Gambia: On The Spot

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Gambia: On The Spot

Friday, 28 October 2011 15:30

(Column) - In line with our insatiable desire to bring Gambians and Gambian affairs to our readers, we are please to announce yet another weekly column, On The Spot. Anchored by PK Jarju, a prolific writer formerly with both the Independent and the Daily Observer, who now lives in exile in the United Kingdom. Each week PK would run interviews, hard hitting ones that is, with Gambians and non Gambians who might have one way or the other influence the course of society in our country irrespective of their occupation or background. This week, PK starts with a familiar face but one which has not been heard of for some time. His guest is Aboulie Sey, another prolific writer whose gripping and moving prose and expressions in the then Independent Newspaper marked him as a silent but formidable pen pusher which in fact put him in trouble with the authorities. Well that was then. Aboulie is now living quietly in Dakar, Senegal where he works for the African Press Agency APA. If you know him then, and wonder what he has been up to, then follow PK's interview below;

Who is Mr. Abdoulie Sey?
A quiet, reflective human being who lives life without a timetable.

When were you happiest?
In childhood, holding hands with that first love – M

What is your greatest fear?
The future, fraught with uncertainties

What is your earliest memory?
As a young boy feeling vulnerable right in the middle of a herd of cows

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
My voice, not deep enough

What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Their smells

What was your most embarrassing moment?
When paraded in school assembly for slapping a teacher.

What is the most expensive thing you've bought?
The complete works of Shakespeare.

What is your most treasured possession?
My children.

What would your superpower be?
God.

What is your favourite smell?
The scent of a novel idea, whatever that means.

If you could bring something extinct back to life, what would you choose?
My childhood

What is the worst thing anyone's said to you?
“You deserve nothing but death” – while in detention, 2003.

Have you ever said "I love you" and not meant it?
I do not trust that phrase.

Which living person do you most despise, and why?
I do not have it in my heart to despise

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?
My childhood sweetheart, her name begins with the letter M

If you could go back in time, where would you go?
Kono Spark Road, Sierra Leone.

Which word do you most overuse?
OK.

What has been your biggest disappointment?
My inability to read Arabic.

How do you relax?
Idle evening walks around my village.

What is the closest you've come to death?
1989, almost at the end of a loaded pistol I stole from a close cousin to satisfy an early curiosity with guns

What single thing would improve the quality of your life?
Confidence.

What is your greatest achievement?
Bringing children to this world.

What keeps you awake at night?
The right words to use for my thoughts the next day.

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
Faces don’t usually mean what they show.

Is it better to give or receive?
One can’t go without the other, since you have to receive first before you are in a position to give.

Which living person do you most admire?
Wole Soyinka, says at the right time the right thing that’s in everybody’s mind.

How would you like to be remembered?
Sweet, even-tempered and easy to please.