Moxyland

Tendeka

Zuko rattles the can of spray-paint far longer than he needs to, but he’s working the crowd, both the kids he’s teaching and the passers-by, which makes for a considerable crowd on a Wednesday morning on the Parade. It strikes me that this must be one of the only occasions that the kids are drawing positive attention from the public. Zuko takes to the showman role brilliantly, demonstrating how to hold the nozzle so you get a smooth flow without collateral spillage on your clothes, and why you have to wear the fumemask.

The kids who live on the street make their own agenda, and if you try to force them into yours, you’re just going to lose them. We’re not overly worried if they don’t rock up first thing or if they leave before four p.m. They can come and go as they please, the only rule is they can’t be fucked up or get fucked up while they’re working with us. If we catch anyone huffing paint, it’s an instant red card.

I’ve got no illusions. I know exactly where they go when they peel off at two or three, after lunch, because that’s the deal, four hours’ work and you earn a decent meal; and I know they won’t be coming back till tomorrow, once they’ve slept it off. The thing is to respect them and how they run their lives. We can’t force them to be here, but we can offer an attractive alternate to rummaging in the garbage or begging for food. We’re building a conversation, not handing down a lecture on high. Respect is reciprocal.

It’s remarkable how fast Ash pulled it together, once he got over his shock that I had changed my mind about the sponsor thing. Fast-tracked by his corporate buddy boy at Chase Standard Bank’s CSI program, which makes me think he’s got something going on for Ash. Of course, Ashraf thinks that’s hilarious.

Chase Standard insisted that we didn’t use straight chipped flyers or posters, that they had to have an opt-in function, so that you have to physically stop and interact with the poster, but the kids are overloaded with all the slick clubvertising on Long Street, there’s no way they would have paid them any attention. So we saved the cash on the posters and hit all the shelters instead, speaking to the kids personally, and getting the social workers onside.

It’s disgusting how much of a difference real sponsorship makes. Instead of badly printed tees, the kids have navy overalls, with the logo stitched tastefully over the heart. The stitching on the back boasts ‘Investing In Our Youth’. Instead of cold potjie stewed at home with whatever ingredients Ash can find, we have nutritionally enhanced hamburgers delivered promptly at quarter past twelve from the kitchens of Chase Standard’s head office, two blocks over.

Unfortunately, we have to take the overalls from the kids at day’s end. We tell them it’s because we need to wash off the paint, but it’s at Chase Standard’s insistence, so they don’t go off and get vrot and harass people, still wearing the logo. Likewise, no one’s allowed to leave with paint, in case they tag with it or, worse, inhale.

Practising is all designated within this specific zone, although all the kids get branded sketchbooks and a box of pencil crayons (because you can huff koki) to take back with them. It’s an inspired gesture, which could have only come down from a corporate social investment dick who doesn’t have a clue about streetside reality, where kids get mugged for anything vaguely precious or personal.

We’ve pulled together some seventeen kids, itching to get their hands on the paint, but this is not just tagging shit. There are techniques to be mastered. The kids with no artistic ability get to do the manual fill jobs, but even that requires a measure of skill, using tight little circles, or precision strokes to make sure the paint doesn’t run.

The LEDs, on the other hand, are plug and play. Tiny bulbs the size of the head of a drawing pin, imported specially from Amsterdam. We’re using magnetic paint, so it’s just a matter of positioning and slapping them on. It was what sold Chase Standard on the project – that we could embed lights in the shape of their logo, which would blink all night for all the incoming traffic to see. You can pre-program patterns to add dimension or words. ‘Peace’. ‘Love’. ‘Ubuntu’. ‘Revolution’.

It’s easy to embed other things in magnetic paint too. Totally stable, skyward* assures me. I wouldn’t expose the kids to unnecessary risk.

We’re doing up all three of the panels on the side of the ex-library, up there with the logos and adboards and videomercials beaming down. All in the name of a Good Cause, the street kids channelling their frustration into something useful, something beautiful. Something the public can feel good about.

Watching Zuko workshopping the rapt crowd, spraying up an outline of letters, ‘LOVE’, the style somewhere between the fat curves of Sixties’ hippie typo and the jagged tangle of Eighties New York subway bombing-style, I don’t know why we didn’t do this earlier.

I tell Ashraf as much when he comes back from giving the tour to the bunch of Chase Standard employees on their lunch break, and that I’m proud of him. He practically glows, which makes it harder to come clean about all the extra-mural we’ve got planned.

Oh, he knows about the animal rights thing, that’s his baby anyway. He’s always been a rabid defender of our furry friends. He was hectic PETA before we got into working with kids. And the station protest has been a long time coming. But he’s not in on the picture on the optional extras, the stuff that is gonna make the news.

The point is that the kids are homeless already. As long as we don’t get caught, they have nothing to lose. They can’t be disconnected because they don’t have phones. The disenfranchised will get their moment of glory.

I’ve discussed it at length with Zuko and some of the other boys, Ibrahim and S’bu, not with all the details, but they’re up for it. The only worry is the dogs, but there are ways, skyward* says, of dealing with gen-mod animals.

And making headlines at the same time.