Episode 12: Chad-The Babel Tower of the World

Come and explore the nation of Chad or Tchad.  Along the way, we'll explore Lake Chad that feeds 50 million people.  Let's discuss how Tchad never stopped resisting colonization and what some of the consequences of that resistance looked like.  Let's explore the country that was called "The dead heart of Africa".  

#chad

#lakechad

#mahamatkaka

#sarapeople

#transsaharanslavetrade

Come on Explorers!  Let's journey through Africa, one nation at a time!

Come on Explorers!  Let's journey through Africa, one nation at a time!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Lake Chad, you've probably heard of it. It's a lake in Central Africa that sits at the meeting place between Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Niger. Lake Chad is fed from the Shodi River, among other tributaries. So go back to episode 11 to hear more about the Shodi River and what a tributary is. The freshwater lake is situated in an interior basin that used to be a much larger ancient sea. So this lake provides fresh water to about 50 million people in Africa. And it is shrinking fast. It's been around for thousands of years, millennia. But about 50 years ago at its fullest, it was as large as 25,000 square kilometers. Now it covers about 2,000 square kilometers at its fullest. Why? Well, climate change, that's real, and it's affected rainfall. Also, people. People use the lake water for building, development. Concrete requires water. But also population growth. The local population has tripled in the last 25 years. War, drought, famine, these are all things that make people migrate. Estimates show that with the current practices, by 2030, the whole world will face about a 40% shortfall between the water we will need to have available and the water that will actually be available. We need to understand the dynamics of water availability now more than ever. AI-driven data centers alone could increase the whole world's water consumption by about the amount of Denmark's annual consumption times five. Now the Lake Chad Basin offers the world's clearest view into our collective water future. Though the lake hasn't shrunk in about 20 years or so, the big shrinkage it went through it was very drastic in the 70s. So between the 60s and the 90s, that showed us how quickly water security can collapse and how devastating the consequences can become for millions of people. Lake Chat is giving us a preview of where the planet is heading if we don't make changes. So you can you reduce your water consumption by 40% now? Maybe turn off the faucet? Can you use 40% less AI now? We know AI is here to stay, but do we need to rely on it for every single thing? If we make changes now, we can prevent this water crisis. But I digress. The name Chad means lake or water in Kanuri. So Lake Chad is actually Lake Lake or Lake Water. So let's just call it Chad, like the original people did. Now that body of water is such an important feature in that area that the land surrounding it became known by the same name. I'm Gina from Sankofa Sojourns, where we travel to places impacted by the transatlantic slave trade, learn the history, while we also bring light and joy to spaces where there is just pain, sadness, and shame. We reclaim our heritage and we move from pain to joy, but we do it together in community. Follow us on all social media platforms and travel with us. And I mean it. Come on, I want to see my followers increase. I need more followers on YouTube because I'd like to do some more things with you on YouTube, but I can't because I don't have enough followers. Yeah, these platforms have lots of different benchmarks that they use to measure your availability. So they won't open up certain gates to you until you have a certain number of followers. So we need to get to a thousand followers on all platforms in order for me to be able to do more things with you. I'd love to go live more. I go to different spots and I'd love to take you there with me, and I'd like to do some live things there. So follow me on YouTube, Sankofa Sojourns, follow me on Instagram, Sankofa Sojourns, follow me on Facebook, Sankofa Sojourns. You're getting a hint here? Follow me on LinkedIn, Sankofa Sojourns. Follow me on TikTok, Sankofa Sojourns. That's where you'll follow me. But the more followers I get, the more we can engage with one another. So we'll be sojourning to Africa Town in Mobile, Alabama in November. So for more information, go to Sankofa Sojourns.com because I would love for you to sojourn with me. Now, explorers, on this journey, we will go to the closest place to the East Coast of America where you can see the big five live and in action. We're gonna learn today about a country that never stopped resisting colonization. Today we're gonna explore Chad. I love it. I love it. That's the Chatty and National Anthem. You can hear the RB influence. It's a cultural exchange that takes place, right? Our music goes out from black America all over the world, and then it comes back in different forms. So that's a beautiful tribute and a beautiful song. You could look it up and