People go into debt with their family members, asking for loans so they can pay for all the food. Family members give willingly, because that is the unspoken Senegalese social contract and they know this family member will help them pay for their own Dennabo next time.
Most households in my village consist of multiple men with multiple wives who are having babies every other year for ten to twenty years. This means there is usually a Dennabo happening. Most evenings I can hear a DJ playing in a nearby neighborhood, and I can be 99% sure it’s a baby shower.
Weddings
Dewgal celebrations, or weddings, bear a similar cadence to the Dennabo, being held over the course of three or four days and consisting of lots of dancing, cooking and eating. There is more planning ahead of time, and I’ve noticed more people from out of town. There is typically no ceremony or a signing of documentation for the bride and groom. The couple may go to the mosque to get the official blessing from their Imam, the leader of their Mosque, but other people will not accompany them there.
On the big day of the Dewgal celebration, the bride will be walked from her house to the groom's house, by all the women and girls in her family. People will play music and dance through the street. Some of them will be in new dresses they’ve had made to match, like bridesmaids' dresses. The women will whisk her into her new home with luggage full of new items for her house.
Another tradition I’ve observed is that the bride lays in a bed in a white dress supposedly, as I was told, for three days, resting up for the wedding day. I don’t know if this happens literally or if it is more so just a stated tradition.
