Rosalie’s Wedding

February 21-22, 2004

Felix, my administrative assistant, is the oldest of ten children, most girls. His father died several years ago, leaving him as the head of the family. He is thirty seven, but looks quite boyish. His first sister is married and living in Jersey City. His second sister was married on Saturday, and I was invited to the wedding with my colleague, Anne. The family is Catholic. A couple of weeks ago he handed me a formal invitation. I graciously accepted and for the past couple of weeks have been asking how the arrangements were going and offered him a few days off to prepare for the wedding. He thanked me and said he was going to take some time off. Yet each day he still arrived at work. On Friday I asked why he wasn’t home. He said the house was too full of all the relatives, arriving from the villages, and he would rather work.

Upon inquiring about what his sister would like for a gift, he said he would ask. The next day he arrived with a small piece of paper, the “liste de marriage”, the gift registry. It named the one large housewares store in Dakar, Orca. Gratefully Anne offered to go shopping and get a gift from us both. Manga drove her to the shop. In the shop, as she describes it, she was escorted to a corner where all of Rosalie’s gift selections were out on display. She chose a very nice espresso maker, quite expensive. The store clerk filled out a very nice gift card from us, gift wrapped the wedding gift, and off it went on the back of a motor scooter to be delivered that instant. How easy!

The wedding ceremony was on Saturday at 4 PM at l’Eglise Saint-Pierre de Boababs, not far from my residence. I had planned to take the kat kat (4 x 4) and drive us there. When Manga, our driver, heard that, he said, no, and insisted on driving us. He picked us up at 3:30 and took us to the church. I wore my brown suit. I have trouble guessing what proper attire is here. I wore my suit to the funeral last week, and was the only one there with a suit and tie. But this time I guessed right.

The church is absolutely beautiful. It is build so that all the walls slide open, leaving it breezy and cool inside, in spite of the heat outside. It is sparsely decorated, but there well all the usual trappings of a Catholic church, organ, pews, altar with Jesus on the cross, etc. We arrived as the wedding party was getting there. Rosalie, her mother, and Felix got out of a silver Jaguar adorned with flowers and streamers. Other cars carried the brides maids and grooms men. The bridesmaids wore lavender gowns and the guys had dark pants, lavender shirts, and ties. There were also three little girls in their party dresses, serving as the flower girls, I guess.

A French priest and two African altar boys came out to the entrance to the church, where everyone had gathered. And then the wedding party proceeded down the aisle, exactly as an American wedding would be. We all made our way to the pews. I chose one directly behind the choir. The music during the service was beautiful. A choir director conducted a choir of about 15 singers in four part harmony, accompanied by an organist and three djembe (drums) players.

The service took about an hour. Since it was in French, I didn’t follow everything, but it did include the bride and the groom each coming up and reading something, the priest saying something warm and humorous about the couple, and ended with communion. The only distraction was the videographer and the two photographers who kept blocking the view.

When the service ended, everyone streamed out of the church and a celebration began. The drummers carried their drums out into the sun and started playing enthusiastically while all the women started dancing in Senegalese style. It was very celebratory and African and in contrast to the service that had just taken place inside. Yet another in the amazing contrasts one encounters daily here. Manga picked us up and drove us home to rest until the evening reception.

A little before eight we were driven to a reception hall downtown. I had no idea what to expect, although I had the sense that it would be a pretty western-type of affair. We were greeted at the entrance by a hostess who looked up our names on a list and escorted us to table number 12. There was a DJ and gigantic speakers blaring disco music very, very loudly. It was impossible to talk. Shortly the rest of the folks at our table arrived. Two other couples, one a very sophisticated Senegalese woman with a child and a very handsome Frenchman. The child was one of the flowergirls and obviously the Frenchman was not her father. Then the last couple at our table arrived - Marcel and one of his girlfriends. Marcel is short, fat, and about 53 years old. He is married and has at least two mistresses, or so I have been told. He immediately spoke to a waitress who brought him a bottle of whiskey. He paid very little attention to his girlfriend or their daughter, one of the other flowergirls. I did ask Marcel why he hadn’t attending the wedding service. He laughed and said he had been to the church many times before. How warm.

The DJ introduced the bride and groom, who made a grand entrance. Then everyone lined up to greet them. Behind me was the littlest of flowergirls in her mother’s arms. I naturally reached out to hold her and she quickly accepted. So I spent the next half hour or so hanging out with her. We all shook hands with the wedding couple and gave our felicitations and returned to our seats. Then came very lengthy speeches by Felix, an uncle, and the father of the groom. I think found out that this was a “mixed marriage”, since the groom is not Senegalese. He is from Benin, another West African country. Champagne was poured and a toast was made. The Frenchman downed his champagne immediately, obviously not familiar with the toasting custom, which I assume is universal.

Dinner was served shortly after all the speeches and toasts. It consisted of lamb and potatoes. The Senegalese tend to eat mutton and goat, lamb being more expensive and a delicacy. The meat was butchered Senegalese style, which means it is just hacked off the animal, bone and all, then grilled. I generally don’t eat meat, but I tried it. My piece happened to be very fatty and grissly. I looked over to see Marcel say something to the waitress, who brought him a special piece, deboned and without a lot of grissle. The privileges of the aristocrat!

By the time the main course was finished, it was past 11 PM, well beyond my usual bed time. And although the music had been muted a bit during the main course, it started blaring again. It was so loud, it was almost painful to my old ears. We couldn’t talk to anyone, were interested in dancing in the hot room, so we agreed to make our departure. We found Felix, thanked him for the invitation, praised him for such a wonderful day, and agreed to stop by his house the next day. He said it was going to be non-stop people all day, with food, dancing, and the usual. A cell phone call brought Manga within a few minutes and we off for the night.

The next day I had some errands to run. I had to go to Badji, my tailor, for a fitting for my new suit. That is a story on its own! Then at around 3 PM, Dramane and I stopped by Felix’s mother’s house to check out the scene. And what a scene it was. From pretty far away, we could hear the music. There was a canapy erected outside the residence. Under the tent were the women, in African dress, eating from huge platters of Jaboo-Jen (rice with fish and vegetables) African style (from on common plate scooped up with the right hand). Drummers were playing and women of all ages and sizes were jumping up spontaneously to dance. It was really cool! Many of the women had their babies strapped against their backs, hanging their with little concern by mother or baby.

And the men. The men sat in small circles under trees, talking and drinking beer and hard liquor. Felix and Manga were both there, making occasional runs to replenish the liquor. I sat with a group of guys, some of whom were Suffolk employees, taking in the scene. My choice was Coca Cola, which I drank in the afternoon heat. I sat with the guys for a couple of hours, all the while people coming and going, dancing and eating and drinking going on all day, more plates of food appearing from the neighbors. It was quite a raucous event, very different from the reverence of the church service or the Western-type reception of yesterday. This was an African wedding celebration.

So, I left around 6 PM, after thanking all my hosts and saying goodbye to the guests I knew. The bride and groom, by the way, never appeared. They were at their apartment, doing what newlyweds generally do, I guess. With all the celebration going on, nobody really needed them, I guess.

The next morning, I was told by Manga that he stayed there until the wee hours of the morning, and the party was expected to continue into Monday too. When the relatives come from the villages to the city, they stay and stay! And Felix took Monday off, not to be with the relatives and guests, but to sleep off the day before.

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