A new obsession: textiles

When I arrived in Kenya, I knew that tailoring was common, and I had the plan to get an outfit made for me.  I had no idea that within days I would become totally obsessed with textiles and start a collection that will definitely make packing to return home difficult. 

The first thing I found were khangas, or lesos (machekas in South Africa).  These are cheap cotton pieces of fabric that are used for literally everything.  You can carry a baby, carry your groceries, wear it as a wrap, have a picnic on it, get clothing made… anything.  There is a growing market of people making craft and high fashion items like shoes and purses covered in patterned khangas, which are really cool.  They are usually printed in two bright, contrasting colors and have a saying on them in Kiswahili.   When you buy them, you get two pieces that are a few yards long each, for about three dollars. 

from left: Mumias town, Lodwar, Lodwar, Johannesburg, Mombasa

During my first field trip to Kakamega, I had one goal, and that was to buy a khanga to remember my time there.  While you don’t see them as much in Nairobi, every woman in Mumias town was wearing or carrying a khanga of some sort.  I bought my first one, a blue and orange piece that said “UKIPATA SHUKURA HATA MIMI” which means something like “when you receive, also give me thanks.”  I wrote the place and date I purchased it on the edge and decided I would have to collect one every time I traveled.

number one

By now I have collected quite a few and gotten one in Kakamega, Turkana, Nairobi, and Johannesburg.  Sonia also brought me one from Mombasa, and I have been collecting some to give as gifts.

DRC skirt

My next obsession came in the form of kitenge.  Vitenge are printed with a batik technique and come in a ton of colors and patterns, like khangas.  Unlike khangas, the pattern doesn’t end or have a border, but is repeated on the bolt.  It is used to make outfits and purses and all kinds of good stuff.  Sonia took me to a store called Amani ya Juu in Riverside and I got a skirt made of a kitenge from DRC. 

kitenge from Joburg

a "few" examples

In South Africa, I discovered shweshwe.  Shweshwe is a thick, printed cotton fabric.  It was originally dyed with indigo, and much of the fabric available is still primarily blue and brown.  Each piece is made up of a single color, with a dark shade, a lighter one, and white, forming an often circular-based pattern.  The acid discharge roller printing technique used to create the patterns leave the fabrics with a distinctive smell and stiffness.  The fabric is used for many things, but is frequently made into short-sleeved, full skirted dresses.  I got a few examples, in traditional blue, brown, and one in special green.  UPDATE: I WENT BACK AND GOT MORE

easily my favorite

details

the famous Da Gama seal

African waxprints are very common is West Africa, but as Joburg is a hub, everything is available there.  I stocked up on a couple while I had the chance.

wax print

My plan when I return to Kenya is to get a few yards of kitenge and have an outfit made.  Any comments or suggestions?  Let me know!

Poor but happy?

Even though I’m in a very good mood today, I have decided my new blog will be a rant.  A rant about “poor but happy,”  the phrase I have heard many, many times.  No, I am not working on poverty alleviation as such, but when people talk to me about traveling and working with underprivileged communities, I hear this phrase a lot.  Usually it is a nice, upbeat commentary about traveling in the “third world.” 

“It is so eye-opening!  You see these people that have so little, but they are still so happy!  Their lives are so simple.  It makes me reconsider my busy life with email, iphones, dinner dates and deadlines.  Maybe they have figured out something that we don’t know.”

And I’m here to say:  I have no idea what it is like to be poor, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it does not, in fact, make you happy.  Nor is life simpler.  At all. 

Take, for example, drinking water.  I would say those of us in the developed world have things a bit simpler when it comes to opening the tap, filling a glass, and drinking some water.  If you live in many parts of the world with running water, you still have to boil it to render it potable, which takes a lot of time and energy (yours and the stuff you pay a lot for).  Maybe you don’t have running water or a borehole, and you have to go collect water, which can take a huge chunk out of your productive workday and take a whole lot of effort.  If you have to carry your water, you are probably going to use a lot less of it, meaning you spend a good portion of your life pretty dehydrated.  This would not make me happy. 

Besides the extra difficulties in conducting and everyday life that most poor people deal with, they still have the stressors that we do.  They still worry about work, school, boyfriends, etc.  Maybe their life seems more “pure” to us because they aren’t worried about selecting the wine with the correct terroir, or waiting in line for the new iphone, but they probably spend just as much time and more energy waiting in line at the borehole. 

The 9 to 5 Life and Me

For one month, I will be living the 9 to 5 office life of a real, grown-up adult-style person.  Let’s see how this goes. 

I have gotten pretty used to setting my own schedule so far in Kenya, so leaving for work at 7 was a bit of a struggle for me the first few days, but I am getting used to it.  At 7:30 every morning I check in at the Rennie House in Braamfontein and head up to the 14^th floor to the HO offices.  This is one of the taller buildings in Braamfontein and the view is amazing.  From my desk I can see the entire Wits University campus and the posh suburbs of Joburg.  It all feels so grown-up and I felt out of place and awkward until the rest of the staff rolled in on my first day.  The staff is largely female, and either young and devastatingly hip or super-hippie.  Lots of drop-crotch pants and flowy colours and shweshwe in the office.  Not to say that everyone isn't super-professional—these people get a LOT accomplished—but the atmosphere is really chill and cool.  Also, there is a fancy cappuccino making machine that I have become quite fond of.

view from my desk

My job during the first week was taking stories from the beginning to the end of the publishing cycle, which has many, many steps and requires a lot of attention to detail.  I love it.  It goes something like thing: collect the final versions of a story in the L1 (first language, mother tongue, home tongue), get the translation into English, Zulu, Afrikaans, or Kiswahili (L2, lingua franca), and create a metadata form with all translations of the story, author/illustrator names, host organization and copyright information, dates, etc.  This is the master page for the story so there is no room for error!  Then I collect all the illustrations, make sure they are high-res, and create a powerpoint layout of the text and images in each language that looks nice.  All this hardcopy information then needs to be loaded onto the organization’s sharepoint so it can be accessed by everyone.  Now the real fun begins!  Publishing!  Did I say fun?  I meant excruciatingly tedious.  I need to upload each image onto our website’s image database and fill in a ton of information for each image—colors used, keywords, type, category, size, book reference, shape, file type, name… it takes a few minutes to do each image, and we are talking hundreds of images for the stories on my roster.  Once all the images are up, I use our story builder app, referencing the layouts on the powerpoint I made, and publish a finalized story!  I have published six so far (38 to go!) and you can check them out if you a tiny bit of investigation online.

I am also checking the 120+ stories in our database to make sure all images are available on the HO sharepoint and online, all metadata are correct, and the story “family trees” of the various language translations are linking properly online.  This is a big task!  I am also presenting on my work at the pilot sites during out year-end wrap up and doing several other tasks, so I am very occupied. 

To cap it all off, when I get home at night I am working on my master’s paper for Heller… I am a busy lady for these few weeks, but it feels pretty good to be truly tired when I lay down at night.