Bread and Danish
An odd combination, but not to worry, I will tell you how I got there…
The Meaning of a Minaret
I suppose this article is more an editorial than a travel piece, but one of the reasons travelers love to travel is that ‘travel is so broadening,’ as Sinclair Lewis was wont to say. In my view, the term ‘broadening’ entails a readiness to learn about and perhaps even embrace the unknown and the unfamiliar: in some countries, people relish dishes with squid ink or bird’s nests, in some countries, people have unfamiliar art or dance forms, or customs or holidays or forms of worship.
Last year at this time I was in Dakar and watched as Muslim men of the Bocoum family prepared the ritual sleep for slaughter for the feast of Tabaski. This practice hearkens back to the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son when asked to do so by a higher power, and what I loved in Senegal was the way in which Catholics and Muslims lived side by side, in peace, sharing one another’s customs and holidays, inviting their neighbors of another faith to come partake of the feasting and celebration. I was an outsider, unable to speak their language and unfamiliar with many of the major tenets of Islam.
