The topic of plastic bags cropped up at work today, enthralling I know, anyways got me thinking of the kids in Zambia who collect plastic bags from the roadside and turn them into footballs.
How?
A couple of styles are used but the most common way is kids scrunching litter into a small plastic bag, making it into a football shape then adding more and more plastic bags making sure to tie each in a tight knot in even places around the ball. The strongest plastic bag is always kept until the end and then carefully melted to make it strong (others use string to hold the ball together), resulting in a 'chimpombwa'. The ball doesn't bounce like a normal football but it doesn't stop the kids playing for hours pretending to be Eto, Drogba, Messi or Rooney.
Two young creative Zambians; director Mosten Mutale and photographer Mark Mwanamwalye have told the story of how Fred Tembo from Garden Township in Lusaka makes his unique 'chimpombwa'. The Zambian short film 'Condomise Zambia' is this year's winner of ActionAid international film competition held in Denmark and the story has been described as "being young in a developing country" by the judges.
Plastic bags are also used to make kites and other waste is recycled to make toy cars. Large bottle tops make for good wheels, wire and the odd stranded flip flop make for a superb chassis!