uh listen to so you can see what the lyrics mean. She's singing in French because as we'll learn, that's their official language, or one of them. But let's get to the greetings. Dumboy or Asalam Waleikum. Those are some of the ways you would greet someone in Chad. Dumboy is hello, and it might be in a sar language. It was difficult for me to find a lot of information as far as translations with Chad. And Asalamu Aleykum is Arabic because Chad is a predominantly Muslim country with a lot of Arabic-speaking people. Their official name is the Republic of Chad, and in French is Republic du Chad. Now remember, Chad is actually spelled with a T. Now I put it in as C in Africa A to Z because I didn't want to blow your mind. But Chad is spelled with a T. So it's actually T C H A D in French. But in English it's C-H-A-D. And so I know we're decolonizing, but I need you to be able to come along with me, so I didn't want to jump us ahead too far. So the Republic du Chad. So a lot of times you'll see Chad because Chadions, those are the people of Chad, but that's also how you describe things about Chad, Chadian music, Chadion food, but you'll see it spelled with a T at the beginning. So T C H A D I A N, or sometimes the French spelling with two N's and an E, different things. His nickname is the Babel Tower of the World or The Dead Heart of Africa. The motto of Chad is Unité Travail Progré. Their official languages, as we said, are French and Arabic. And now you know when you meet someone from Chad, they're a Chadian person. So you don't have to call them Chadis or something strange. Just Chad. Now let's get the Jeopardy facts and figures out of the way. The capital city is Njamina. There's a silent N in front of Jamina. So it's spelled N. Apostrophe D J A M E N A. So you might hear people say Jamina, Jamena, Jamina, Jamina is the capital city of Chad. Chad is the fifth largest country in Africa. It's pretty big. The currency is the CEFA, CEFA franc. So again, the Central African one, the XAF, if you're looking up the exchange rate. Remember, we talked about this. So Cameroon and Central African Republic are two of the nations that also own the CEFA. And Republic of Congo, aka Congo-Brazzaville, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon. So they're all on the same currency. The median age for Chad is 15.7 years old. So we're going to say median age, and we're going to use that instead of the average age because I've learned that statistically speaking, most things work on the median age. So what's the difference? The median age means half the people in the country are above that age, and half the people in the country are below that age. So this is in the middle. So the age in the middle is 15.7 years old. Their population is 21.7 million people and growing. That population was about 7 million people 25 years ago. So as I said, war, famine, drought, these all force people to migrate to different places. The region of Africa that Chad is in is the central region, right? Chad is in Central Africa. Your neighbors are Libya, Sudan, Nigeria, Niger, Central African Republic, and Cameroon. So if you follow what's been happening in the last 20, 30 years, you'll know that people are fleeing from Libya, people are fleeing from Sudan. Some people are even fleeing Cameroon. People are fleeing the Central African Republic, too. As people have to flee, they had to go somewhere. So Chad is getting a lot of refugees. Now Chad is roughly the same size as Alaska if you're you know comparing it to America. It's a little bit bigger than Alaska, about the same size as Peru, if you're looking at a global map. And so let's remember to look globally and not just think of everything as you know America versus the world. You know, let's look at the global picture as part of how we decolonize. So Chad is a landlocked nation and it's almost in the center of the continent. It's got three different temperate zones. So it has the Saharan desert zone in the north. So the Saharan zone is in the north. The middle is Sahel. So remember we talked about Sahel, that's the transition zone from the Sahara to the savannah. So you don't go just from desert to forest. So you have the Sahelian zone in the middle, and then in the bottom third, you have this what they call the Sudanese zone. So this is savanna with rain, trees, shrubs, grass, things like that scattered throughout the savannah area. The area is landlocked, but that mighty shoddy river and a smaller Logoni River run through those lands, run through the land of Chad, and they both go up to feed Lake Chad. So the climate changes from zone to zone. So you got desert, semi-desert, and tropical. So we'll start at the south in the Sudanese zone. It's tropical. They have long, heavy rain season. It ranges from May to early October. So that's a lot of rain. In December and January, the rain stops and then things heat up and temperatures go to about 35 degrees Celsius. So let's free our minds and do the math. So you're going to take the Celsius temperature, multiply it by 1.8, and add 32. So you get from 35 degrees to about 95 degrees. So 90 is 35 Celsius, 95 