Medina Life

My new home is in a medina, a maze of tight, narrow streets, shops, and homes that surrounds the mosque. The streets are wide enough for one person to walk down, which doesn't stop packs of wild children from barreling through the maze at full speed. This medina and the crumbling walls around it were built to slow and confuse raiding pirates. I imagine that it was effective. I still struggle to find my way home. Lucky for me the wild children of the medina can always lead me to my house. In fact, any white person who stumbles into the medina will likely be brought to my place. I'm thinking about naming it Wazungu House.

For me the medina is characterized first and foremost by sound. There is no quiet in a place where one can step from roof to roof. Children laugh and scream, women chat and bargain, men listen sports and play games. But here the dominating sound, the sound that rules over daily life, is the call to prayer. It comes from the iconic turret rising from the mosque. An eerie singsong chant calling "Allahu Akbar": God is great. Reminding the medina's inhabitants five times a day of the force that governs their lives. As the call sounds the male residents will make their way to one of the half dozen smaller masques packed tighly into the one kilometer maze. When the call to prayer falls silent the beating of drums  rises to take its place. Women practicing for the all important weddings that are bound to take place that night. Rhythm is life in the medina. Silence rarely comes, even in the deepest night. Music plays at all hours, until the 4am call to prayer signifies the start of a new day.