Over fall break, in M’Bour our group was looking to go out one night. The twelve of us set off down the road in search of just about anything. Three other girls and I found a local couple and decided to ask them if they knew anything happening nearby that night, or any places to go. The rest of the group waited a small distance away. The couple told us they were just planning on going out to a club downtown, and if we wanted to go with them we could. Figuring why not, the four of us went ahead with the couple and the rest of the twelve followed a few steps behind. We followed them to the main (a relative term) road in M’Bour, and they hailed down a taxi. It then dawned on us that we didn’t know where we were going, so we asked them the name of the club, looking back to relay the name to our group, they were nowhere to be seen. We called several people in the group, but couldn’t figure out where they were, or how we had gotten separated. Our group of four called the others, and we agreed to meet at the club, since we were taking taxis, splitting up would have happened anyway. The couple we were with convinced our taxi driver to squeeze six of us into a taxi meant for four. While in the taxi, however, the two mentioned that we needed to stop at the woman’s house, to ask her mom permission before we went to the club. Although we were slightly put off, we agreed to take the stop. In retrospect, this was a little sketchy on our part, but we got out of the taxi, and followed the couple to the woman’s house, and talked to her mom in Wolof, when she agreed that her daughter could go out with us (note: the man and woman we were with were each about 25 years old). We got back to the main road to catch another taxi (which in this region are just unmarked cars that happen to stop) and head over to the club. We asked the couple if there would be a cover charge, and found out that it would be anywhere from $4-$10 to get in. This took us by surprise, since most clubs in Dakar are free for girls. We told them we were looking for the cheapest one, so when the taxi dropped us off in downtown M’Bour, we did a small tour to see how much each club cost. Each time we got to a club the man would go ask how much the cover was, and then come report to us five girls. At a third club, however, my friend Angie decided to go ask with him, it seemed like the clubs were more expensive than they should be. The bouncer told Angie it would cost us $2 to get in, but our man came back to tell us $4. Hmmm…We told him we wanted to stay at the club we were outside of, and he said, “no problem, just give me the money, and I will pay all at once for us to get in.” Deedeet (no in Wolof) we told him, we can pay for ourselves, and besides, the price is half what you told us! The four from our group paid the bouncer to get in, and the man we were with started to get angry (he obviously was hoping to pocket the extra money, but didn’t think we wouldn’t believe him). At this point, he began to yell at us saying that we needed to pay for him and his girlfriend to get in since he paid for the taxi. But he had offered to pay for the taxi, even after we asked several times if he was sure. After a few minutes of arguing back, insisting that we weren’t going to pay for him to get in, we squeezed past the bouncer and into the club, where he couldn’t follow us. After a few minutes, we had calmed back down, agreeing to forget about the jerk that tried to scam us, until he approached us on the dance floor! Continuing to ask us why we didn’t pay for him, (and in case you don’t already think this guy is a jerk, he left his girlfriend outside to do this). The four of us decided we had “to go to the bathroom,” so went and hid there for several minutes, until we heard the man getting kicked out of the club—very satisfying. Another note on how much of a scum bag this man was, before the fiasco started, as we were walking to find taxis, the woman introduced herself to me, and said the man was her boyfriend, I asked her if they would get married, and she answered, yes, very soon. The man, when introducing himself to me a few minutes later (he hadn’t heard what she had said) he told me the woman was his sister… liar! thankfully, we had a four to one ratio on him, which made us feel much more comfortable; I am also glad, we were able to shake him off and enjoy the rest of our night!
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