There is so much I could say about my community placement, Green Wave. Green Wave is a social enterprise selling jewelry that trains and hires women from the nearby women’s shelter called Maison Rose. I could talk for hours about the mission, my boss, or the community that has become another family to me over the course of my Bridge Year, but to keep it short, I'll just share what a typical day looked like for me.
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It’s breezy as I hop off bus 35 and start my 10-minute walk to the workshop. I stop by my favorite coffee stand and ask Dialow how his morning has been, how his family is, and if I can get my usual—“comme d’habitude?” He asks me how work has been, how myfamily is, and how my weekend was, as he nimbly crafts my cafe au lait. I pay for my coffee then repeat this same process with Ibrahima down the street, who makes the best omelet sandwiches in all of Dakar. With my hands full, I head to the workshop.
“Asalaam Maleykum!” I greet the workshop.
“Maleykum Salaam,” comes the resounding response from the women around the workshop table.
I ask them how they are, and they ask the same of me. Just as with Dialow and Ibrahima, I ask about their weekends and their families. Their weekends were peaceful, and their families are at peace. Mamdiarra, who is the youngest in the shop and is also ⅞ of the way through her small brioche bun, tells me to come eat breakfast. That’sher breakfast she’s referring to, by the way. An egg sandwich in one hand and coffee in the other, I thank her for offering (but do not take her up on it), sit down at my designated stool at the table, and start on my breakfast. I then make the fatal mistake of zoning out mid meal, and Ami, the oldest in the workshop ("Mom Ami" to me), scolds me for forgetting to invite them to eat. I quickly correct my mistake, saying “come eat!” and in a shocking turn of events, no one wants any of my sandwich. It’s about the principle, of course.
As I go to the storage room to stash my backpack, Ndeymour—the outgoing spokesperson of the group—showers me with compliments about my Senegalese garb and the style of my hair that day. I open my mouth to thank her, but before I can respond, she’s switching gears, worriedly asking why I look so tired and if my stomach has recovered from its bout of nausea from the week before. I tell her yes, andI’ve got a hunch that it’s the fried donut holes that I buy from a vendor down the road. I give her a reassuring thumbs-up. She levels a glare at me, shakes her head, and sighs exasperatedly. We’ve had this conversation before. “What have I told you about street food?” she says. I promise her that it won’t happen again—though it most definitely will—and, satisfied with my response, she leaves me be.
Mamdiarra, Ami, and Ndeymour are the three women who are part of the gold and silver team of Green Wave jewelry. They were the first women to be trained by Hazza, our boss, and had been in the workshop for over a year by the time I arrived. All of them are single mothers of three and, through Green Wave, have become completely financially independent, a feat nearly impossible to do in a society where women’s roles are mostly confined to cooking, cleaning, and raising children. However, despite having an income much higher than anything they've had before, being a single working mother with young kids means daycare, and daycare isn’t cheap.
I peek over at the mat in the corner and make eye contact with Lamine, Mamdiarra’s four-year-old son. Shooting me a cheeky smile, he picks up where we left off the day before in a hide-and-seek game, before Mom Ami tells him to be quiet, which is code for me to do the same. Lamine and I share a sheepish glance before I finish my breakfast and begin my work.
At the beginning of the year, my work consisted of training a new group of women at the women’s shelter in a new line of jewelry that my boss had adopted. The Sea Plastic line, made from plastic that we’d found washed up on the beach, aimed to be more affordable than the gold and silver options already offered at Green Wave. And through reusing plastic, this new line sticks to Green Wave’s mission of sustainability that was previously displayed in the recycling of silver within the silver/gold jewelry line. Personally, I thought the idea was creative genius.
So now, toward the end of my time in Senegal, the new women are fully trained. They come into the workshop two days a week and I help them create pieces for the shop. However, at Hazza’s suggestion, I’ve been trying to gradually back off and be less involved in their work so that when I leave in a couple of weeks, they are completely self-sufficient: sustainability—in more ways than one.
So, on days like today, I inform the women about a couple of new projects, and they know exactly what to do. As they work, I take videos for Green Wave’s Instagram, go through our emails, clean tools, and reorganize the Sea Plastic display until they have a question for me. And it’s kind of bittersweet to watch from the side. I’m always itching to help in even the smallest ways, but watching them continue their work independently is beautiful and amazing in a way because that means I did my job.
Typically, about two hours into my day, Hazza comes in. The workshop always brightens up at her windswept appearance, as she greets everyone individually and really, truly asks how each person is doing: She asks Ndeymour how the apartment search is going, if she’s managed to get a hold of her landlord. She asks Mamdiarra about her boyfriend, if they’ve made up from their fight last week. She asks me how excursion planning is going and how this reflection is coming along. That is the nature of Hazza and, as she’s explained to me, the nature of this business. As a social enterprise, it requires trust and communication, much more than your average business.
This is because, since the beginning, the women’s personal lives have been so deeply intertwined with their work because hiring women from a women’s shelter means hiring women who often have no one else to lean on. There were hard conversations that had to be had—about living situations and loans and infants in the workshop. And the conversations that started out as a necessity, employer to employee, became something a lot more comfortable and familiar, almost friend to friend. Now,the ladies come to Hazza for troubles ranging anywhere from childcare complications to drama with an ex-best friend. Now,the ladies criticize her for the state of her hair or interrogate her about the wellbeing of her boyfriend. It’s casual and comfortable and what some would call wildly informal…but I think that’s why it works.
As I wrap up my work for the day and clean my spot at the table, Hazza gives me the update on some of these issues. She gives me all the details, throwing in commentary about how she believes culture and societal pressure have influenced these challenges. And here is where I cannot emphasize enough how perfect she is for this job: Hazza was a human geography major in college and is a lover of all things sociology. So, for all of the ways she’s different from the women by race, language, culture, and ethnicity, she makes up for in patience, understanding, and sociological imagination.
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I’m now writing this reflection from a chair in a hotel where my Bridge Year cohort is staying for transference. It is May 13, seemingly far from even my final weeks at Green Wave, and even farther from my first days there. But what sticks with me is a quote that Ndeymour said to me on my last day of work, which I feel so strongly reflects the way I have felt towards Green Wave and the whole team there: “Tu m’as donné une raison de sourire.” You’ve given me a reason to smile.
