FREEDOM OF OCCUPATION

WANA UDOBANG
Ever so often, i get asked the same question, “What are your plans?” As one who does enjoy a little bit of indulgence on the blonde side, the usual response would follow, “what do you mean?” They would proceed to with a lecture on whether or not i have looked into a career in either advertising or corporate communications. The lecture will delve into the merits of my qualifications and its correlation to world of corporate branding. Then further revealing earning possibilities, perks and the likes. Other times i had been asked about my occupation. Then i mention that i work on the radio, i am then asked again what I really do. Of course after reiterating that “i work at a radio station” it is followed up with a “who do you live with or are your parents alive?” The statment is accompanied with a look of shock horror as though to say "God forbid your parents know what you are doing"
Excuse my extensive blonde moment but then it finally occurred to me that to most, i don’t have a real job. We are just merely overindulging in a vocation. Apparently all i do is turn up to work, sit in front of a microphone and just move my lips for less that 365 days a year. Some have even insinuated that they can’t believe that i get paid just to do that. So sadly as I’m not calculating taxes, profit and loss, suturing an artery, developing computer codes or strategising a PR blitz for a juice company, whatever i do is merely a vocation. Not that one should care much but the sad thing about this is the power of the stereotype. During these conversations about ambitions and life plans, i have found myself throwing in my private practices slash vocational occupations into the mix and unbeknownst to me has added a little extra credibility to my occupational repertoire. With some scepticism, they still add with bemusement “do people really make any money from writing”. Well thanks to the Cassava Republic and Farafina generation, writing has become somewhat prestigious.
Though a career in radio is highly unacceptable as a real job, being a writer means i still have a bit of a brain to string a couple of sentences together. As myopic as it may seem this happens to be a largely collective state of mind. I recently discovered it also is likely to affect your dating quotient too. I met a guy with a nice corporate job who referred to my job as a “THING”. In his words “you said you do a thing with Dan Foster on weekday’s right”. Besides the jabs at my day gig, there are always numerous references to the fact that i wouldn’t know what its like to have a real job.
In my hiatus of implosion sometimes what i really want to say is “look idiot, i have worked before you even dreamt of graduating from university. Waitress, supermarket checkout girl, company administrator, recruitment officer (that’s what we call the London hustle baby), BBC, production company, we have done it all and guess what, im just 25..and oh did i add that i have a first class degree from the third largest arts institution in Europe,..and just before i forget, i paid for it myself thank you very much”. But then again, the beauty of an implosion is that it never spills out of your head if you don’t want it to. So all i say is that i believe am free to do whatever occupation i choose and shouldn’t be crucified for it either, how ever unintelligent or unserious you think it is.

OVER IDENTITY- HAS PRINT COME TO DEFINE THE AFRICAN DESIGNER?

BY WANA UDOBANG
During the British summer, the country’s collective state of mind is equally dictated by its unpremeditated skyline as much as it fashion trends. I remember one of these summers walking down Oxford Street. The Selfridges window was decorated with stuffed tropical wildlife, spears, horns and mannequins’ draped in all shades of African print. The window backdrop was plastered in Ghanaian Kente cloth and off shoots of elephant grass sprouting from different corners. As you can already tell, that summer, European fashion was going African.
Since then, it has been observed, that print has come to define African design or even the African fashion aesthetic. From Lisa Folawiyo’s bejewelled Ankara garments to Odio Mimonet and even Zebra’s ready to war line, print has become the main course in the African designer’s staple. Hilfiger and Lauren came to embody the All American look, even then, they saw the need to diversify to satisfy the insatiable buying taste of trendy fashion consumers.
In terms of the retrospective, designers Kesse Jabari and Nikki Africana started of working with African fabric. They varied from Adire tie die, Asho Oke, George, Damask, Ankara to even brocade and lace, the Y2K generation haven’t completely departed from this model. Though Tiffany Amber works more with romantic and ethereal fabrics like chiffon, silk and lace, Mali’s Xuly Bet opted for fabric with solid blocks of colour in its last gothic inspired collection. Still there were enormous traces of Print. It makes one begin to believe that there is a likelihood that this monopoly of Print may become detrimental to the African designer as it has come to detract from the technique and dexterity of the African clothes constructors.
Though different iconoclastic trends are still traced to its lineage in certain eras, like corsets to the Victorians and floral to the hippies, every knowledgeable fashionista can see its evolution through the decades. Granted the two thousands saw less originality and more a re-invention of the wheel, no particular attribute has come to strongly define a designers nationality or race.
So should being an African designer be one who just works with African fabric? Some might argue that people should be able to work with what they know as well as what influences them without giving into the paranoia of global acceptance. At the end of the day Yinka Shonibare’s Print influenced and revamped Nelson’s ship has been commissioned for the fourth plinth in Tralfalger square. The same can be said for the Japanese kimono and for the south East Asia with their Saris.
Don’t forget that though Vivian Westwood has been ordained the Dame of opulent fashion, she was once the goddess of punk rock. There is a need to become more than the Ankara before it becomes us. This homogeny of fabric should not obliterate its handler.

