Why Echoppe?

Marie Gogo, Grand Marche (Lome 2004)

By now, you may be sensing a theme...Echoppe is an important part of our wedding.  Whenever people ask where we're registered, I try to remember to mention that we HIGHLY encourage donations to Echoppe in lieu of a physical gift, but there's never enough time to explain just how important this particular gift is to give.  So, at the request of Bev Ott (co-founder of Echoppe, Manchester grad, and friend of Wendy), I thought I would go into a more thorough explanation of why we choose to celebrate Echoppe as a part of our wedding...

Echoppe is not a charity. Echoppe is an investment, a community, an extended hand, and in many cases, a life saver.  For many women in Togo, a tiny country in western Africa located between Ghana and Benin, no one has ever thought enough to consider these women as equals in business or in life, let alone considered offering them an opportunity to invest in themselves.  But when women come to Echoppe, they find they are neither alone in their struggle, nor in their ability to change their circumstances.

Beneficiaries come to Echoppe by word of mouth and their first loan must be co-signed by a current beneficiary/entrepreneur.  These women enter the doors with a variety of reasons - their husbands have run off, their children are hungry, they want an income they can control that someone else can't squander away, etc. - and yet they all come looking to find a foothold, a way to step out of whatever mire they find themselves in.

The first loan a woman can receive is the equivalent of approximately $40USD.  Before she can receive these funds, she must provide a business plan, open a savings account, and commit to attending a monthly meeting in her neighborhood.  She has an initial 6 months to pay back her debt and along the way she works with Echoppe to learn valuable skills that range from the importance of educating her daughters (as well as her sons), where/how to find help when she is physically or sexually abused, as well as recognizing the symptoms of malaria and HIV in her family.  Where many organizations step in and tell people how they should change their lives in order to do X, Y, and Z, Echoppe provides a platform for the women to form a community and a network of peers, and together, the women teach one another. 

By the time a woman is ready for her second loan, she has already experienced the power within herself and moves on to bigger plans, greater goals, and a stronger sense of her own worth (economically and otherwise).  One of the most powerful milestones I had the amazing pleasure of witnessing was a requirement as well as a rite of passage between the first and second loans: the women must sign their name to take out the second loan.  While many may have attended school through 8th grade, others through university, some have never learned to read or write.  Often, a first loan is signed with a thumb print, but the second must be written.  Just the memory of watching a woman named Marie Gogo (photographed above) sign her name with such pride still brings tears to my eyes - six years after she offered to show me what she could do.

I could go on and on (and will be happy to share more stories with you if you ask), but the main reason we have chosen to celebrate Echoppe as we celebrate our marriage is that these women are a part of my community.  They are a part of who I am, and thus a part of our (Navid and Wendy's) relationship.  We have a literal wealth of material goods between the two of us, and should all of it disappear tomorrow, we have YOU to fall back on.  These women who come to Echoppe do not.  If anyone "deserves" celebration, these women, this community that is Echoppe deserves celebration.

In lieu of cheesy "thank you" favors left on the tables for the guests at our wedding, Navid and I will be making a donation in the name of our family and friends.  We ask that you join us in this opportunity to give.