BEIGNA IS BACK
For readers of this blog, this should perhaps not cause too much of a surprise, because it is not the first time our troublesome barman has been sacked and later returned. (For those less aquanited with Djenne Djenno life, look up Beigna in the blog search above)
He is seen above in the picture taken last year when Malick Sidibé came to photograph the hotel.
Beigna is now back after nearly four months in the wilderness, when as usual more or less the whole of Djenne filed before me pleading for mercy and begging me to take him back. I refused steadfastly. Officials from the Djenne workers union came twice to try and reason with me, but I refused. I had followed all the steps in the cumbersome bureaucracy required in order to sack someone and all was in order. I did not need to take him back.
But here he is again. So what happened exactly? I heard stories of him sitting forlornly in the courtyard at Chez Baba's with the guides. I saw him once when he himself came back to plead with me. I refused, but I noticed that his teeth were getting disoloured from smoking too much. Then three days ago I needed something that only Beigna knew about. I told Baba to call Beigna on his mobile phone- Baba said that Beigna no longer had a telephone. I think it was this fact that finally did the trick and softened me. For the young handsome stroppy Beigna to no longer to have a mobile phone would be deeply humiliating. His girlfriend had left him too I found out from Kaita- she was no longer interested in someone without money or even a mobile phone.
Then I remembered all the good qualities he possesses: I remembered the times he pursued a guide through town and collared him in front of the Mosque for non-payment of a beer, his scrupulous honesty, his charm and of course his beauty- when he and Baba are dressed in their Fulani boubous and flit in and out amongst the dining tables they are not only efficient as a team but charming to behold.
So Keita and I had a talk. He thought about it over night, and called me in the morning- yes, he agreed, we should take Beigna back. So here he is, and probably he will remain with us until the end- but who knows?