Tales from the Hot Pink Woodshed

Monsoon Vermont®: Report from Jakarta

First, a message to all you who have supported Monsoon Vermont's® efforts to create a marketplace for the goods made from garbage picked by Jakarta's scavenger community, Thank You.

With hands held out in prayer fashion, Pak Haris, said to me, ‘"Thank you for caring about us.’" Although I was the one who stood there, I know I was merely a representative of all of you who have shown such deep compassion in your shopping choices. (Not to mention, exceedingly good taste!).

In this age of constant global trauma, this age of — choose your genocide, choose your war victim, choose your hurricane refugees, it is in fact, most likely a divine coincidence of sorts, that caused me to have stumbled upon this one, desperate community in the world. Scavenger communities around the world are the unseen suffering amongst us. As their suffering is not the source of a recent natural disaster or a war, these are the people we rarely get to take into our consciences, numbered in the many thousands, seen traveling along the roads with their wooden carts, squatting in the city dumps outside of Jakarta, picking through the eternally deep garbage, looking for the detergent packets and the fabric softener packets with the soft smiling baby faces and little graphics of dancing happy brooms , mops and toilet brushes that exclaim, ‘Pewangi Klin!’ for our products. When they do appear on the radar screen, it is a report of how many have died in an avalanche of garbage, and even then, it is usually deep within only the local newspapers.

Sitting on Pak Haris's most magnificent new front porch to his work shop, Tracy and I saw first hand the ingenious workmanship and beauty of scavenger carpentry. Utilizing scrap wood, Haris made little louvers above each of his windows. The flooring was of a very thin vinyl plastic, similar to bag lining material. We sat on plastic chairs with arms and backs and even enjoyed a soothing breeze coming from an electric fan. His workshop is a den of well sorted, mostly cleaned garbage packets, three sewing machines, good windows and a section for inventory waiting to ship out for Monsoon Vermont's customers. It was hard to believe when we stepped outside his door onto the landing that we were still over the toxic swamp that the Tanjung Priok slum is built over. Like a lotus flower, Pak Haris's place of work and his personal house was beauty grown out of the murkiest of circumstances. I wish design magazines and others involved in art and design would take a trip to these kampungs and see how beauty is culled from the wreckage of human consumption.

This entire venture was led by the YE Water Program. More about them next, but essential to know, is that Pak Haris and the scavengers and the sewers are all a part of a series of anti-poverty and clean water programs run by the YE Water Program. Our main products from this kampung are the wastebaskets that are signed and dated by the scavenger artist who created them. Each bag is a unique creation of its artisan creator.

Welcome to The World of YE Water Program!

www.YEWaterProgram.org

Early Monday morning, Tracy and I had our morning coffee and then set out for the Jakarta headquarters of the YE Water Project. YE Water Program is a part of a larger Yayasan, the Yayasan Emmanuel, which acts as an umbrella for extensive anti-poverty projects including an orphanage, the water program, and even a food program. When we arrived at the offices, the project's director, Mindy Weimer gave us a tour of YEWP's new offices. Having just moved in over the past couple of weeks it was a wonderful example of what a grassroots campaign office should look like. Piles of milk biscuit boxes and water purification systems surrounded our meeting room table.

Soon we met Mindy Weimer's crack team consisting of Mita, the child education services coordinator, Arun, the water purification project outreach co-coordinator and Pardo, the tireless driver and an all round ‘Guy Friday’.

During a presentation of the YE Water Program, Mindy kicked off with an overview of the project's history and the serendipitous way in which she and the Yayasan Emmanuel began their fruitful and quite symbiotic collaboration. It all began several years ago when both Mindy and Emmanuel, creator of the Yayasan Emmanuel, were students at the Jakarta International School. Years later it seems they both found themselves wanting to make an impact on the city they had spent their developing years in. Their collaboration has indeed yielded a most inspiring organization, with the sorts of projects any visitor to Jakarta, as well as resident's of this booming growing metropolis of some 14 million plus people, longs to hear about. Mindy ended her presentation with a brief description of the Tanjung Priok slums we would soon be visiting. She explained that the shacks are built over the toxic swamp waters, they are primarily squatters, and that there is a mix of livelihoods; both legal and illegal. In general, most people make around 20,000 rupiahs a day ($2.00 U.S.). Of this, water accounts for around 30-40 % of daily costs. Water is expensive. The unpurified, mostly illegally tapped water that gets sold on the street is not only expensive; it also needs to be purified. YE Water Program has a rooftop purification system that purifies water for free. This is an extensive aspect of the project's work in several Jakarta slum communities.