Fahrenheit. But the temperatures do take a drop at night, and sometimes they can go as low as 16, 17 degrees Celsius. So that's like 61, 62 degrees Fahrenheit at night. The hottest month in the Sudanese zone is March. Highs are normally around 40 degrees Celsius. I'll let you do the math. I'll wait. Yes, 104 degrees Fahrenheit. So in summer, the temperature is about 30, 31 degrees Celsius. But it's not so much the heat as it's the humidity, right? We know that, especially if you live through a New York City summer. So in the south is where you will also find Zakuma National Park. And that's where you can see the big five: elephant, rhino, lion, leopard, and Cape Buffalo. So they roam the national park. The park is open from December 1st to May 31st because that's the dry season in the Sudanese zone. So if you're going to visit Chad, maybe take some time, make a plan. Because it takes planning to visit Chad. It's not a place you just pop up and go to. So make a plan and go to the park and go see the animals. As I said, see. They want to live, but they do like for you to see them. They're beautiful and they like to show off. So go see them. In the center of the country, you have the Sahelian zone. So you have the same rainy season, but the rainfall is less than it is down south in the Sudanese zone. Now the high temperatures in the Sahelian zone in the middle are about 30 Celsius. So we know that's about 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Now that's during the day, and sometimes it's higher. The air is dry and the nights are cool. Now, but by February, the temperature starts rising and it reaches its peak around April and May. And it can often be hotter than 104 degrees Fahrenheit. That's the 40 degrees Celsius. So in the summer months here in the US, the temperature in Chad goes down to about 90 degrees. So when I say going down, because think about these heights of 104 degrees, so 90 is nice and cool compared to 104, it's all relative. Now in the north, in the Saharan zone, it has its own hot, dry climate because it's the desert. But when it's winter here, the temperatures are lower there too. So during the day, temperatures can be about 30 degrees Celsius, and at night they can dip to zero degrees Celsius. So we know zero times 1.8, it's still zero. And then you add 32. So 0 degrees Celsius is 32 degrees Fahrenheit. So that's freezing temperature. So at night in the Saharan zone, the temperatures can dip to freezing. So if you're going to be up north, remember to bring the appropriate clothing because the temperature can range from 86 to 32. Now the rest of the year, the Saharan zone is really hot and temperatures are around 40 degrees Celsius from April to September. The highest recorded temperature is about 50 degrees Celsius. That's 122 degrees Fahrenheit. That's hot. The best time to visit Chad is winter. And in particular, the months of December and January. The sky is clear. Even though sometimes the northeast wind, you remember the harmitan can raise dust. It can create a haze, but the weather is still nicer in December and January. And if you have to come during harmitan, just learn how to twist that desert turban. Bring a long scarf. Somebody will teach you how to make a turban out of it to protect your face. Chad is a presidential republic. But they have had eight coups, and five have been successful. So they've had lots of times where they were under military rule. Lots of conflict in Chad. Now a presidential election was held on May 6, 2024. And Mahamat Idris Debi Into, he was the son of President Idris Debi Into. Mahamat won. He was inaugurated on May 23rd, 2024, transitioning from military leader to president. And he's ostensibly, meaning on the surface, returning Chad to civilian constitutional rule. But prior to that, his father ruled from 1991 to 2021. That's a long reign. And he was killed on the battlefield in a coup. So his son, they call him Mohammed Kaka, took over and ruled by military junta for three years until those elections in uh 2024. So the son took over after his father was killed in battle. Military junta, that just means instead of a regular government and you know with uh different chambers of house and national assembly and things like that, you have a group of military leaders who are running the country together. Junta is Spanish, right? For together. And I think it also means meeting in Spanish. So you have they were ruled by military junta. That's what it means to be under military rule. Um your armed forces run your nation. So let's see how all this plays out. We're talking, you know, leadership, coup, succession. Let's just see what happens in Chad. Now the people of Chad feel like they have a little more hope. Or at least they did before President Idris Debbie was killed. But I feel like from what I've seen and read, hope is returning to Chad. The original people were the South people. They were a legendary civilization, and the legend has it that they were giants. Yes, physical giants. Anyway, the Sao civilization flourished around the 6th century CE. Remember common era, and its center was around the Shari