Sahara
Day 46: Tirelli
Watching the tingetange, stilt dancers, at a celebration of the dead. Four or five feet off the ground, with masks, cowrie shell bodices and horsetails, the dancers require exceptional skills and long training.

It is dazzling in its colour and energy, but I'm frustrated at not being able to comprehend more than the surface of this complex, expressive ritual.
The end of the dance does not mean the end of celebrations in Tirelli. The dancers are rewarded with a special brew of kojo, millet beer, and things really get going after we've gone.
As I lie in my tent, exhausted, as we all are, by another hot day of hard labour, the sound of partying carries across on the night air and, not for the first time in West Africa, I'm lulled to sleep by the distant sound of people having a much better time than me. And they're at a funeral.
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PALIN'S GUIDES
- Series: Sahara
- Day: 46
- Country/sea: Mali
- Place: Tirelli
- Book page no: 145
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