Celebration

Yesterday, we journeyed to find the University of Capetown just to discover the entire University is on holiday until July 30 for winter recess. though the physical campus was absolutely stunning to behold nonetheless....and as always the studios were in post-review chaos.

We had planned before takeoff to construct an installation of the ground floor of the proposed structure in order for the MonkeyBiz women and community to get a sense of the scale and nature of the spaces that are to be built. Today MonkeyBiz and Art AIDS Art had organised a blessing and celebration for the building and with the large gathering this was an ideal opportunity for us to carry out the installation. CashBuild, the Khayeltisha version of home depot where most residents buy building materials, was the source of the installation materials. We decided on a basic construction of walls using twine and metal stakes. We were unable to install on the site itself because of the existing building so we chose a location a few blocks away next to the large community center. With Loyiso, Sydney, Nadeem, Stephanie, and Tom's assistance the installation construction actually ran very smoothly in the beginning and many people watched from the road and a few residents approached to find out what we were up to. We were then approached by two members of a local community development forum who were concerned about the installation because they saw outsiders conducting what looked like manual labor. This concept insights opposition in the community because there are so many unemployed residents of khayelitsha and with any building project in khayelitsha local residents should be employed. Tom, Nadeem and Loyiso explained the project to the forum members and they invited us to speak to the forum later in the night.

With the installation complete and ready for occupation we went on to Makatiso's house for the blessing and celebration of dancing, singing, bunny chow, and the discovery that no evil spirits reside inside the house or on the site which is always good to hear, Tom introduced the building to the community in Xhosa a great gesture, and Angie introduced the project Khayelitsha team with the translation help of Loyiso. We then gave a short explanation of the building through a board that was taped to the MonkeyBiz container. The community members gathered and said a short statement that they were very pleased with the work of Barbara and MonkeyBiz and that they were excited to have a new center based within the community. Almost the entire celebration group then moved on to the installation site and we passed out floor plans and renderings so that each person could better understand what was to be constructed. There were then more speeches and it was actually a great opportunity for us as well as the participants to visualize the way the space will be used. The group of around 35-40 people fit easily into half of the multipurpose space and this reiterated the concept that Tom and Dorothy stated from the very beginning, that what may seem like small spaces to Americans can be efficiently utilized here in ways that we do not typically conceive of. The MonkeyBiz women and other participants that we met were more open and receptive to the design and the installation than we could have hoped. There were perhaps some that were confused about the installation and its purpose and humored us nonetheless, but as Stephanie (our law school mate at Blue on Blue) stated the most valuable aspect of the event was that we were able to convey our genuine attempt to communicate, share and learn with the MonkeyBiz women and community throughout the building process.

After the long day, and some fried chicken, we attended a short meeting with the community development forum mentioned earlier and Tom, Loyiso, and Nadeem were able to clarify the goals of the project and the current support of the surrounding community and we were also able to show our schematic design board to illustrate the nature of the building.

it was a full day, and a great day to continue to build support and ownership for the project within the local community.