Episode one: The Preparation
A journey ill-prepared, yields ill-satisfaction; this was the golden rule from the organizing members under the leadership of the ferocious chairpersons. Pa Nderry, the Deputy Chairperson of the NWT, knelt on the neck of every organizing member and beat the laziness out of you. He kept repeating that we either got the job well done or he was done with this, and of course everyone answered to the first option. Aji Mai made sure that things were in order and in an unavoidable situation of lateness. She had constantly rained blames on her driver and in her most tiny Wollof voice, she will lament, “Pa Nderry mann suma driver bi motah ma late” and Pa Nderry would respond with a choice-less voice by saying “That’s fine,Aji Mai.” Immediately after the call ends, he would be hissing out of frustration.
In moments of ecstasy, the aspirations of organizing a spectacular tour were blurred, beclouded and galvanized with massive financial frustration and donor-fatigue epistolary. A courtesy call on stakeholders was the order of the day. Baka was fond of adding “yoko” to every meeting with stakeholders. This lady would bulkily load every dignitary with series of follow-up questions. Siman would drown his “Scooter” in a sea of tiredness and dilapidation. This man with his unending tuck-ins would griot every stakeholder to an extent that we all thought that we were born on a dry mat of poverty.
How about the strategic plans of communication? A plan and a contingency plan were always tailored to attack any stakeholder with the aim of extracting funds for this tour. Sometimes Aji, Siman or Mentor would miss the track and Pa Nderry would instantaneously be rolling his eyes in desperation like a dangling bulb just to flash you a warning in order to redirect you to go by the already placed plan. He was always concerned about the situational words that might perishably bombard our hopes with avoidable utterances. At the end of the day, these gestures yielded us the outcome of the most successful Nationwide Tour.
I can’t forget about the departure on the D-day. Those heavy suitcases can turn a man into a monk.* I can remember…*
Read more about that tragedy in the next episode….