One of the things I disliked about being young is the fact that I grew up as a kid under a Fashion Fascist regime. My mother - aka die Führerin - bought my clothes, decided where and when to wear what (wondering why not being allowed) and dictated what was in. Well, out is the more appropriate preposition here, since 'fashionably alternative' was not in her dictionary. Nor - as I later came to understand - in the budget.
Luckily enough, this all came to a halt during the Great Era of Textile Revolution - more commonly referred to as 'puberty' - when I managed to end her supremacy over my wardrobe. The price I had to pay was high - literally then, as I didn't get too much pocket money - but step by step I was able to climb the young adult's sole scale of relevance: the Ladder of Coolness. Sneaking out of the house in an old pair of trousers from my dad (there used to be a cheap alternative to baggies), donning a shirt from a favourite band underneath the jacket that went into my backpack as soon as I rounded the corner, and wearing a legendary pair of old-school Adidas shoes I once won through a television show (long ago, in a time where answers to television quiz questions were still answered by post-cards, not by speed-dialing): puberty started to feel not so bad after all...
And although I don't wear my old shirts from the Offspring or the Beasty Boys anymore, I can't really get it over my heart to throw them away: they are still part of the pile, like withering witnesses of the numerous battles fought for Freedom of Fabric. Battles it were indeed, because there was an annual counter-movement: during the spring break cleaning, the Fashion Police launched unannounced raids. This meant Government intrusion into my kingdom - a four-walled room plastered with posters and rock star pictures - relentless wardrobe inspections and the annual deportation of anything that didn't match the official taste.
Resistance was futile, as I once experienced. The victim was a self-made shirt. To be more precise: a white, tight Fruit of the Loom shirt customized with my very own graphic design in black marker, turning it into a piece of an imaginary band's merchandising. In all my haste, I had forgotten to hide this unique member of the censored collection when I heard my mom marching up the stairs. And as she crawled herself through a pile of clothes that were even out of fashion to her taste - which, in view of her perspective on the concept of being in fashion, meant that they were almost ready for an afterlife as a retro style piece of clothing - she bumped into the unfortunate politically incorrect refugee in the closet. "This one," she said with a look of disdain on her face, "does not belong here." And the fearful words fell, the equivalent of a shirt's condemnation to death: "This one has to go." I tried everything I could, even a rather far-fetched "But mom, this one brings good fortune!", but nothing could prevent one of my favourite shirts to be banned forever. Off with a bunch of other clothes, in a big yellow plastic bag, direction Africa. "The poor little kids over there will be more than happy to get these clothes," she always added, addressing my conscience and thereby suppressing any further inquiries for justification from my part.
Last week, I visited a tiny village in Kirundo, the northernmost province in Burundi, close to the Rwandese border. Across lake Cohoha, walking a mile inwards, through banana tree forests and randomly scattered huts housing a family, a few chickens and - in the best case - a goat or a cow. It was one of the weirdest moments of my life. I was literally surrounded by a whole village, more or less 200 people, with the likely exception of the unfortunate guys lying passed out under a tree, probably still regretting having knocked down too much impeke the night before when they heard the news of the day: a real muzungu, from across the water, in the middle of their village. According to my guide I was the first visitor in five years, and judging from the stares I got I don't think he was exaggerating. If you'd ask me, this should be a standard part of our education: standing alone amidst dozens of black people, including the poor little guy bursting into tears in fear of the unknown, pointing at you and your white skin.
I have to agree, I felt rather uncomfortable. Not that I was afraid that something might happen – I was accompanied by a guide from the village after all – but the average dictionary contains more than one entry whose meaning I don't necessarily want to understand through experience, and 'a mob' is definitely one of them. So I felt rather relieved when my guide suggested to walk me back to the boat. Until one particular man suddenly caught my eye. A shy, slender guy, sheepishly peering at me from a distance. I couldn't help myself, but I give him a long incredulous stare. Back where I live, in the so-called civilized world, this is often considered as an application for a fight: looking for a fraction of a second too long at someone - or, as is often the case, his girlfriend - usually induces a rhetorical "What you looking at? Am I wearing something of yours?", and may result in your face meeting that someone else's fist. This man though, did nothing like that. He just stared back at me.
Strangely enough, this was the first time the aforementioned question would have been justified, as he was wearing a not-so-tight, not-so-white Fruit of the Loom shirt. Customized with red soil streaks, bloody stains and hardly visible black markings referring to an imaginary band. The only thing that crossed my mind was a genuine repetition of my earlier plead: "I hope this shirt may bring good luck to you.".
