Timelessness

Now under 7 weeks until I leave for Senegal. I am still reading Maskalyk's book, Six Months in Sudan. So much resonates with me. Not because I think I will be experiencing the desert, an isolated post, dying or sick people but because his reflections and the very simplicity of his style trigger memories of my stay with Somali people in a small 'isolated' village, Wajir, Kenya. And because I am thinking ahead to the challenges and pleasures of Kaolack.

In a previous blog post, I mentioned that a memory of mine was the 'simplicity' of living in Wajir, Kenya (and in Mangun, Nigeria). Yesterday while reading, I thought Maskalyk had captured better the essence of what I felt, by his explanation: fewer distractions. For him fewer distractions resulted in a sense of timelessness, of living in the stretched-out present.

most of us in the project have contracts for six months.  some are shorter, none are longer. though mine is only a couple months through, it feels like more. tim and i have decided on slogan for this project: “for those who think life is too short… come to abyei! it feels like it lasts forever!”

I think in some way, we all distract ourselves to avoid the true experience of time because it is uncomfortable…

i think some of the reason the time feels differently here is that there are few distractions. it was something I looked forward to when I read in the job profile: must have “interest to work in remote locations.” there is no morning paper to read while we eat our breakfast, after dinner, there are no concerts to go to , nor walks to go on. we sit quietly, and moments stretch. (pp. 170-171)

This sense of timelessness is what addicts must  crave: a couple of glasses of wine,  a refreshing drink of tequila and orange juice and  only the present exists. Past and future take their distance. I felt this divine sense of now sitting evenings cross-legged on a woven mat soft on the sand in Wajir where I  spent timeless evenings with Nick and Ian, two British VSO volunteers.  Quietness.  For two years we played UNO, and ate our suppers of camel goat, rice and onions under starlit cloudless skies. There was no morning paper that I remember, no shopping, only our short wave radios tuned to the BBC news.

I long sometimes for that sense of timelessness, of presence in the moment.

Here in Canada, I am constantly asked to consider RSP’s, pension plans, future employment advancements, new styles of clothing.  Propelled into the future. In some crazy way it seems appropriate to stress about work.  I often spend my now in the future, thinking about tomorrow’s lessons, problems at school, how to stay competitive.

I realize that Kaolack is a large city of more than 172, 305 people. It is situated at a busy port on the Saloum River. It has an important peanut processing industry, and I am convinced that Internet cafes and cell phones, and newspapers will be in plenitude. …though I do not remember seeing any newspaper in Dakar during my stay there with Ndoumbe Ndiaye 5 years ago.  But when I see the photos of Kolack, I see dusty or sandy streets, small kiosks, and I think there will be, for me, fewer distractions than here.

I remember how I felt when I lay my head down under my mosquito net in a tiny hostel with in indoor open to the night courtyard bar in Dakar five years ago in June.  I was overwhelmed with joy at being ‘home’. 

The effect of my three weeks in Dakar have stayed with me. Sometimes when I  tell someone of this mountain top experience, they ask me how long I was in Senegal.  When I answer that I lived there 3 weeks, I see in the person’s eyes a dismissal of my experience.  They have not understood that time measured in hours and minutes and weeks was irrelevant.