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Senegal a land of culture where nature rules

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Senegal a land of culture where nature rules

« Teranga » means « Welcome, » and it is the word that best describes the people of Senegal who are incomparably smiling and hospitable.

Senegal is sort of the California of Africa, a generous and secretive land that beyond the rigors of the Sahara offers unsuspected riches. Among these are 600 kilometers of fine sandy beaches, often brilliant white, sometimes pink, along with small ports nestled around creeks where the fishing is miraculous. Also to be found here are long heavily ladened canoes overflowing with fish and lobsters, as well as natural parks where you can come in contact with antelope, elephants, buffaloes, and rhinoceros, where rivers, fast and slow, flow past places whose banks are filled with mystery, where ancient and solitary trees stand sentinel while their enormous roots suggest time passed.
Immaculate lakes are ringed by small villages of artfully crafted palm-thatched huts with lively markets, and where the setting sun is a triumph of nature. These ingredients along with other surprises make up the main menu of this delectable nation. All this can be found in Senegal, but that isn’t all, because culture and nature meet here.

A few hours from Morocco, beyond the sands, Senegal opens the door on the other Africa, the one where nature can still offer itself the luxury of rebellion, where time has excavated indelible trenches in the history of mankind. Senegal is the republic that chose for its first president one of the world’s greatest contemporary poets, Leopold Sedar Senghor, an eminent member of the French Academy, but above I all a man of simple wisdom and vast culture.

About this cultural primacy there are abundant witnesses throughout the country. The tourist who comes here to hunt, to wander about or simply to get tan, all will be inevitably challenged. On the memorable Isle of Goree, they erected very beautiful memorial not that long ago dedicated to the Italian architect ottavio Di Blasi. Also very recently, on the same island, they renovated a number of buildings dating from the 11th century including the Governor’s Palace. This whole setting welcomes many hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. It is said that the monuments cry or that the old stones whisper among themselves; this much we know: they are the sighs of history. These sites, however, although emotionally charged, cannot stop being simply beautiful. Here, feelings blend together. Thoughts take root. Art, present everywhere in this country, helps to go beyond simple ideas. In the drawers and the display cases of the museums, the people of Senegal tell us about their past. There are three important museums, the museum of the sea, on the same Isle of Goree, the history museum, and best of all, the great museum of African art. Together they house close to 13,000 pieces from everywhere in sub-Saharan Africa. These three museums, that should not be missed, belong to the L’IFAN (the Fundamental Institute of Black Africa of Cheik Anta Diop). L’IFAN also houses the Departments of Anthropology, Sociology, Linguistics, the study of Islam, etc.

This attachment to culture was not born yesterday. Remember the first festival of African art that was all the buzz in 1966 took place in Dakar, and that was one of the most important moments in the cultural life of not only Senegal but of all of Africa. This attachment has also been given a voice in a very important theatrical production. The world famous « Des Griots » company introduced a new form of theatrical art that combines story telling with historical narration and word plays. Dance is everywhere in all the regions, among all ethnicities. It is not just simple body movements, but one that participates in the expression of thought, a choreography that also speaks of men, of women and their battles.

If the cultural landscape seems to impose itself everywhere, it is because it takes root in a fertile nature that gives it its vigor. Senegal is a multiple land. Contrasts stand out clearly here. From the ocean to Mali, from Mauritania to Guinea, the country goes from dry to humid, from tropical forest to savannah, from brutal desert zones to mild maritime regions. Here, the slender pines give way to hundred year old baobabs, majestic, patriarchal, venerated and feared because of the spirits that live in these trees.

The water and the nature in Senegal

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The water and the nature in Senegal

A little further on, there are stagnant waters where thousands of birds nest. Stilt further on, the very dense forest imprisons and protects its multitudes.

