Multi-wife management

In any conversation about Senegalese culture, polygamy is pretty much top of the list. Not only is it arguably the most difficult aspect of life for westerners to really get their heads around, but it is increasingly the source of heated, if both good natured and light hearted, debate amongst the Dakarois.

A friend of mine has 3 wives. He is the first to acknowledge that his life is extraordinarily complicated. Recently his second wife was all wrong with her timing and managed to give birth to his fifth child while he was on rotation with wife 3. They were sound asleep when the phone rang at 3am to announce the happy event. Wife no. 3's reaction? 'This woman is making my life a misery - she won't even let me get a full night's sleep now!'

As he says, complicated.