River, which is south of Lake Chad. So the Sao were highly skilled farmers, craftspeople, and artisans, and they worked with clay and metals. And then the Zagawa people arrived from what would be Libya today. So they migrated from what would be Libya today, a little further north to the area around Lake Chad. And when they got there, they found these independent, walled, what you will call city states. So they weren't nations. They weren't countries. Each group had their area and they had them walled off and they worked with one another outside the walls, but they lived within their own walls. We find that in many parts of Al Kebulan. The Trans-Saharan slave trade changed things. One of the main routes in the trade went from the Lake Chad area up to Libya. And that area was the heart of the Trans-Saharan slave trade. So that's when I heard the name Dead Heart of Africa. I wondered, is that why they called it that? Islamic rulers like Mai Idris Aluma in the 16th century used horses imported from North Africa and acquired through the sale of humans to expand raids even further south into non-Muslim territories, creating a self-perpetuating cycle. So it was the captives funded the horses so that they could take more horses down south and take get more captives. And so you just had this circular trade. It kind of reminds me of the triangle slave trade. Boats would leave from England or Europe, but mostly England. Let's keep it real. In the beginning, especially, right? And they would come from England, loaded down with things to trade, weapons, cotton, different things. They would bring stuff from England and bring it to Africa, trade those things for Africans, and then the line would go back from Africa to the Americas or the New World, right? So it could be Brazil, could be Charleston, could be New York. These were all big ports for the slave trade. And so they would bring those goods, you know, if they brought those goods, say to the Caribbean, then those people would send molasses and sugar cane and rum up back to England in exchange for the enslaved Africans that they had. So you just had this evil triangle just running across the Atlantic Ocean. So that was the triangle trade, which the Trans-Saharan slave trade just made me think of. So if you remember the episode on Central African Republic, powerful kingdoms like Kanem, Darfur, they raided the area to fuel the Transsaharan slave trade. People were captured and sold into slavery to northern Africa, Arabia, and beyond. The Sultanate of Dar al-Kuti, established in the late 18th century, became a powerful force and very big in the slave trade. They would raid populations to the south, sell captives north, and that again really solidified these Saharan roots. So by the 1870s, we got the warlord Rabi Azubir. And he was pretty destructive from the 1870s to the 1890s. He captured so many people that he left the area full of half-empty villages. He left a legacy of devastation that persisted all the way up until the colonial era. His reign finally ended when the French got the territory in the scramble for Africa, and they used French and African soldiers to finally defeat the Sultanate. And in 1900, Rabia Azoubert was killed and decapitated by the French in the Battle of Kusari. This hastened the decline of the Trans-Saharan slave trade. But as we know, it didn't end it. It still goes on today. There are over 200 ethnic groups in Chad. That's why they call it the Babel Tower of the World or the Babel Tower of the World. So many people, so many different languages, people living together, working together. Mostly in peace. Sometimes there's conflict. The predominant ethnic groups are the Sarah. That's about 26% of the people. And then you have the people of Arabic descent, and that's about 13%. You have the Wadai, you have the Goran, the Sagawa that we talked about, they're still there. But they're about 2% now. The Fula, we always, they're everywhere. They're popping up in every country. They're about 2% of the people. Currently, you have a lot of foreign nationals, refugees, so that makes up about 2.5%. And then you have a tiny minority of French Chadans who've been there since the 1800s when their ancestors first came to the area. Chad is home to more than 170 languages. Sara is one of the most widely spoken language families. So that's what I learned about Chad. It's like you may not speak Sara, but you might speak Sar. There's different languages within each linguistic family. So it's very fascinating. Arabic is the lingua franca. So that's the language of commerce. French, I said, is the official language, but you also do business in French. You're not not just um going to school and doing government things. Like it's sort of like if you don't speak one of the ethnic languages, you can default to French or Arabic and do business that way. So the languages are grouped in families, as I said. So there's the Arabicized groups, there's the Chadic groups, there are the Nilo-Saharan languages, some of which face extinction. There are the Mabhan languages, Saharan languages, such as Kanuri, where we get the name Chad from, Zakhawa, Tubu, and