Ferial Haffajee : Design of the week
Kudos this week to the Beyond Awareness Campaign for taking an international symbol and making it local.
A community development project called Ilala Weavers in Empangeni, KwaZulu-Natal, has taken the international symbol of the fight against Aids – the red ribbon – and recast it as a Zulu love letter.
“This area [rural KwaZulu-Natal] is the epicentre of the Aids epidemic in South Africa and it is poignant that women from that area have made these love letters,” says Karen Bulsara of the Society for Family Health. This very South African symbol is meant to convey the message: “When you’re loving, love safely.”
Zulu love letters were first made for young migrant workers, who left their rural homes to work on white farms or new towns, by the loves they had left at home. At first the women wove simple bands where the message was in the colour and it was read linearly. Later on these became more elaborate ornamental squares where women would convey entire stories by the intricate threading of beads into multi-coloured designs: black beads for disappointment, pink for poverty and green for love sickness.
Often green beads were interpreted as “I have become as thin as a blade of new grass from pining for you.” Red beads indicate intense love, while white is the symbol of purity, cleanliness, true love and hope.
So successful has the love letter been, that the philatelic society has drafted a stamp using this design. It’s sitting with the Health Department and once it receives their stamp of approval, the love letter and its message will wing its way all over the world.
The Beyond Awareness Campaign wants to do literally that: to take the fight against Aids beyond awareness and into action. One of the ways it wants to do this is by making the national Aids hotline a number that is dialled more often. The hotline number which will accompany all red ribbons is: 0800-012-322.