A return to Ziguinchor, after a year away. Nothing much has changed. The baggage handlers at the small airport are still the same, the crooked old man still struggling under the weight of vast west African suitcases carrying unidentified cargo and nylon chinese blankets. There have been the usual rounds of marriages and deaths, it seems, including one friend who got married and had a baby, but forgot to tell me, but is not living with his wife, and declined to say more. Likely that the girl's father found out and arranged a wedding quick-smart.

At the house, mama came to greet me with a jug of water on her head, pumping my hand voraciously while looking straight ahead, popping her chin forwards and back to keep the jug balanced. The children were at school, and at midday they came running round the corner and leapt into my lap, chanting, "Rose now-na" (Rose has arrived).



Daba, who a year ago was more prone to rolling around in the dust fighting with the neighbours' children than showing any kind of affection, has started wearing dresses and being very loving. She has turned into a proper little girl, leaning calmly on my knees as we sit outside under the trees, and no longer determined to break everything she touches, instead begging me to play drum-kit on her back, and wriggling around in fits of giggles when I do.

The others are much the same, but bigger, although there is one who has not grown in the three years that I have known her. She has stopped crying at least. There is another little girl in the house now, the daughter of one of the brothers, and she is now the one who spills things all over herself and shrieks instead of speaking. Perhaps all the new recruits go through it; it is quite a daunting place to be, so many self-assured people in one small space.

This afternoon, the band, still going, it seems, went off to Bissau in a bus.



The bus arrived late in the day, and three swarthy-looking boys climbed out of the insides as if appearing through a narrow cave opening. They started hauling speakers and keyboards from inside the house onto the roof, while the children all helped wheel the musicians' suitcases through the dust and bring pieces of the drum kit alternately to the back of the bus, and then back inside the house again.



I thought about going in the bus with them, since i am off to Bissau myself tomorrow, but it's possible I will arrive after them anyway. The bus looked like it might need a bit of TLC along the way.