Pounding Millet

©2006 Djibril N’Doye

Everywhere in this world, people talk about modern technology but they never talk about the potential destructive effects of “modernizing” and technology. Some of the richest traditions I experienced while growing up in my village, where I was always inspired and educated, are affected by modernization.

During my youth, I would wake up every morning with the sunrise, aided by the rhythm of “Walouwâye”: the pounding of the millet for the day’s meal. Each household has an area reserved for storage of the grain and the women go there day after day to prepare the flour.

“Walouwâye” represents a place and a time for women to gather to work, but also to chat amongst themselves, share ‘secrets’, seek advice and comfort. When a family “upgrades” and spends money to have one of its members take the grain by herself to be ground up quickly by a machine, she loses that special time of bonding and kinship.