Kanembu. Kanembu being the language of the people of Kanem. You have your Eastern Sudanic languages, central Sudanic languages, your Niger Congo languages, Buwa, Atlantic Congo, and that's one of the languages where the Fulani people end up. And so Fulani falls in that family. About 23% is Protestant, 20% Roman Catholic. Now you have about 1% who say they don't follow any religion, and about 1% who say we follow traditional indigenous religions. And the syncretism is real. People literally practice ancient ways mixed with modern religions. Now, as far as business, Chad joined the ranks of oil-producing countries in 2003. So they had hoped that things would turn around economically for the country once they got all this crude oil pumping. But so far it hasn't changed much for most people day to day. Cotton is grown in the south, cattle are raised in the center. And those are the main industries of Chad. Now who came and colonized Chad? In the scramble for Africa, this area went to France. In 1910, Chad became part of the French Equatorial Africa Colony. The French put civilians in charge of running this southern Chadian territory of their French Equatorial African colony. Because it's landlocked and isolated, another reason might be it's called the Dead Heart of Africa. Nobody wanted to work there. So it was actually a punishment to be sent there from France. So you got to remember, there's places that are coastal, the French owned, could get sent to be in this beautiful city. You could be in Saint Louis or Dakar, where you're on the water and you have the breezes. So nobody really wanted to go to the dead heart of Africa. So it was a punishment for the French. Like if you were a French diplomat and being sent to Chad, you probably did something wrong. Now in the north, and really we learned across the nation, but specifically in the north, in that Saharan zone, they never gave in to colonization. And the French kind of left them alone. As long as they didn't engage in slavery and those big slave raids like outright anymore. The French kind of left them alone. Why do you think that is? Do you think it's because the French really cared about slavery and didn't want to see the people of Chad, the Chadians, exploited? No. They needed those people themselves for the free labor. Because they had forced labor once they took over. So they were building railroads to get things out of Chad and through Chad to use Chad as a way station, a bypass to get to the coast to move things. So they wanted to build railroads and roads. So they built a lot of roads. And the building of the roads did help reduce the trans-Saharan slave trade because there were less places for raiders to hide and catch you on the road because now you had cleared roads. But also the French wanted that labor for themselves. As I said though, the people of Chad really never accepted colonial rule and they resisted. But there was a massacre on November 15, 1917, in the town of Abeche. French forces carried out one of the worst episodes of colonial oppression on record. So what happened was a French soldier was stabbed to death, and his commanding officer decided it was one of the local Islamic dignitaries who had killed him. Now it's 1917. It's not like they were going to have a trial and they were going to produce evidence. This is just what this man felt. Now they had some proven cases where soldiers killed their commanding officers and soldiers killed each other, French soldiers. But he decided, no, this was done by this man. So on the morning of November 15th, the commandant ordered the colonial troops to assassinate the military chief of Dacom and his men. 56 people were killed. More than 20 of them were Quranic scholars. Their heads were decapitated again and laid out in two rows at the eastern entry of the district. So that way, if anyone entering this area would see these rows of decapitated heads. That's how oppression works. You have to use fear, you have to use horror to get people to comply. Then the Commandant started rounding up, assassinating and deporting any suspects who were left. In 1918, children were assassinated in Doba to punish the parents who manufactured and sold a local beer. So they did not want the local people having their own businesses and making their own money because then they wouldn't be working for the colony. So they assassinated the children to stop the parents from being independent. There was forced labor and the farmers had to grow cotton. What is it about cotton? What is it about cotton that it just it brings out the worst in people? There was so much killing and brutality visited upon the people of Chad in the name of colonization. But the people never stopped fighting. Because as I said, it wasn't a colony that was a hot property. It was just what they had. So resistance continued. And then after World War II, France gave some autonomy to their colonies and allowed them to be represented in the French National Assembly. So Chadians were getting French citizenship and forming political parties. There was a conservative party called the Union Démocratique