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Friday, September 17, 2010

Monstrous Moustiquaire

Wednesday morning, I got the call to complete an emergency mission for the “Voices for a Malaria Free Future” project. They needed someone to document the creation of a mosquito-net. Not just any mosquito net; a mosquito net big enough to cover the lobby of the UN building in New York City.


With my new, shiny blue camera, I was chosen to take pictures and videos of this monster “moustiquaire,” and show the chaos involved in shipping this mass of fabric to the states.


A slew of African heads of state are heading to NYC for an ALMA meeting, “African Leaders' Malaria Alliance” (www.alma2015.org) and in the American spirit -- where bigger means better -- the Big Apple hosts thought it would be a great plug for malaria awareness to have this gigantic net greet their guests. They wanted it shipped “at whatever cost” by Monday evening, to have it in place for the conference kickoff on Tuesday.


Thankfully, our “United Against Malaria” campaign was getting such a mosquito net made for one of Mali’s most notable monuments, “le Tour d’Afrique.” Sitting at five stories tall in the middle of the capital city, when covered with “un moustiquaire” the Tour d'Afrique will give the United Against Malaria campaign some serious visibility, and ideally influence Malians to get their own net, albeit smaller, to sleep under.


The official draping of the notable statue will occur in a few months, and in the meantime there’s another structure everyone’s talking about. To celebrate Mali's "Cinquantenaire"/50th anniversary on September 22, Monsieur le Président Touré purchased a 5 million dollar monument of a girl and a boy to be placed on the Niger river.


A $5 mil. project like this would be considered nothing in a high-income country. In the developing country of Mali, however, $5 mil. ain't chump change. Such a huge percentage of Mali's purse could be used in so many more productive ways -- strengthening the health system, education system, infrastructure.


You could come back with the counter-argument that: oh well, at least the money’s going back into the Mali economy, which could then trickle down to these other sectors.


But no, M. Touré did not have the monument locally constructed. He bought it from China.


Instead of making a fuss about the already decided, ludicrous purchase of a statue that will contribute nothing to decreasing poverty, hunger, or disease in Mali, we at “Voices for a Malaria-Free Future” are just going to put a giant net over the much bigger, and more respected, monument. We’re sending a message to the Malians that even though their president made the decision to put the country's money into a chunk of Chinese handiwork with his name on it, we can make the decision to aim the country's attention away from it. We’ll be combating the president’s example of using Malian funds for self-commemoration with a better message to lead by example. If the Tour d’Afrique is going to sleep under a mosquito net, so can you!


It is this same Tour d’Afrique’s mosquito net that our project so kindly decided to loan to the United States, and whose production I was assigned to document.


On my way to the tailor’s, I started imagining the room where the monstrous moustiquaire was being assembled. The twenty, thirty people working together under high ceilings, trying to keep in order what could be the design for King-Kong’s insecticide-treated bednet.


I was led through the “Grand Marché,” Bamako’s famous market, up a narrow staircase, and into a poorly lit room with a twin bed-sized pile of white netting on the ground. Sitting in the room, next to the sole dangling lightbulb, was a young man with a sewing machine: the tailor. The only tailor that had worked on this already-sewn, ready-to-go mosquito net.


It was an impressive feat for one person to squint through, and both he and the project were thrilled at the agreed-upon price of $300. I got a great video interview of his excitement in sending his work to the United States, all taken while he was lounging on top of the giant mass of netted cloth.


Monsieur le Tailleur


He walked me through the production process, starting from measuring the light fabric using his arm’s length. He mimed cutting with his rusted scissors. He showed me how to start up his lone, antique sewing machine.


Mass heap of mosquito net in the background


We wrapped up our interview when two of his buddies walked in to wrap up the net for shipping to NYC. They used a much larger needle to thread together four pieces of tarp that would ensure that the delicate netting did not get ripped. The tarp would allow something like rolling the net down the stairs to take place without worries.


All packed up and ready to fly


So that’s what they did. After stuffing the net into this homemade tarp contraption, they let her rip down the outdoor staircase. Eyes on my digital camera, I almost got blasted with the falling heap, and instead let it knock down a moto to my right.


Avalanche.


They jacked the tarped mass onto a cart, rolled it through the Grand Marché, and stopped traffic at each intersection for this all-important mosquito net that would travel over an ocean to an internationally-recognized building in NYC, and back again to top Mali’s most acclaimed monument.


When finally in the car, I looked through my video footage. This life-saving material looked so cheap, like tutu netting you could get at Marshall’s for ten cents a yard. Why wouldn’t those guys in New York just use such arts and crafts netting and get a local a tailor to make their show prop? Our shipping company told us it would take this $300 net a jaw-dropping $5,400 to ship there, and another $5,400 to ship back. The investment seemed almost as ludicrous as Monsieur Touré’s.


The car ride back to our "Voices" offices was tight and uncomfortable, all of the seats folded to make room for the net of honor. When we arrived, we all ran up the stairs to get everyone down to the car to see probably the biggest mosquito net ever made.


We walked in and were met by somber faces. Those flippant New Yorkers decided not to get the net shipped after all. Apparently, "at any cost" had a ceiling.


While this may disappoint our lone tailor, it was a wise decision not to burn over $10,000 that could be used to buy moustiquaires for 2,000 households, saving much more than 2,000 lives.


Now if only we could get Touré to retract his $5 million being exported to China. Who knows how many lives that could save -- something much more worthwhile to commemorate his presidency, and Mali's 50th anniversary.


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These blogs are written on personal accounts and opinions of my near and far away adventures, so far. They do not in any way reflect the thoughts and opinions of the organizations with which I work.

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