ethical tourism

10 Years of Being The Gallivantrix:

/ Gallivantrix / 2 Comments

At the time of writing, Gallivantrix has 290 posts which average 4000 words each. That’s over a million words or two copies of War and Peace. 

In 2024, I watched as my 10 year achievement flew by. It’s hard to mark a life of gradual change with anniversaries, but a decade is a good amount of time to take stock. I started the blog in May of 2014 while I was preparing to re-launch my international ESL teaching life by heading to Saudi Arabia that September.  As I noticed both of those decade markers fly by in 2024, I thought to myself how nice it would be to sit down and quietly reflect on what the last 10 years has brought and how it has changed me. It is only now, staring down the barrel of the New Year that I finally feel like a quiet sit-down is possible. Still, better late than never. 

A Life Dedicated to Travel

In the last 10 years I have lived and worked in 4 foreign countries, and visited an additional 27. That’s more than ¾ of the international travel I’ve done in my lifetime so far and nearly all of the travel I have done as an adult. But what does it mean to live a life that nomadically?

One of the big things that I encounter when I tell people how I live is envy. I have no illusions about how amazing the experiences of my life have been, nor do I think I live in a way that is accessible to everyone. It can be a bit strange to remind people that I’m not rich, and in fact, have spent chunks of my life being poor, eating from food-banks (charities), and relying on friends for a roof over my head. And, no, I didn’t win the lottery or get an inheritance. Luck, circumstances, and the support of others have played a big role, but also I made a conscious choice to prioritize travel over almost everything else in my life, and then I worked very hard to make that happen.

I found a career that allowed me to work in a variety of countries. I took extra education to gain the necessary credentials. I took terrible jobs to build experience. I reduced my life’s possessions to what would fit in 2 large suitcases and a carry-on. I had no home, no car, no bed, no books, no dishes, no spouse, no children, no pets, no musical instruments, no garden, I gave all my art away, and my sister is keeping the few family heirlooms we treasure. I ate cheaply, used public transit, and wore free, thrifted, or clearance bin clothes. I bought second-hand phones and cheap laptops and used them until they died, relying on my office computer for any big projects. I only got a portable video game system during COVID because I couldn’t go anywhere.

I don’t feel like I’m missing out on these things because I don’t have them, but I think it’s helpful to remember that no one actually “has it all”. The people who envy me usually have stable, local jobs, a lease or a mortgage, a car (and payments), kids and pets, a multi-seasonal wardrobe, hobbies and crafts, new phones and complex computer set-ups, and a lifetime of memories in the form of stuff that has to have a place to exist. They can’t afford all of those things AND prolific travel, but neither can I. I didn’t make that choice all in one go, either. It took years of gradual change to reach a point where I have a 2-suitcase life. I had plenty of chances to change my mind and back out, but I *like* my life. I just want others to understand it isn’t a traditional life + travel, it is a life purpose-built for travel.

From the Inside

10 years is a long time no matter what lifestyle you have, and I hope that everyone grows and changes in that amount of time. It is a well-studied phenomenon that travel has a big impact on the human brain, and sustained travel with its joys, challenges, and culture shocks has forced me to look more closely at myself and my place in the world.

Although therapy didn’t take a starring role in the blog until COVID-times, it’s been an on and off part of my personal journey for a while. In the 2 years leading up to the launch of Gallivantrix and my international life, I dedicated a lot of my free time to researching and practicing positive psychology. TED has a wonderful series of talks on the subject and several practical resources that I still recommend to people like Superbetter and AuthenticHappiness.

I believe it was a direct result of this work that I was able to embark on the journey, but it did more than give me the strength to adventure. From 2015-2019, I gradually changed the way I approached interactions with others. Some of this work resulted in stronger, healthier relationships and some resulted in the end of years-long ties. The people who remain in my life are strong communicators & loyal friends. Those who left were, for the most part, not “bad people”, they simply had their own struggles with trauma and healing that left us incompatible. Perhaps the hardest of all of these was with my mother.

From 2020-2022 I dove back into the world of mental and emotional health, this time with a focus on childhood experiences and generational trauma. You can read through my book list in the archives if you’re interested. Even though I made good progress using these tools, the circumstances of the pandemic meant that by the end of 2021 I needed to make plans to leave Korea and get out in the world around other people in order to keep improving. 

Bouncing off to Senegal after years of isolation may have been a bit like trying to ski black diamond right after recovering from a compound fracture. It hit me hard, and you can see most of it in the essays I wrote during that time. I will be forever grateful for the experience, for what I learned and how it changed me, but it was not the joyful return to global travel that I had been craving. It took me 9 more months of trying various things and eventually moving to France to finally find what I was looking for in myself that I thought I had lost in 2020.

10 years of international living, a global pandemic, and a deep commitment to emotional healing later, and I am now a much more emotionally mature person than I was in the past, capable of identifying and sitting with my feelings to understand what is reasonable, and what is reactionary. I am able to approach conflict resolution with an eye toward responsibility and solution instead of blame. I know my limits mentally and physically and I plan my life, work and travel in such a way as to protect the hard limits while pushing soft ones. I want to make the world around me a better place, and while I’m ok doing that one person at a time, I’m also interested in how I might do more. I have learned so much about the world and the human race, that I will never be able to look at it without that knowledge seeping in. At some times that is beautiful, and at others it is profoundly painful. I have flaws, just like every human, but I am learning to love myself, and to extend grace and compassion inward and outward for flawed humans everywhere. I don’t want to look away.

Accommodating My Needs

Whether you want to call it chronic illness, invisible disability or anything else, there is a growing awareness of this category of health issues that limit what people can do without making us unable to work, travel, and live independently. I received my first couple diagnoses as a late-teen/young adult, so it isn’t new to me, but as I age, not only does the list get longer, my ability to simply push through my limits is sharply diminishing.

Back in 2018, I had a real “come to Jesus” moment during a long summer holiday backpacking across Europe. It made me start rethinking my priorities and what tools I could use to make the most of my travels without destroying my physical and mental health in the process. Over the next three trips, and the pandemic induced therapy-work, I slowly built not only a list of practical tools to make travel easier and more enjoyable, but also the ability to accept my limitations. The second one means I don’t get so tempted to do things which will result in burnout later on, and I get to enjoy things I am able to do without dwelling on regrets, missed opportunities, or generally hating my body.

I am more likely to book larger seats on long haul flights because I know the difference it makes in my recovery time and pain levels. I always check the accessibility options for places I will stay, including distance from transit, number of required stairs, and how far the toilet is from the bed. I take extra time when walking everywhere, usually planning at least double the Google Maps estimate. I carry snacks, meds, and water everywhere. I keep a little extra in the budget for when I need to catch a taxi or ride-share because the walk/transit is too much. I accept that hot weather means I’ll need extra rest and extra painkillers, and I must plan to do very few things. 

That last one continues to boggle the mind. Spending spring in France, I was able to walk longer distances and do things for hours, even spending 12+ hours a day walking around some places! I’m never going to be up for a 5k run, but when the weather is mild-cold, I have so much more energy and mental focus and so much less pain. It has become important for me to keep notes when I am in different climates because it’s easy to forget how dramatically the heat affects me, and I need to be able to reference daily and weekly records of my experiences to hold onto the fact that it’s real and not a trick of memory.

Even knowing this, I still choose to go to hot places sometimes, like India… in August. But I made sure to always keep water and NSAIDs on hand, to walk very slowly, use a sun-shielding umbrella, and crank the AC in the car and the hotels. I was exhausted by the end of it, but I got to see some very amazing cultural and historical sites. I also went to Taiwan for 3 months starting at the tail end of August, knowing that the weather would be too hot until October. For the first 5 weeks, I did almost nothing besides go to class and get food. I knew heading into Taiwan that I would not be able to do a bunch of touristy things, but I still wanted the language study and cultural experience, so it was worth it.

