Abidjan

If you want to know how hard Aiidara Amadou works, you only have to look at his fingers. They have become shrivelled from the water. His fingernails have nearly dissolved from the soap. Still his fingers work ceaselessly on this morning. They grab the black t-shirt, lock it between Aiidara’s legs, twist it ruthlessly like a vice. When the water is wrung out, they quickly spread the pieces of fabric on the tiny patch of lawn from where you have a good view of the two motorways and 50 men and women who are wading through the river and washing as if their life depended on it.

The river is filled with spluttering and squelching sounds, and snapping when the men toss their bales of washing onto the car tyres swimming before them in the river. Dexterously they spread the Ahou-Gbasra soap. There is no soap that washes any cleaner, they say; on the surrounding hills, women cook the grey lumps of palm oil, tree bark and acid – industrial soap would be much too expensive. When the Fanicos step out of the water, when they wring the washing, spread it out and iron it later with irons filled with coals, they are soaking wet. They earn 25 CFA francs per piece of laundry – not even 4 cents. If they do not wash enough laundry, they do not have any food in the evening. They actually wash for their life. And Aiidara is their leader.

At six o’clock this morning, the 40-year-old set out through the overcrowded and quarter Adjamé that never sleeps. “Habit, habit”, the small man cried, “washing, washing”. And his loyal customers gave him the laundry they collected especially for him, because they trust him. At half past seven, Aiidara stood before his personal tyre in the river, like every day. It is hard work, he says, “I scrape along”.

Six years ago, when the war started in Côte d’Ivoire, the Fanicos were driven away. In those days, they still worked in the nearby forest, hundreds of them; the water was clear, and old trees protected them from the sun. Then the forest police came and drove them away – probably because they were afraid that rebels could also be hiding in the forest. Reportedly, many people were killed. The washer Aiidara became the leader Aiidara. He went to the town hall and begged: we have to provide for our families! Please give us some place to work.

Soon Aiidara will go to the town hall again. He wants to lead the Fanicos back to the place they used to work at. Here in Attecoubé, between the two motorways, there is virtually no room for their washing; the sun burns down ruthlessly from the sky, and the water is brown and muddy. Tourist buses with curious whites have long since stopped coming. There mostly used to be four a day; they were a change and brought good money with them.

When Aiidara is finished and his washing is ironed, he takes it back. It is four o’clock in the afternoon by then, and the thin man can feel how much he has worked in his arms and legs. He can see it in his fingers and his shrivelled bare feet. He goes home to his wife; his five children all died, two of them in the hospital, before the very eyes of the doctors. Aiidara has every reason to complain about life and its injustice. But he does not complain at all. Instead he softly murmurs: “I rather come here instead of becoming a crook.”