Pilachi_Sketch [ BLOG ]

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On the request of the Delegation of the European Commission in Ghana the print publication “Collaboration in Action” and the companion DVD, that Pilachi was commissioned to put together last year, have been re-purposed for digital distribution.

“Re-purpose” is a misnomer if you really think about it: because Pilachi is a digital design studio, so the files all started out digital[ly].

The brief of the project was to prepare a 50 page book and interactive disc celebrating three things:

1. 50 Years of independent Ghana: the first black ruled nation in Sub-Saharan Africa
2. 50 Years of the unification of Europe
3. 30 Years of European Commission and Ghana Collaboration [...hence the catchy title... "Collaboration in Action"]

As you can imagine, this was a tall order; so we flipped the script a bit. Read more

Introduction: Borne Out of Conflict

“As the country strives to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, Ghana’s foremost priority is to sustain its growth and translate national gains into poverty reduction for the most vulnerable. The EU, through the European Commission and the bilateral programmes of the member states, is a dedicated partner to the Government of Ghana in this effort…”

Each of these chapters is available for download by clicking on the image or on the highlighted text. Read more

Man… yesterday I felt like a smurf on a cloud; today… a different smurf, under a different kind of cloud. Outside, it has just started to rain.

Perhaps it is the prospect of finality, facing the uncertainty of Ghana feeling completely unprepared. Maybe it is the idea that I came to Jamaica three months ago to complete three small tasks that were very important to me… not one is complete. Maybe it is the fact that the weather changes so quickly with emotions, that I do not know whether to carry a rain coat, a warm jacket or a bikini and shades.

So much is going so well. Perhaps the choir is right… focus on one thing at a time.

But that is it… my brain feels like a multiple processor computer running on 64gigs of RAM… and my fingertips feel like multiple sensory organisms… and my body wants to move in such a lugubrious way, that my inexplicable mass is confounded by the lump of lard before it.

Maybe it is not that complex. Read more

Today I feel very smurfy; like someone swimming with endorphins; or maybe that is my brain compensating for what it just learnt about having needles stuck into you. I had my ackee punctured.

As graphic as that may sound, it is not quite as dramatic as it sounds; nevertheless I must say… what a ridiculous word ‘nevertheless’ is. has anyone really thought about it?

Always-the-more we should use words that really mean something to us. Perhaps something useful.

So… back to the endorphins. I learnt what acupunture is today… and just how it works to make your pain go away.

I felt nothing… which as I understand was supposed to happen… but it feels pretty damn good to swirl my shoulder blade now.

So… maybe I can get back into the swing of things soon enough… like hanging off a light post with a camera.

Peace pee-pel.

“So a funny thing happened today…” is usually a very bad way to start a sentence; and bad is really a poor word choice; so let’s try another…

… way. no way. yes way.

I started physiotherapy two days ago: [yesterday]. I must say, having almost started this sentence with a proposition, that I quite like physio; a useful spelling error, with relevant irony, if ever there was one.

The two ladies who “propriet” the place are astutely whimsical in the most intellectually challenging way. To put it another way… I know that my physio-therapist is a brilliant, genius-esque, rocket-scientist brain hiding her true self from the abcess-mediocrity that is the Jamaican social ethos… and her partner in crimen… es un[a] cool chica tambien.

I mean that with absolute sincerity; so chew, but don’t misconstrue. chebere.

This is what I mean… it is possible to present your ’self’ at a fraction of your intellectual quotient in an effort to not cast shadows on the people around you… while still remaining way above the people who you openly mock. It is a great experience to be a part of… this ‘tell a joke and be a part of the physical execution of the punchline’ bit.

For this reason in particular, I look forward to my therapy sessions. Read more

It has taken more than three weeks and still I am unable to write a simple proposal.

Is this a mental block or am I too close to realizing a purpose greater than my own self-involvement; so much so that I stumble on the answers and bludgeon the questions into an incalculable pulp.

Far too often the third party residual is blamed for my in action; now in a divine irony, my new found inaction is forcing me to face the problem. I sit here riddled with painkillers, nursing a torn ham-string–the gravity of which I have never sat long enough to comprehend [no pun intended]–considering instead all the things I would have done, if I had the opportunity.

The funny thing is… I had all the opportunities that ten people could have dreamt of… and still, nothing was done. I could have written “I did nothing” but that would have taken too much responsibility.

What is a ham-string anyway? A pain in the ass? more like an opportunity to sit long enough to have to do something, anything.

We came back to Jamaica to try to make a difference in the way that we as Jamaicans relate to each other; and also to influence the way that the rest of the world relates to us as Jamaicans: the people, the nation, the notion, the myth.

Having spoken with a series of similarly mis-shapen movers and mis-shakers, the unanimous decision is that Jamaica needs the positive influences of the creative professionals on the ground: the people who are able to independently fuel the coffers, so that social development becomes the necessary not-for-profit community-service-without-the-sentencing.

We are all parts of a singular daisy chain and all feel that politics, public sector governance, private sector corporate governance, all the way through the informal sector… the priorities are incorrectly placed and thereby make it vary easy for the susceptible to fall prey to temptation and corruption (read: every single one of us).

Without a moral compass and / or positive role models, how will we know what is the right way; how will we hold onto the things that we are sure are the right ways… if the people who drilled these positive morals into us: our mothers, elderly grandmothers, principals and old-time-teachers… are all desperately poor, exploited and / or suffering at the hands of the people and systems that we are taught to look up to. How do you blame those who fight back in negative ways… how do you not become one of them yourself?

If the road to hell is paved with good intentions; where is the off-ramp? Read more

On the tail end of a whirlwind month of self discovery, it is difficult to continue with scathing commentary on life related issues. So the steady droll has slowed to a grinding halt. Perhaps that is an integral part of the process of self discovery; once you face down the scary monster, the shadows lurking in the infant’s bedroom becomes a particularly rural place. Then we slowly grow up and face the real monsters in life; so let us un-monster-ify them too.

To admit that this was an awkward week is much like washing your hands after using the bathroom, or ensuring that your brown belt matches your brown shoes.

Well, more often than not, I wear black shoes; and for the life of me, I can’t seem to find my black belt. So the visible absence in the daily rant is a bit of a relief for those among us who find this type of “over-sharing” a bit awkward.

The fact that the word “awkward” was used two times in a paragraph, three times in a single blog entry, and four times in the same week is unacceptable. Creativity be damned. Read more