Power to the people
2008-09-25
Marguerite Lombard
COMIC books were big news back in the 1960s, when every self-respecting café owner had a turnstile full of black and white picture books with evocative names like ‘Ruiter in Swart’ and ‘Die Swart Luiperd’. On the farm Boplaas in Wellington a group of farm workers have been producing a monthly photo-book called ‘Weltevreden se doen en late’. The books are produced by LOOP (Landelike Opvoedings- en Ont-spanningsprojek), an initiative of the Goedgedacht Trust oudside Malmesbury. Sue Power, the owner of Boplaas, is the project co-ordinator, and explains that the idea is to culturally appropriate information to people who have poor reading skills. The project started two years ago, and since its first edition in June 2006, circulation has grown to about 18 000 a month. “Our themes are always very topical. We have tackled themes like alcohol and drug abuse, family violence, and recently did an issue with the Wellington SPCA on how to care for dogs. “For fetal alcohol month, we produced an issue on fetal alcohol syndrome and the social issues around that theme.” The photo-books have proved to be a much needed way of providing people with important information. “Official handouts from government departments are often in a very difficult language and the situations they depict contain very little with which farm people can identify. One is left with the impression that the handouts are written by people living in town who do not necessary have a feeling for what is happening on the ground.” LOOP works with NGOs and government departments to advise them on content. In the issue on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, they worked with the University of Stellenbosch. “It is very important to get content as accurate and informative as possible. Each issue also contains an information page with contact numbers. Those numbers must be linked to a real person. If you don’t have a lot of money, you don’t want to waste it on an unhelpful phone call.” Most of the ‘Weltevreden’ actors live on Boplaas farm, and everybody gets a chance to act in the book. Sometimes children from a neighbouring farm, Rooshoek, are used as ‘extras’. The name Weltevreden is arbitrary, and is simply chosen to reflect and ordinary Boland farm. Hannah Jacobs - one of Weltevreden’s seasoned actors - is Sue Power’s casting officer. “If we need a character we don’t have on the farm, she scouts the neighbourhood for an actor.” Sue says that farmers have been very helpful distributing the comics. “We are selling the comics at 50c a copy plus postage and packaging to the farmers. This is just to help cover some of our costs. But it is distributed free of charge through the district’s mobile clinics. “Although our official circulation figure is 18 000 we know that a single copy is read by several people. “Most of the magazines go to NGOs, clinics and mobile clinics. I also post off about 500 copies a month to the Overberg district council, and there are farmers as far afield as Calitzdorp who buy copies for their workers.” The “stars” of the show are becoming quite confident with the acting work. “It is quite amazing. When we first started, it took us all day to produce the first comic. Everybody was till learning how to act. Now, we can easily do two comics in a single day. Everybody is getting a whole lot slicker.” Some of the better known actors are also becoming minor celebrities in Wellington. “Everybody knows them, and some readers take things quite seriously. “The other day one of the young actors was stopped in the street. In the comic she played a girl who had no furniture, and she was stopped in the street and offered a chair! “Although we deal with difficult themes, we try to keep the content light. I try to pick a topic that is an issue at the moment, and then give the basic storyline to Strikers. They develop the theme into a comic format.” Sue explains that her next goal for ‘Weltevreden’ is to turn it into a magazine format. Weltevreden is produced with full colour photographs, and shot on the farm Boplaas and at the Soetendal clinic.
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