reflections

i woke up this morning feeling lighter, with a smile on my face. i felt confident that we had succeeded in what we had set out to do. in retrospect, the launch didn’t perform as planned, but the organic evolution from what we had organized into what it rather wanted to become was satisfying. the children had delighted our jungle gym – and that was what we had strived for all along.

my family arrived at 10am and we set out on our way to kwathema. the drive was familiar and strange. i talked them through the project as we drove.

its our time. mr cindy was on site, watering. to my amazement, the whole structure was animated with little moving bodies. the activation of our space brought warmth to my body, all the while aching from the strangely situated bruises i had acquired along our turbulent journey.
it finally became clear to me. the success of this project was not by any means based upon the realization of ifg ulm’s designing politics brief, nor upon hannahs ephemeral agendas, and not even upon our group’s sometimes controlling and most-times sensible and aesthetic considerations. its success was based upon the subsequent appropriation of the space. our space. the community’s acceptance of it, in order to permit expressions of liberty and individuality.
what we strived for was a mouldable place; a jungle gym. an open-endedness rather than a prescription – a place where people would have a significant degree of agency over their environment.

today, a certain spirit was reincarnated, resuscitated. the little bodies energized with life, excitement, relief, liberation. their spirits lifted the heavy, smoky clouds of struggle, more so than the trails of traditional incense ever would, all swept away by the ever-persistent gushes of wind; that same wind that carried their unassuming kites across kwathema’s sunny skies.