Accepting my limits doesn’t keep me from going places, but it changes the way I go and what I expect to get out of it. I may not get as much out of my trip to India or Taiwan as a more healthy and fit person, but I definitely get more out of it than someone who never goes at all.

From the Outside

When I started the blog, I harkened back to the early days of social networking (Live Journal, My Space, and even bulletin boards!) where everyone who was online in those days was producing what we now call “content”. I know I sound like a get-off-my-lawn antique (and I am GenX), but objectively, it’s not just me that’s changed in the last decade. The internet / blog-o-sphere and the world at large have also undergone some dramatic makeovers in that time, too.

Demographics

It’s always hard to compare the present to memories of childhood, so I can’t say how much of what I recall about the travel I did with my family as a child is accurate, but one thing I think is objectively measurable is just the sheer number of people flooding popular travel destinations.

When we lived near the beautiful white sand beaches of Panama City, Florida, my mom and I joked about buying shirts that said, “I’m not a tourist, I live here.” because we felt like we could hardly go near a beach without being accosted by cheap seashell trinkets (made overseas) and green key-lime pie (it’s supposed to be yellow!). Perhaps because of this formative childhood experience, I have never enjoyed a tourist trap even though I have not always been able to avoid them. Yet, when I lived in Florida, the population of the US was 107 million fewer people than it is today. Not all of them visit Floridian beaches, but it stands to reason that the population rise alone will result in more humans per beach.

This NYT headline said in 1984, 27 million Americans travelled abroad, a new record at the time. By 2014 that number was 68 million, and by 2023 it was 98.5 million. Data on 2024 isn’t out yet, but I would bet it breaks 100 million. And that’s just Americans!

The global population has risen by almost a billion (that’s B) in the last decade, and more and more of them are living higher wage, higher quality lives which include international travel. Over 1.1 billion tourists (15% of the global population) travelled internationally in 2014, in 2019 (just before the pandemic) it rose to 1.5 billion (roughly 19-20% of the global population). Obviously, the pandemic saw a lapse in travel, but most statistical analyses agree that in 2024, international travel levels caught up with and then exceeded 2019 levels.

Also, there’s more people living in most of the popular locations. Only a few countries have been experiencing declining populations. Meanwhile, swift urban development and technological advances mean that a smaller percentage of people are living a rural/agricultural life, choosing instead to flock to cities and suburbs for better schools and higher paying jobs. In many places, migrant workers who come in to do things like drive taxis, work in kitchens, clean homes, and do construction do not show up on official statistics of urban populations, yet they certainly contribute to the body count.

When I arrived in Senegal, many people told me that the city had nearly doubled in size since the start of the pandemic, and that the cost of living was skyrocketing as migrant labor from the villages flooded in. Although official statistics show about a 3% yearly rise in population for that city, that is still much faster than the infrastructure can keep up with. Senegalese citizens and immigrants from less stable West African countries want to live in the city because they can earn more money to send home to their families. The flood of people coming in has resulted in overcrowding, lack of adequate sanitation, lack of housing, lack of food, and lack of employment. 

Dakar isn’t a hotspot for tourism, but many developing countries that rely on tourist dollars are experiencing a similar trend, meaning more locals are in the cities we travel to and more of them are struggling to get by. My foray to Zanzibar in East Africa highlighted this most dramatically where I would walk through a neighborhood with no running water to reach the high end resort hotels on the beachfront. As hard as it might be to live in a developing country and see first world lives on TV and the internet, how much harder must it be to see them across the street when you must carry water from the well and dig a hole for a toilet?

Among the expat communities, people who live and work abroad, not just traveling for fun, we have anecdotally noticed an upturn in the tendency to be treated as a “walking ATM”. The rise in the number of locals living in cities but struggling financially has led to a (totally understandable) level of desperation in the competition for foreign dollars that hasn’t always existed. And don’t get me wrong, I feel an enormous amount of compassion for those less fortunate than I who have not had the chances and support or even the citizenship that give me my advantages. However, I cannot singlehandedly change the fortunes of a developing economy with my few thousand dollars. 

Then, when I come back to the US, I am shocked at prices and poverty here, too. 100 million of us may be able to travel internationally this year, but how many of those scrimped and saved to do so? How many are using airline miles they earned buying groceries and gas? How many only go once a decade or once in a lifetime? How many are taking on debt to do it? And of the remaining 235 million, how many are food insecure (47 million), how many are one paycheck away from homelessness (200 million). People shouldn’t travel if they can’t afford it. Please, do not travel on credit! But regardless of how we pay for it, most people can’t afford to go over a carefully planned budget while on holiday.

I want to spend my money on local small businesses when I travel, but it isn’t fair to be treated like a bottomless money pit because we were born in affluent countries. What’s more, it makes for a very unpleasant experience which will only damage the future of their tourist economy. I work hard to avoid these kinds of situations, and have developed tactics over time to deter scammers and hawkers, but it’s exhausting and demoralizing to be walking around a beautiful historical and/or sacred monument only to have to fend off junk-sellers every 5 ft. Many take “no thank you” and move on, but others will follow you around telling sad stories about their kids to try and guilt you into buying some cheap trinket you don’t want.

This experience isn’t new in and of itself, as I recall having had it in China back in 2005, but it feels like the number of such “sellers” and their persistence, willingness to invade personal space, and leverage emotional manipulation has dramatically increased. I think it was one of the big reasons Senegal was so hard for me, as well as the main reason why in places like India and Egypt, I opted to hire local drivers and guides who I can budget a gratuity for in advance, and expect them to act in part as a barrier to the other hands being held out for cash.

The upshot of all of this population growth, demographic change, and economic inequity is that many places are more crowded and fighting harder to extract every penny from the visitors that they can. There are still places in the world that do not have this problem, or at least do not have it in excess, but I feel like it’s much harder now to plan a trip that avoids them, especially if you have any bucket list items that include major historical sites, world-class museums, or unique natural wonders. Maybe it’s easy for me to say because I’ve already gotten to visit quite a few of these, but now when I give travel advice, I tell people to focus on small local experiences rather than grand bucket list ones since you’ll be more likely to have the space and peace to enjoy it.

Going Viral

In addition to the population and economy, there’s one more very large factor that’s changing the face of travel and travel-blogging: the social media revolution. My 5 week stay in Tours France was relaxing, idyllic, and felt almost nothing like tourism at all, but when I left Tours and went on my color-coded-spreadsheet trip of tourist highlights including Disney, Lyon, Marseille, and all the big bucket list spots in Paris I had somehow never gotten around to like the Louvre and Versailles. Although almost every place I went was new to me, the experiences of being a tourist all seemed eerily familiar.

Authors and researchers like Jonathan Haidt have been studying the changes in social media over the last 10-15 years, and there are some fairly strong conclusions about the manner in which content is created and consumed. Other old-fashioned travel bloggers like me who want to share personal content over rubber-stamped listicles are also expressing frustration.

As social media drives attention to ever more similar short-form bucket lists and glam photos, tourist attractions have also started to become homogenized. This isn’t all bad, nor is it fully ubiquitous. I have written before about the fact that cathedrals in western Europe are all kinda the same in the way that roses are all kinda the same, and I still like them both every time. Huge enough attractions like Disney and Versailles don’t need to change too much to keep attracting visitors, and they will always be tourist processing machines filled with photo-happy crowds and overpriced souvenirs. Yet, everything in between seems to be riding a post-Instagram, post-COVID wave of striving to provide travellers with photo-ready experiences that exactly mimic what they have already seen online. Stand in this line to get the perfect photo, order this dish at the restaurant, look for this “hidden gem” that’s now overrun with tourists, and always post your best photos!

