Yoro Sidibe

***“Back when I lived in Bougouni I recall one day seeing a very old man wearing a floppy hat and mudcloth riding by on a bicycle. He was a fairly normal old fellow save the fact that he was barefoot and shouldering what appeared to be a gigantic musket. He wasn’t the last old guy I saw riding around on a bicycle with a giant musket. One day I asked my friend, ‘What about those old men riding around on their bicycles with the big guns?’ He whispered behind his hand: ‘Donsos. Chausseurs. Hunters.’ My friends were not eager to tell me much more. It took the son of a donso who I befriended to tell me why they were hesitant to open their mouths, to wit: ‘The donsos,’ he said, scratching his chin, ‘are the men who are able to, for example if someone is dancing during a village festival who should not be dancing, they will hurt that person.’ ‘Hurt?’ I asked. ‘Make dead,’ he said. He told me that his father had once made medicaments for a man who was now very rich and who was repaying the debt by letting the son, my friend, live with him. ‘Rich because of the medicaments?’ I asked. ‘Bien sur,’ he said. ‘This magic was too old to let the tubab in without his earning it.’ This is their music. It is played before hunts and is meant to both harden the heart and excite it. (STREET DATE - 4/22/2008)