Knitting In Mfuleni 12 September

THEEDUCATORSNEWCLOTHES went with a friend to Mfuleni (Township) to knit. She works as an art teacher twice a week at an NGO based facility for primary child care, and other community activities. Students come from nearby schools to have art classes, and a meal afterwards. Whilst she was teaching I wondered around the township sitting in various places knitting. 

The general atmosphere was relaxed and friendly. People spill out from their small houses onto the street. There’s a hustle and bustle, things seem communal; open .The houses are small brick dwellings with tin lean-to rooms attached, there doesn’t seem to be fences or walls around the individual properties. People congregate on the sidewalks and in the roads. The main road has many shops, mainly assembled out of corrugated tin sheeting. The main road is like the ‘high street’ with carpenters, restaurants, general stores, hair-stylists, barbers, etc. I walked past braziers cooking chicken feet and tripe.

I sat outside the school and began knitting and soon attracted attention. A crowd of school children came past and were very intrigued. I engaged with them and some adults encouraging conversation:

Education is very important

Learning continues even after graduating from school, one can always take short courses to pick up extra skills and qualifications.

Some teachers are abusive toward students (there was a comment that a teacher had raped a pupil!)

Generally conversation was sparse and lacked flow.

However another form of conversation seemed to be taking place, one that was non-verbal, tactile and tangible; the children like to come up really close to me. They crowded about me 4/5 deep! They leaned against me and wanted to touch the knitting and my ears. I felt a talking happening thought our bodies, them leaning on me and each other. And as time moved this would get more intense, identities fell away and it’s although we became a big lump humanity!

One particular fellow, who had more leadership skills, advised me to move to another site on the main road. He recommended this as it is a major junction and would really pull crowds. I walked down the road like the Pied Piper of Hamlin with a troupe of merry children following! And yes a rather large crowd developed. This young man (I have forgotten his name, I just recall that it means Freedom) discovered that R5 coins fit into my ear-rings, this caused much delight. .He also took the photos using my camera.

It was a beautiful and fulfilling, boundary breaking afternoon. For those few hours I experienced incredible relief from the I, me, my, mine.