Soccer

Here's the scene. It is about two hours before sunset, and the afternoon heat has been replaced by the early evening freshness. The rains have coaxed the grass from the barren earth. The ground now resembles a putting green, and with the coming of the grass begins two yearly rituals in Boustane: farming season, and football season.

The football pitch, a flat piece of land with improvised stick goal posts, is about 500 meters from the village center, just over the ridge, and crucially, out of the sightlines of the marabout (religious leader). The boys of Boustane have gathered together to play a match against a group they refer to vaguely as "the Sereres," who come from a neighboring village further in the bush. However, whenever a football match is played in Boustane, it has to be done without the knowledge of the marabout, who is firmly against it for the stated reason that it causes his religious students and the youngsters in the village to get injured. From personal experience playing and watching matches here, people are often quite reckless when they attempt a tackle and it is a wonder that more people don't break their legs playing football. If the marabout catches his villagers playing football, the kids will be thrashed and the ball will be punctured. Thus, whenever a football match is to be played, it is done very clandestinely, with elaborate planning to ensure that the marabout does not see it.

Kids will wear one of their very few pairs of shorts, and if they are lucky enough to have footwear, will don that too. Most wear sandals that resemble the "Jellies" that The Dude wore throughout the Big Lebowski. They offer terrific traction on the sandy ground.

The boys from Boustane were a bit shorthanded. Every year, during the farming off-season, which lasts between December and June, adolescent males will look for work elsewhere. Given that nearly all of Boustane is illiterate, work options are limited to manual labor. Their search will take them to places as diverse as Dakar, where they might work as coffee vendors, to Richard Toll where they might work with rice or sugar, or to Louga, where they will work in gardening. Unemployment is incredibly high- the lucky few will find work elsewhere. The beginning of the rains herald their return to help their families in the field, and as an added benefit, to represent their village's football team. There were a few stragglers who had not yet returned, but their absence would be sorely felt.

At halftime, Boustane was barely holding on, losing 2-1. They seemed unable to create anything in the opponents half. Whenever Bass Diaw, perhaps their best player playing with his back to the goal and a terrific finisher, would get the ball, he would be muscled off of it by bigger and stronger players from the Sereres team. Perhaps things would be easier if Bass switched positions with his stronger cousin Bara, who had played in midfield in the first half. The second half started.

The beginning of the rains signal the villagers to plant seeds in their fields. The villagers had mostly finished sowing their millet fields, and were in the process of planting their beans. Only when the ground became more damp would they begin to plant their most notable crop, peanuts. Indeed there is a wide swath of land in Senegal known as the Peanut Basin due to the amount of peanut farming that takes place there. However, with global warming and unsustainable agricultural practices (which the Peace Corps among other groups are trying to mitigate), the soil is gradually becoming less fertile and the effects of erosion, aided by the wind or by water, are becoming easily apparent.

The rainy season also heralds the arrival of mosquitos, and a rapid spike in the number of malaria cases. Indeed, most healthcare facilities see the majority of their patients during the next few months. However, with gradually increasing access to and usage of mosquito nets, malaria incidence can be stabilized. Slowly and steadily do we win the race...

Unfortunately for the boys of Boustane, the half-time adjustments did not change the result as the Sereres put the ball in the back of the net three more times. Both Abdoulaye Fall and Abdoulaye Faye, strong players who are very difficult to push off the ball, were still in Dakar working and they were sorely missed. Boustane was swearing to the Sereres that things would be different when the absentees returned. A second match was planned. The muezzin's call to the evening prayer made everyone hustle off the pitch to go perform their ablutions and perform their prayers. Now it was time to rest. Tomorrow, they would return to the fields to help their fathers with the farming.

Be safe.