Allez Lions, Allez!!!
Invigorating - but bittersweet - afternoon at the stadium. Senegal vs. Mali.
Moving on to qualify for the World Cup requires both a win on our part and a loss for Togo. Thus, scanning across the half-packed stadium, (which seems to have been sized in a cookie-cutter fashion, more like the size that a national stadium "should be" and less like a relevant size for the smaller crowd of fans blessed with money and transportation to attend the matches), one sees a sea of red, yellow, and green jerseys, peppered with silver rectangle radios transmitting the most recent results of the Togo-Congo match.

The national anthem begins (here I find myself thinking of listening to our national anthem with Dad and the Vikings...lazy Sunday afternoons spent eating red pepper, shouting at the TV, and snoozing). I am struck by how ill-fit the song seems to be for Senegal. Strong, stoic, trumpet-laden, and with a thumping beat, it would have made John Philip Sousa proud. It seemed to only make the Senegalese crowd uneasy; about one in three people knew the words, and even then they only mumbled them half-heartedly. This surprised me. Generally in Senegal, you KNOW when someone likes a song, as she will demonstrate this for you via a loud sing-a-long or by busting out an mbalax dance in rythm to said piece. This fact holds true whether the song is live, on a radio, or on tv as the jingle for a butter commercial. (More on advertisements in another entry...) In conclusion, I feel like the national anthem has less to do with Senegal and more to do with the aftermath of french colonization. I'm waiting for the mbalax national anthem.
The game starts. The crowd is seated and multitasking. Eyes on the field, ears up to portable radio speakers, noses taking in the odors of bodies packed in, (3 bodies to every 2 seats in shady spots), hands clenching another's, mouths of christians, jews, and non-ramada-ing muslims chewing peanuts, oranges, and sweetbread.
Senegal Scores Once! Twice! The crowd leaps wildly to its feet. Drums pound out the mbalax I yearned for earlier. The scorer and his teammates pose flamboyantly for expectant cameras. A group of men circles together, fanning the center of the circle excitedly...my friend Maren looks concerned and wonders aloud whether they are trying to start a celebratory fire right there in the stadium. Further investigation reveals efforts to revive a woman who has fainted from heat, excitement, and - if I may interject a western
Ramadan-inspired opinion - dehydration. (During Ramadan, most Muslims will not eat or drink between sun-up and sun-down)

Excitement grows as radios transmit the news: Togo is behind by 3 points!
Halftime. Loaves of sweetbread distributed. Seats renegotiated. The crowd returns, anxious. Togo begins to regain lost ground. Without a radio of my own, I find my reactions to the game incongruous with those of the rest of the crowd. I cheer for a complicated play towards the end of the game - the rest of the crowd remains seated, mumbling. Togo has pulled ahead. Senegal scores again! No matter. Togo has won. Half the crowd is gone. The game continues.