I have been going to Angelina’s in Paris since 2015 (that makes it sound like I go a lot. I do go at least once every time I visit, but it’s only like 6-7 times total) and yet sometime between 2019 and 2024 it got internet famous, and for the first time ever, when I went this year, there was a LINE out the door and they were no longer accepting reservations. My patience was rewarded in the end, and when I went back a few weeks later at a better time, there was no line at all. Despite Angelina’s appearing to have handled their newfound fame well, many local restaurants that receive viral treatment do not.

Internet fame can send tourists in droves to small businesses that are unprepared for the volume of new customers which ends up leading to disappointing experiences and bad reviews. Some businesses overextend themselves financially trying to keep up, only to be left with debt when the viral spotlight turns elsewhere. Very few small-scale restaurants survive viral fame, and even fewer benefit from it. Additionally, the desire to have a replica of the online experience leads to long lines at one location while those around it languish. This is bad for both local businesses and for the tourists themselves. The joy of a hidden gem or hole in the wall is that it is unique, different, likely thriving off of local and seasonal ingredients meaning that the dining experience is different from day to day. Meanwhile, viral sensation seekers want to experience what they have seen online and nothing else.

Jerusalem Demas famously wrote, “Tourists are like bees. I don’t want a bunch of them circling around me, but I also don’t want them to disappear.” Developing countries are not the only ones that are both economically dependent on, and simultaneously damaged by increasing tourism. Many large cities in affluent developed nations are experiencing an overdose of tourists that is causing chaos and unhappiness among the locals. This Forbes article goes into more detail of the struggle between reliance on tourism for economic success and the damage that over-tourism brings.

Viral fame hasn’t just damaged food experiences, but also art, music, and nature. One beautiful Mediterranean beach may be edge to edge bodies while a few villages over, a pristine beach boasts only a few locals. The government of the Philippines had to shut down some extremely popular tourist beaches because the sheer number of tourists was damaging the environment, yet there are hundreds of practically empty beaches around the Philippines that no one is going to. Is it because they don’t know about them or because they want to recreate that experience they saw online?

Imitate and Recreate

When “influencer” first became a job, they would try to use clout or ad space to get free meals and accommodations. A very small number of extremely successful ones still can, but remember a billion+ people are traveling every year, so an influencer with a million followers is only 0.1% of the potential market, and most of their followers aren’t actually going to travel, because travel lifestyle influencers are largely aspirational.

Now the issue is less influencers trying to get free stuff and more that a small number of tourists with influencer dreams have their hearts set on recreating a viral photo or video on location. Surveys and polls vary a bit, but generally speaking somewhere between 50-80% of Gen Z consider influencer a desirable and realistic career option, with more than 40% of adults overall feeling the same.

As a result of this, you get people doing choreographed dances in the middle of a UNESCO World Heritage site, or self-employed ‘models’ posing over and over in front of the thing that literally every other tourist there wants a photo of. This has gotten so bad that in many places, the government or local businesses have posted signs banning tripods and costume changes.

I am not criticizing dancing nor taking photos. Normal polite people usually spend a few minutes taking photos, arranging poses, and checking to make sure no one was making funny faces before moving on. On the rare occasion I indulge in a selfie, I tend to take a handful before I get one I don’t hate. I think it’s fair to want to look your best in your photos. But these people will stay for 30 minutes to an hour, taking pose after pose or restarting their dance 17 times, all while blocking everyone else from being able to take photos of the site. Tourists are often on a tight schedule, and will end up missing out on their photo ops for their own memories because a wanna-be influencer can’t share.

Even when they aren’t taking photos, they will often sit or stand in desirable photo-op spots to scroll their phones instead of moving off to the side to allow others a chance. And again, I’m not criticizing wanting to check your phone while at a famous landmark or museum or whatever. They might want to make sure photos turned out; they might be checking their itinerary for the day; they might be reading about the site they are visiting to learn more; they might be trying to contact their group; they might even just be scrolling because it’s so crowded and overwhelming that they need a break. All of these are fine and valid reasons to be on your phone. None of them are reasons to block the view while you do it.

AI photo editing has made it easier to cut out unwanted hordes of tourists, but it can only do so much. Plus, my photos are primarily a gateway to my memory. I can wait for the perfect shot or edit out a stray person in the background, but if I look at the photo and remember the obnoxious influencers and pushy junk-sellers more than I remember the awe and beauty of the place I came to see, then what am I even doing?

What Am I Even Doing?

In 2014 when I started this website, there were (according to Google) hundreds of thousands of travel bloggers across several platforms. Now in 2024, those same estimates place the number of travel bloggers in the millions. Far and away the vast majority of them are just in it for the money. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to a bit of extra cash to support an already expensive hobby, but the current monetization model of social media pays for eyes, for attention, for engagement, and so using keywords and creating short 1 min or less content allows social media influencers to maximize money while minimizing effort. Millions of travel content creators exist, yet the format for a travel blog has been trimmed down to those few most monetizable models on platforms like Instagram and TikTok, meaning everything is starting to look the same while containing less and less original or unique information. 

I have never thought of Gallivantrix as something to monetize, no matter how many times well-meaning people suggest that I turn this hobby into a side hustle. I hoped my blog would primarily serve as a way to connect with my loved ones while I was abroad, give people a deeper perspective of the world, and maybe add a soupçon of helping other travelers. 5 years ago when I checked in about my motivations for writing, I stood by my long-form and intermittent style and I am still drawn to long form essays with no particular schedule, but the content of my writing is changing.

I have always been an essay writer, tending mainly towards narrative essays. I used to call my writing style “narrative nonfiction”. Sometimes, I write descriptively, giving detailed accounts of what an experience is like, to paint a picture that my readers can imagine. Sometimes I involve research and write more informatively to talk about the history or broader context of an experience. Since COVID, my writing has taken a more personal bent, with liberal doses of expository and reflective writing.

Writing narrative essays about my experiences not only allows me to share my adventures, it gives me good motivation to go out and do things and to live mindfully while experiencing those things. By setting myself up to notice things “for the blog”, I’m more likely to have a deeper and richer experience and remain mindfully present. Later, writing the memory allows me to review all the photos and relive the experience vividly in order to record it. I may not want to do this for every single place I visit, but it’s a great tool to have in the box.

During my France holiday, I wrote narratively about Tours, and I meant to do the same for the other places I visited, but over and over I came up against the idea that I could not say anything that was not already said both more succinctly and more informatively. 

It seems now when I’m travelling in places that are inevitably viral, I no longer have any interest in publicizing my journey. I still take photos and share them with my friends, and I write little highlights for myself, things that in the past would be the notes I used to write blog posts from later, but I don’t have any interest in spending hours creating content that a million other people have already created. I found that when I am already in a good headspace mentally and emotionally, I am able to be mindful and present in the experience. It isn’t necessary to try to find ways to make yet another blog about Disney, I could just enjoy it.

When I went to South Asia, I was surprised and inspired by Sri Lanka in part because since the civil war and the earthquake, not a lot of people have focused on tourism and travel there. I never have time to write while travelling, so I tucked it away for later, only to be confronted with the contrasting experience of India, and capping off my South Asian odyssey with a visit to a third wildly different environment in Nepal.

I knew I didn’t want to write a bunch of blogs about sightseeing and history at places which have been endlessly blogged about, but I started to think about how I would like to write about South Asia. Nestled in between my May and September decade markers, the trip made me think about who I want to be in my next decade as Gallivantrix. I thought about the essays I wrote in the pandemic about deep emotional issues, those that I wrote while in Senegal about the social, political and economic impacts of colonialism and white supremacy, and about the essay I wrote in France about finding joy in the everyday. I want to combine my experiences as an expat and tourist with what I have learned about the world, historically, politically, and economically, and how the countries I visit fit within that broader understanding. I don’t intend to fully discard narrative or informative writing, but I want to embrace the personal and the reflective.