Chadienne. Now remember, it's Chad with a T. So it's the UDT party. And that was made up of Chadians who were loyal to France and traditional Islamic leaders, all wanting things to stay the same. They were all advocating for things to just remain as they are. Then there was the Progressive Parti Progressive Chadien, the PPT, because remember Chad spelled with the T. And that was made up of some of the Sahra people, because they were the bulk of the civil servants in the nation. So that was made up of the civil servants, activists, both labor activists and social activists, and people who wanted political reform. So the PPT wanted complete independence. They were done with autonomy, they didn't need to be represented in the French National Assembly. They just wanted to be left alone and become an independent nation. So the PPT is the one that took hold, and that's the one that gained support. And when the people of Chad had the right to vote in their own elections, the PPT was the prevailing party. So in 1958, Chad voted to form a republic, and the PPT leader, Francois Tombalbet, became the Republic's first prime minister. So the Republic of Chad declared its independence from France on August 11, 1960. And then Francois Tombalbet went from Prime Minister to the country's first president. By 1962, President Tombalbey had banned all political parties and had become very autocratic. Meaning he wasn't interested in building a democracy necessarily. He ruled the country with an iron fist. There was corruption, the people were not happy, there was lots of discontent. So on June 22nd, 1962, so almost two years after they became independent, the Front de Libération Nationale du Tchad, or the Frulinat Party, was founded. But it was founded in Sudan, in Niyala, because remember, uh President Tombalbe didn't allow for any other political parties. So people got banned, people got exiled. So these exiled leaders in the North founded this Frulina party. Now that party, it unified different opposition groups, and the goal was to overthrow the southern-dominated government and fight this neocolonialism. Because they were proclaiming a program that rejected ethnic discrimination. They also wanted something called confessional politics, meaning they wanted politics that was um distributing power among different ethnic groups and different um religious groups as well. And they also demanded total national independence. So with Frolinat and the PPT, things got hectic in Chad. So people had to go through initiation ceremonies to prove their authenticity, to prove their loyalty. In 1975, Tombal Bei was assassinated in a military coup d'etat. This was the first of many coups, and this is how the country changed hands, leadership changed hands for many, many generations. As we saw as recently as 2021, when the son took over after his father was killed in a military coup. The educational system of Chad is patterned after the French mock. So you have primary, secondary, higher education. Primary education is free and compulsory, starting with your six-year-olds, and it gives them basic literacy training for six years or so. And then your secondary education is offered for seven years, and it gives students the option to go into different vocational tracks. So they could go into fashion designing, they could go into restaurant work, they could go into hotel management. So vocational school is designed to send that child from school to work. And then they have higher education as well at the university. So education is free and compulsory from ages six to fourteen. But still, uniforms are not covered, food is not covered. So many children don't go to school. And if they do get to go to school, they don't go for the whole time from ages six to fourteen because of you know socioeconomic challenges, systemic challenges. When there's coups and things, it's hard for schools to remain open. The literacy rate is low, about 30%. So that means 30% of the people of age 15 and up can read and write in Chad. So 70% cannot. So they rely heavily on oral storytelling. That's how people learn culture, that's how culture is passed down from generation to generation, not necessarily written in stories, books, and poetry, but by people telling the stories themselves, also through music and dance. Okay, that is a way to pass down knowledge, history, and values from one generation to the next. So they have traditional storytellers that play a critical role in keeping the cultural heritage. Um, so you might hear the French word for these storytellers is creot, the African word. And I say African word in this case because you'll find it in lots of different countries. So I'm not even sure which language it belongs to. It seems to belong to Africa, this word, Jolly. Jolly or Jelly. That's the storyteller. That's the person who keeps the history and passes it on. So this person plays such a significant role that during the COVID-19 pandemic, the UN partnered with the Jollies and had them traveling around the country and teaching public health lessons through oral storytelling. To me, that shows the power of this oral tradition and