These dance photos were taken one evening within the president's compound. About half a dozen members of our party had been invited to have dinner with him. The dinner began around 9 p.m., and we found the president to be charming, eager to put us all at ease, and possessing a great sense of humor.

When the meal concluded at about 11 p.m., he ushered us outside to a row of armchairs facing an open courtyard. There, close to 300 dancers waited to entertain us.

The drumming accompanying much of the dancing was intense, complicated, and very exciting. The dancing I know best comes from the South Pacific. The depth of my ignorance about The Gambia is profound, and I certainly don't claim to be any kind of expert, but I was able to compare Gambian dance with what I was accustomed to.

I have learned that, if you examine the dances of a country, they contain important clues about the psychological content of the culture they come from. I did note a number of things in the performances we witnessed.

While the dancers frequently performed in unison, they also performed solo in what evidently is a highly competitive and confrontational fashion. This contrasts strongly with most of the dances of Samoa, for instance, where the emphasis is almost always on the group rather than on the individual.

Perhaps if I am privileged enough to visit The Gambia again in the future, I'll be able to learn more about what the different dances are about and what they mean.—Richard A. Goodman