Toubabs in Touba

Touba was such a unique experience for all of us. Touba is the holy city for the Murids, the biggest brotherhood in Senegal. The girls soon found out that we were not as prepared as we thought we were. We were under the impression that we just had to cover our hair but we soon learned that we also must disguise the shape of our body.  As we got of the bus we were checked to make sure that we were suitable for entering the mosque and library. This set the tone for many of us girls and a lot of us spent a good chunk of time checking to make sure all of our hair was covered. The wind proved to be a difficult obstacle with my head scarf almost blowing off on several occasions.

            Inside the library we were lucky enough to get a tour from the curator himself. We walked around the different rooms of the library, the first one being a room that contained a lot of writings from Seringe Touba, the man who started the Murids. He had written so many things about a variety of topics and it blew my mind how many books were in this one room of the library. Something I learned while in the library is that all students of the Koran must write the entire Koran from memory in order to finish their schooling. It takes the most dedicated ones about a year and longer for those that learn about other things besides just the Koran, such as Islamic ethics. We were also able to see some of Seringe Touba’s personal belongings however we could not enter the room where they were kept because we did not perform the proper cleansing rituals. It was a really cool to be able to see all of those books and on one of the shelves there was a book gifted my Muhammad Ali. One thing I noted about the books in all of the library was how colorful they all were. In the reading room we were able to see the steps that they are taking to allow people who are illiterate the opportunity to have access to all of this knowledge. But what really confused me is that they have all of this knowledge and access to them is so limited. It was so weird that we were able to have access to all of this and people who are part of this religion might never see it.

            The Grand Mosque itself was one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen. The tile work was so pretty. One of the more uncomfortable parts of the trip was the separation between genders. We had to keep some distance between us and we weren’t allowed to take pictures with members of the opposite sex. One thing I noticed is how aware we all became of our location in space. We were all very conscience to not be to close to someone of the opposite gender.  At one point a little boy followed us around just watching our movements. It was really amazing to get to go inside a place that is so holy and experience Murid culture at its strongest.

            After we went to the mosque we met with the Speaker of the Baye Fall which is a branch of the Murids. The Baye Fall believe that the best way to practice their faith is through work in the community. As a result they do not practice all five pillars of Islam. They also believe that they have mastered temptation so men and women are allowed to be together and we no longer had to cover our hair. We actually got to experience a Baye Fall work site which was amazing. I was taken a back by the shear size of it all. There were people everywhere doing so many different things it was incredible. While we were there a group of girls came up to me and wanted me to take a bunch of pictures with them which was very funny. I think they sensed I was the weakest link.

            After the site visit we went and ate with the speaker at his home and we had the amazing opportunity to ask him questions. He was incredibly welcoming and so was his family. When we ate he came over and helped us take the chicken off of the bones and made sure that we all had enough to eat.

Corey Pabst