Sahel Quotes

“They were the men and the women of the sand, of the wind, of the light, of the night. They appeared as in a dream, at the crest of a dune, as if they were born of the cloudless sky.”
― J.M.G. Le Clézio

“To witness the awe of human beings delighting in their own hands forming the written word was humbling and he understood it profoundly at that moment watching those two, with the ancient land around them, in their traditional robes and the resting camels by their campfire, intently regarding writing with such immense respect … that illiteracy meant subsistence, while literacy meant human advancement, the base on which higher achievements and accomplishments of great civilizations could be built.”
― T.K. Naliaka

“The truth for a man, it's what makes him a man.”
― Antoine de Saint Exupéry

“They glided out of the heat-haze on their camels like specters. There were twenty of them, and they were Tuareg. Their faces were hidden by black veils that left only slits for the eyes, and they wore purple robes that fluttered in the desert wind. They carried swords, muskets and seven-foot iron spears, and wore stilettos in sheaths on their left forearms. They were an impressive, sinister sight.”
― Michael Asher, Death in the Sahara: The Lords of the Desert and the Timbuktu Railway Expedition Massacre

“What an interesting contrast between us, even just in the consideration of one woman. Your complete disregard for her will ironically be your destruction, while my regard for her will be my triumph over you.”
― T.K. Naliaka, Iron Mixed with Sand Salt without Memory

“Mais voici qu’aujourd’hui nous avons éprouvé la soif. Et ce puits que nous connaissons, nous découvrons, aujourd’hui seulement, qu’il rayonne sure l’étendue. Une femme invisible peut enchanter ainsi toute une maison. Un puits porte loin, comme l’amour.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Terre des Hommes

“Nous avons accepté la règle du jeu, le jeu nous forme à son image. Le Sahara, c’est en nous qu’il se montre. L’aborder ce n’est point visiter l’oasis, c’est faire notre religion d’une fontaine.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Terre des Hommes

“Ils étaient les hommes et les femmes du sable, du vent, de la lumière, de la nuit. Ils étaient apparus, comme dans un rêve, en haut d’une dune, comme s’ils étaient nés du ciel sans nuages.”
― J.M.G. Le Clézio

“Huh. What a dope! Wait till Mom hears about this. He's so in trouble now. You know how crazy she gets about malaria.”
― T.K. Naliaka, A Difficult Damsel to Rescue

“Though they were not familiar with the expression,to paraphrase the saying, when any country in the Sahel sneezes, the rest of the region catches pneumonia, the men there would have clicked their tongues and ruefully nodded their heads that 'woolayi' this was the truth.”
― T.K. Naliaka, Between Dunes and Hard Places