DAKAR, Senegal — When I arrived at my host family’s house for the first time, it was around one o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. After the standard greetings and a quick tour, I was shown to my room and told lunch would be ready in a few hours. Then everyone disappeared and the house went quiet.
Perhaps an early siesta, I thought. Looking for something to do, I watched an entire Premier League match with an older host brother; the game came and went, still no one to be found—not even the tireless Abdoulaye.
At school the next morning, I explained my situation in great distress. Did my host family hate me? How could they already hate me? The worry faded quickly into confusion as classmate after classmate explained their encounter with a similar phenomenon. Did all our host families hate us?
Fortunately not. To paraphrase the forty-second president of the United States: It’s Sunday, stupid. The French expression for sleeping in, “faire la grasse matinée”, literally translates to “do the fat morning”. At least in Senegal, alarms are not set, blinds are left closed, and wake-up times regularly stretch into the early afternoon. I adapted my weekend accordingly and could soon sleep until two o’clock like a professional.
Needless to say, any ambition to attend Sunday mass quickly fell by the wayside. A few classmates and I went to Dakar’s central parish one time. It was a sweaty, confusing experience compounded by our lack of local knowledge (not bringing a fan) and linguistic struggles. We were not eager to head back and leaned hard into Sunday-ing the Senegalese way, which often included another nap at the beach.
One Saturday a couple weeks ago, however, my host grandmother let me know that I would be headed to the église the next morning. We have talked at length in the past about (1) religion and (2) politics—the opposite of dinner table conversation in the United States—so she knows I grew up going to church.
She had taken the liberty of arranging a family friend to bring me to Saint Pierre des Baobabs, the closest Catholic parish. I texted our study abroad WhatsApp group to find any willing partners, and sure enough a few of my classmates agreed to join. Part of me doubted that the family friend would actually come pick me up for church. Sunday culture, you know. I hadn’t met any early risers.
Sure enough, a knock at the door came around nine o’clock and I was off on a journey through Dakar’s sandy streets to the church. As we walked, I got to know Jan, Abdoulaye’s former nanny whom he absolutely adores. She told me that when he was a baby, he couldn’t go thirty seconds without seeing her before bursting into tears. Years later, the second she walks in the door he is attached to her at the hip.
After jumping on the car rapide, or a neighborhood hopper bus that costs about thirty cents per ticket, we arrived at the church and sat, naturally, in the front row. A light breeze wafted through the open-air parish, and women in brightly colored fabric dresses fanned themselves as kids fidgeted in their seats. Hymns reverberated from the choir and, for the first time, I understood the priest as he read. The service ended after about an hour and a half, and we strolled back to Sacré Cœur to find my entire host family still in bed.
🇸🇳 Read more from Senegal.