Homecoming Revolution?
A few months ago I got an email from a high school mate of mine telling me he was coming back to the continent. Now, I have known Phil since we were both thirteen. Phil was that kid most people in high school didn’t dig because they felt he was too bourgeois (which he bloody was!) but somehow it all changed when we went to college in the States. Anytime I was Zimsick, Phil was the one person I could call and chat to in lengthy phone calls while he was in college in Florida and I attempted dismally to learn the hula in Hawai’I (clear indication that black people having rhythm is a myth).
So when he emails me he tells me he is coming home. And I am bloody excited. I hadn’t seen this cat in ages. So I meet up with him a couple of weeks after his arrival and he hasn’t changed a bit since I last saw him when he was 18 (either that or my brain hasn’t aged. I am more for the latter, eternal 21 and all).
He tells me he is decided to become a businessman and I am impressed being a full-time writer and all and a full-time businessperson in my own way. ‘My sneakers are being launched, yada yada yada’…ok, whatever Phil, I become a little sceptical here. But you know, I do the whole encouraging mate thing.
And then last week I get an invitation.
And lat night I went to the launch.
Jhung Yuro ( www.jhungyuro.com) and True Ambition ( www.trueambitionlife.com ) are not the type of shoes that one would wear to the office unless you work for an NGO, are in advertising, or an artist. But if what my daddy said was true that you judge a man by his shoes, then in casual wear, they are IT and in my eyes, you wear Jhung Yuro and you are all good dude. At the launch, the hip-hop beats were pumping (great for the target market but crap for dinosaurs and anyone over 25 who was keen on the shoes thus my short stay. Oops, kidding. I am really 21.), and Phil was marvellously on board to explain everything to anyone who had any questions about the brand. I am generally my friends’ greatest critic but I must admit to being impressed (obviously not by the music but by the product itself). The many pairs I looked at were well worth their cost in Rands. The cost and the stitching were stellar and I can see guys wearing them for a ball game, for a non-dressy date, or, because they appeared comfortable enough, for a laidback day at home. Somehow Phil and his partner (non-sexual) Sam managed to find a niche market for something that they are passionate about and it shows. If I had enough of a budget I would certainly have bought a few pairs for some guys I know. As it was, after I left, I sent texts to all my living ex-boyfriends who are still talking to me and in this town to go and check the sneakers at Munk on 10A in 7th Street in Melville out (now that would be street NOT avenue, babes).
But these two young entreprenegroes are not doing it for Joburgers alone. They have decided that Africa is their oyster and will be setting up concept stores for their brand of sneakers all over the continent. I have it on good authority that they have just signed the lease for their Harare store and will be hitting Nairobi in the not too-distant future. So to all the men looking for a good pair of sneakers that is actually for you by you, it may be coming to you sooner than you think.
On a continent where we have been ingrained to believe that we need someone to give us a job to make it happen, I am proud of Phil and Sam’s go-getter attitudes in daring to venture where angels fear to tread. I wonder just how much richer this continent would be if more Africans in the Diaspora realised the possibilities that are on their mother continent instead of wasting their brilliant talents as third class citizens in the Western world.
There are those who will argue about issues of crime, corruption and what-not on the African continent and I choose not to dispute that (although I could mention the fact that former French president Jacques Chirac is going on trial for corruption is an indication that crime and corruption are not the sole preserve of Africa and Africans). What I would like to highlight though is that all things concerned, this place we call home is, as the advert highlights, alive with possibilities, and when we put our minds and efforts to it, we can make it work for us.
So as I sit and type this, I raise my cup of tea to a continent of intellectuals that I hope will bring their intellectual property home soon so we can make this continent as great as it should be.
I raise my cup in the hope that one day we shall be on the cover of some magazine as The Continent of Hope and Achievement as opposed to the Hopeless Continent.
And I raise my cup to Phil and Sam– marketing a designer sneaker brand in an Africa where we survive on less than a dollar a day -now that’s True Ambition!