Is anyone even interested in reading something like that? Wouldn’t it do better as a podcast? A video-essay? Is my approach too old-fashioned, too long, too nuanced, or just not cute enough? Eeehhhh. There’s millions of travel bloggers out there, but I don’t need an audience of millions. I hope there are a few people in the world who will read and think and share those thoughts with others. In the end, I write what I most need to say in order to process my experiences and ideas in a flow of words that may be only for the void.

If you happen to be here in the void with me, Happy New Year.

The Sights of Tours

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Although I only spent 5 weeks in the city of Tours, France, I feel like I managed to squeeze in quite a lot of sightseeing around my French classes and cheese eating. In an attempt to organize my adventures there, this is the 2nd of 4 posts about Tours and it features attractions which are close to the city center, such as museums, gardens and interesting tourist attractions.

Musée Compagnonnage (The Companion Museum)

This was the first museum I visited in Tours because it was right next to my tram stop. I don’t know what I expected from a place called the Companion Museum, but this was not it. The Companionship (Compagnonnage) were any and all artisans and craftsmen who made things with their hands and then passed the knowledge of their crafts through apprenticeships. As you may imagine, that’s most of professions. It’s something between a secret society and a very strong union. In fact, given the amount of masonic imagery, I’m surprised to find that the museum denies any connection beyond the coincidence of the compass and square.

According to their own legends, the Compagnonnage dates back to the construction of the temple in Jerusalem, known as the “Temple of Solomon”, in the 10th century BC. The colossal project, under the direction of the architect Hiram, would have been led by Soubise and Jacques. Different legends also make these last two monastic and chivalrous characters. Salomon, Father Soubise and Maître Jacques are the 3 legendary founders of the Compagnonnage. However, there’s no archaeological evidence of the Compagnonnage until the 13th century. Incidentally, the Free Masons are not found until the 18th century so if they are linked, the French did it first.

The Compagnonnage includes any industry in which people work with their hands directly to produce things. I was going to try to list them, but the museum website takes a whole page to do so. It’s… a lot. Excluded careers were things like merchants, academics, doctors, architects and engineers (presumably the later because they design things rather than build them. Carpenters and stonemasons, people who implemented architectural and engineering designs, were absolutely included in the Compagnonnage.)

You can read more about the historical ups and downs on the museum website (thanks Google Chrome for auto-translate), but it went fairly strong until WW1 dealt it a near fatal blow. It didn’t really recover until after WW2, and it’s worth mentioning that although they claimed to welcome anyone wishing to improve in their profession, they didn’t agree to admit women until 2004(!) and didn’t actually accept one until 2006. Even though many of the trades historically included into the Compagnonnage were industries which had many women workers including sewing, weaving, laundry, and baking, it seems the society was about more than just teaching skills and protecting workers. Quelle surprise! (by the way, all of the art pieces below are sugar and pastry!)

Despite the overwhelming presence of misogyny throughout the history of Western civilization, I still enjoyed seeing the craftworks and tools of the various trades included in the Compagnonnes. I also believe that the centuries-long tradition of protecting the rights and wages of these workers has likely influenced the French cultural value of workers’ rights and collective bargaining. Did you know that striking is protected under their constitution? That not only can they not lose their jobs for striking, their employers must continue to pay them during the strike? That’s a big accomplishment for the same culture that produced Versailles.

The Hôtel Goüin

This is what happens when you don’t plan in advance and just wing it. You get weird stuff. This hotel is on my walk from the tram stop to my school and I got curious about it, and noticed it’s opening hours were only on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I looked at it very very briefly online and saw that inside was an art gallery with rotating exhibitions. I thought, well I like art galleries, and it’s free, so why not? 

First, let me say, I do think it’s worth it to poke your nose into any free museum in your vicinity. Heck, even any museum under 10$ is likely to be worth a stop to me. I have gone into unexpected museums before, things I ran across that were adjacent to another stop on my journey, and it’s roulette. Also, since I had totally failed in the planning phase of my stay in Tours, I was eventually bound to suffer the slings of ‘wing it”, and only not mind too much because a) it’s 5 weeks, and b) my goal in Tours was not sightseeing – it was French Living.

If you or someone you know is headed to Tours and you happen to be in Old Tours on a Wednesday or Saturday, sure, drop in. However, there’s no need to put it on your bucket list. This summer, the Olympics are being held in Paris, so all of France is in Olympic fever. The Hôtel Goüin being no exception, they decided to offer an exhibition on the Paralympics. In large part, the exhibition was mostly very beautiful and inspiring photographs of paralympic athletes, but the upstairs (no elevator, btw, way to accommodate the athletes being celebrated!) contained not only documentaries, but interactive displays where visitors could “try on” a disability and attempt a sport. … I don’t even know what to write about that, other than, yes, I’m sure that’s what they were for because a museum employee told me about it and smilingly encouraged me to try.

If you are not cringing with me, or are wondering why I am, please check out some videos on YouTube by following this link.

The Musée des Beaux Arts

The third and easily most impressive museum I visited was the Tours Museum of Fine Arts. You can go to France and not visit an art museum, but why would you? I spent about 2.5 hours inside the museum of fine arts. I only took photos of things that struck me in particular, but it was room after room of beautiful stuff. I love looking at oil paintings up close. There’s some things that no photograph can ever capture, the quality of light, the ability for a part of a painting to seem like it’s glowing, the way the brush strokes move the eye, the size (both the enormous paintings and the tiny details). Seriously, even gallery-pro photos rarely do them justice, but if you want to see the museum’s own photographic collection, click here. 

Nonetheless, I cannot paint a picture of a gallery with only words, so I hope you enjoy the pictures I took and that maybe it can inspire you to visit an art gallery in or near your own town. Galleries often have wide collections, and even trade around highly desirable artists so that everyone can get a chance. The Tours museum is not anything so grand as is found in Paris, Lyon, London, or New York, but it still had a Rubens, a Rodin, a Rembrandt, and a Monet alongside many lesser known but still very talented artists from the 14th to 21st centuries.

Garland of flowers and trompe l’oeil, Jan-Philips van THIELEN, mid 1600s
Anonymous copy of the Mona Lisa painted mid 1500s
Mary Magdalene, Matthieu FREDEAU 1642
The Virgin, the Child Jesus and Saint John the Baptist, Eustache LE SUEUR, early 1600s
Portrait of a woman in spring, Workshop of Nicolas de LARGILLIERRE, early 1700s
Diana and her companions resting after hunting, Louis of BOULOGNE 1707
Allegory of the Times, Wealth, Power and Love; Claude VIGNON, mid 1600s
Nude study, Léon BELLY, 1857
Sarah Bernhardt in her Belle-Ilea garden, Georges CLAIRIN, late 1800s
Leaving mass on Easter Day in Labastide-du-Vert, Henri MARTIN, 1915

I recently had to try and explain Queer Coding to some folks and I found myself returning to YouTube to shore up my own understanding and references. One of the videos I watched pointed out that a lot of artists who painted under the totalitarian glare of the capital “C” Church used secret signs in their paintings of religious icons, and imagery out of Greco-Roman mythology to be able to portray scenes of queer love, romance, and eroticism that they could otherwise have been turned over to the Inquisition for. It was a perspective that made looking at many of these paintings from the 14-17th centuries much more entertaining.

I had to put this painting on its own. This is “Panoramic view of Tours in 1787” by Pierre-Antoine Demachy. When I turned a corner and saw this view, I was absolutely stunned because that’s the bridge I ride the tram over every day too and from school and my apartment. It’s actually fairly easy to regognize the major landmarks like the Cathedral on the left, the large white buildings with black roofs along side the road which is the Rue National (those are still holding shops today), and the Tower of Charlemagne as the tallest structure on the right. The artist was able to make the buildings in the distance look larger than they really are, and there are too many trees and new buildings for me to exactly replicate this view with my camera, but I gave it a go.