MARIAH MOMENT

WANA UDOBANG
Our last office meeting was dreadful. Well, all our office meetings are. A mass listening of your self played back to all. They call it the “aircheck tape”. We do this every week and it helps you know how dreadful you sound. Because strangely with the air check tape you just never sound right. Your a repetitious babbling bundle of mess. That’s it. That’s what you sound like, a hot pile of audible mess. So everyone in the room spits out bile alternatively known as constructive criticism. After a while of attending these meetings, you learn to take the good, accept the bad and just move on with the ugly. But that day i was told something a bit more interesting. After listening to everyone around the table drivel about how i could improve my very unsatisfactory performance on my Sunday show, my boss said to me “i don’t think you have a personality on Sundays”. Of everything he said i was most perplexed by that. He later explained that everyone liked the acid tongued, gossip ridden alter ego that i displayed on weekday mornings when presenting the entertainment digest ( a character named Mizz Infotainment who made a guest appearance only ten minutes a day). He said i needed to give the people what they wanted. I should become the authoritative figure on information (well soft cell trashy gossip). In my defence i told him that i felt it was unhealthy for me as an individual and as a professional.
Though during my internal monologue, i was really saying “wasn’t i already giving the people what they wanted, haven’t i given you people enough of my soul already?”. My friend is found dead with stab wounds in the woods, i have to be funny, witty and crazy, my aunt is in hospital with a lump in her neck, i have to be funny, witty and crazy, she dies a week later, i have to be funny, witty and crazy, I’m going to a funeral at twelve noon, my mother is in hospital, i get dumped in the morning, i still have to be funny, witty and crazy. Funny, witty and crazy have come to define me. I had conditioned myself to supress pain and all forms of other emotion because i have to be funny witty and crazy!!!!!!!
I had been told a fair few times that i was nothing close to my persona on the radio. People said when they listened to me on the radio i was insane and overly hyper. General unqualified pseudo psychotherapist had come to a conclusion that i showed schizophrenic and slightly bi-polar traits. I had successfully turned myself from campaign journalist cum custodian of the fourth estate to radio buffoon and still it wasn’t enough? They seemed to be breeding superstars in this place and until i had come full circle as a ten minute persona of my own invention, i was nothing close. My friend Banjo says maybe I’m looking for relevance. I think i have become a victim of my own invention. Fun sometimes doesn’t seem so fun anymore. I reckon i have created a monster. But hey, bills have to be paid and mouths to be fed. No time to check into rehab just yet.

