In the busy harbor of Dakar, Senegal, a ferryboat nudges the sun-drenched pier, disgorging tourists onto Gorée Island for a day of sightseeing. Looking down from the bridge, 25-year-old Khoudia Sarr is all business, turning control of the vessel back over to its commander before heading below to check on the engines. For Sarr, a graduate of the CRWRC Adolescent Health program, it is a journey that began with a knock on her door.
“Someone from the program came to my house and explained the program to me and spoke to my mother,” Sarr said. “She agreed to let me take part in the Learning Circle.”
Working in collaboration with a partner organization, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Senegal, CRWRC has established learning circles as part of its Adolescent Health program. Designed as a way to engage out-of-school youth in learning, the seven months of Learning Circle sessions empower participants to make healthy choices for their lives, to pursue their dreams for their own futures, and to gain the confidence and skills to look beyond the meager opportunities that life would otherwise offer them. CRWRC provides the training, staff mentoring, technical consultation and networking that enables this program to succeed. Having grown up watching her father work on car engines as a mechanic, Sarr says she dreamed of becoming a mechanic herself.
“The idea started when I was a participant in the Learning Circle group,” Sarr said. “Other girls said they wanted to learn to cook or sew, but I said, ‘Why can’t a woman be a mechanic?’”
Despite resistance from friends and even from her father, Sarr persisted. With the encouragement of the program staff, she began volunteering at the shop of a local mechanic. At the same time, having completed her Learning Circle sessions in 2002, Sarr joined her local Community Action Group, a group of former Learning Circle members who work through the Adolescent Health program to pass on their knowledge to other young community members. Even as she ascended quickly to become president of the group, Sarr’s dreams kept growing. When she learned in 2006 of an open position as a mechanic at the port, she applied and became the first female mechanic ever hired there.
“When I applied here they gave me a position no other woman had had, so some people were talking about me,” Sarr said. “I was Second to the Chief Mechanic so I was above a lot of the men, but I had the experience and skills for that job.”
Tasked with maintaining the massive engines that power the port’s ferry fleet, Sarr is also learning to pilot the vessels, taking the wheel on many trips to nearby Gorée Island after she completes her engine room checks. For Chief Engineer Abdoul Ndiaye, a 16-year port veteran and Sarr’s immediate supervisor, each day brings an even deeper level of respect for the work that she does.
“I’ve never seen a woman as exceptional as Khoudia,” Ndiaye said. “She is very competent, she’s courageous, and she never makes mistakes. I work every day, every hour, and she does the same. I wish I had more young women like Khoudia on my team of mechanics.” Confident, poised, and capable, Sarr moves comfortably around the workings of the ferry boats, her graceful hands both deft enough to pilot the ferry and strong enough to tune its engines. Her goal, she says, is to work on cargo ships, traveling the world on the power of the engines she herself maintains. It is a dream, she says, that took root during her days in the CRWRC Learning Circle.
“The program helped me a lot because I learned how not to get trapped by things like early pregnancy and early marriage.” Sarr said. “And it gave me the courage to follow my dreams for my life.”
~ by David Snyder, Contract Writer