The lower floor of the museum is where the rotating and seasonal exhibits live. When I visited, it was an exhibit about the history of women called “THE SCEPTER & THE DISTAFF. BEING A WOMAN BETWEEN THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE“. Although it did have some generalizations, it mainly focused on France and it’s neighboring European countries and offered examples of illuminated manuscripts and artistic renditions of women as visual aids to the historical records. Anyone who has studied the history of women in the West will be well aware of the issues, but for those who are not, may I recommend the recent re-translation of Simone de Beauvoir’s eminent work, The Second Sex. If you’re on this website, I assume you like to read and so recommend the book, but there are plenty of YouTube videos reviewing and analyzing it. I don’t claim it’s the authoritative book of feminism (it’s got issues), but she does a very good job of assessing the historical condition of women in Western culture.

After I finished inside the museum, I headed outside to look for the pickup spot of the hippomobile. I didn’t make up that word. “Hippo” isn’t just a big African water mammal, it’s actually the ancient Greek word for “horse”. “Potamus” is Greek for “river”, which is how the hippopotamus got it’s name – river horse. Thus, the hippomobile is simply an ancient Greek way of saying horse-car, or horse drawn carriage. I don’t know why the one in Tours uses this name instead of the wildly more common French word “calèche“, but the first time I saw it on the website, I fell in love with the word and I refuse to relinquish it.

The internet further told me that I should catch this wonderful ride in front of “Fritz the Elephant” outside the Musée des Beaux Arts. When I arrived at the museum, a sign outside advertised the ride as picking people up at Fritz the Elephant as well, yet by the time I finished my museum tour, I still had no idea where (or really what) Fritz the Elephant was.

The Story of Fritz the Elephant

In my mind, Fritz would be a statue, or maybe a mural, adjacent to and clearly visible from the museum. Upon exiting the museum, I took a quick walk around the gardens (lord do I love the way the French put gardens everywhere). I found a little food stall, and a playground, and a trombone quartet (very unexpected), but still no elephant. Finally, I went over to a building off to one side that looked like it had been (or might still be) a stable. Lo and behold, there was Fritz in all his taxidermized glory, sheltered from the elements by a roof and plexiglass.

TW animal cruelty: because western civilization didn’t figure out animals had feelings until really recently and this is a story out of history. But also, there’s a silver lining at the end? If you want to avoid it, skip to the Hippomobile section where the animals are treated with kindness and respect.

Around the turn of the 20th century, the Barnum and Baily’s Circus was at its height. You may have been exposed to a glorified version of this with a singing Hugh Jackman, but the real circuses relied heavily on exotic animal shows, and the treatment and training for those animals, including elephants, was cruel and violent. Fritz was in captivity for 35 years, which would have been most of his life considering Asian elephants only live into their late 40s. He was purchased by Barnum in Germany in 1873 and shipped by sea to the US. Sea voyages were especially hard on animals then, since they took a long time, had terrible conditions, and there was no medication available to help the animals with anxiety or seasickness. Many elephants died on such voyages, including several of Fritz’s companions. 

In 1901, the B&B circus headed over to Europe for a continental tour. While in Bordeaux in May of 1902, Fritz began to show signs of agitation and aggression, and so was chained to two other elephants to keep him in check. When the circus reached Tours in June of the same year, the circus offered a parade through town as a way of attracting visitors to the shows. Though the parades were difficult, they were also often the only time the animals had any real freedom of movement. 

For reasons unknown to history, Fritz became enraged during this parade. 35 years of captivity and violent treatment cannot have been without consequences, and whatever the reason, Fritz freaked out and terrified all the local parade attendees. The handler was able to get Fritz under control and on the ground (laying down), but director on site still ordered the elephant put down. As horrible as that is, the method of execution was worse, and yet it’s inhumanity may have been the reason why Fritz became such an important historical symbol. The method used was strangulation with chains and rope. It took more than three hours for Fritz to pass. 

The remains of Fritz were sent off to a naturalist for preservation, and within 8 months the skeleton was installed at the natural history museum, and the taxidermized hide was placed in the former stables at the Musée des Beaux Arts. The press latched on to the story, framing Fritz as a gentle giant and a victim. Wild speculation abounded as to the cause of his rage. Some posited it must have been a lit cigarette burning him, but there is no evidence to support this claim. Regardless, Fritz became a beloved mascot of the city of Tours, and the tragic incident became a pivotal talking point for a growing movement acknowledging animal suffering and animal rights. 

As of my visit, more than 100 French cities ban the use of wild animals in circus shows, and the French government at the federal level has decided to completely ban all use of wild animals in travelling circuses by 2028. If that sounds like a small and late change, you aren’t wrong, but France isn’t behind the times. Most developed (rich) nations are still in the process of passing similar laws, often in patchwork and piecemeal ways, and of course developing nations are struggling enough with human rights, that it is difficult to get them onboard with eliminating animal exploitation which can mean the difference between feeding their own children or not.

I have talked about ethical animal tourism before and how important it is to patronize businesses that prioritize animal welfare because that needs to be seen as a viable economic model in order for more people to follow suit. 122 years have passed since Fritz was strangled to death on the streets of Tours for simply being a wild animal, and that seems like a long time, but we were still going to circuses with mistreated elephants when I was a kid. As short a time ago as 2008 I watched a tiger jump through a ring of fire in China (I didn’t know that would happen when I sat down for the show). Kids on the streets in Africa and SE Asia use baby monkeys they took from the mothers in order to lure tourists into taking and paying for cute selfies. There are still plentiful places that offer swims with captive dolphins or rides on captive elephants as tourist attractions. We love looking at and interacting with animals, but all too often that love is toxic.

Horse-drawn carriages are another great example. I’ve been to developing countries where the horses are near starved, dehydrated, and forced to work without a break in the scorching sun. I recall at one point in Egypt seeing a sign near an area with shade and water troughs that an animal welfare organization had fought to have installed for the horses which carried tourists around the ruins. It’s hard to convince a person who lives in a state of desperate poverty that they need to prioritize an animal when their own children may not have enough. A shorter work-day means less money, and is a big barrier to enforcing any kind of animal rights. Thus it’s up to tourists who take the rides to express a firm requirement that the animals be treated well. Stop paying for rides with badly treated animals and the drivers will change.

Please check your sources. Look for the zoos that have habitats of comfort and preservation (lots of zoos these days are changing their habitats to protect and serve the animals, and they rely more on rescuing animals that wouldn’t have survived in the wild or breeding programs rather than capturing healthy wild animals). Look for animal interactions that protect the animal ambassadors. They exist. Animals that for one reason or another don’t mind interacting with humans on their own terms can be great species ambassadors and inspire humans to better protect the environment, but we have to respect their boundaries and needs. Even the pet cafes can have better treatment of their animals, such as creating spaces where the animals can retreat when they want to, and having highly trained staff around to make sure the animals are safe and comfortable at all times, even if that means disappointing a customer.

We may be past the era of such tragedies as happened to Fritz, but we still have a long way to go to restore the balance between our love for interacting with animals and our ability to respect them.

The Hippomobile

Thankfully, in France, the labor rights are strong, even for horses, and these chevaux have restricted work hours, mandated breaks, days off for extreme weather, and nice digs.

