In 2007 and 2008, I produced a series of reports from all over Spain on the relationship between intensive agriculture and immigration (European, North African, sub-Saharan and even South American). And in March 2009, I went to the USA for 3 months to continue this work (the link between intensive agriculture and immigration, South American this time), in addition to documenting the effect of the financial and economic crisis (subprime crisis) that was hitting the country.
To press on a little further, at the beginning of 2010 I read a lot of reports and popular books on agricultural policy which fascinated me, and whenever there was reference to the African continent I recalled the testimony of a Senegalese friend that I had seen, unfortunately, under very unworthy living conditions while looking for work in the Andalusian strawberry fields.
"You know, Thomas, I have some land back home. If I left my wife and children and am here now, it is to earn money to buy a tractor, even a used one, and go back to my country. We cannot continue to work the land like our parents, it is no longer possible ".
It was with this in mind that in the spring of 2010 I flew back to Senegal, my faithful bike as usual in the hold. And for about 8 months I pedaled over 7,000 km, from Dakar (Senegal) to Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso). This allowed me, among other things, to document an entire farming season, from pre-planting to the harvest festivals in the villages.
Ten years later (already!) when for the purposes of creating this website I have to write this little blurb, I see two solutions. To fall back on the journal I kept day by day in school notebooks without worrying about the length. Or to jot down very quickly, in one go, what comes easily to mind and could be useful for understanding the context of the images offered on the site.
So tonight I remember--as a good little Frenchman--unfortunately, complaints and complications first! Indeed the first days on the road were quite difficult. Getting out of Dakar by bike with a pedal that keeps falling off has to be experienced! Overwhelming heat, theft of my papers by a pickpocket in Saint Louis, altercation with a thug (having lived in Italy) and his henchmen for banal photos taken in the fields, etc. So at first I sometimes wondered if I would ever get to my destination.
Then I had to suffer from technical problems which did not make my life easier! First, chromatic aberrations due to a wide angle lens not suitable for my very first digital camera which had cost me an arm and a leg (but not both because I had to take out a loan). Then, when the first rains fell in northern Senegal, the damn camera would no longer want trigger at the pressure of my index finger, which meant that I had to work in self-timer mode. So after pushing I had to wait a good two seconds for the picture snap. When I got back, it was explained to me that the case had oxidized and that the famous manufacturer (although the camera was still under warranty) could not do much about it since it didn't say it was "tropicalized." She could only offer me a small discount if I bought another ...
Then also, in Mali, a bush nurse screwed up the battery charger of the camera at the same time as that of the small laptop which I used to store the photos by forgetting to connect the current stabilizer while turning on his generator. The problem of the camera's battery charger was solved in the village by soldering, done by a gifted handyman with an antediluvian iron (who first asked to light a fire in order to heat the iron with embers). But for the computer charger there was no way. So started the struggle to get another one sent from France ...
In Mali, I had some security concerns that prevented me from staying very long in Nioro du Sahel to document an agricultural program. On the advice of the population, I stayed there only one day before returning to Diema, where later a motorhome driver was kidnapped and, still detained, unfortunately lost his life less than two years later. After Bamako, I was thinking of biking to the rice fields in the Niger delta and especially going to the Dogon country where contacts I met along the way awaited me, but I had to give it up and entered Burkina-Faso from the south (Sikasso) .
Finally, at the long awaited time of the harvests, the malaria that I caught in Burkina Faso nailed me for a good three weeks in Koudougou. This is where my little effort to recollect shifts at last to more positive memories which are legion. Because, during my malaria attack, I was able to verify that the expression "We are all in this together", which I had often heard and which I sometimes doubted from hearing it so often, had genuine reality.
I will always remember the reaction of Valentin who looked after a beekeeping enterprise that I had visited, and who had kindly offered me a stay in a small former library (of the association's cultural center) during the time that I documented the structure. When I fell ill, he categorically refused that I go to an inn so as not to annoy them and watched over me discreetly, with the help of a neighbor "Madame Nana" who prepared very simple things for me every evening (like millet porridge) that I could ingest.