that it still works today. The sciences don't have a big presence in institutions in Chad yet, because they don't have a lot of money. They're still trying to figure out how to turn that crude oil into money that improves the life of the country. They also have lots of civil wars and coups and all of that sort of thing will get in the way of scientific research and teaching. But they've had their ancient technology for millennia. As I said, the people were working, the sow people worked in clay and metals, and as long as the area was populated, they have been using their ancient technology to produce household utensils, make tools, and also make works of art. Now, some of the art is for religious purposes. So you might have burial urns, you might have little figures of people and animals made in clay and bronze. So the Chadians have always been technological. They've always been technological. And now they're focusing that technology on counterterrorism efforts. Because, as I said, they're located near Sudan, they're located near Libya, they're located near Nigeria. So they all are facing different terrorist groups working within them. And they sometimes come into Chad. And so Chad is working with the UN to fight terrorism, and that's where their technology is going right now. Well, we want to talk about the arts of Chad, and I always like to start with the most beautiful art, the culinary art, food. So I found that Chad, since it's such a diverse population, the food is also very diverse. And there was just so many things. So one thing that I found that seemed to run throughout the nation was millet, millet porridge. It seems to be eaten across the nation of Chad. So it's cooked with water, sometimes coconut milk, flour, cinnamon, topped with fruit. It looks delicious if you watch them making it, and it really sounded good to me, too. Southern Chadians, remember, I said there's the Sudanese zone. So they eat rice, potatoes, red beans, spices, fruit, meat, and of course, millet. Now the people in The north are nomadic and they they raise cattle, so they rely primarily on milk and meat. Now it is landlocked, but remember the Shatter River and the Lake Chad are prominent features. So they do also get some fish in their diet. So remember the beer I was telling you about that the people were making during colonization, and their children had to be murdered to stop the parents from as a punishment for the parents making it? Well, they still make this beer. It's called billibili. And it's a homemade beer made from millet or sorghum, and it's very popular in the south. Now, tea. They always just say offer you a cup of tea. But it sounds delicious. I tried to make it at home, but I didn't have any more um hibiscus leaves. So I don't know. I'm gonna have to look through my treasure trolls because I know I got hibiscus somewhere. So you make tea from black tea, green tea, dried hibiscus flowers, and spices. So that's when someone in Chad offers you a cup of tea. That is likely to be what you're about to drink. It sounds so wonderful. And it is the most frequently consumed beverage in the country. This this tea is what everyone agrees on in Chad. So the other art forms they have would be wood carving, mask making, basket weaving. These are the things that they've been doing for thousands of years in Chad. Now, in literature, I've learned about this politician who also wrote books, Antoine Bangui Rombay. So Bangui, remember that's the capital city of Central African Republic. So that just shows you how this area wasn't a country necessarily. It was people. People living and working together. But anyway, Bangui wrote about his life in Chad, and in his writings, he was always standing up to the government because, as I said, from 91 to 2021, they had the same leader, and he was an autocrat, too. So there was a lot to stand up against. Uh, Bangui went to jail for his writings. He wrote, and then he came out and wrote about his time in jail, right? So he was a warrior and his pen was his weapon. He died January 28th, 2026, at the ripe old age of 92. Now, in a country where the life expectancy is probably in about 60 years old, for him to live to 92 was such an amazing testament to his strength that he was going to keep living and he was going to keep fighting for the freedom of his people. So that's Antoine Bangi. Chad has some unique musical instruments, and one of which is the Kakaki. You may have heard the Kakaki. A smaller version of it played. If you've ever seen a snake charmer, the small horn that they're playing is like a miniature version of the kakaki. The kakaki is like 10 feet long, it's huge, it's massive. It sits on the ground and you stand up to play it. And they also have another familiar instrument in Chad, the Balafon. And these instruments are used to create melodies that accompany dancing at religious ceremonies as well as cultural ceremonies and celebrations. Now there's some popular Chadian music that you can look up on YouTube. These are some things. And you can also look up traditional Chadian music. There are some really interesting musical traditions in Chad that