Creativity costs little

I attended the last day of the Arts and Crafts class at Cuban Heights, Lavender Hill on Monday 5 December. The class is run by Veronica Kroukamp, a local resident who attended the Warehouse Social Transformation Course in 2010. Veronica started these craft classes for women who attend a “soup kitchen” run by her where they receive bread, vegetables and other items donated by local supermarkets. Veronica herself trains the women in their various crafts. The day was one of celebration and fun. But beneath the joy on the faces of these women is the evidence of the hardship they’ve known as they struggle to survive, to feed their families and to protect their children from the violence and abuse for which Lavender Hill is renowned. The women were all there, crafts were on display, speeches made and eats were served. I was introduced as the person who had trained Veronica in social development.

One woman brought a Christmas wreath that she had made, and before she laid it on the table, she described what had happened.

“I wanted to make a wreath,” she said, “but didn’t have any of the materials. First of all I needed the twigs and grass. I looked around and saw a tree with just the right kind of branches, but the branches were too high. So I asked my son, ‘won’t you climb up and get those branches for me?’ And he did that. Then I needed pine cones, but there are no pine trees in this area, so I asked my sister if she could get me some, and she did. But the pine cones needed to be painted. Where do I get paint? So I did some community research and found a lady who could give me paint, and this is the wreath I made.”

At the end of the session each woman present was instructed to bless someone else in the room with something she had made, and all kinds of cards and gifts were exchanged. One woman came to me with a set of three scatter cushions. “I want to bless you with these,” she said, piling them into my arms. Later I asked her whether she sold the things she made and she said she didn’t; all she wanted to do was make things to give to others. One thing she did ask was whether The Warehouse could help provide her with material.

I was so impressed, and so proud of Veronica. Here were women – Veronica included, who have virtually nothing, yet so much to give. Here was an example of true community research; that which identifies the gifts present in the community and uses that to build something else.

Veronica’s next step is to train the women in business management, so that they can improve the quality of their goods, price them, market them and sell them. She has sourced a Business Management course to be run at New World Foundation. As I left, she was handing out application forms to all the women. Creativity and generosity costs nothing!

Colleen Saunders