The same week we went to Guinea Bissau, we also went to the Casamance region of Senegal. Casamance is in the far southern part of the country, between the Gambia and Guinea Bissau. It is, without a doubt, my favorite part of Senegal. It is by far the greenest region, and the people are more relaxed, less uptight, and more genuine than the people in Dakar (sorry if I have offended any Dakarois — this is just a generalization). You have the feeling in the Casamance that people are without ulterior motives, that they genuinely want to be friendly to you.

I love the above picture. I took it one day when we visited one of Abraham’s medium enterprise subjects, a place where cut trees are processed, near Ziguinchor. The day we were there, they were cutting up wood for match sticks. The man on the right was Abraham’s Ziguinchor contact, and the two on the left worked at the plant.

We spent several days in the Ziguinchor area, where Abraham hit the jackpot and interviewed nine businesses. The rest of the time, we just walked around the city which, in spite of its small size, is the most important one in the Casamance. We saw these boys playing table hockey — something you see all over Senegal — and they gladly posed for our picture.

We liked this juxtaposition of a donkey in front of a mural/advertisement. Unlike the rest of Senegal, there are donkeys instead of horses in Casamance. This is because of the presence of tsetse flies in southern Senegal, which are attracted to large moving things (i.e. horses, buses) as well as the color dark blue. Tsetse flies cause trypanosomiasis, also known as sleeping sickness, and is a serious health problem in rural parts of West Africa, although less so in Casamance than in areas of West Africa further south and east.

A more serious problem the Casamance has faced has been an armed conflict between local rebels and the Senegalese government. The people of the Casamance are traditionally very independent, and some in the past have wanted to be independent of “Dakar.” Many people died in sporadic violence during the 20 years up until 2004, but fortunately a peace accord was signed that year and the region is now calm. There is still a large Senegalese military presence, however. The biggest problem now is the presence of landmines in some isolated rural areas (we stuck to known routes that are landmine free) which have caused many deaths and serious injuries.

Above is a peaceful protest that passed near our hotel. It had nothing to do with with the conflict.

This was taken inside the Alliance Franco-Senegalaise. The building is shaped like an impluvium, a traditional Casamance building. It is doughnut shaped, with an opening in the middle where water (and beautiful light!) could enter. Impluviums were often used for shelter during times of war.

Our hotel in Ziguinchor, Le Flamboyant. It felt very luxurious to us, and is one of the great bargains in Senegal.