Slow on the uptake…
So for the past two years, I have been working with the CCM Women’s Society to plan, organize and carry out a sewing project. As we’ve talked they’ve mentioned the things that they want to learn and always mention that they want to “aprender cortar” (to learn to cut). I always thought it was interesting that middle aged women didn’t know how to use scissors but figured that it was just part of the poverty of Moz that they didn’t go to kindergarten where they cut out shapes.

Turns out, I’m slow on the uptake. This week, I went to their sewing project and there met a woman who came for the first time. She too mentioned that she wanted to learn how to cut but also said she already knows how to sew things like skirts, blouses, and dresses. I asked her, “How is it that you know how to sew but don’t know how to cut?” All the women twittered at my naiveté. Learning how to cut actually means, learning how to design – taking something one’s seen on the street or in one’s mind and figuring out how to make it from nothing. I told her that’s a gift that people have, not something that is exactly teachable. It involves thinking, measuring and experimenting. She said, “That’s what I want to learn!” and looked at me as if I was going to be the one who teaches her how to do that. (I don’t have that gifting for clothing).

Some things are never clear even though you understand the words spoken. Nothing like learning the meaning of “aprender cortar” (to learn to cut) two years after learning the individual words.