#thoughfulconsumption consciousconsumer marimekko sustainability longetivity watercolour copicmarkers Japan tamabi exchange-semester

[asthavinash]

The Marimekko Apron This story at first was not as interesting till I came back and understood that how it actually made sense. My first week in Japan, I was a very conscious buyer. I knew that I would need an apron as many of the courses I had picked were unity and messy in terms of process. As I was playing pragmatic for the 6 months, I decided to go to a 100 yen store and buy the cheapest apron possible there as I have to throw it in the end anyway. The next day in class, I saw this girl who was wearing a marimekko apron. I being myself, kept staring at it for a while mostly admiring but then, I smirked at the look of it and said ‘What a waste!’ in my head. She had stained it with pigments and dyes a couple of times too. I smirked even more and remarked myself that ‘hah what a waste, 11,000 rupees gone down the drain.’ By December, I had only a month left till I go back to India, I looked at my plastic 108 yen apron, and saw that It had marks and stains from each and every course that I had taken up. Every picture of mine that was taken while I was working or documenting my work was in that filthy apron. All my fancy clothes that were bought in my trips to the downtown were hidden by a 108 yen apron, On the other hand, the girl with a marimekko apron was wearing an inspiration throughout, had stains of hardwork and memory on her apron only adding value and meaning. Maybe this time when she saw me throwing my apron into the bin because I wasn’t attached to it, she must have smirked in her head “hah! what a waste!” There are many ways of looking at it, but in the end I still feel she made a more pragmatic choice as most of the year I was seen in the apron more than any thing else. It was the only object that saw me go through all of it. And there is nothing I love more than my work, so the stains on my apron should have been something I value, something that motivates me to work more. But sadly my apron was in the trash already. Now, who was the loser here? fin. bye. But on a different note, does it actually matter marimekko or cheap polyester? what matters is the memory the story that the piece of clothing could tell. What should matter is the amount of pride I take in when I see the stains of hardwork that went in screen printing, yuzen zome , kata zome, it was me and the apron that wen through all of it together. There are different ways of looking at the same but in the end all I realise is that I shouldn’t have thrown it.