Siraboye Diallo begged her parents to allow her to be circumcised. At 9, they thought she was too young. But she was determined to join other village girls in a centuries-old coming-of-age ritual celebrated with feasting, drumming, dancing and gifts.
Years later, the reality of the ordeal referred to by some as "sitting on the knife" changed her mind completely. Now, Diallo is among a growing number of people across Senegal, including religious leaders, tribal chiefs and even some circumcisers, who are helping to persuade hundreds of villages to stop ritually cutting of their girls.
"I don't want any other girl to go through what I did," Diallo tells a group of women, some suckling babies, sitting in the shade of a giant baobab tree in Nangar, a clutch of thatch-roofed huts deep in the hills on Senegal's southeastern border.
The village pledges against circumcision began five years ago, on the other side of the country, in a place called Malicounda. After taking an aid group's class in human rights, health and hygiene, women there decided the practice was dangerous and convinced the community to issue a public declaration formally abandoning it.
Since then 708 villages just over 10 percent of those practicing female genital cutting in Senegal have issued similar declarations, with some 400 more pledging to do so this year.
Despite more than 20 years of campaigning by health and human rights activists, genital cutting remains a custom in much of Africa, where girls may be seen as unclean, unchaste and undeserving of marriage if they do not undergo the rite. Because sexual contact is often uncomfortable for circumcised women, some men believe it prevents their wives from being unfaithful.
The World Health Organization estimates up to 140 million girls most of them in 28 African countries have been subjected to what it terms "genital mutilation," with some 2 million more at risk every year.
Senegal outlawed the practice in 1999, imposing jail terms of up to five years for violators. But most villages defied the law, and legislators say in only two cases have perpetrators been brought before courts.
Some campaigns against female circumcision alienated people with their graphic images of taboo subjects. Usually, tradition and ignorance prevailed.
"Women who have been circumcised die, and women who haven't been circumcised also die. So there is no reason not to do this," said Diala Sadiakhou, a proponent of the practice from Lingue Koto village near Nangar.
In most areas, the practice is to cut out part or all the clitoris. But in the southeastern Tambacounda region, the most extreme form is also performed: all of the girl's external genitals are removed and the remaining tissue sealed, leaving a tiny opening.
The risks include shock, hemorrhaging and infections that can kill the girl. Abscesses, cysts and difficulties in childbirth are also common, causing pain throughout the woman's life. And because the same blade is often used on many girls, there are concerns about spreading disease, even HIV.
Diallo, now in her late 30s, was sealed to ensure she wouldn't become pregnant before marriage.
"From morning until night, I didn't stop bleeding," she said. "I didn't dare cry because I was afraid my friends would laugh at me."
The day she married, she had to be cut open again so she could have sex with her husband a union women are expected to consummate while still bleeding, to prevent the wound from closing again.
Diallo suffered years of complications delivering 11 children. With her first son, she endured more than three days of labor and a painful bike ride to a health center 11 kilometers (seven miles) away; the boy died soon after birth.
But this did not stop her having three daughters circumcised. Without it, she thought at the time, they would never find husbands their only guarantee of economic security.
At least one in five girls undergo the procedure in Senegal. The number is much higher in Tambacounda and other parts of the south and northeast dominated by tribes like the Peuls, Mandingos, Toukouleurs and Bassaris who follow the practice.
The ritual used to be performed between the ages of 10 and 14, accompanied by instruction on a wife's responsibilities. These days, it is typically done before 4, making it less a right of passage than insurance for the girl's honor and by extension, that of her family.
Pressure to conform is overwhelming. One woman, who came from a family that does not cut its girls but married into one that does, said she endured years of rejection by her in-laws.
"If I cooked for them, they wouldn't touch the food. If I washed their clothes, they washed them again. If I swept the floor, someone would do it again," said the woman, wrapped in a green veil.
When she couldn't stand it any more, she had a circumciser quietly perform the operation at home, when she was already in her 30s.
"No matter how bad the pain was, it was less than what I was going through every day," said the woman, who asked not to be identified.
Until they learned about health and hygiene, women said they did not understand genital cutting could cause complications.
Oureye Sall, a circumciser from the northeastern Fouta region, performed the rite on hundreds of girls during a 20-year career. Some girls passed out from pain and others suffered hemorrhages, but she said: "I thought it was evil spirits who were getting at my girls."
Since coming to understand the dangers of circumcision, she has visited more than 100 villages to persuade them to give up the practice.
The aid group whose training set off the movement against circumcision Tostan, or "breakthrough" in the Wolof language was surprised by the reaction. The organizers say they did not set out to end female genital cutting, but provided information about its risks as part of a broad health and development program.
"Women are very smart. When you give them the information, they make the right choice," says Tostan's founder, Molly Melching, an American from Danville, Illinois, who has been in Senegal for years.
Now the movement against circumcision appears to have taken on a life of its own, with women trained by Tostan spreading the word to villages where the group is not present.
Key to the women's success has been the willingness of traditional and religious leaders to support their decision and even help promote it.
On foot and by bicycle, Imam Alassane Bah travels kilometers (miles) of dusty, bumpy roads to reach isolated villages and explain the dangers of circumcising women.
Many who practice the ritual believe it is required by Islam the religion of most Senegalese and is an "honor" or "gift" for women. But Bah assures them that is not so.
"Islam neither forbids this practice, nor requires it," explains the diminutive man in a flowing blue robe and delicately embroidered, white prayer cap. "It is an honor that is done to women, but it is an honor that hurts them, and the religion says don't hurt women."
Since some Christians also practice female circumcision, Christian clergy have joined the campaign.
The example of Senegal's majority Wolofs, who don't circumcise women, also may have contributed to abandoning the practice. The Wolofs and other tribes have coexisted for years and marriages between them are not uncommon.
But even where female circumcision has been formally rejected, doubts remain about whether to abandon the practice and it is impossible to tell what goes on behind closed doors.
In Nangar, where Siraboye Diallo recounted the suffering that led her to turn against female circumcision, one of the women sitting under the baobab tree listening intently was Assiatou Kamara, who felt Diallo's pain but wondered if ending the practice would be accepted by all.
"We are ready to try this," Kamara said. "But what if in a few years no one wants to marry our daughters?"
The question was left unanswered, hanging in the air.