Here is a short video of the marketplace directly in front of the school gates. There are charcoal sellers here. Every day they come in from the country, sometimes with the charcoal loaded on little pack horses or a donkey. More often you'll see someone with one of those big plastic feed-store 100 pound grain bags, only filled with charcoal and balanced sideways on their head.
One day I took a long walk and saw a woman and her daughter walking ahead of me. It was during school hours, so the daughter was obviously unable to go to school. They were charcoal sellers, hoping to sell door to door, instead of sitting in the market. The competition for this has to be ferocious. I walked all the way up a long hill, at least a quarter of a mile, maybe longer, and they did, too. When I arrived back on Pivert, the main street I had started on, there they were, mother and daughter. The mother's bag of charcoal was about 4 feet wide and 2 feet high, packed solid. The daughter's was about half that. The daughter was about 10 years old and it made me feel sad to know that she was out working that hard at such a young age. I thought about my little girls at that age and the things we did together. And I don't believe they had sold any at all, judging by the look of their bags.
I am experimenting with video. I have lots of it, but I can't upload a very high quality. Dave, our school's technology coordinator, kindly gave me some suggestions when we talked last Friday. I know the video on this is a little blurry, but the audio is pretty good, and if you only knew what a triumph and how many hours of experimentation it represents. I promise I will find that tipping point, a file that is small enough to send to you but large enough to be seen!
No comments:
Post a Comment