This is Leonor.
She's the daughter of Empada's healer.
Owns a gorgeous smile!
She is a kind and joyful girl.
She is a fanatical soccer player.
She sings and dances beautifully.
Contagious presence!
O tecto da casa da Safi é de palha e tem de ser renovado de 2 em 2 anos senão começa a chover dentro. Durante a última época de chuvas o tecto da casa da Safi já ia para o terceiro ano, pelo que chovia dentro...
As pessoas que têm mais posses podem comprar placas de zinco e resolvem este problema de forma praticamente definitiva, mas para isso têm também de mudar as traves de madeira, pois as que suportam a palha não aguentam o peso do zinco.
Quando vim da Guiné trouxe comigo uma carta da Sumai a pedir ajuda para comprar as placas de zinco. Duas amigas minhas das Belas-Artes já se dispuseram a ajudar e ontem lancei o desafio às amnistisiadas (que de Viana mostram-se mais dinâmicas que nunca).
Confesso que nunca pensei que este blog tivesse o potencial de poder ajudar a transformar o mundo de forma tão eficaz. Estou cada vez mais rendido ao poder da internet...
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The ceiling of Safi's house is made of straw and it needs to be renewed every two years or else it will rain inside. During the last rain season, her ceiling was about to enter the third year, so it had already started raining inside her house…
People with more possessions can afford buying zinc boards and solve this problem almost definitely, but they also have to change the wood beams, because the ones that support the straw can't bear the zinc's weight.
When I came from Guinea, I brought a letter from Sumai asking for help to buy the zinc boards. Two of my friends from the Academy of Fine Arts have already offered help and I've launched the challenge to the amnestians yesterday, who are revealing to be more dynamic than ever.
I must confess I never thought this blog had the potential to help transform the world in such an efficient way. I'm growing more and more subdued to the power of the Internet…
Beside the fact that I really like this picture, I just have to point out the Guinean girls' way of carrying the goods. While we make use of our arm strength, they use their whole body balance to support all the weight on their heads.
It's funny that they have their hands on their hips, because it only happens when they've stopped. In motion, the balance and the harmony are such that it looks like there isn't the slightest chance that what they have on their heads will fall…
Of Sumai's entire interview, one of the things I remember the better is her answer to one of my questions:
'What was the happiest moment of your life?'
After thinking for a while, she couldn't answer… she didn't understand why I was asking her that question…
I insisted so she would answer, but she wouldn't…
That moment troubled me…
Happiness is the reason behind our actions. If we're not happy, everything around us loses meaning…
For a moment I was arrogant to the point of thinking that happiness didn't matter to her…
This was one of the moments that made me see how small I am… how little I know of others… the many things I have yet to learn… how daring of me… wanting to know what's happiness for a Guinean, having only been there for a month…
The thing I like the most about this picture is the horizontal division which reminds me of the line that divides our world in two. Southern and Northern countries are separated by an imaginary line that distinguishes poverty from wealthiness. This picture shows that the more we peek between those two lines, the more we find out about the existence of other sorts of lines that aren't necessarily horizontal, which dilute themselves on one another, cross paths and create new shapes.
Trying to accomplish the Millennium Development Goals isn't an easy task as merely removing a horizontal line. It is in fact a crossroad of paths full of stones on which you trip over, with no indications, cold, wind and too much heat… but it is also a path of self overcoming. It is finding out that we transcend ourselves when our physical body is exhausted…
This picture tells me that even surrounded by so much bureaucracy and visual distractions we always manage to find something fascinating… the person itself!
There are two things that fascinate me about this picture: the red colour of the soil and the unevenness of the canoe.
For me, red soil is now synonym for Guinea-Bissau. Whether I was on the road, on the fields or by the seaside, the red earth would impregnate our feet, as if it wanted to be a part of us. This little dock, from where men leave on their canoes in order to go fishing at the sea, is the closest to Empada. It only takes about 15 or 20 minutes by foot to get there. On this particular day, the tide was low and this canoe didn't make it off the dock. Its unevenness shows me the handwork that its building took… and it is curious that fishing is also a hard hand-using work, at least in this place…
My connection to Industrial Design forces me to see the art of good craft in this canoe. Are there any aesthetical concerns? Of course not! Are there functional concerns? Surely! What kind of design is this? Yes, because this canoe also had a project; there are others alike it, it isn't a mere artistic object! I feel like saying that this is the purest design that there can be! These canoes are thought to be light and still carry all the weight of the fishermen as well as the fish's. There is no waste of material… when they go in the water they reach their maximum possible limit… and they are produced in series… it isn't a production as the one we know, but the existence of other canoes like this one proofs that there is a project that is followed…
There was a great design professor whose name was Tomás Maldonado who once claimed that product design was everything industrially produced in series. I agree with him, but not as much as I used to…
If it is well projected, but not industrially produced, isn't it still design?