Senegal is at its best close to the water. This country’s essence is in the water that flows, its rivers: the Casamance, the Senegal River, the Saloum, and the pink lake, aft are sources of life and beauty. This is revealed in the beauty of its canoes, the fishermen along the banks casting their nets as the sun [ails, the beauty of laughing women washing their multicolored laundry, the beauty of viftages where the houses have mud wafts, palm frond roofs, all gathered around humble and touching minarets. It is in Casamance that the country is the richest, and that begins to explain why it arouses covetousness that in turn has led to the region’s many wars and invasions. Mandingue and Diolas fought for power there, and then the conquerors came from Europe, the Portuguese, the English, and the French that successively and temporarily installed their dominion. Aft of Casamance is beautiful, but around Ziguinchor, Cape Skirring, and the beautiful villages like Djembering, tourism is already popular; it is a tourism of quality, enriching because it is not predatory. This tourism, however, is not the only kind to develop; there is lodging designed to cater for business travelers and conventioneers, plus lodges, traditional hotels, villas, guest houses that can receive non-typical tourists. Senegal is because of its exotic flora and fauna a land of natural parks where nature is protected. The Niokolo Koba Nature Reserve has recently been registered by UNESCO as belonging to worldwide patrimony of mankind, Elephants, buffaloes, panthers, monkeys, and antelopes are sheltered there along with 400 species of birds.
Photographic safaris are available, but hunting is prohibited.
Hunters are nevertheless welcome outside the Mako campground where small and large game can be taken, but it is mainly the wart hogs, partridges, hares or guinea-fowls that top the list.
It is not necessary, however, to be a hunter to fully appreciate a stay in the area. In absolute harmony and total quietude, this Senegal of respected and preserved nature is perhaps the lost Garden of Eden that we remember with nostalgia.

Air Senegal international Spreads Its Wings

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Air Senegal international Spreads Its Wings

Two years after being founded, young Air Senegal International (ASI) has reached a crucial new stage in its development, having just inaugurated two new generation Boeing 737-700S. As a result of this fleet modernization, the Company intends to remain a major player in the West African airline industry. It also is determined to respond to market demands in terms of the number of flights and the quality of its service it is able to provide.

Created as a result of a cooperative agreement between Morocco and Senegal, Air Senegal International, controlled 51% by Royal Air Maroc and 49% by the Senegalese state, was officially started on November 2, 2000, and launched its first commercial flight on February 23, 2001. Since then, it has traveled far, earning the pride of its people and the highest Senegalese authorities. The President of the Republic of Senegal cited the Company as an example of success in his traditional New Year’s speech on December 31, 2002.

The new company, that has already demonstrated leadership in the regions, owes its success for the most part to the quality, regularity and punctuality of its service that has been made possible thanks to its strategic partnership with the experienced Royal Air Maroc.
The results obtained after the first two years of existence surpass all predictions and have rendered obsolete the Company’s initial business plan.

Having started with a fleet of two planes, a Dash 8Q 300 with 50 seats and a Boeing 737-200 with 99 seats, the Company had foreseen to transport 98,000 passengers with 24 national flights and 48 international flights to nine international destinations and four national destinations in 2001. In terms of turnover, the forecast was for 7.1 billion FCFA. With a carrier market, structural conditions and a very favorable contingency outlook of a quality air transport company, forecasts, however, have been quickly reviewed upward.
Before the end of that year, ASI doubled the number of international flights, transporting 124,000 passengers during the first ten months and augmenting turnover to reach the total of 11 billion FCFA, which was two times the turnover figure forecast in the business plan.

ASI’s progress in 2002 has been similar to that achieved in the first year, with the growth rate of two times and even three times!

Air Senegal International dynamism and progress

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Air Senegal International dynamism and progress

The fleet has seen the introduction of two new generation Boeing 737700 planes that were called into service to handle more African ports of call, as well as a new market for ASI, namely France, with daily departures to Paris Orly and two flights weekly to Lyon and Marseilles from Dakar.
With this new fleet, ASI has improved the number of flights and the number of passengers to all the West African capitals (Abidjan, Bamako, Conakry, Ouagadougou, Niamey, Lome, Cotonou, Bissau, Banjul, Nouakchott, etc.)

Two-hundred and fifty thousand passengers have been transported in 2002, double the number carried in 2001, and with a provisional turn over approaching 30 Billion FCFA, representing 2.7 times the amount from the preceding year.

