What does the expression dugu jɛbali mean exactly and/or how is it used in general?
In a recent class, we encountered it in E424 of Djoko at roughly 0:42. The context is a character (Basita) asking another (Denba) where they are arriving from:
Dugu jɛbali, i bɛ ka bɔ min?
"Bright and early [???], where are you coming from?
The expression seems to have to do with the typical use of ka jɛ with dugu to express the idea of “the day arising”.
With the negative participle -bali, it seems to literally mean like this:
dugu jɛbali
“unwhitening land/town”
(as in, “unrising day”)
But I am not sure if it used to say “bright and early this morning” or if it’s a different nuance.
From the Bambara Reference Corpus, I also found this example from the book “Bamanankan kalangafe”
Tile wa tasuma? Ayi, nin tɛna kɛ tasuma kɔni ye dugu jɛbali in na.
“Sun or fire? No, this will not be/become fire in any case early this morning [???] .”