Introduction

Abstract

Although I did not realize it at the time, the seed for what follows was inadvertently sown as a result of a holiday I took in August 1994, while living in the Ivory Coast. On the recommendation of friends, I had journeyed to Sinématiali, in the North of the country, to stay with a French couple who had a farm nearby, where they received guests. Near Sinématiali, we turned off the main road and drove for several miles along a dusty track which appeared to be leading nowhere. The instructions we had been given seemed decidedly vague to our urban sensibilities referencing, as they did, baobab trees and clusters of huts as the relevant signposts that would head us in the right direction. Any doubts we had about finding the place were dispelled when we found ourselves on a eucalyptus lined dirt “avenue,” which led us to the farm. Vidalkaha, La ferme africaine, as it was called, was in fact a mango plantation or at that time the early stages of one (it is now an export business) to which the owners had added accommodation for guests in the form of a collection of small wattle huts. We were shown to our accommodation and told that drinks were served at sundown on the veranda of the reception hut, which was set on a sharp incline overlooking the plantation below. We arrived before our hosts and after admiring the magnificent view over the valley below we wandered into the sitting room.