Visiting Bafatá was one of the few trips we made to Guinea-Bissau. You can find one of South Guinea's most famous markets there! You go down a narrow street full of merchants until you get to the market where everything is sold…
There is where one of our preconceived ideas about Africa starts to vanish. As shown in the picture, organization is "queen" of the market! I use the term "queen" because women are those who arrange the stand. Everything has its own place, everything is as it's supposed to be so it captures our attention. Everything has a feminine touch, so organized and delicate…
Many people have asked me about what is cultivated in Guinea… I can't say everything that's cultivated there, but maybe one can learn more with the aid of this picture.
The little orange bags aren't grown. Inside of them lies the most famous juice of the region. Children put one of the corners in their mouth and little by little they sip the juice, so they don't run out of it too fast. That's how they cool themselves off from the intense heat…
In August 2008, a surge of Cholera was spreading in Guinea. Unfortunately, hygiene cares aren't many and these juices were one of the ways children caught it. The source of the water in these juices was unknown and their hands weren't often washed…
If we can't live without water and we use our hands to bring food into our mouths, all the steps are taken for the disease to spread quickly…
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Almost at the end of the documentary "Cuma qui bu na mansi?" there is a frame that shows Segunda making braids. Her elbow crosses the frame vertically and there is a flash of light on the back that momentarily blinds us…
Segunda really enjoyed making braids and play soccer. I didn't miss the chance to play with her, but I never learnt how to make braids! Many where the afternoons I went over to her place to find her dedicated to her friends' hair…
If there's an investment a Guinean girl likes to make is to heartily do her hair so she can seduce the boys…
Time goes by slowly at the hospital... at least that's what it seems when you spend some time there…
The nurses use up some of their afternoon doing some embroidery. They share their double canape with the ill and they all talk the days away. The living room seems like a cloister. It is where you lit up a fire to prepare lunch for the sick. It is also where all those who can get up from their beds spend their afternoons. It is there that everything takes place!
As we got up really early in the morning, we usually slept for a while after lunch. During the first week, it was impossible for me not to take a nap. The amount of humidity was such that I just couldn't keep my eyes open…
… as the days went by, I got used to the weather and the schedules so, instead of sleeping, I would spend my early afternoons visiting people. It was during that time that I would draw the children, visit some ill people in the hospital or just simply sat and talk to people on their porches.
One day I decided to visit Safi's family. When I got there, I noticed they had gone working in the kitchen garden and only Fámata and Aissato were home. Fámata must be around 11 or 12 years old and Aissato about 2 or 3 years old. Sitting on a wood stool, Fámata was holding Aissato, who was ill, coughing and burning with fever. When I saw the both of them, I immediately realized that something was not right and the feeling of powerlessness was so immense I just didn't know how to react. I noticed Fámata was tired so I held Aissato until the rest of the family came…
… having such a small and beautiful (as shown in the picture) and at the same time fragile being in my hands was something I will never forget. She was soundly asleep in my arms and my mind was constantly troubling me with the question "why didn't you study Medicine instead?"
I wasn't aware, but before going to the rice paddies (which in Guinea's creole is "bulanha"), the rice is planted in a piece of land near the houses. That's called the "dryland rice". When the time is right, the rice is rooted up and its roots are replanted underwater. It is a dangerous task and many times have people been bitten by snakes while doing it.
This picture was taken in the day we visited the third family (which ended up not being in the documentary). It was Mr. Quintino who planted the rice. We were supposed to go with him to the rice paddies, but we never had the chance. I ended up having only this picture of this beautiful green from the dryland rice planted everywhere near the houses.
From today on, another partnership will be established. The blog will be bilingual. The transformation will be slow and I don't even know if the previous posts will also suffer this change, but we owe this achievement to the work of a colleague and friend who has accepted my challenge of putting her skills into practice: Rita Trindade.
This bilingual version might slow down the updates, but we'll see…
If the 8th Millennium Development Goal is put into practice, a lot of work will no longer be lost and will result in a union of efforts which can, indeed, change the world!
Partnerships happen all the time in a daily basis. At school, home, college, everywhere! Even our human body works based on partnerships: the fingers help each others to pick up objects; legs articulate themselves so we can walk; jaws, teeth and tongue join efforts so we can eat… but for me, the most fantastic partnership about the human being are the neurons! They associate among themselves to receive, interpret and share information. This partnership among neurons ends in a brilliant result: our thoughts!
In Empada, one of the most common partnerships revolves around the well. The strongest person pumps the water so that everyone can fill up their bucket. The well does not only mean water, it is also a place to be together, a meeting point and a place to play…