Small excerpt from the diary that I still ended up opening at the pages concerning Koudougou:
Same malarial routine. I have been hanging around for almost two weeks now and the people in the neighborhood have gotten used to me. I am no longer called “le Blanc, give me.” I believe they understand what is happening to me and are considerate in many ways. For example, every time I go to the well with my 20 liter canister, the kids now rush to take it from me, and always one of the people pumps the water for me. Since the start of the trip, I have been hearing repeatedly of “African solidarity” and I can testify, thinking of Valentin, Madame Nana, the shopkeepers, the guardians of the center, that it exists.
Yesterday Paul and Sabine, who take care of the packaging of the honey, told me that people from the neighborhood had asked (most seriously, they assure me) “if Jesus had come to live with them, in district 5 of Koudougou? And Sabine, whom I never suspected to be zealous for God, strongly insisted that I bless them on the spot. Maybe with my scraggly bearded look I could make a career here, start a new church? I sometimes see myself more as an intermittent hobo, a photographer cyclo-vagabond, rolling on the tail of the beat comet, but go explain that to them."
Beyond this somewhat extreme moment, I can speak (forgive me for the banality) of the welcome that "Mr. Thomas" (as I was often called in the villages) received. Finding a place to spend the night was never a problem on this journey. And I recall all those hours chatting with my hosts for an evening, all those people who kindly offered to accompany me, sometimes for days on my walks or bike rides to continue our discussions or just spend more time together.
A little anecdote that I sometimes tell to say that hospitality could be on the order of the extraordinary. An employee of City Hall to whom I asked at the end of a day of cycling where I could pitch my tent for the night gave me this answer: "Well, right here! We do say 'Town Hall' don't we!" And here we are, after a quick visit to the mayor's home (and before going to eat at my new friend's house with whom I have always been in contact since), inflating my little travel mattress and installing the mosquito net abobe it with the help of chairs in the rather pompous office of the city councilor. "In fact you're a bit like my ancestors, who left like that with almost nothing to Mecca!"
A lot of things like this are recorded in "my tablets" (logbook) and maybe one day far away, if we live to be old! and the desire is still there, we will do something with it! (This is quite some early teasing, isn't it!)
Finally, if I remember all the good humor and the energy received during the stages. I also remember the big big fatigue when I returned by bus to our friend Yvot, in Dakar, where I awaited the date of my flight to France. Afterwards, I understood that, day after day, seeing people forced to "make do", "proceed bit by bit", prevented in reaching their goal (even if often they did not talk about these subjects) had worn me out.
Now when I look at the photos in retrospect, apart from the fact that the color at is crying out for correction (which I agree is just a detail, because it is up to us) to reload the raw files to do more honor to people and landscapes or to entrust them to a good professional if ever one day we win the lottery!), I tell myself that it is a privilege to have been able to make this trip with such freedom of movement (except in northern Mali as I mentioned above) and I am devastated every time we hear talk about terrorism in Burkina Faso, in Mali and the economic problems which affect a large part of the population.
By continuing to take an interest in these topics, I see that almost nothing has been done and that the situation in my opinion has even worsened. The contacts that have kept up with people from these countries, in meetings and while attending the COPs, do not deceive me, unfortunately. Let the industrialised countries start giving (1) what they have committed to, since COP15 in Copenhagen in 2009 (2), to help these countries adapt to the effects of climate change, because they are in the front line as they say nowadays. Even if this does not solve everything, it would already be a first step.
(1) https://unfccc.int/fr/news/mme-espinosa-exhorte-les-pays-a-tenir-leur-promesse-de-100-milliards-de-dollars-us
(2 )https://www.economie.gouv.fr/mobiliser-100-milliards-de-dollars-par-dici-2020
(Links accessed on 18 June 2021)