WELCOME TO MEDIOCRE-CITY

I love the Nigerian spirit. The gift of the hustle, the ability to turn water into wine, the resilience to shine even in an eclipse, it seems like the Tupac poem reads we are, “the rose that grew from concrete”. We can be scum that always finds a way to rise. The latest street motto screams “hustle or dye trying”. It is what has come to define our identity, Naijapolitanism.
Even i consider myself a prime pedigree of the hustle movement. When people question my hustle credibility, i utter with fire in my eyes, as though about to get into a trash talk spar “you say you are from the street, but i am the street. Ask them my name and they will tell you”. (Google me bi@£%h)
However, despite my admiration for our messianic ability to raise the dead, i am starting to wonder whether this has let to the mass mediocre metropolis in the making.
People wake up from sleep and embark on missions without a destination or blueprint in sight. A friend of mine once made a lot of hype about starting a magazine. She raised funds to start up and solicited my support in the process. As any good friend i was supportive. Along the way i realised there was neither rhyme or reason to the publication. I couldn’t tell the audience or demographic, there was no advertising or marketing strategy. Well none that made much sense to me. Plus there was no concrete plan to where the publication was going. In the end it all seemed like a ploy to climb some social ladders.(after two publications it came to a halt) As you know in Lagos its important that you have an occupation that makes you relevant in the gatherings.
“so what do you do?” with that irritating smirk and annoyingly eager widening of the eyes like they are really interested in knowing you or what you can do for them. And then they would reply “i am a designer. I design based on order but I’m working on my ready to wear line”.
In order words i go to my mothers wardrobe, pack all her unused Aso-ebi fabric ,cut out images from magazines because i cant sketch,(and probably cant thread a needle either) and then get my tailor in Costain to fabricate each style. I would then get my skinny friends to model them, get my photographer friend to photograph the models in my designs and do a mass viral campaign on my new collection. It hasn’t gone without notice that a multitude of designers seem to work primarily with Ankara fabric (using the pseudonym AFRICAN PRINT)
One would have to give an A plus for effort at least. Fashion is just one aspect of it all. There are events, magazines, television shows, websites, workshops, courses, seminers.etc etc etc all selling you the same brand of mass mediocre hysteria.
Without deliberately trying to sound like a “101 in ideas development lecture”, with every idea comes a blueprint on identity, demographic, marketability, sustainability, profit and investment potential, with an exception to fun or experimental projects of course. The scam can only last for so long. Though some have successfully made an art out of it all, being pedestrian that it.
After all said and done, even i have numerous occupation cloaks. Radio presenter, TV host, writer, PR consultant, blogger, content producer/provider, voice over artist, poet, plus i definitely see room for plus size designer somewhere in there. I better run off to Evans and Monsoon websites to fabricate my first collection. Oh and look out for the Guerilla Basement magazine too.(just joking.. but i foresee a coffee table book though) You never know. Somewhere in all of this one has to admire the feat we undertake. Just can’t knock the hustle.

HAUNTING THE MAN MARKET

If you have spent a significant or even not so significant amount of time in the world of recruitment and human resources, there are a few terminologies in the recruitment dictionary to get acquainted with. When people apply for jobs, they come in categories. Permanent positions; contract positions; temporary positions and temporary to permanent positions. They are all pretty self explanatory however what makes this piece of random information really interesting, is it's peculiar parallel to the world of dating.
Applying for the position of a girlfriend bears an uncanny semblance to the job market. The problem though is that most of us girls forget the position we applied for initially and automatically believe it should be permanent even though that wasn’t advertised in the first place. Let’s take a look at the temp to perm positions. In the job circuit, it could be a quick replacement for someone who occupied the position before, or it could be a newly created role in the organisation to experiment with, ultimately deciding whether or not the role is paramount to the organisations success. During the interviews they inform you that it may become a permanent position. The term “MAY” not being an absolute should inform you that after a set time, you are likely to become unemployed again and should you be applying for a girlfriend position, perhaps single again. On no account is one meant to assume that all positions are an open invitation to a permanent life of bliss.
On a number of occasions, my male friends have accused my gender collectively about their indecisiveness when it comes to what it is they are looking for. In defence i have to expound using the job market analogy once again, but this time round i take a leaf from the applicant’s book.
Most people looking for jobs need and like security so inevitably would like a permanent position. So they still apply for the temp roles hoping and believing that their qualities shine thorough and essentially they become indispensible to the organisation. There is also the constant wishful thinking that the previous inhabitant of the position will fully abdicate their throne and never return. The same goes for the temp to perm applicants. They work hard enough and prove themselves to the employers trusting that there is some room for a renegotiation. As for contract applicants, it says it all on the tin.
When applying for some jobs, negotiations take place too. You are asked what you want and sometimes, you know your wants can’t be met and you accept what you are offered again later hoping your perseverance pays off in the end. These situations and circumstances are perfectly normal within the applicant and job provider dynamics.
It may sound a bit insensitive to compare girlfriends to job applications, but sometimes people need jobs to get them through. Be it contractual, temporary or permanent, the job meets a need. Its never easy admitting that you live in a world of loneliness and solitude, plus you need someone to meet certain needs too. In the fairy-tale ending, we believe we will find a permanent and secure position in the organisation best suited for us. In the mean time though for some any role is good enough.