“Our equine friends are given a day off every Monday. The horses that draw carriages in the morning are replaced by another set in the afternoon. The animals take breaks in the shade of the magnificent cedar tree outside the Museum of Fine Arts. The carriage driver decides which route to take depending on the time of day, weather conditions and/or the horses’ energy levels. When the weather is unfavorable to horses, the timetable may be modified or suspended.” — quote from the Filbleu website regarding this service

I joined the first afternoon tour (3:30pm) and although I was a bit disappointed that the weather plastic remained down (it had rained heavily a few days before), I was seated right at the back and could look out the open rear for clear views. I didn’t see a lot of new things because by this time, I’d lived in Tours for over 3 weeks and had done a lot of exploring on my own. However, Old Tours is endlessly charming and the weather that day was simply stunning, so for the price of transit ticket, I happily enjoyed the clip clop of horses hooves while I admired the scenery. 

The Cathedral of Saint-Gatien

This stunning cathedral is right next door to the museum and makes an easy side trip. I may have a love affair with gothic architecture and stained glass. I can’t seem to stop going into cathedrals which are all generally of a similar blueprint, and staring in wonder at the scale and scope of human achievement in terms of really big, really complex, and emotionally moving buildings. I took far too many photos of the different types of stained glass, but I admit that I’m more interested in the colors and shapes than I am in the catechism represented therein, so I can’t tell you what they are supposed to be depicting (though there were dozens of signs explaining each window inside the church).

When I was in the Fine Arts Museum, I found a painting of the cathedral, and did my best to replicate the angle in modern photo form. It may be a silly American thing, but we simply aren’t used to buildings which have stood for centuries, and despite knowing how old the building is (800 years), seeing a 200+ year old painting of the cathedral made it’s age somehow more real.

While I was in the church, the trombone quartet that I had found in the gardens outside the museum showed up to practice with the organist. I love listening to the giant pipe organs! It started out quiet enough so you could hear the trombones, then the organist pulled the stops out (that’s where that phrase comes from, right?) and wham!

The Botanical Gardens

Another thing to love about France is the ubiquitous nature of nature. I mean the public gardens. Although what the French call a garden may be anything from a highly cultivated botanical display to an asthetically designed artistic movement, to a grassy place with a water feature, they are all clean, safe, and well maintained, and above all free to the public.

I wrote about my three gardens in Paris earlier this spring, so while experiencing the long weekend and excellent weather in Tours, I decided to pop in to the Botanical Gardens. I was not disappointed. The bus lets passengers off right at the main entrance to the gardens (although there are multiple entrances because it is such a huge area of land). I started by walking to my right into a maze of botanical specimens. The plants are arranged in pleasing beds and trellises and I suspect at least part of it is in bloom in every season except winter. There were three paths with three different points of view and experiences, and at the far end sat a grand glass greenhouse. Unfortunately, that was closed during my visit, but it was a fairly small part of the overall parc.

As I turned around and headed back towards my entry point along a different pathway, I was treated to entirely different scenery and the sounds of very vocal frogs. I managed to sneak up on one in the water feature and snap a photo before he plonked into the depths. I walked for a while simply admiring the plants and small streams, watching families and couples enjoying picnics in the grass, and then suddenly I came upon the menagerie. Here in the middle of this garden were a small number of animal habitats. I recall seeing the same thing in the Jardin des Plants in Paris and being generally surprised that any free-to-all style park could afford the staff and upkeep for that. 

It is by no means a full zoo, but I feel like it added a layer of beauty but also entertainment and diversion (especially for children). There were some wallabies, peacocks, flamingos, turtles, tortoises, and a lot of farm type critters (chickens, geese, ducks goats, rabbits, and even a pig). Most of the animals were fenced away, but there was a mini-farm where people could go in and get a bit closer. 

At the opposite end, there were two playgrounds with equipment for children to climb and play on, and still more beautiful lawns of grass for people to picnic and nap on underneath the enormous sprawling trees. I left the park feeling tranquil and refreshed with the satisfied feeling that my last weekend in Tours was extremely well-spent.

Souvenir Means “Memory”

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As an American/native English speaker, the word “souvenir” has always been associated in my mind with consumerism and with the temporary (and often disrespectful) tourist population. I spent part of my childhood living in Panama City, Florida, which was a huge tourist destination famous for it’s sparkling white sand beaches. Whenever my family would go out to enjoy the seaside, we were beset by sellers of overpriced fake key lime pie and tchotchkes made of seashells (which probably weren’t even from the local beaches). We joked about needing t-shirts that said “I’m not a tourist, I live here.”

I am never going to be the person who buys the shell encrusted picture frame or the novelty coffee mug, but I do like having unique keepsakes of my international homes as well as gifts to bring back for friends and family. For my friends, I’ve been gradually accumulating tidbits made from unique Senegalese materials and ingredients by small local businesses, but for myself I found an ethical, local, environmentally sound silversmithing class which seemed like a perfect way to combine a new experience with a physical representation of my tenure in Senegal.

The Existential Crisis Continues

Before I tell you about my cool souvenir experience, I need to talk some more about the (possibly culture shock induced) ongoing existential crisis that is living face to face with the legacy of the colonial and capitalist systems which benefit some at the expense of many. “Kaine, can you talk about Africa without going on about the ethics of it all? Can’t you just tell us the cool story?”, Nope. At least not yet. I don’t get a break from my brain feeding me moral quandaries, so neither do you. But the cool souvenir experience ties into the ethical discussion, and also I am trying my best to make it more “huh, I never looked at it that way” an less “moral philosophy lecture”, so hang with me.

The Global Supply Chain of Souvenirs

I noticed in Zanzibar that a lot of pan-African tourist goods on offer were not actually Tanzanian, being the same exact tropical island stuff I found in SE Asia complete with “Made in Thailand” tags. Even the more “Africa-centric” items like big 5 safari animal themed goods, and Maasai themed goods were not really helping the local economy since the raw materials and production were almost certainly outsourced, while most of the shops are owned by foreign investors. (the exception seemed to be hand painted artwork, which you can often see the artist create on the street)

It’s harder to tell how much of that is the same here in Senegal because Dakar is so much bigger than Stone Town, but it has been a challenge to find good souvenirs and gifts here that are genuinely unique and local. I’ve found that the majority of markets often only sell staples for living, and that many gift oriented markets offer imported items, while tourist oriented markets offer mass produced “pan-African” souvenirs which may or may not be made in China or by exploited workers in neighboring African countries. (the exception seems to be bespoke clothing and furniture, but these are way outside of my luggage size/budget limits).

Toubab Spaces

I only realized here in Senegal that the French word “souvenir” means memory in English, and I really love it because I am far more interested in a memory than a thing. My collection of physical souvenirs are all attached to stories of the experiences I was on when I got them. I’ve been trying to find memorable experiences in Senegal, to see, learn, touch, taste, listen and do things that help me to understand this place and people, but I have noticed that every time I find myself interested in or excited about a product, place, or event it’s probably actually owned by Toubab (the Wolof word for white people).

For example, I found an artisan chocolate shop which uses local fruits, grains, and spices, then I met the Belgian dude who is the half-owner. The woman who owns the other half is Belgian/Congolese, so at least there’s some Africa in there, but not Senegalese, and most Senegalese people couldn’t afford their chocolates anyway. The bar I go to is run by a French/Lebanese man who is super cool, and very dedicated to Dakar, but a foreigner nonetheless. My favorite restaurants are owned by foreigners (Italian, Mexican, Indian) and not just because I love those foods. I really like Senegalese food, but it’s challenging to eat at their restaurants for practical reasons like language barrier (they may not speak French), portion sizes (Senegalese meals are often cooked for groups to share) and “Senegal time” which means it could take 2 hours from the time you order to the time your food arrives.

