The eye of the Daymani

Someone of the Oulad Daymane¹ (one must not say a Daymani, nor a man of the Oulad Daymane tribe) had a very sore right eye. Very, very sore. The eye of someone of the Oulad Daymane must hurt exceptionally badly before one may say that this eye hurts him not a little. This very painful eye did not unduly trouble our man, who told himself that things were fine as they were, or at least that they could be far worse. A passing camel driver, dreadfully "tchiggui"², that is to say one of those incredible non-Daymane peoples who get worked up over the slightest thing and meddle in everything and nothing, noticed the ailing eye. One must never notice anything about the Oulad Daymane. But the camel driver was precisely not someone of the Oulad Daymane. He could therefore permit himself anything.

And he permitted himself to speak of an "excellent man, an excellent friend, who treated eyes excellently — eyes in general and right eyes in particular". He insisted so long and so well that our right-eye patient began to listen. And he listened so well that he convinced himself of the necessity of seeing this excellent healer of right eyes as soon as possible. Of seeing him not because his eye worried him more than usual, but simply to please the camel driver, who was taking such pains to find a client for his friend.

So the patient packed his bags — that is, stowed them at the bottom of the tazaya³ — and asked his new friend the camel driver to take him pillion as far as the well of Toumbayaali⁴. From there he would go on alone to see the healer. The camel driver took him along, on a rather restless beast, as far as Toumbayaali. The patient's right eye hurt more and more. He walked half a day towards the north-west and came upon the healer's little camp. This healer really was an excellent man — extremely enthusiastic, extremely skilful, extremely dynamic, extremely efficient. When he saw our man heading for his tent, he understood that this was a patient, an eye patient, coming to see him. He lit a very large fire. Into it he put all his tools: a cutlass, cutting pincers, a branding iron for livestock.

The patient barely had time to say salam aleikoum. The excellent healer threw himself on his neck, embraced him four times, forced him to lie down on a prayer skin, told him it was absolutely nothing, no longer than the blink of an eyelid, it goes quickly, I do this a hundred times every evening — only yesterday I treated fourteen Idjaqmadjqui⁵, two Gounania⁶ and one hundred and fifty-seven Idawaalawi⁷. Two hundred and ten people in all. The patient told himself that the gentleman was perhaps an excellent healer, but that he was very poorly gifted at mental arithmetic. Anyway… He waited barely a second. The healer came back at him, cutlass in hand. He neatly removed the eye and made a cross in its place with the branding iron. It was the left eye. The someone of the Oulad Daymane fainted for a few moments, came to, and thanked God aloud. The very busy healer told him to go and rest and to come back very early the next day.

Our patient went off, relieved of a left eye which, however, had never hurt him and was not so heavy to carry after all. He spent a most satisfactory night at Toumbayaali. Early in the morning he set off across the dunes to rejoin the little camp of the man he called, in his head, the "Benefactor". "Benefactor," he said to himself, "because in addition to my healthy eye he could have torn out the ailing one, cut off my tongue and ears, sliced through my neck and feet. But he didn't do that — no, he merely relieved me of an eye. He really is an excellent man."

The Oulad Daymane have a very relativist vision of things. Along with remarkable sang-froid. The healer welcomed the patient effusively, kissed him on both cheeks, ruffled his hair, slapped him on the back, asked him whether he had eaten well and how "the eye" was doing. Our man dodged the first question (the Oulad Daymane do not eat, or so very little). But he answered the second: "The eye (the Oulad Daymane do not use the possessive), the eye is doing very well. I mean the left eye, the one you operated on. The right eye, the one said to be somewhat ailing — well, that eye, it is still said to be somewhat ailing."

The healer said: "So it was not your ailing eye I treated yesterday?" The patient replied: "I think perhaps not. But in any case you were only very slightly mistaken. There is so little distance between the two eyes." The healer: "Why didn't you tell me?" The patient: "You were already very busy. I didn't want to disturb you." The healer: "Then we shall have to operate on the other eye…" The patient: "I think so too, since you think so…"

The eye was torn out in double-quick time. A cross was made in its place. With the branding iron. The World Bank–Mauritania couple is currently re-enacting this story. We are at least at the first eye.