REBRANDING THE GOSPEL

I once read in a book that if you needed to know the place of worship that was right for you, one had to think of them like your pairs of shoes. I was only sixteen at the time but let me enlighten you further. The book said churches were like shoes. They all had the same primary purpose; to protect the feet. So some churches were like high heels. They were pretty, sexy, exciting, but they hurt a bit and sometimes left you with blisters. But like you know , what’s a little pain for a world of glamour? Then there are those that are like pumps. Orthodox, routine, dated, not so glamorous and just plain boring.
I was more the pumps kind of girl. I like the stained glass in the church, the hymns, candles, frankincense, hommili and the solemnity of it all. The ritual has always been a part of my spirituality. Until i moved back to Nigeria and realised that in a bid to lure back its dwindling congregation, my orthodox church had started adopting a new design of pumps to market and rebrand itself. The first few times I attended mass, I couldn’t help but notice the priests had become more fiery and ferocious when delivering the sermon. At random moments, he would quote passages of scripture that weren’t included in the misille already assembled in Rome. He sometimes even without subtlety condemned the congregation. I always knew them to have very interesting senses of humour with a lot of metaphor and satire when it came to condemnation. At times they were poetic too, even parental using a lots of analogy and allegory to re-iterate their message.
Last week the Reverend father yelled at us he said “what have you sacrificed for the lord this year..common fasting till 2pm you cannot do..Later you will ask God please do this and that for me.” He was one of those heavily accented charismatic priests from the East of Nigeria. A bit hardcore for me. We seemed like the belligerent children being seriously reprimanded by a Father. I later asked my mother what this was all about. She said most people were now moving to Pentecostal churches because they said the catholic church was becoming repetitive and boring. I had a friend once tell me she had to change churches because the world was evolving. In her words “we are fighting fire for fire”. But you see, marketing and rebranding the church wasn’t just a Catholic or Anglican thing.
As part of my numerous private practices, I got a job to write and voice the advert for a new church somewhere on the Lekki highway. I found myself writing about the church like it was a new business club everyone needed to be a part of. I recently heard of a church event where both gospel and circular musicians were all paid to perform. Not saying that there is anything wrong with circular artists performing at a church, even rapper DMX recently organised a church concert. I was curious as to how lyrics like “what the f*&k do want from a Nigga” would go down with an American negro spiritualist congregation.
It all sounded a bit paradoxical to me. Well, Jesus did die for all our sins and didn’t come to save the already saved, so who am I to chastise.
I realised it had become much more than faith, worship, spirituality or just general hypocrisy Sunday worship. Churches needed to keep the numbers up. In order to do that re-branding was necessary. For those that built schools and orphanages, the figures needed to add up to maintain that. For those that bought private jets or were intending to, the figures needed to add up too.
It seems i just have to get used to the fact that my pumps have morphed just a little. They now have some kitten heels attached and have become slightly pointed; Further more a little uncomfortable too. Need I say, I also have to contend with a two hour Sunday Mass. Maybe it is time for me to move on. Goodbye to meditation and solemnity, hello to a shattered eardrum.