Luckily enough, this all came to a halt during the Great Era of Textile Revolution - more commonly referred to as 'puberty' - when I managed to end her supremacy over my wardrobe. The price I had to pay was high - literally then, as I didn't get too much pocket money - but step by step I was able to climb the young adult's sole scale of relevance: the Ladder of Coolness. Sneaking out of the house in an old pair of trousers from my dad (there used to be a cheap alternative to baggies), donning a shirt from a favourite band underneath the jacket that went into my backpack as soon as I rounded the corner, and wearing a legendary pair of old-school Adidas shoes I once won through a television show (long ago, in a time where answers to television quiz questions were still answered by post-cards, not by speed-dialing): puberty started to feel not so bad after all...
And although I don't wear my old shirts from the Offspring or the Beasty Boys anymore, I can't really get it over my heart to throw them away: they are still part of the pile, like withering witnesses of the numerous battles fought for Freedom of Fabric. Battles it were indeed, because there was an annual counter-movement: during the spring break cleaning, the Fashion Police launched unannounced raids. This meant Government intrusion into my kingdom - a four-walled room plastered with posters and rock star pictures - relentless wardrobe inspections and the annual deportation of anything that didn't match the official taste.
Resistance was futile, as I once experienced. The victim was a self-made shirt. To be more precise: a white, tight Fruit of the Loom shirt customized with my very own graphic design in black marker, turning it into a piece of an imaginary band's merchandising. In all my haste, I had forgotten to hide this unique member of the censored collection when I heard my mom marching up the stairs. And as she crawled herself through a pile of clothes that were even out of fashion to her taste - which, in view of her perspective on the concept of being in fashion, meant that they were almost ready for an afterlife as a retro style piece of clothing - she bumped into the unfortunate politically incorrect refugee in the closet. "This one," she said with a look of disdain on her face, "does not belong here." And the fearful words fell, the equivalent of a shirt's condemnation to death: "This one has to go." I tried everything I could, even a rather far-fetched "But mom, this one brings good fortune!", but nothing could prevent one of my favourite shirts to be banned forever. Off with a bunch of other clothes, in a big yellow plastic bag, direction Africa. "The poor little kids over there will be more than happy to get these clothes," she always added, addressing my conscience and thereby suppressing any further inquiries for justification from my part.
Last week, I visited a tiny village in Kirundo, the northernmost province in Burundi, close to the Rwandese border. Across lake Cohoha, walking a mile inwards, through banana tree forests and randomly scattered huts housing a family, a few chickens and - in the best case - a goat or a cow. It was one of the weirdest moments of my life. I was literally surrounded by a whole village, more or less 200 people, with the likely exception of the unfortunate guys lying passed out under a tree, probably still regretting having knocked down too much impeke the night before when they heard the news of the day: a real muzungu, from across the water, in the middle of their village. According to my guide I was the first visitor in five years, and judging from the stares I got I don't think he was exaggerating. If you'd ask me, this should be a standard part of our education: standing alone amidst dozens of black people, including the poor little guy bursting into tears in fear of the unknown, pointing at you and your white skin.
I have to agree, I felt rather uncomfortable. Not that I was afraid that something might happen – I was accompanied by a guide from the village after all – but the average dictionary contains more than one entry whose meaning I don't necessarily want to understand through experience, and 'a mob' is definitely one of them. So I felt rather relieved when my guide suggested to walk me back to the boat. Until one particular man suddenly caught my eye. A shy, slender guy, sheepishly peering at me from a distance. I couldn't help myself, but I give him a long incredulous stare. Back where I live, in the so-called civilized world, this is often considered as an application for a fight: looking for a fraction of a second too long at someone - or, as is often the case, his girlfriend - usually induces a rhetorical "What you looking at? Am I wearing something of yours?", and may result in your face meeting that someone else's fist. This man though, did nothing like that. He just stared back at me.
Strangely enough, this was the first time the aforementioned question would have been justified, as he was wearing a not-so-tight, not-so-white Fruit of the Loom shirt. Customized with red soil streaks, bloody stains and hardly visible black markings referring to an imaginary band. The only thing that crossed my mind was a genuine repetition of my earlier plead: "I hope this shirt may bring good luck to you.".
wow :)
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