Essential French phrases

How every interaction opens, in a country around 97% Muslim. Thiès also has a substantial Catholic community and a cathedral, so you will sometimes get 'bonjour' back — the greeting still opens the door.

'How are you?' in Wolof, followed by your family, your household and your health before anyone reaches the point. Wolof does far more of the work here than French does.

Thank you, answered with 'we share it'. The reply refuses the idea that a favour creates a debt, which is a fair summary of how obligation works here.

'How much is it?' Asking in Wolof in a Thiès market gets you a materially better first number than asking in French. Markets and taxis negotiate; shops and pharmacies do not.

The shared seven-seat estate car that runs between towns and leaves when full rather than on a timetable. Thiès is a hub for them, which is precisely why a car here is less necessary than in most Senegalese cities.

The Wolof kingdom this region belonged to, whose last damel, Lat Dior, fought the construction of the Dakar–Saint-Louis railway and was killed in 1886. The city that the railway built sits on the land of the man who resisted it, and everyone here knows it.

Not a metaphor. Thiès is 'la capitale du rail': the Dakar–Niger workshops arrived in 1923, the network's headquarters in 1934, and railwaymen were the city's professional class for two generations. Ask an older resident about the rail and you get an autobiography.

Sembène Ousmane's 1960 novel about the 1947–48 Dakar–Niger railway strike, much of it set here. It is the book Senegalese schoolchildren read about their own labour history, and reading it before you arrive tells you more about Thiès than any guide.

The tapestry works founded in 1966 on Senghor's initiative, which turned Senegalese painting into woven wall pieces sold internationally. It is the city's signature industry and its most surprising one — a state atelier that outlived the state's cultural policy.

'Slowly, slowly' — from the proverb about catching the monkey in the bush little by little. Deployed at you, kindly, whenever you try to compress a process that will not compress.

Hospitality as an obligation rather than a mood: feeding a guest first, giving up your bed. Refusing a meal outright reads as a rejection of the household, not as politeness.

Discretion — the duty to cover other people's difficulties rather than expose them. In a city this size it is also practical: everyone knows everyone, and loud public complaint costs you more than it gains.

Rice, fish and vegetables, the national dish, on UNESCO's intangible heritage list since 2021. Thiès is inland but an hour from the Kayar landings, so the fish is genuinely fresh and people are particular about it.

Green tea in three rounds over a small burner, bitter to sweet, taking an hour or more. Leaving after the first glass is the local equivalent of hanging up mid-sentence.