Our tailor

Claudia* is our age, early to mid thirties.  She is strikingly pretty, petite and slender with a ready smile and a sparkle in her dark eyes.  She lives in and works from two rooms in a neat little duplex in a shared compound, off a dirt road on a hill and down a dirt path between planted crops.  The compound shares water.  She puts her stove under a table during work hours, and puts her work under the table when she cooks for her small family.  She has two little girls, Joyful and Grace, 4 and 18 months.  Joyful is exactly as her name would imply, seeming to find utter delight in every breath she takes, constantly laughing and making her sister laugh too.  Grace toddles around, sharing her discoveries of the world with her sister and her mother.  Claudia does not send Joyful, with Grace tied on her little back, to run errands, or send the girls away until their needed for work.  She’s attentive and loving, and they thrive in the utter confidence of her care.  Joyful goes to nursery school, and Claudia always says customers can come by at any time, except when she goes to pick Joyful up from school.  They are delightfully under foot and ready to share their fascination and enjoyment and games with customers who come to drop off or pick up orders.  Claudia sews beautifully, creating unique, made-to-order clothing from the fabrics we bring her.  We try things on in the bedroom, sometimes asking for the fit to be adjusted here or there.  Some volunteers say she is a little expensive.  The little girls love each other and are growing up as sisters, but they don’t have the same parents.  Joyful is Claudia’s granddaughter.  Joyful’s mother is in Claudia’s village, going to school.  Her father acknowledges that she is his child, but he’s young too, and his family does not recognize his daughter.  And children - feeding, clothing, housing, schooling – are the sole responsibility of the mother in this culture.  Fathers give gifts, and it’s nice when they do, but not required.  Now we’ve seen many men carrying babies, holding the hands of small children, in complete adoration of their children, but it’s accepted and even expected here that men will have different families in different villages, and they can just as easily say that those children are not their responsibility.  Claudia makes sure her oldest daughter and her granddaughter go to school.  Claudia is our age.

*Names changed.