week ago I spoke of the power of silence and the obvious necessity to claim “dumbness” when one is forced to speak out of turn. Unfortunately, my words fell on deaf ears, for barely a week later, the progress this country has made over the years in the emancipation of our women from the slavery of ignorance was deleted when a certain “Religious leader” decided it was time to attack the success stories we have found in our women. How the Standard newspaper has found a “prophet” in him is at best shocking. His words were filled with much folly and as I read through them, I was overtaken with grief instead of anger, for I had come to realize that education is certainly not for everyone. Now my words may seem naïve but they come long hours after I have forced myself to accept that some people are more equal than others.

Jul 29, 2011

Election Season 2011

 

It is election season again in Gambia. Once more the papers are filled with campaign accusations and counter-accusations, defections and threats and warnings, and endless promises. Camps are created, enemies branded, and bitter words exchanged.  For a while we will not be able to hear over the din, and then it will pass. 
 
The question in the air, the most important, on which everything depends: Are we better off now than we were before, or has our condition as a country worsened? Many things have changed, this is beyond dispute. Yet "nothing has happened", some people will have  you believe. All the supposed changes are merely fantasies. We are much worse off, the country has gone to the dogs. Or they will maintain use of the "previous regime" excuse. Yes, they will concede, there have been changes, but most of them are projects started in the previous regime, only completed by this one.

Shedding Colors

It took me this long to get back in the feeling of writing since the beginning of the year. Each coming week, I get agitated with myself for pulling out my laptop to write about the many issues that come to mind: the pretty inspiring young mechanic lady I came across at Bokal Automotive in her overalls, the shaky state of world affairs etc; yet I just couldn’t do so.

But today is a different day; today, I was told what I believe has been one of the most beautiful stories I’ve heard, by one of my favorite cousins, E.  The protagonist, a supposed ‘mad man’ living in her neighborhood whose actions will forever remain with me.

As the story goes, E wanted to give food to the watchman next door but her son said to her, ‘Mommy, we are always giving food to this man but his employer often gives him food too and by the way, he is asleep.

Feb 09, 2011

Black Red Nonsense - 1

When the world looks at Africa, what do they see? They see a dense forest of lions and elephants with people living on trees. But these are the enlightened ones for those who are yet to be enlightened see a continent of wasted resources, corruption, crime, wars and nothing. I did not frown at the vision of the world cup in Africa with the advertisement campaigns of Messi and crew getting lost in our “wilderness”. It did not baffle me and neither did it surprise me. This was the Africa that was better than the other. The only other option they had was to show a traffic policeman taking a bribe, or an AIDS infected region or better still they could have an advertisement featuring my favorite Togetherness Tshabalala the demon taxi driver racing across and in between the cars of Johannesburg.

Africa is not such a bad place. We look at a situation that seems beyond relief but I see a little more than that when I look at the Mama Land.