Tie-Dying in West-Africa

Sports have always played a major role in my life. I even have documented evidence; my first photo, at age 6, for my t-ball team. Down on one knee I proudly wore my purple Vikings uniform. Back then we didn't have the standard white pants--which makes sense, we were bunch of kids--so my mother made me a matching tie-dye shirt and pants combo. I remember wearing that ensemble down quickly--there was no dirt on the field that went untouched. Now, many years later I have returned to tie-dye.

It is common among volleyball teams to make tie-dye t-shirts together as a team building activity. When I was coaching my first volleyball team, a club one of my best friends and I had started, we had a tie-dying party. So the idea to do the same thing in Africa came naturally, and like in t-ball my mother came to the rescue. She set about buying t-shirts for the girls and while she could have just bought some regular tie-dying kit at Wal-Mart, she went through the process of ordering a kit from a company called Dharma Trading Company. She even called them to ask if they shipped to Benin. They did, but at the fear it might get lost she had it shipped to her first.

Following the volleyball tournament I had all the girls over to my house to tie-dye. I couldn't explain what it was to them, but they went along with the activity with vigor. Of course we had to work around the directions a little. For example, I can't control water temperature from the pump, and instead boiled water to mix in with the cool water.

We let the shirts sit in their dye for almost 24 hours, at the girls’ insistence. The next day on a Monday, four of the girls came over to help rinse off the dye so we could hang the shirts to dry. They were all wowed by the colors and how the shirts turned out. The four girls immediately started calling dibs on the shirts they wanted. Even the shirt we were sure was going to turn out "villain" was pretty. Another sign that the shirts were a success is the girls wanting to sell them. Apparently south of our village a group of woman do tie-dying, and the girls eagerly pointed out these shirts were way better.

On Saturday the whole team returned and I set about demonstrating how they could use the fabric markers--also courtesy of my mother--to sign one another shirts and decorate the t-shirts. The girls acted cautiously at first, but after an hour they were all into it, so much that I couldn't get them to stop. They wrote messages to each other and spread "I love volleyball" across the shirts with hearts. Next year these shirts will serve as their practice t-shirts, and while I thought they might wear them outside of that, they have taken this notion seriously. These shirts are for volleyball only. It gives them something to look forward to next year and like my photo from t-ball, it gives them documented evidence for the future.

(See slideshow for pictures)

Benin Volleyballin’ Part I

In February, with the enthusiasm of my school’s director and consistent assistance from another member of the administration, I started C.E.G. Matéri’s first volleyball team. It was opened up to only girls, much to the chagrin of the male students, who insisted they too were jeunes filles (young girls).

Initially, I set out to practice once a week. Free time is not a commodity for most girls in Benin, as they are responsible for cooking and cleaning at home, along with keeping up with their studies. We decided on Saturday mornings at 7 a.m. going for an hour and half. The second week in, after receiving a lecture on making sure they arrived on time, as we only practiced once a week, the girls approached me, “Madame Jamie, ‘What about practicing on Sunday?’.” I asked if this was instead of Saturday morning, but no, they wanted to practice twice a week. So it was set, we’d start practicing twice a week, two hours each day. Of course I can’t think of a single time our practices didn’t run shorter than two and half hours, with the girls continuing to get some last passes in while we were taking things back to be locked up at the school.

I don’t think these girls give any second thoughts to the conditions they play in, meanwhile I have had to slowly accept them, which has sub sequentially left me with total admiration of these girls. We play outside, on a terrain that is basically hard ground, with tiny rocks everywhere. The girls fall on the ground without question or complaint, at the same time they are forced to move quickly to avoid falling all together.

In addition to the one volleyball the school had, I bought a volleyball, which quickly was deflated as the girls sky rocketed the ball everywhere and anywhere but the volleyball court. Then we resorted to using a basketball and two soccer balls, just so the girls could get repetition.

I couldn’t figure out how to run a practice at first, because I was used to having many volleyballs at my disposal. I also struggled to explain things in French. I knew this would be a challenge, but never realized how ingrained in my head volleyball lingo had become. As a result though, the girls have learned a little more English, evident by them saying “Mine,” sometimes, as opposed to “J’ai” to call for the ball. Thankfully with the help of another school administrator I survived and developed some new strategies on my own.

I had to leave behind the complex volleyball I had learned and go back to basics. This means just simply passing and setting, and despite protests underhand serving—next year they are all learning to overhand serve. I had to deal with the time eaten up by chasing balls. I finally resorted one day to taking the girls to the side of the school building and passing with the wall, making them get in ready position, throw the ball up, and passing, in a methodical, controlled process, that kept them focused. I also had to deal with how the other coach wanted to discipline the girls, by yelling and hitting. It was only a matter of time, until the other coach saw giving them running, having them hold the passing position, or doing push-ups worked more effectively. Then there has been the slower process of reprogramming these girls to pick one another up, instead of blasting each other for mistakes.

This all leads me up to today, which was the first day at a regional competition in Benin, where the first girls’ sports team ever from Matéri is participating.