I Was an Elephant Salesman: Adventures between Dakar, Paris, and Milan

Lacoste

110 Pap Khouma I would send for him. He’s eager to have his own experience here. I am happy to encourage him to come because it would be nice to have a relative close by. Unfortunately after two months of selling I still haven’t been able to put aside the money for a plane ticket. I have to try to get a loan. We illegal immigrants don’t have banks. In these cases we turn to homemade banks that we organize among ourselves. No Senegalese keeps the money he earns on him for fear of losing it or of being robbed. He gives it to the head of the apartment, the oldest and most respected guy in the apartment. He’s the one who keeps all the money. When everyone leaves, the head guy, the teller, has the job of hiding it in the safest place. He at least makes sure that it’s safe. All our lovely savings can easily disappear. It only takes one person to come home before the others, to start rummaging around and then have a little luck: the money pops up and the friend takes off with the stash. You can’t report him, you can’t do anything. But the thief will never be welcome at anyone’s place again. Sometimes these friends are even cops or the carabinieri. It might even happen that at the beginning of a police search, there’s a million lire well hidden and at the end it’s half that. It’s never happened to me. They’ve told me stories about it and I have good reason to believe it’s true. Our teller, Bobo, doesn’t turn down my request for a loan. My little brother Samba can come. I go to get him in Rome. I hug him and bring him to Riccione. He repeats the same journey I made two years ago, except he has the luxury of being able to explore the city and ask questions because he has someone showing him the ropes, someone to take him around and give him advice. The season is almost over on the Adriatic. The tourists and the Senegalese are leaving . We will follow them. With the furniture convention in town in mid-September, Milan is overcrowded, and so are the hotels. There aren’t any rooms, none at all. I make do sleeping in our friends’ car. But how can I make my brother who’s here fresh from Senegal do the same? I send him back to Rimini as a guest of another friend. In the meantime I will I Was an Elephant Salesman 111 figure out a solution. I meet my old friend Madicke. The two of us are looking for a house. One as desperate as the other. One evening near the metro station at Sesto Marelli we ask an Italian guy for some information. There are now three of us looking for a hotel, and with no results. In the end, the Italian, whose name is Walter, invites us home saying, “Come stay at my place.” He calls his wife and then tells us the good news. We find ourselves with these people who want to know everything about our lives. After spending too many nights in the car, Madicke and I can’t keep our eyes open. And our sense of prudence takes over. Never tell anyone who you are, where you are going, what you are doing. I make up the story of a father from the Ivory Coast and a mother from Senegal, and a job between France and Abidjan: “We’re just passing through Milan. We came to buy some merchandise and then we’re going to sell it in our country back home.” I’m sorry to trick Walter, who is nice and hospitable. But those are the rules. We are still illegal, still living in the shadows . We can never open up completely because the good old deportation papers are always just around the corner. Walter invites us the next night as well, but we don’t show up. We’re too scared and maybe too cautious. A hotel, though, is nowhere to be found. We have no other option for the night but our friends’ car. When even that’s not available, our last resource is the Central Station. Those were some horrendous nights, those nights spent at the station. The marble benches are hard and the guests of the station...