Then Mita introduced her education program with the children in the slums and we saw photos of children washing their hands with soap and water, and receiving coloring books promoting personal hygiene habits. The children in the slums look forward to Mita's visits and most times they are given fruit after their sessions as a reward for their participation.

The next presentation was by Arun. She introduced us to the various water purification systems, their costs and benefits. Arun's information was especially handy later in the day when we met people actually using the systems. Most promising and exciting was the rooftop system which allows for free purification. It's a basic system consisting of purchased tap water in clear 1 liter bottles with labels removed and placed on the roof for six hours in the hot Jakarta sun and Voila! Water purification!

After the YEWP presentation we packed six people, several water systems, and just lots of YE STUFF into the tiny Suzuki Sidekick for a 1½ hour trip to the northern part of the city which strings out along the Java Sea. When we arrived at Tanjung Priok's squatter camp, what was reassuring was the warm smiles and gentle constant stream of hands reaching out to wish us a warm 'Salamat Pagi'. While there was a lot of muck underfoot, it is what many call home. It was heavily littered, flies were everywhere, and it was in short, the ubiquitous 'photo op' one always sees well utilized in anti poverty charity's brochures and media campaigns.

At the same time, however, what I saw and experienced was beautiful children with near professional dance and song repertoires, women with their hair tied up prettily and dressed well. While the huts are primarily one room shacks, their knack for organization and an eye for beauty was ever present.

I saw rooms which included a sheet of linoleum on the floor, a double bed, straw bed mats neatly rolled up, a light bulb hung from the ceiling, and in some, even a color TV. In the case of Pak Haris's place, I personally witnessed a level of ingenuity nearing brilliant. His front porch, as you know from the earlier article, was my absolute favorite place in the kampung. Awnings made from scrap materials kept it cool and shaded in the hot soup swamp the shack lies over.

All in all, what Monsoon Vermont® saw was a viable anti-poverty, economic development project that went hand in hand with a public water disinfection program. The efficient design of this little yayasan is an inspiring David and Goliath like example for other charities to take note of. Indeed, let's all remember that it just takes the will to do something, the details will follow.

More Monsoon Vermont®…

Another venture in Jakarta was our meeting with Rully, Monsoon Vermont's® main manufacturer of goods. He runs a small start up venture that produces high end designs that rival even Gucci, Chanel, and Fendi. Don't believe me? Check out our new stock of bags, and yes! UMBRELLAS! All I can say is, Rully is actually a design genius and he is playing an active role in cleaning up the environment. Not only does Rully buy garbage from scavengers, he also works with a lead manufacturer of the original packets that create the garbage. At some point, maybe the nickel will drop and they will have a revelation, ‘Why should we package our goods in non-recyclable packets that clog waterways and pollute the atmosphere when they are burned? I know! Let's use earth friendly packaging!’ One can only wonder what is so difficult about coming to this conclusion, with even just a momentary glimpse of any city in Asia, Mexico, South America, Africa, and well, fellow American, take a look at your local dump, I mean, ‘transfer station’, it is clear, we have a problem.

What's up at Jamaica House this year?

Giving Thanks

Monsoon Vermont wants to thank two very special people, who gave us their incredible insight, talent, invaluable leads, and ideas on marketing our treasures culled from garbage. Louis Postel and Fayette Hickox, thank you from the bottom of our hearts, for your enthusiasm and support.

Tracy and I want to thank Dakota, Simon, Jamie, Dave and Kim for taking care of our four legged family members. If I could howl like Oaty I would. It is a joy to have such a fantastic support system, thank you so very much.

Welcome Aboard

Monsoon Vermont also wants to welcome some new talent to our crew. Our new web consultant, daven, who has made our online catalog much more user friendly and cohesive. We found him amongst the ricefields of Ubud in Bali. Who knew?

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