A Quest for Ribbon:

As I mentioned a while back, one of the hardest parts (if not the hardest part) about living so far away from home is the missing of big events in life… Eva’s birth, Dave’s graduation, my friend Sara’s baby shower, birthdays, anniversaries, parties, new jobs, moving, transitions, etc. There is a lot – some of it I will be able to catch up on… some of it I won’t – like weddings…

My friend Kris is getting married in May. She has known this for about a year, and I have known that I was going to miss it before then. It is a big bummer to miss such a big day and since I came it has been one of my regrets. I kept thinking… maybe I will be able to make it back… maybe I could skip class and go home for a week… (and when it is really hard here…) maybe I could just go home and not miss any of it! However, when my rationality returns to me I realize that I should probably deal with the fact that I may not be able to participate in the lives of my loves ones in person, but I can participate creatively from far away.

In my attempt to do just that I emailed my friend asking her if there was anything I could provide for the wedding from Africa. I was thinking necklaces for her girls, a fun painting or carving, some fabric… stuff that Africa is known for. She was very gracious and accepted my need to participate and requested that I find some ribbon to wrap around the flowers for her bridesmaids. Great idea… except up until that point (and for the entire year I was in Zambia) I couldn’t remember seeing any ribbon anywhere – except that which you would wrap presents with, probably not appropriate for wrapping flowers. Thus, I knew this quest would be a difficult one. To add to the challenge, she also is having a very creative wedding (anyone who knows Kris – or who has seen her amazing films or scrapbooks - knows the extent of her creative endeavors) and although all of the girls are wearing a nice black summery dress, they are each wearing jewelry of different colors – all in beautiful muted shades: lavender, emerald green, taupe, baby blue, etc. To emphasis why this would add to my challenge I have a simple question for all of you: What do you think of when you think “African colors?” Are any of the colors of Kris’s wedding in your conception? Yeah … my thoughts exactly. This still didn’t deter me; however, because when the request was made I was just starting my travels to Port Elizabeth and Durban.

The Quest started in Port Elizabeth. My friend George and I enjoyed the beach and the shops and searched in all of the ones we went into. However, we couldn’t find a thing, and didn’t know if there was a fabric store around. We met a nice Rotary couple at the end of our stay who knew of a fabric shop – but it was all imported ribbon from Europe. Not ideal in my mind – I really wanted to send African Ribbon. I wasn’t discouraged however, because the next stop was Durban. Durban has a large East Indian population – they have beautiful colors that could be similar to those Kris is requesting and it is a much larger city than Grahamstown; thus, I was thinking this was a good place to find some ribbon. When my friends (Drew, Sarah, and Anna) picked me up from the airport they asked me what I wanted to do while I was there. (They were super gracious because they still had class and a lot of work to do). I said there were three top priorities: go to the beach, go to church on Easter, and find ribbon. The first two were already in their plans for the week. They lamented with me the difficulty of the task, but soon jumped on board.

First lead… One of Drew’s roommates is a South African professional dressmaker, Greg – specializing in formal dresses. Upon first meeting him I asked… where can I find ribbon? He mentioned that to find African ribbon would be virtually impossible – all of the stuff he used was from Europe – bummer! However, he said that there were some ribbon manufacturers in Johannesburg. (I wasn’t going there – but there might be some in the shops around Durban.) He gave me a list of shops and my friends promised to take me. Sporadically during my week in Durban, Sarah, Anna, Drew and I looked for ribbon. We looked at an Indian bizarre – found some, but it wasn’t right… We looked at the mall and even tried to find a ribbon store in downtown Durban. No luck… Finally when Sarah and I were shopping for groceries at another mall I asked a lady and she gave me two places to look. As we searched we were lamenting and brain storming how I would be able to get a good match for all of the seven colors and if I should cave and buy European ribbon in Africa – I guess it would be coming from Africa right?!? I then said something to Sarah that changed the course of the quest… “I wish that she had asked for something beaded! It is so African and so beautiful and you can find different colored beads everywhere!” Then it hit me… If I could find some ivory ribbon… perhaps I could get someone to bead the different colors onto the ribbon and I would have African ribbon – even if the ribbon was from Europe – it would still be African-like! With that I went into the last shop I was looking and found some iridescent ribbon made in Joburg. It was great and would probably work because it shimmered as a lot of different colors. I bought it as a back up to my master plan, but I was now determined that I had a better option and I didn’t want to let it go.

Second lead… I traveled back to Port Elizabeth and stayed with a beautiful Rotary couple – Trevor and Denise Long. I had decided that I would stay and go to the Rotary meeting there and also to an amazing play the next evening. During casual conversation I updated them on my quest and they got on board as well. Later the next day, Denise took me to a shop called Mama’s and we found all sorts of ribbons and beads! I bought all that I needed and some extra, not knowing exactly how this would work and deciding that if I combined some colors perhaps it would get closer to the color needed. It was fun and I was excited. Greg had told me some techniques for sewing beads onto fabric/ribbon while I was still in Durban. I tried that night when I got home. It didn’t look right, but I wasn’t too sad, I had another lead – my favorite craft shop in Grahamstown…

Third lead… Upon returning home from my traveling I attempted to adjust being back. That was the week Eva was born so I was full of emotion (see previous post) and a little down that I couldn’t be closer to home. I distracted myself by doing as much homework as possible and trekking on with my quest for beaded ribbon. First stop: Kisma Crafts. Tracy is a lady there who does all sorts of bead work and beautiful crafts. We became friends when I kept coming back in asking.. “ how do you do that? And that – what is that made out of? “ She sold me some patterns (I now how to make beaded hearts) and continues to chat with me about crafts and pretty things. In need of some support I brought the ribbon and beads to her. At first she despaired a little…mentioning how difficult it would be to get the beads to not droop and to get them in the right patterns on the ribbon so that they could be put on the flowers without overlapping the ribbon onto the beaded part. However, then she looked up and we both say the answer: wire hanging in a spool over her head. She sold it to make the beaded hearts, angels, etc that she sold patterns before. We realized if we could simply put the beads onto the wire, then they could actually be put over the ribbon and didn’t even need to be sewn on! It was such an amazing discovery and we both smiled with the smugness of knowing that we had solved the most challenging aspect of the quest. However, the journey was far from over.

After I had gotten all of the beaded work done, I packaged it all up as well as I can and went to the post office. On my way I met another friend, Sylvia – a Xhosa woman who I had also requested help from. She asked me about my endeavors and I showed her. She sits outside the University and sells her beadwork to students and passersby. She offered to teach me as well someday and I plan on taking her up on the offer. Some of the bead work has a cultural connected, so I am interested in learning more about it! Out of courtesy for her and her interest I bought a little Aids awareness pin and added it to the package (Kris is socially conscious – she would appreciate the small token. Anyway, it was part of the process). When I got to the post office I asked the safest way to send a package. They responded DHL, but that it would cost more than 100$USD. I opted for the alternative, a world ground service that was little more in my price range. Off they went. This was almost four weeks ago…. I was a bit worried that they wouldn’t arrive, but Kris emailed and said they were there!!! Yippie… Quest finished… quest successful..