The Name of the Rose in Tambacounda

I had been warned that it would be unbearably hot by February. But I took it as a promise and less as a threat. And so I enjoyed escaping the wet and cold Nuremberg and landing in Dakar in summer temperatures. We spent the first few days in Thiès, not far from the Senegalese capital, and it was an exhilarating feeling to work where others go on vacation. After meetings with “Technicians without Borders” and planning the expansion of a drip irrigation system, we went to Tambacounda for a project visit.

On the dusty roads riddled with potholes, the approximately 400 km became a day-long journey on which the temperature increased with every kilometer. Already at the first break in Kaolack, we felt the absence of the maritime wind at the western tip of Senegal and were greeted with almost forty degrees inland. The next day we visited the plantations located along the river and had long discussions with the representatives of the cooperative about sales opportunities, processing and conversion to organic cultivation. When the temperatures of over forty degrees took away all my attention, she appeared and I was suddenly wide awake.

She stepped into the middle of our meeting like an apparition. Perhaps in her mid-twenties or thirties, I estimated the mesmerizing figure before me. She moved gracefully and you could feel the powerful life in that body. Her eyes sparkled and her features and lips reflected the lust for life. Even though I didn’t understand a word of Wolof, I hung on her lips and couldn’t take my eyes off that body, modeled as if by an artist, which stood out under the T-shirt and work pants. Just as quickly as she had come, she left our circle and for me this aura of strength, lust for life, creative will and beauty remained in the room for a long time.The others were surprised that I wanted to know everything about this visit, which they saw only as a disruption of the meeting. She was one of the unnamed plantation workers. While we were discussing, she had been working for many hours and since she could not read, she had to get the information about the next steps of the work.

In the past, my colleague said on the long drive back to Dakar, people like this woman were simply “wasting their lives.” After all, hunger and a lack of prospects often forced them to literally wear their skin to the market in the capital. That is why the continuity of the cooperative was so important, which ensured them a livelihood.

On the return flight, my colleague read the story of that one Adson of Melk, who described the people in their opportunities and vices of a medieval world and also told of the encounter with a wasted life: The Name of the Rose. I took this image with me when the plane had long since brought me from the heat of Africa to cool Germany, and I still have it before my eyes.