The year 2002 has also seen ASI improve its position for the quality of passenger service by putting into place several products such as frequent flyer plans, a website, the Etoile class service, etc. Passenger surveys indicate a level of overall satisfaction that reaches an average of 85%.
Finally, at a professional level, ASI has been an active member of lATA (International Air Transport Association) since May 2002 and has been elected a member of the executive committee of AFRAA (the Association of African Continent Companies).

20021 a decisive year

During the course of the year 2002, the Company demonstrated the same dynamism by augmenting growth significantly.
In order to re-enforce the strategic choices of its development plan, ASI opened other regional routes (flying to a dozen local capitals).
In order to respond to existing market demands in a more efficient way, ASI started its fleet expansion plan by introducing its two new Boeings 737-700S, inaugurated on September 24, 2002. In this way, the Company supports its regional expansion without forgetting the international market. This is how since January 2003, it has opened new routes, including one to New York and one to Johannesburg in share codes with South African Airways. The route Dakar-Paris-Dakar is now served daily as well as the one from Dakar-Marseille and Dakar-Lyon twice weekly. ASI hopes to open new routes to Lagos, Accra, and Freetown that will help make Dakar the biggest air hub in West Africa. On top of its strategic partnership with Royal Air Maroc, ASI has signed a partnership agreement with South African Airways and foresees to sign another with Kenyan Airways and other continental companies in the framework of a long term, strategic alliance with African airline companies.

Destination Johannesburg

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Destination Johannesburg

No further need to go through Brussels in order to get to South Africa. Royal Air Maroc has introduced a direct flight to Johanesburg from Casablanca.
In eleven hours you will find yourself in the heart of one of the most beautiful countries in the continent.

The history of Johanesburg is reminiscent of the epic of an Eldorado. After the diamond findings in the 19th century which led to the creation of the De Beers by Cecil Rhodes, the largest diamond mine in the world is discovered in the Witwatersand in 1886. Johannesburg is then established and a real gold rush is started. All those who have cherished the thought of getting rich saw no other alternative but to try their luck in this African Eldorado.

Indeed, many have succeeded and today Johannesburg is ranked among the world’s largest and modern cities with its five star hotels and large palace homes.
To extract the mineral, thousands of workers came to find work. It led the small camping village of Johannesburg to a fast growing and well designed urban Johannesburg.
In the following sixty years till 1945, gold will play a developing role for the city and the country itself The gold mines constituted the first source of income. Since industry, mining activity especially gold remain a predominant role in the economy’s growth. With an annual production of 600 tonnes, the African giant leads the world in annual gold production.

From 1886 to 1970, about 224,000 tonnes will be extracted. To do so, miners had to go 3,200 meters underground. The extracted soil led to large plains of yellow sands, a clear sign of mining activity in the country side. The gold city has thus become the economic heartbeat of South Africa.
On the western edge of Johanesburg, the sectors of Germinston, Benoni and Springs make up the leading industrial complex of the entire African continent. This phenomenal industrial development has led to an enormous influx of manpower and fast urbanization. Thousands of workers are nowadays housed in modern facilities, a far cry from the tin homes they once lived in. The well known suburb town of Soweto regroups more than 60,000 black inhabitants.

In between the sandy plains of the eastern part of the city and the large plants of the west, stands the heart of Johanesburg. An area where all the modern amenities of a modern metropolis. The pre 1940′s buildings were replaced by modern sky scrapers, where commercial centres are established. The Carlton Center is one such center that offers an outstanding panoramic view. Revolving around this sensible city center, large residential neighbourhoods where the vast majority of white citizens of Johanesburg call home. Johanesburg’s proximity to the wilderness is a major positive factor for the visiting tourist. Easily accessible by air and ground, the large Kruger Park, one of the most beautiful in the continent is only a few hundreds kilometers away.
Johanesburg stands at 1760 meters with a dry and invigorating climate.
The Jan Smuts International Airport, half way between Johanesburg and Pretoria makes Johanesburg a gate away from the world. Now, Casablanca is also one gate away from Johanesburg.