Ila Touba!

Ila Touba! Goodbye in Touba! The greeting of hundreds of thousands of people who make their way every year to the Grand Magal, the Great Pilgrimage to the Holy City of Touba in Senegal. They travel in overcrowded buses, on mopeds, horse carts, in shared taxis. The whole country is engulfed in traffic chaos. In December 2013, I am also on my way. From Dakar with a tourist guide and 3 of his friends. In a “7 place” taxi.

Touba, the capital of the Mourids. A Sufi movement that has millions of followers and great political influence in Senegal. It was founded by Cheikh Amadou Bamba, whose image is omnipresent in Senegal: head and mouth covered by a white scarf, wrinkles on the forehead, piercing gaze. His portrait adorns walls, hangs on the rear-view mirror as a good luck charm. Yet we are stuck in a traffic jam.

The smell of coffee. The guide squeezes black liquid from a flowered plastic thermos into brown espresso cups. “Café Touba,” he says, smiling. “Jerejeff. Thank you,” I say. Taste carefully. Heavily sweetened. With a hot, peppery finish. “Café Touba is livening up,” says the driver. “Bamba louki,” everyone sings. I feel like I once did on a catholic youth group trip. Only more carefree. As I join in the happy melody, I earn benevolent glances from my fellow passengers. They are Baye Fall, followers of Lamp Fall, Bamba’s most important adept. They are still sitting in the car in jeans and T-shirts. Later, they will slip into colourful patchwork robes like Lamp Fall wore. “As a sign that we are all different, but part of one big whole,” I am told.

We drive again. Savannah, fields, huts, baobab trees, mosques, donkey carts, wrecks of crashed cars, buses, dust. At crossroads women offering mangoes, water in small plastic bags, peanuts. The radio plays zikr, spiritual chants. I am tired. My boubou sticks to my skin. We are 4 ½ hours on the road when we reach Darou Moukhti. We spend the night there.

We spend the main festival day in Mbacke, a village 20 km before Touba. We doze under a baobab and eat, all from one bowl. Lamb, rice, cereal porridge. Drink sweet mint tea. In the evening I lie in my sleeping bag. Feel: the cool sandy ground, the air vibrating. Drums. A murmur over Touba and all the surrounding villages. They celebrate Bamba’s return from exile – more than 100 years ago.

“We go to Touba!” they say the next evening. By shared taxi and horse-drawn cart. The mosque is brightly lit, magnificent to behold. “First to the tombs,” says the guide. In front of Lamp Fall’s sarcophagus, Baye Fall sing loudly “La ilaha illa Allah”. Although not a Muslim, I am allowed in, wearing a headscarf. I am asked to take photos. The Holy Spring, the queue of women praying for fertility. Joy, happiness, coupled with spirituality, I take with me in my heart. I will come again.