Toura Ran Houta (or) the Dougou of Baltimore

~ Dinde Sare, the peulh griot, opens the stage ~

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_Gbam! Kpon Kpon! Itchiik! (Tam Tam)_

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• Dinde: Salam Aleikum!?
• Audience: Ené iodi! (It’s pretty, it’s beautiful)
• Dinde: Salam Aleikum!
• Audience: Ebé diam! (All is well)
• Dinde: Salam Aleikum!
• Audience: Fadam, fadam! (Wait for me, wait for me)
• Dinde: Salam Aleikum!
• Audience: Bissimilah! (You’re most welcome)?

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_Gbam! Kpon Kpon! Itchiik! (Tam Tam)_?

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~ Dinde, having sipped some british tea few minutes earlier, suddenly turns into a Sahelian Shakespeare ~

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• Fa! Like the West African medium of communication with the Gods and Ancestors
• Fatu! Sublimal name worn only by African pearls
• Ma! You incarnate the Maat's 7 principles and 42 ideals
• Mata-Mata! Fighting for justice as one would hope Malay police officers would?

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~ Dinde Sare, the fulani griot, jumps like a wodaabe and stops! Then says the following in an intense voice, full of life and honor ~?

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_Gbam! Kpon Kpon! Itchiik! (Tam Tam)_

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Fa!Tu!Ma!Ta!

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_Gbam! Kpon Kpon! Tadam! (Tam Tam)_

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Fa!Tu!Ma!Ta!

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_Gbam! Kpa Kpa! Taboom! (Tam Tam)_

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• Fatoumata!?
• Toura Ran Houta!
• Dougou of Baltimore!
• Daughter of Tadjimaou, the Black jew princess mother of the 4 Fulani clans?
• Defender of Ingall, the 12th Tuareg cross of Niger
• Darer of the Sahel, consumed with delivering encaged destinies buried in the sandy depths of the Tenere
• This is your "Njaru”, a testament to Fulani bravery?

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~ Dinde Sare thinks of a croissant and becomes Molière's friend again ~

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• Savior of the Desert
• You perfume with light the hearts arid of hope

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• Fulani splendor with Bantu sway
• Sculpted in the image of the dunes
• Your fine features veil brute strength
• Strong in experience and witness to the fallen
• Your jet-white hair reveals a rich mix of histories drunk with glory.

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• In your warrior bosom, seeds germinate
• Like Dubai in the Arabian desert
• They will blossom on the desert plains of Niger

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• A testament to your humanism
• Your interventions, above all vocal and collective
• Your voice carries for the respect of human rights, like the duudaandu (Peulh for flute) or the odiliiru (clarinet) made of millet stalks that accompanies the young pastor in his solitude.

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~ The unstable griot realizes that Barry sounds sexy, which makes him crazy in...english ~

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• Niger may be landlocked geographically?
• But it is not talentlocked, futurelocked, nor developmentlocked?
• Your nomadic bravery is unlocking the mental locks of Djoliba land to its glorious what if and why not?

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• Voice of the voiceless
• Driven by the fire of freedom
• Inspired by the naughtiness of the patriarchal society
• You symbolize the hope of million souls?

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• I don't see in you another Michele, Maya, or Oprah
• I see in you Fatoumata, the one and only that Sahelian girls in 2050 will dream to emulate, if it hadn't already been the case 30 years earlier, in 2020, when you decided to rewrite the lines of your destiny, a personal legend to be reckoned with.

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~ Dinde is hungry, his head thinks of dambou (local dish in niger), his belly sings Italian, his eyes see no color but that of kopto (moringa leaves), and his ears hear the pestle beating millet in the mortar of his entrails. He sees himself giving birth, pardon me, ballooned with deguê (millet yogurt), and abandoned by Ms. English ~

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• In contrast to the hot, dry climate of Niger
• You refresh with your presence like a Himalayan mint
• In your colorful hopes
• That compassion governs
• And love seasons
• Coexist suns and seas?
• Mountains and valleys
• Indian spices and exquisite millet
• The pot that will contain this devastatingly tasty blend has yet to be found, although rumors have it that it exists in Ethiopia...

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_Gbam! Gbam! Gbim Gbim! (Tam Tam)_

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Fa!Tu!Ma!Ta!

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• Lady with a child's heart, like the stars of Inwagan and Takarmenda
• Generously true like the crosses of Abalak and Karaga
• Royally constituted like those of Tchintabaraden and Crip Crip
• Serene and welcoming like those of Inaranganak, Bilma, Bartchakea and Iferouan
• Slicing and meat-loving like Bagzan, Timia, Taghment and Air
• Critical and vivacious, like Tilya, Tahoua, Madahoua and Tchimoumenene

• But above all, a woman!
• Charming indeed, but first and foremost a woman
• A leader, but also a woman
• Intelligent, but always a woman
• Rich, but also a woman
• Sister again
• Yet still a woman
• Always a woman!

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~ Dinde is willing to go on. Alas, it's time to pray. He certainly doesn't want to miss out on the virgins promised to him in paradise, a place full of carnal meat, much to the dismay of Fatoumata, who loves mea…ty bulls, beef, what I say, or rather cows, because the males bore her ~

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• Hastafoulaye! Shouts Dinde!?
• Alhamdoulilaye! Responds the audience.

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~ Before going to pray, Dinde approaches Fatoumata and whispers in her ear: Yaa once told me that you remind her of Maryam, the Tanzanian whose acts of kindness almost led her to convert... ~

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Just as Dinde throws down his mat, a human antelope strides off with a dish of Dambou with lamb, accompanied by a syrup of hibiscus and moringa! Fatoumata's nose has smelled the meat, Dinde no longer remembers Allah! Into which Peulh belly will this meal descend?

• Aie! Big dilemma!
• Na wa for them oo!
• The meat has eaten the meat eaters!

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Curtains are drawn!

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_Gbam! Kpon Kpon! Itchiik! (Tam Tam)_

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THE END

* Poem originally written for and offered to a Peulh friend as birthday gift! Oh yes, the Peulhs are not only into cows, milk and meat. They are also into arts, science, policy making, tech...you get the vibe?

*The native language used in the piece is Peulh.

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