Behind the Tats: Fula Scars

I don't realy know what we were thinking; fresh wounds when the Harmattan winds were blowing down off the Sahara - rendering everything and everyone a red and dusty blur. I don't know that the rainy season would have been better - nothing heals because of the perpetual dampness that settles over the entire region. Wounds just fester until even the tinest knick gets infected. So it's a toss up between which season is more favorable and the season in which you are in always seems the most unforgiving.

Despite this, the five of us converged on Wassu, CRD almost exactly six months to the day that we arrived in country. Our hair-brained scheme seemed simple enough - go to Wassu, track down the woman who will cut our skin open with a bitik (corner shop) razor blades and then shove peanut ash in the fresh wound, bond over shared experiences then continue traveling up country to visit Basse. Simple right? Well, like everything in this country, the process turned out to be a little less bullet proof then we had envisioned - especially since we had no idea what the woman's name was, where her compound was or really how to communicate effectively despite having all three languages represented in our little band of explorers.

Eventually we figured out where the probable location was and managed to get a small-girl to show us the way to the compound. When we arrived we were greeted by two old men who were very excited to see PCV's as they no longer have one in Wassu. The men were extremely helpful and the compound we were looking for was right across the path from theirs. One of the men sent a child into the fields to fetch the woman and later helped us translate as most of the words for requesting scars was out of our vocab range. While we waited for the woman to return from the fields, we sat under the mango tree and nervously chatted while about 30 children stood around staring at us. As we waited, I started to grow more and more nervous about the upcoming scarification and my stomach had begun to swirl thinking about the whole endeavour. I convinced the guys that I should go first so I wouldn't have to watch anyone else been sliced and diced figuring this would make the pain easier.

Shortly, Fatou Cessay, our scarer to be, arrived back at the compound and began to make preperations for the process. It was a little awkward at first, none of us really knowing how to behave in the situation. Eventually Fatou told us to come into her house so we piled into the back of the mud hut and I sat next to her on the straw mattress. We negotiated price and then she said "Let's get started", but in Pulaar, and all of the sudden I found myself sitting in front of her with my shirt off with lines drawn on my back. Brian sat in front of me be my hand squeezer - fufilling our pact during our first week in country to get tattoos together. Since I was going first I tried really hard to be tough [also because I was the only girl and wanted to show the boys up :)] and not scream or make any noises associated with ripping skin and pain. By the third (out of four) cuts I gave up and let out some whimpers because the flimsy blade was starting to become dull and the cutting started to feel more like ripping. Some older PCV's warned me that the pain is pretty bad but I tried to just brush it off. Turns out they were right, it was pretty painful and I was no where near prepared for what it feels like to have your sliced open by flimsy razor's bought for less then a penny at a corner bitik. Just when I was bracing myself for more cuts, the guys announced that I was done. I was overcome with relief then all the sudden, I felt a rough, dirty old rag being drug across my fresh wounds to sop up the blood. Nice. The dirty rag probably rendered the sterilizing of the razors and the latex gloves pretty useless. It turns out that this is only appropriate in this country cause just when you think you've got things figured out and planned for, you are proven wrong and naive for imagining you could actually control your surrondings. After the rag was drug across my back, Fatou emptied some ash from peanut shells that was stored in a hallowed out bull horn (it's true, you can't make stuff like this up) and packed my cuts with the ash, instructing me not to bathe for three days or the ash would wash away. Jim bandaged my back with gauze and tape and I settled down to watch the rest of the guys get their scars.

The whole process was surreal and Fatou was very speedy, scarring five of us in under an hour. Brian and Jim won the prize of more hardcore because Brian has six curved lines on his chest and Jim has three huge gashes across his rib cage that makes it look like a tiger attacked him. After everyone was scarred, and in a fair amount of discomfort, we thanked Fatou profously for sharing her cultural tradition with a bunch of crazy toubabs and each paid her 100D for her trouble (about $2.75) and set off back to the carpark to continue our journey upcountry. Turns out the carparks, bumpy gele-gele rides and waiting for three hours are even less fun when you are in pain and bleeding, but we all survived and lived to tell the tale.

A little background: The scarring is a traditional practice mostly attributed to the Fula (or Pulaar) tribe, a once nomadic tribe of cattle herders who can be found throughout West Africa. Other tribes, such as the Jola and some Sereers (the tribe I live with), do the scarring as well but sometime placement and meaning differ among different groups. The reason for getting the scarring done is sometimes for beautification but it also has traditional medicinal purposes and is related to traditional animist beliefs. It's hard to get a detailed history from people as they either aren't sure or aren't willing to talk about the in-depth traditional aspects with an outsider. One woman I know got three small scars on her chest because she had insomnia and she swears as son as she has it done her sleeping problems went away. Who knows, the power of belief right? I think that if it is done for medicinal purposes their is more ceremony and ritualistic stuff then what we had. Most Fulas that I have seen have the scars on their face, next to their eyes or mouths and a lot of the Sereers in my village have them on their chest of backs.

So all said and done, it was a great/crazy experience. The scars are all healed and look pretty badass and plus I will literally have a little bit of Gambia in me for the rest of my life to help remember this whole adventure. Check out the Flickr accounts for pics!