New Friends

Wednesday, 5:30 am

Uanee Karuuombe

Busy day yesterday.  Needed to meet with the gentleman who will be guiding the extended tours (up to Etosha Park or down to the big sand dunes) offered to the conference delegates.  His name is Uanee  Karuuombe.  What a great guy.  He is Himba, from a village just outside of Opuwo where we used to go to work with the teachers from the Ondao Mobile School Project. He started as a camping assistant and worked his way up to guiding for a number of major tour operators before starting his own company, Ombaue Tours and Safaris. You can probably pick out which one is Uanee.

He gave us the sad news that the big crafts market in Okahandja had had a flash fire a few months back.   It used to look like this and housed some of our favorite merchants including Elizabeth who sold baskets and batiks.  We known her for six years, from right when her baby Emma was born (in this photo Emma is about one).

The whole place burned to the ground in about 15 minutes, fueled by the thatched roofs, dry wooden posts and the crafts.  Okahandja does not have a fire truck and there were no water spouts or hoses to help.  Thankfully, no one was killed but most all the merchants lost all their wares and for most their life savings were in their merchandise.   Unanee is taking us up to the market later today so we can see what is left.  There is another market at the other side of town.   One of our conference tours was to visit the market, so we have to decide if that needs to be changed.

 This is what the market used to look like.

Penduka & Martha Muulyau

 Drove back out to the Katutura township to the other side where there is a place called Penduka.   As stated on their website, “Women in Namibia suffer from a low social status, which makes it difficult for them to find a job. As a result, the entire family lives in poverty. This vicious circle is often strengthened by a physical handicap or by diseases like tuberculosis and HIV AIDS.  Penduka tries to break this negative circle by providing these women with work. This way they can support their families and as a result their social status will improve both within their family and within their local community. “  They make beautiful textile products, embroidered goods, batiks, soft dolls, etc.  It was started in 1992 with 4 employees , I believe as a co-op/shelter for battered women  and now has 110 employees and supports another 500+ women through training in the crafts trade and interest free loans for education and housing.   One of the co-founders was Martha Muulyau and we were lucky to find her out on the café deck.  She a wonderful, kind lady and despite here physical disabilities (she was diagnosed with polio at age 4 and still uses braces, has had operations for scoliosis and wears a pacemaker), is a real powerhouse.

We invited Martha to our big conference Gala dinner and she accepted.   This will be fun as delegates will wear traditional, formal attire.  With delegates from 35 countries including India, China, Bangladesh, Zanzibar (is that a country?), Cyrus, 10 African countries, ... it should be an explosion of color! 

We would like to support this organization by paying them to make our conference bags, 300 to 350 of them.  After our discussions, Martha showed us around Penduka.  Some women were right in the middle of making batiks.  Batik fabrics are created by forming patterns from a mixture of flour, maize meal and water on fabric that is then painted.  The dried patterns are peeled off leaving beautiful designs.   Here they are laying two batiks out to dry the flour mixture.  Next they will paint them.

 Headed back to the lodge in front of an incoming thunderstorm.  Here are the clouds forming over Katutura.

Have to run to breakfast as Uanee is coming soon.  More later.  In the upper 80s today, so no snow in the forecast.  I hope all is going well at Minter.  Take care.