They are so black, Celie, they shine. Which is something else folks down home like to say about real black folks. But Celie, try to imagine a city full of these shining, blueblack people wearing brilliant blue robes with designs like fancy quilt patterns. Tall, thin, with long necks and straight backs. Can you picture it all, Celie? Because I felt like I was seeing black for the first time. And Celie, there is something magical about it. Because the black is so black the eye is simply dazzled and then there is the shining that seems to come really, from moonlight, it is so luminious, but their skin glows even in the sun.
– Are you I worried that men would be intimidated by you?
– It is exactly the man I would have no interest.
I feel you. I have been there thousands of times, and precisely asked that question. My intelligent feminist side sometimes can’t help falling for the basic cultural instinct of perceiving my purpose in life as finding a man, getting married and laboring children. And I have noticed that in the country I leave, the way my brain works and my personality (sometimes marked by «masculine» adjectives such as rational, harsh or direct) might be an obstacle for that goal.
This is why I smiled so sincerely listening to the answer Chimamanda Ngozi gave to her friend, because even though I had never phrased it like that, her answer is so right for me as well! It makes no sense to polish my girly-personality in order to pretend to be someone I am not. That would never ever last. Maybe I am the one cherry picking here. And it might take me some time to find the right guy for me. For sure he must be smart, not intimidated by the true-me at all and have a couple more aesthetic attributes on my wish-list 🙂
Awesome idea, which is already working and everyone can help to fundrise here.
Just one small thing missing from my point of view: how can we make from this a social business? The idea is there, the technology too, it has already been commercialized… but it depends on the charity of many people, or from a couple of rich ones, to keep existing. And generally, that is not sustainable.
Using the famous sentence of don’t give a man a fish, show him how to fish, the solution to get a pair of shoes to every children passes from teaching them how to make their own shoes. Maybe technology can be exported to those places in Africa where shoes are needed de most? Maybe then you can employ local people and use local material instead of fancy rubber and treated leather?
Next step is to make it profitable (or at least take it to the break even point) and self-sustainable. Charity can help to set up a business, but if it can not fly alone in a couple of years people will move their interest and their wallets to something else, and it will sadly disappear. You can use for instance recycled materials to cut down costs, or set flexible prices according to the location you sell them: cheaper in the poorer villages, medium in more resourcefull cities and overprized to tourist or first-world stores.
Then the impact in the world will be not only to thousands but millions of children.
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