Neighbors

Did you see that list of questions I typed up to ask when house hunting in Senegal? Well, we forgot to ask the one about daaras.

There’s a daara behind our house.

Now, this isn’t the end of the world. But it could make things interesting.

What is a daara, you say? It’s a home for talibe boys. These are not, per say, street kids. But, you wouldn’t know that if you saw one.

Sometimes, Senegalese parents choose to give their children over to a Marabout (Muslim religious leader) to give them a Koranic education. The Marabout is supposed to educate them in the Koran and also teach them humility. They do this by requiring that the boys beg and bring him about a dollar each day.

There are some Marabouts who do this, some who don’t. Regardless, the boys don’t get a proper school education. So, the boys who stay into their teens don’t learn to read or write and aren’t equipped with a skill to find them a job in adulthood. Sometimes the boys aren’t fed if they don’t bring in the money the marabout requires. Sometimes they’re abused. Even in the best of daaras, it’s a terrible life for a child.

There is an undeniable link here between poverty, Islam, & exploitation.

We don’t know anything about this particular darra yet. We hope to have a good relationship with the Marabout and not too much trouble with the boys.


Some days, I’ll be annoyed with the chanting and noise. Or, the ringing of my doorbell.

Some days, my heart will break to see motherless children walking down my street in rags.

Some days, I’ll be angry over the injustice and wickedness of this practice that is allowed to persist in Senegal.

Pray for us. We probably wouldn’t have taken the house if we had known this. We actually turned down another house for this reason. The Lord knew; that’s for sure.