are beautiful. And the Jali use these instruments when they're telling their stories as well. So it's a beautiful blend of the different ways that movement, memory, art, and culture work together. Now, in most cultures, because I remember Chad has about 200 cultures, but hospitality is a big part of all of the cultures. So you as a visitor will be treated very well when you come to someone's home. People are honored to have you as a guest, and um, I noticed that in some a lot of West African countries as well, uh, when a guest is coming and it's an honored guest, they will prepare a chicken. So it's not something like here in America, we just go around just eating chicken all the time, but that's not so everywhere. And so if a chicken is prepared in Chad, that's a big deal. And if they offer you the chicken gizzard, well, you just won the jackpot. Because that means you are welcome here and we respect you here. So if you don't want to eat a chicken gizzard, you might start an international incident. You figure it out. Now, the celebration of the visitor reflects the real deep way that Chad and people work together. The community is everything, they don't even want to eat alone, it's just all about doing things as a community, but also putting the community above the individual, the collective well-being is what makes the Chadian culture run. So eating together off the same plate, that's part of solidarity, that's part of friendship, and that's something that you can expect in Chad. Dance is also used to tell stories and to reenact history. Now, some of the dance is pretty calm, it's not as spirited as you may see in some West African dance cultures, but it's very graceful and it's very beautiful. And I did see a group of wodabe young men, and it's clear from the way they were dressed and what they were doing that they are part of the Fulani family, because this was a courtship ritual where the young men get all dressed up in their finest clothes and their hat, those cone-shaped hats, and they paint their faces with different materials to highlight their own beauty. They might paint their lips darker to make their teeth look even whiter, and this is all about highlighting their beauty because then they go out and perform a ritual dance for the young ladies, for the eligible young ladies. So I don't want to butcher the pronunciation. It looks like to me Gerrawal or Garowal. So G-E-R-E-W-O-L, Garowal or Gerowal. Look it up. It's it's it's interesting, it's fun. So from the trans-Saharan slave trade to colonization to autocratic rulers and military coup, the Republic of Chad has seen quite a lot of conflict and pain. Yet, the people still dance, the young men still court the young women, people plant their crops, they fight, they work, and they live on. So I want to say Shukran Jazilan. That's thank you very much, and that's what you're gonna hear in Chad. It's Chadian Arabic. So thank you very much. So I invite you to like, follow, and share this podcast. We're now in 36 countries. 36. We got another one, and still on six continents, but I want to say thank you, Finland. Welcome, Finland. Finland is the home of Yari Litmanin, one of the best Finnish football players of all time. When the world is gripped in the throes of World Cup fever, I want to say welcome, Finland. Welcome and thank you. And thank you to all of our loyal explorers here in the US and in the UK for never missing an episode. Never missed an episode in Dublin, Ohio. Never missed an episode in Tower Hamlet, London. Never, never, never. So I thank you, thank you, thank you for your loyalty and for your commitment, your commitment to yourself for being here, doing this work with me, and hopefully opening your mind. Welcome to our newest explorers in Stanford, California, Hillsboro, New Jersey, and Tampa, Florida. And shout out to all of my listeners around the world. So the Explorers Club is growing. Keep sharing the podcast, keep inviting others to listen to, share an episode with someone you know would enjoy it or somebody who you think should open up their mind. So the next episode up is Camaros. May never even have heard of Camaros, but you're gonna enjoy yourself when you explore it. So as we come to the end of this episode, we're gonna do some deep breathing. Because we need to always have tools to control our central nervous system. So as we explore the center of Africa, let's explore our own centers. And let's also stay centered. So let's breathe in through our nose and out through our mouth deeply. Breathing in through your nose, push it down to your stomach and let it come out of your mouth with a sigh. So again, breathe in. Again, breathe in. Take a long breath and let it last time deeply breathe in through your nose. And let it close this out the same way we opened it. By saying, Asalamu alaykum. Peace be unto you. It's how you can greet someone coming in, and how you can greet someone going out. I want you to think about this question until we meet again. Can you while stepping forward into your future look back into your past and take only what serves you as you move forward? Can you sank hopha?