“Roots” is a devastating story of a dark time. And reading “Roots” while visiting The Gambia made my toubab (white person) soul more than a little ashamed. But guilt, like sadness, is hard to hold onto in The Gambia. The people are so genuinely and infectiously happy and welcoming. “Gambia– the Smiling Coast” reads the advertising billboard, and for once the ad people don’t lie.

It’s certainly not material wealth that makes for the ready smiles and willingness to joke. People live in cement huts with corrugated iron or thatched roofs. The $8 needed for a school term is too much for most parents. We came across a young woman crying in a forest in over 100 degree heat because she was too frightened to return home. She had lost one hundred dalasis (about $5) in the village, and didn’t know how to tell her mother. And yet despite the poverty there is tremendous happiness… happiness, in fact, as large and radiant as an African sun.

In a two week period I held more babies, cradled more toddlers, and danced with more grandmothers than I have done in my life. I never saw kids fighting with each other. The teenagers were so gentle and mellow, adolescent aggression appeared an anomaly. Even the bumsters, the local guys trying to bum a free ride, were more charming than worrisome.

When I ask my Gambian friend Lamin to account for this outpouring of friendliness and good will, he told that it stems from growing up in extended families. “You have to learn to get along with everyone,” he told me. In fact, it’s shameful to be separated from a family member by ill will, and a Gambian will go to great lengths to avoid a fight– the consequences just aren’t worth it.

I think that maybe something else is at work too: When you grow up surrounded by an extended family of people who love you, pick you up, hug you, care for you– you feel safe and secure. And maybe that’s what is at the heart of happiness after all: that sense of belonging.

Of course two weeks is no time to get to really know a place– but my 80-year-old mother, who has spent a great deal of time in The Gambia over the last eleven years, says this happiness is genuine. When she walks down the street she’s greeted by everyone: Barbara, Barbara” they call. Gorgeous young men with faces black as licorice hug her. Everyone knew of my coming. “This is your daughter?” they ask. “This is good” they say, taking my hand with delight. “It is good that you are here.”The girls tell me shyly I look like my mother, “You are beautiful,” they whisper to me. “No,” I say truly, “it is you that is beautiful.” We smile at each other. We are happy.

I love the point about how Americans may be travelers because of our roots, being immigrants. I think that is a very good point. We so often do things based on where we come from even if we don’t realize why. Interesting thoughts.