It’s almost impossible for me to find products and activities that I want to enjoy which are owned and operated by Senegalese. I love to eat at the Senegalese faculty restaurant on campus because they are patient with my bad French, have single serving plates, and respect the fact that the faculty don’t have 2 hour lunches, but I don’t go there unless I’m already on campus. I suspect that Senegalese own and operate lots of small businesses, like all the corner stores, fruit stands, and small bakeries, as well as hardware stores, dry goods stores, and clothing shops, but with the exception of the occasional corner store run, I don’t shop at those places because I don’t need most of the things they sell other than food. My grocery delivery service specializes in selling from local producers, and it’s nice to be able to support local small businesses, but it’s not a souvenir in either the English or French sense of the word.

Cultural Exchange

When I was preparing to move here, my RELO told me there would be a lot of room for cultural exchange like dance lessons, or learning local music styles, local cooking classes, and so on. I was very excited. I don’t expect people to perform their culture for me, but I have become accustomed to being able to find at least a few people (or a government sponsored program) that want to show and tell, who are overjoyed to find a tourist that takes an interest. In New Zealand, I participated in a Maori tribal tour; in Spain I went on a cookie tour of nunneries; in Ireland I went to a trad music/storytelling night in a local performer’s home; Japanese ladies taught me their summer festival dance, Korean ladies taught me a tea ceremony, one of my Chinese friends taught me how to haggle at the market for the first time ever. In Zanzibar, I got to do a Swahili cooking class with a lovely Tanzanian entrepreneur and enjoyed a tour and history lesson from another local. These experiences are always my favorite parts of a trip, and they are usually not that hard to find.

Here in Dakar, I am better off watching YouTube tutorials if I want to learn how to make attaya or thieboudienne. People seem disappointed that I can’t speak Wolof, but I can’t find a class or really any help (one person sent me a pdf of common Wolof phrases, but no pronunciation guide, so again, better off with YouTube) I didn’t move here just to learn about it from my living room. I learned more Swahili in three weeks by chatting to locals than have learned Wolof in 9 months. I am making music, but it’s with other expats… they aren’t Americans at least, and not native English speakers either which makes it all the funnier that they love playing bluegrass covers of classic American rock songs (no, man, it’s “Tex-Arkana” not ‘Turkish-cana” Texas, not Turkey). I love it, it’s so fun and a wonderful way to feel like I’m part of a community, and although it is cultural exchange of a sort, it’s not with Senegalese, which remains a source of frustration 9/10ths of the way through this adventure.

Aid, Colonialism, or White Savior-ism?

I have been struggling since my arrival with the role of foreign aid in Africa in general and the very difficult to navigate line between aid and neo-colonialism, or help and white-saviorism. I think that while there is no hard and fast rule, the general guidelines are not that different from Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. In my opinion so far, the closer to the bottom (survival) the need is, the fewer qualifiers we should put on giving it. If the man is currently starving, give him a fish. Once he’s well fed, teach him to fish, and so on. As helpers, our long term goal needs to be to help the group achieve self-sufficiency, but we may have to do some things for them on the way.

In addition, because those things cost money in our capitalist hellscape environment, that means we will have to publicize the helping to raise that money. I and every other English Language Fellow write little publicity blurbs every time we do something that improves the lives of locals so that Congress can see where the taxpayer’s money is going. However, we don’t call ourselves out by name, and we focus the story on the achievements of the locals. This is the needle we thread to help just the right amount while learning how to say, “no, we will not do that part for you” and also advertising for funding without exploiting anyone’s suffering for personal gain. Fun fact, Chidi Anagonye, the moral philosopher of The Good Place, was raised in Senegal. I feel like my ongoing moral tummyache honors the writers work.

Green and Pink: The Cool Story

The Pink House (Maison Rose) is run by an older French woman and funded mainly by a French charity organization, but it serves a very real need in the community for women escaping domestic violence and sexual exploitation. They have an embroidery workshop where local Senegalese women are employed at a fair wage to hand embroider designs for (mainly French) fashion houses which are committed to raising the quality of life for women in West Africa. It still sounds slightly like a sweatshop, but I am assured that the women are paid fairly, and that for many if not all of the women who work there, not just the money but also the work itself are a huge part of their recovery and financial independence as survivors.

The Green Wave Jewelry shop has only recently started, but their goal is to provide free 3-month training courses to women from Maison Rose, and to then employ them to make the silver jewelry and “sea plastic” home décor items that they sell. The shop is committed to using natural and recycled materials, so their silver is all recycled, the materials for the molds are washed up from the sea, and they even use ocean trash plastic in a beautiful way (sea plastic, lol). The project is designed to give the women a skill which they can not only parlay into a viable economic opportunity, but also something that can build their self-worth back up.

They told me that although things have been slow going, they are selling enough product to train and hire another round of women this fall, plus they hope to hire one of their trainees as the new workshop manager to run things when they are travelling around Senegal or back to the UK. Finally, the fact that foreign founders don’t put themselves front and center on their social media is a good sign that it’s more about the impact than the image. See, I told you the experience was connected to the ethics. Now, let’s make a cuttlefish ring!

Did You Say “Cuttlefish Ring”?

The silversmithing workshop takes place for 5 hours over two sessions (2.5 x 2), and you get to choose if you want to do the sand technique or something called the “cuttlefish” technique. I looked at examples from the Instagram, and decided the cuttlefish was more my style, but I also was deeply intrigued by why it was named that. I guessed (correctly) that the sand technique was casting in sand, which although I’ve never done personally, I see videos of people making jewelry that way on TikTok and Facebook all the time because the algorithm knows I love watching people craft things in condensed 1-2 minute chunks. I very purposely didn’t investigate this jewelry technique before going because I wanted to be surprised, so everything I’m sharing here, I learned at or after the workshop.

What is a cuttlefish? One of the first questions asked in the workshop was quite reasonable, since although most of us have likely seen these creatures in a nature documentary, we may not know them by name. They are similar to squid, but have a calcium carbonate “bone” (a cuttlebone) that helps them keep their shape and change their buoyancy. When they die, the hard internal structure is left behind and they wash up on shore by the dozens. Cuttlefish have natural predators, but humans enjoy them too for both their high quality ink (that squid ink pasta that looks so pretty in photos?) and for their meat, which is an excellent substitute for calamari. You may have even seen cuttlebone in a pet shop or a parakeet cage before since they are often placed in with the birds to supplement their calcium intake and give them something to gnaw on besides their owners fingers.

Why are we using it to cast metal? The cuttlebone technique may be one of the older metal casting styles around, coming originally from the Mediterranean and traveling upward into Europe. There are examples of belt buckles made in this way in Germany dating back some 1200 years or more, but some antiquarians think the technique could be as much as 5,000 years old.

It’s super easy to carve or press shapes into it, and it’s harder on one side than the other, so the “outside” stays in a solid shape, while the softer “inside” is carved out. But that’s not really it. The way that the layers of calcium carbonate – also called aragonite – form beautiful wave-like patterns in the finished product, not unlike tree-rings. No two are ever alike because it’s an organic process that preserves the life of an organism in precious metal. Neat! The cuttlebone that Green Wave uses is generally that which has washed up on the beaches of Senegal and other neighboring West African countries.

Workshop Session 1

For the casting technique, you need two smaller or one larger (or I guess if you want a Texas sized belt buckle, two larger) cuttlebones. Green Wave had cut ours in half before we arrived. We then learned about the hard and soft side, and how to sand the soft side flat until the two pieces could press together as tightly as possible. That was the basis for our mold. We all sifted through a bowl of rings, mostly made of brass or steel, in order to find the size and style we wanted to use. The model rings were plain and unadorned, just to get the general shape. They told us it’s better to choose a slightly smaller model (foreshadowing) since there will be a later step that files some silver out of the interior. I chose a square ring in a size that would fit well on my index and middle fingers.

