It will be a waist of keystrokes to continue responding to someone who
chooses not to get it. Since dahinne is a cereal explains why Gassa ,with
all due respect , finds it difficult to think reasonably when the sun rises
in the jungle. Hopefully ,by sunset , reasonable thinking will follow.

Beran

>From: Jungle Sunrise <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Of goats and politics
>Date: Thu, 9 Aug 2001 13:54:24 +0000
>
>Inspired by one of the songs of the Senegambian superstar, Yousou Ndure, I
>would like to share a few tales with you. The reason for wanting to share
>my
>opinion of this particular song with you is because of its relation to many
>an incident that sometimes goes un-noticed while very easy to see. Please
>allow me to explain a few things for people to understand how these
>seemingly unconnected things are actually an integral part of the whole
>story. Let’s start with a few definitions first.
>
>BEIYE (GOAT): small, active horned domestic animal; get one’s goat (sl) -
>irritate or annoy one; play/act the giddy goat - play the fool/behave in a
>foolish and excited way; separate the sheep from the goats – separate the
>good from the bad.
>
>Those familiar with West Africa know that goats play a very significant
>role
>in our lives. They are highly resistant to diseases and reproduce very
>quickly and very rarely give birth to single babies. We often rear them for
>their meat, milk, horns for jujus and hide for our drums.
>
>CHERREH: West African cereal meal usually made from sorghum or corn; very
>nice with goat meat.
>
>DAHINNE: A very thick cereal meal that is also very nice when prepared with
>goat’s meat. There is a Wollof saying that goes like this: “Dahinne Baku
>lenye ko yengalleh”. Meaning you steer Dahinne with a wooden spoon and not
>the conventional spoons, as they will break.
>
>In this particular song, Yousou Ndure advises that let the goats go with
>the
>goats or they may go with the “Cherreh” or the “Dahinne”. For all intents
>and purposes, we all know that the goat is better off being within other
>goats than within the “Cherreh” or “Dahinne”. This reminded me of a joke I
>was told a couple of years ago.
>
>THE JOKE
>A wealthy domineering father, his hardworking wife, his sons of about ten
>and three and their mate lived in a big house. The dad always wanted to
>talk
>about politics to the ten year old kid who would rather not have anything
>to
>do with politics. However, out of respect and fear, he tried to get
>interested in his dad’s drivel about politics. He decided to ask his dad,
>while having dinner one day, what politics was all about. His dad, who was
>very excited by his kid’s interest in politics, explained politics thus:
>
>You see son, I have all the money and everything in this house belongs to
>me. So I am “the capitalist”. Your mother here runs the house and she is
>therefore “the government”. You see the mate there doing all the dirty work
>there? She is “the masses”. And we are all doing this for you, “the people”
>and your brother, “the future”. The boy was very confused but pretended to
>understand. Unfortunately that night, his younger brother did it in bed and
>the whole room was smelly. He went to inform the mum but found her in such
>a
>deep sleep that he could not wake her up and his father was not around. He
>decided to go wake the mate. However, the mate’s door was locked and she
>did
>not answer his knocking even though there were some noises coming from
>within. He decided to peep through the keyhole to see what was the matter.
>To his surprise, he saw his dad and the mate doing it with such passion and
>vigor that they did not even hear him knocking the door. Discouraged, he
>went back to the smelly room and tried as best as he could to clean up his
>younger brother and then went to sleep. The next day he was the last to get
>to the breakfast table were everyone else was already having their
>breakfast. After saying good morning to them, he told his dad that he
>really
>understood politics now. His father was naturally very excited and asked
>him
>to explain what he understood about politics. He told his dad that politics
>is when “the capitalists” SCREW “the masses”, “the government” IGNORES “the
>people” and “the future” is FULL OF SHIT.
>
>Now to those who are yet to get my drift, I will like to share my views of
>Gambian politics and our concept of it. For over thirty years we had a
>government that made absolutely no attempt to free its people from
>ignorance
>but instead built an oligarchy of very corrupt people who were very
>insensitive to the plight of the ordinary people. For more than three
>decades we had a government that did everything that the colonialists did
>to
>subdue and control our people. For more than three decades we had one of
>the
>most corrupt governments that subdued its citizens like slaves, mystified
>the role of our leadership and mesmerized the whole population. They used
>us
>to weep up nationalist sentiments and hypnotized us into believing that
>anything other than the status quo was detrimental to the state and our
>people. We followed them wherever they went and did everything they wanted
>us to do. We were just like zombies. This government consolidated
>everything
>bad that the colonialists did. They created and nurtured various clans that
>co-existed in “peace and harmony” and enjoyed all sorts of rights (both
>human and animal rights). We had a clan that ruled, a clan that produced
>doctors and high ranking officials, a clan that produced lawyers, a clan
>that tilled the soil, a clan that sang praises and the rest who comprised
>the clan of the hopeless.
>
>The clan that tilled the soil did so honestly and with dedication. Some of
>them managed to send some of their kids to school, some of whom became low
>paid policemen, teachers, dispensers, health workers, agricultural workers
>etc., etc. They also produced some very daring individuals who, while they
>could not continue their education due to poverty and lack of opportunity,
>had the brains to understand that something was seriously wrong somewhere.
>Some of these instead of researching how to improve our subsistence farming
>methods or some other worthwhile things figured out how to join what has
>become an oligarchy of privileged people. These soon perfected the art of
>stealing massive sums of money from our poor folks. Some of them, when
>found
>out were promoted or transferred to more secure positions were they can
>plunder our meager resources without the rest of society knowing about it.
>This was done in return for them not revealing to the rest of the destitute
>Gambians how they became rich over night and gained the respect of the
>Mafiosi. This new breed of thieves ganged up together and plundered all the
>aid that came into this country. While their kids enjoyed the best
>education
>available here and abroad, led the most flamboyant of lifestyles, the rest
>of society looked on with utter disbelieve. While we had the honest griots
>telling the stories of our gallant past, the dishonest ones sang the
>praises
>of the Mafiosi. For this, this latter group was rewarded with lots and lots
>of money and other privileges. This was the order of the day until one
>fateful July day a group of young army officers rudely invited themselves
>to
>the party sending most on their way to exile.
>
>To be continued.
>
>Have a good day, Gassa.
>
>
>
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