“I want to try, god will be with me”: a wish, a hope, that many young Gambians have shared with Julia Brown Cuneo regional councilor of the Green Left Alliance and socio-cultural anthropologist, who spent the first half of August in the African country between Senegal and Guinea-Bissau.
Marro accompanied Lamin, a Gambian he met in Cuneo who returned home for the first time in ten years. A journey of as many days, intense, immersing himself in the local culture and daily life that he faced with his brother and a friend; the objective, to investigate the idea that this part of the world is making of Europe, of departures, of life down here.
The working group conducted real interviews with Lamin’s closest relatives, “delving deeper into what happened, how the distance was managed by both sides, the return, and what the restart will be like – says Marro –. Unique opportunities to interact with people who experience migration (or baguay as they say here) on the other side”.
“We find awareness of the processes but also little knowledge of the dynamics of reception and work. ‘We know that many die on the journey, that some come back a little crazy, that black people are looked at badly by you, that it is not easy to get documents’, they told us. ‘Lamin has not made himself heard for years but now he has built a life and is happy, even to come back to visit us’ one of his nieces confided to us, one of the many people who live in the house where we were guests”.
“Lamin’s uncle, on the other hand, is a teacher in a public school. – continues Marro – and he told us that he earns about 750 Dalasi a month, more or less like 100 euros: ‘I love my job but it’s not enough to live on. What Lamin sends us from Europe is useful, if there was a safe way to reach it I would go there too for a few years’ he said”.
“Despite everything, the dream of Europe seems to remain vivid for everyone. – concludes Marro –. One way or another they imagine themselves there. Even today, in 2024”.