With the rings chosen, we learned how to carefully but forcefully press the ring halfway into the newly flattened surface of one of our cuttlebone halves. This is harder than it should be, given how soft the material is. I accidentally broke part of my cuttlebone while pressing in, and thankfully it was a chunk off the larger half towards the top, and we were able to smooth out my initial impression with more sanding and move the placement further down. Unfortunately for me, the narrow end of the cuttlebone is harder and more dense, so instead of a smooth pressing, I had to take the ring out and remove the compressed aragonite dust with a paintbrush like an archaeologist.

Once I got the ring model halfway submerged, I added some ball bearings at two corners (to help align the two sides of the mold) and then gently placed the second half again and pressed some more until the two halves touched and the ring model was completely encased. The dust or powder left behind can also be used to polish jewelry, so doesn’t have to go to waste.

The next step was definitely the most interesting because we took our archeology paintbrushes and went back to the gentle and painstaking work of removing all the powdered remains from the mold. When I first removed my model, the indentation was smooth, and I still hadn’t really realized the link between the cuttlebone and the finished jewelry I’d seen in their shop. Then as I brushed away the compacted dust, the beautiful striations of the cuttlebone began to emerge like layers of sediment in rock. The tiny intricate lines were mesmerizing, and more beautiful than anything I could have thought to carve on my own. The tiny brush was uncovering a lifetime of growth a few grains of powder at a time.

Step 4 was to carve the funnel via which the molten silver would enter the mold. This part was actually the most nerve wracking because we had all spent a painstaking 90 minutes creating the ring mold, and a misstep in the funnel could wreck the whole design. However, our teachers were very patient and kind, encouraging us to take smaller cuts if we felt nervous, and never once made us feel rushed or stressed. The funnel was more technical than I expected since it not only needed to direct the silver into the mold without disrupting the natural cuttlebone pattern, it also had to work with gravity to force the silver all the way to the bottom, and with shape, since silver doesn’t like to flow at sharp angles.

The very last step was to create teeny tiny air vents that would lead from the bottom of the ring mold to the top, once again working with physics. The silver will flow, pushing the air down, meaning the channels have to start at the bottom, but air prefers to go up, so channels that run down or to the side may invite the heavier molten metal, leaving air bubbles in the ring. These final tiny tunnels are made by gently smoothing away a groove that aligns with the existing grooves of the cuttlebone pattern, then arcing it upward once it’s a few mm away from the ring impression. Then end result looks a little like a daddy longlegs spider got smooshed in your cuttlebone. After a final brushing to get any lingering loose powder out, we put our two halves together, assuring perfect alignment with the ball bearings, then taping them together tightly with masking tape.

The Molten Silver

It was a little disappointing to realize I would not be pouring the molten silver myself, but it’s probably for the best. Considering how long it takes to master the act of carefully pouring anything into a tiny space without spilling, the addition of molten to the equation means bulky gloves, long tongs, and heavy protective clothing, not to mention huge liability. Would I have liked to pour it myself? Yes, but I’m also happy knowing that one of the Senegalese trainees will be doing the pouring on my behalf. Also, since it takes a long time to heat the silver to 1000+ degrees Celsius, and then also cool off enough to go in the cooling bath, the employees do this part between the two workshop sessions. They were, however, kind enough to take some unique video and photos of my ring during the process.

I was surprised at how small the workspace actually is. The smelter which heats the silver is no bigger than a Keurig, then they have a small crockpot to keep the food grade acid that is used to cool and clean the silver, and a cake pan full of dirt that holds the mold in place and provides a safe splash zone. They make the pour look so easy, but I am assured it is something which requires a lot of practice not only not to make a molten silver mess, but to make sure no air bubbles mar the finished product.

When the mold comes apart, you can see the scorched cuttlebone and all the excess silver. The large chunk on top is the funnel and gets sawed off (though part of me could not help but think that it might be fun to deliberately make a funnel that could stay as a chunky decoration). The wispy lines are the air vents, which are so thin and delicate, they can be broken off by hand. By the time we all returned for our second and final workshop, the rings had been cooled & sawed, and were ready for the finishing touches.

Workshop Session 2

Disclaimer, I took far fewer photos in the second workshop because it was a lot more intensive and focused work. During the the first workshop I had a lot of breaks and down time where it was easy to grab my phone for some photos, but during the second, my hands were busy busy busy.

The very first thing I noticed was the insane amount of texture that my ring had captured from the cuttlebone. One of the reasons I chose a square ring was that I liked the side pattern more than the top/bottom pattern and I wanted to maximize the texture variety of the finished product.

Next, we learned the 4 stages of the jewelry finishing process: 1) brass brushing, 2) coarse filing, 3) fine filing, 4) polishing. The brass brushing is a way to remove any other bits that stuck to the ring during the molding process or acid bath. It’s the most aggressive scrub brush you could imagine, and it’s very important to keep the ring wet while brushing. It can be done on and off during both the filing stages, but has to be finished before the polishing. I thought my ring was fairly bright silver compared to the others in the pile, but a little brass brush scrub revealed even shinier metal.

The filing is both physically grueling and mentally satisfying. We start off working on the area where the funnel was cut off since it’s the largest. For people with round rings, this was a smaller area, and involved making the cut blend smoothly into the rest of the ring. For me and the other person with a square ring it meant filing one entire side completely smooth. I toyed with the idea of doing just the part that the funnel had attached to, but it didn’t look as good as the examples they showed us of the fully smoothed side. They showed us two methods for filing, one using a wooden brace attached to the table, and the other using your own foot (a more traditional method that probably works better if you have calluses).

Once we had the funnel edge smoothed, we then worked the interior. Again, at first, I thought I might like to leave some texture on the inside, but as I worked the sharp edges down, and slid the ring on to test size and comfort, I realized that the flatter interior was more comfortable. So, in addition to smoothing one whole exterior edge, I did the interior as well.

They had advised us to choose rings which were slightly small for the mold making process since filing would give it extra size, but mine was still a bit snug once the interior was smooth flat, so they offered to put it on the ring stretcher. This when the its-not-a-disaster-its-a-bonus-lesson accident happened. My ring cracked. I didn’t know silver could crack! I knew that things which were forged or joined with solder might crack due to flaws in the material or process where two different things connected, but I thought poured silver would be like poured concrete and just — be all one piece? But something to do with the physics of the liquid metal means that sometimes the spot at the funnel where the two sides of the pour meet can be a bit weak.

In the end, it’s best that the ring showed this flaw before I left the shop because they had all the tools on hand to fix it. I got to watch as she broke out two types of solder and a mini blow torch. I’ve seen and even used (a long time ago) solder for electronics, but no one cares if electronics are pretty, so I associate solder with lumpy grey metal. This silver solder is a copper silver alloy that matches the ring and even with a hairline crack, the heat causes the solder to sort of suck up into the flaw, like a straw, aka capillary action. So when the temperature gets into the goldilocks zone, you can see the lump almost vanish. A cooling acid bath and a little filing, and there’s no sign of the repair.

The fine filing is done with a series of smaller files to work on any tiny edges which might be left from the air vents or an inexact alignment of the two halves of cuttlebone. It’s almost entirely invisible unless you are looking with a zoom lens or magnifier, but taking the very tiny square or sharp edges and making them rounded and smooth has a big impact on the comfort while wearing and keeps the ring from snagging on skin or clothing.

Last but not least is a polishing process that engages 4-6 types of sandpaper at ever increasing fineness from 240 to 3000, ending with a silver polishing cloth. The end result is that your filed areas have a mirror shine, and your textured areas are free of poking-out bits.

I’m happy with my finished product as both a piece of jewelry and a memory. It’s a unique souvenir of my time in Dakar which encapsulates many aspects of my experiences here: the chronic quest for cultural exchange, the inescapability of toubab spaces, the long road to understanding my ethical role in aid-centered activities outside my own country, and my struggle to find meaningful projects. Plus, it’s pretty.