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10 Pap Khouma You never change. But go on, son. Behave. Do not smoke cigarettes and do not drink.” I want to enjoy my youth and my freedom. I have no regrets . These will come later, if they come at all. Without any sadness, I say goodbye to my brothers. At the station I run into some friends. What luck not to have to travel alone on the first trip of my life. The train speeds toward Bamako, the capital of Mali. It passes Tambacounda, Kayes, Bafoulabé, little cities that seem so poor, immersed in the heat, flies, and sleep. They are little dots on the still and monotonous landscape, under a hot, muggy sky. Bamako is the last stop on the train line. To continue onward to Abidjan you have to take a taxi. But you have to wait and be lucky enough for one to come along first, and then you have to haggle with the driver over the price. The bargaining is exasperating and takes forever. The departure is liberation. In five or six hours you arrive—that is, if the car doesn’t break down, which does happen. The car didn’t break down. I am in Abidjan. I like Abidjan because life in this city never stops. In Senegal there is a big difference between Saturday night and Monday night, the first day of rest and first day of work. Just like in Italy. In Abidjan, they move at the same pace Saturday night and Monday night, and they make the same amount of noise. Life there seems to be one endless motion. In the market the merchants take turns selling even late into the night and early morning so they don’t risk leaving any potential customer unsatisfied. An endless, tireless crowd moves through the neighborhoods of Abidjan, in Treichville where I live, on the big boulevards, where life happens all around the clock. Abidjan wins me over. I run into some cousins who are selling . I begin to sell, too: mostly ivory and old antique objects to the Italian and French tourists. I’m doing pretty well. My family is far away, but I am young, just twenty years old, and any homesickness is quickly forgotten before the happiness of independence. For the first time I don’t have to report to anyone. I forget about ceramics. I would have had to start from scratch, mold, shape, paint, bake, and then sell. I Was an Elephant Salesman 11 Too complicated and expensive. With the ivory I earn fast. Abidjan seduces me. I don’t think about Europe. I want to stay here. I mean, let’s be honest: if you find a place close to home, surrounded by your friends, a place where you make a lot of money, why would you even think of leaving it? With the Italian tourists, selling is even enjoyable and life is lighthearted. I can practice this trade that I’ve learned well from my cousins and friends and even be fairly successful at it. It’s hot and the sea chases me along the beach just like at home far, far away. But when I am—I won’t say at the height of happiness, no, not cloud nine, but at least taking it easy on a very comfortable cloud—well, I start to feel strange. You in Italy call it mal d’Africa. I didn’t know what to call that sweet seductive breeze that caresses me ever so gently. Maybe it’s the voice of the country calling out to me. Who can say? It is a subtle indisposition that comes on slowly , as if I were tired of selling and walking, as if I didn’t like the Italian tourists and their pretty money anymore. It’s an illness that runs through my veins, rushes to my brain, and takes my breath away. I sit down, look at my hands and let time pass. The doctors can’t diagnose my illness. They tell me again and again: “Young man, there is nothing wrong with you.” But the illness is always there, like a low-grade fever that won’t go away. The doctors repeat: “Young man, there is nothing wrong with you.” So I decide to go see the witch doctors, the African medicine men. They diagnose me immediately: I’m cursed. I try everything to rid myself of the curse. I spend a ton of money. I try new grigris charm necklaces...

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