Food barriers

Something very particular to Sénégal is the way people eat.

Traditionally, food is placed on a large plate on the ground and eaten with the right hand. (The left hand is considered dirty - used for wiping in the bathroom - so you wouldn't eat with it.)

While many families in Dakar have modernized and now use forks or eat from separate dishes, many have not. Others, like mine, are a bit half and half.

In my family, 5 of the 7 people use their hands. Only the two older boys (19 and 25) prefer forks.

We all eat around the common plate on the ground, elevated a bit because we sit on short stools in a circle around the food. Everyone's eyes are directed towards the food in the center, and you have to bend over a bit to get a bite.

It's a bit meditative: we eat mostly in silence (or so it seems, since I don't understand Wolof yet). Between bites our greasy hands or forks hang limply over the plate.

When I first arrived they offered me the fork. I took this as a sign of respect- their way of recognizing that I am from a different culture and may well be disgusted by eating with my hand. Then, yesterday, my mother gave me the choice:

"Did you want a fork?"
"No," I responded, "I can use my hand."

A very interesting dynamic comes up when you are eating in this manner: sharing.
Although it is easy to understand that you should eat the food in front of you and not reach across the plate to steal food from another's section of the shared plate, what happens if you wants more chicken and there isn't any near you?

This is when it becomes your family's job to make sure you are eating well. My brothers and sisters will often break some chicken into bite sized pieces with their fingers and then drop off a piece or two into my section, sort of a silent way to say:
"Here, I found a nice tender piece. It's for you."
As you begin to finish the dish, you start to see lines of food build up between you and your neighbor: the parts that you don't dare touch because you don't want to be in their sections and they don't touch for the same reason.

Last night, I noticed these lines of food on both the left and right sections of my area. In contrast, I noticed that those lines did not exist between the sections of other members of the family.

It was like food barriers: separating me and them.

So, looking at the situation perhaps a bit symbolically, I grabbed some bread and soaked up a mess of onion sauce. Then, I ate the food barriers between us.