Clothing: You Can't Judge a Book by It's Cover but Sometimes the Cover is Story Enough

Here is a picture of Mariama. She is a friend of mine that I work with in Samba's Garden.

Mariama is one of my favorite people in the garden. She is very patient with my elementary level of pulaar. She always laughs and greets me every day.

[In my first draft of this post, I was just going to post some pictures about people in the garden that I work with. When I looked at the picture I took of Mariama I noticed just how much of a story there is in everything that she is wearing. I thought this would be a much better post.]

Looking at Mariama's clothing at first you wouldn't think much- but there is much to say about it.

Starting with her head covering it is one of the obvious signs that Mariama is a married woman. In the Pulaar ethnic group as well as the Diola, the Wolof and the Serer, married women cover their heads anytime they go in public to let the sai-sais / kalabantes AKA pickupartists to leave them alone. This is something that some Peace Corps Volunteer women have done in this region to varying degrees of success.

You may have noticed she is wearing a Tommy Hilfiger shirt. Ever wonder where the clothes you donate to charity go? If they aren't sold to people in the US, they are compressed into tiny little blocks and sent to lesser developed countries like those in West Africa.  As a result there is a booming second hand clothing market in Senegal- which I am a beneficiary as witnessed by most of the clothing I am wearing now.

Unfortunately the flood of cheap clothing or "dumping" of these goods severely curtails West Africa's domestic clothing market. Why buy local clothing if you can buy other clothing for a lot less?

If you look at her arm around the tricep you'll notice a little bracelet/string- it is know as a gree-gree. It is essentially a charm/amulet imbued with specific magic. Some examples are for good health, to never run out of money, to protect from injury or to ward off snakes. I have one that is supposed to protect me from being cut by sharp objects- unfortunately it doesn't protect me from sharp wit. Typically these gree-grees are little pieces of paper with Koranic writing that are sewn into little leather poaches.

Look at here necklace and bracelets. These are very typical pulaar jewelery. I'll write more about this in a future post.

Finally look at her shoes or more specifically her sandals. You might be able to find the same models in any dollar store in the US or perhaps in a Walmart or Target. Yes you might have guessed it... they were made in China. Senegal seems to import a lot of products that you might find in a big discount store. Why? Because they are soo inexpensive.