FAREWELL MCQUEEN

BY WANA UDOBANG
Once upon a time glamazons ruled the catwalk, with their Miami Vice style blazers and stomach length jeans. Runways in London
New York, Paris and Milan were clad in solid blocks of pastel colours along with shoulder pads and elaborate buttons. Just as fashion was about to experience a black hole, then came a young man. His name, Lee Alexander McQueen. Unbeknown to fashion, he would revolutionise its world in all its grandeur and entirety.
McQueen brought something dynamic to the fashion world stage. His shows were theatrical, they were grand, they were a circus, some might even go as far as saying it was a freak show. Essentially in the world of clothing design, McQueen gave the world something to talk about. He became the zeitgeist in the fashion game. Always daring to be different. He created the “Bumsters”, which ultimately spun the trend for the low rise jeans. He also birthed the scarf engraved with the motif of skulls draped on most celebrities and replicated across the globe. In his 1998 Autumn show, he featured double amputee model Aimee Mullens striding down the catwalk on intricately carved wooden legs. With an innately rebellious streak, he was never shy of controversy.
Although he didn’t come from a typical fashion pedigree, his accent to the fashion Oligarch is something that can be attributed to his taste for design, shock factor and sometimes the macabre. McQueen’s clothes have an air of craft and architecture to it, because somewhere along his career, his designs had surpassed pattern cutting and tailoring to become clothing architecture. His works have been more fascinating than Haute Couture. His days as an apprentice on Saville Row always came in handy as it could be traced in his impeccably tailored jackets. His sense of the ghoulish never went without a stare. One could see it in the celebrities attracted to his pieces of fashion iconography. Icelandic princess Bjork, Lady Gaga and Rhianna are just a few of his patrons. While Alexander McQueen was becoming the renaissance man for the Avant Garde , subliminally he was reconstructing fashion’s design history. He was doing what Film Noir had done to the world of cinema. Fashion wasn’t just frivolous anymore. It wasn’t just hemming together yarns of fabric or looking pretty in an outfit. This Scottish taxi drivers son had made clothing become art. Like Warhole and Damian Hirst he was crowd the l’enfant terrible(terrible child) of the fashion world.



McQueen’s clothes were sometimes unwearable and at other times difficult to adapt for high street fashion. He had also been criticised for going overboard. Despite all the criticism, he never compromised his fashion principles.
Alexander McQueen was a working class boy who grew up on a council estate in London’s east end. After leaving school with one O Level in art, he served his apprenticeship in London’s tailoring Mecca, Saville Row.
He would later apply to the prestigious Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design for the role of a pattern cutter tutor. But due to his very strong working portfolio, he was persuaded to enrol as a student and McQueen later graduated with a Masters in fashion design. McQueen served as head designer to Givenchy for five years before starting his own clothing line. Even he once admitted he had to tone down his love for the dramatic whilst working for Givenchy. He won the coveted award for British designer of the year four times and eventually awarded a CBE by the queen
Whilst Donna Karen was going through a spirituality overhaul and presenting boring pieces of loincloth on the runway (a total disappointment of course),Jean-Paul Gaultier had lost his sense of the bizarre(the cone bra worn by Madonna became his last memorable piece). But McQueen always kept in line with his vision of drama and extravagance. The McQueen woman was strong; she was a rebel, unafraid, and never shy of making a strong statement. That was Alex’s girl. That was the McQueen aesthetic
On the 11th of February 2010, Lee Alexander McQueen was found dead in his home just nine days after his own mother’s death and a couple of days to London fashion week. A British tabloid paper reported that his body was found hanged.
. As we mourn the loss this fashion demagogue, we ask who can take his place. Even Vivian Westwood had abdicated the throne as the queen of rebellious youth and teenage angst fashion, who could rule the runways again? Is fashion about to experience another black hole?
As the saying goes, “the world is a stage, we all have our entrances and our exits” McQueen left a bit early, but he waltzed of the runway with a standing ovation.