Cultured

Cultured 

After high school, I started a clothing company with a girl I used to attend primary school with. Her name - Lethabo. I only knew Lethabo for one year of my school career, but I liked her. We had a natural connection despite the fact that I was the new kid. She was real and authentic. She was smart, lively, creative, passionate and had no problems putting me in my place. I avoided verbal misunderstandings that would lead to conflicts with her, she was quick witted and often left me mute. Still, we were cool most of the time.

I hadn't talked with Lethabo since Primary school and now we were done with High School. I reached out and she was enthused. I got her numbers and we talked on Whatsapp about our impending futures. Her energy had piercing spikes. She was creative as ever and our conversation had a lot of substance. She had an entrepreneurial drive that was contagious. She was ambitious, she wanted to do and be someone great. She had a lot of plans. She was animated. She excited me! She told me she was thinking of starting a fashion stable. She was inspired by Malaysian, Saudi Arabian, Indian and African designs. I thought that was the coolest thing ever! In my mindseye I saw something artistic at the same time unfathomable. Like abstract art she caught my imagination, I was intrigued, the prospect of her vision inspired me. I was thinking of creating a company of creatives myself so I suggested we collaborate and build something special. Let's create your fashion stable and when it takes off we can diversify in other artistic markets and domains. She liked my idea and agreed. To make it formal and professional, I advocated we create a legal entity like a company to protect ourselves from liabilities. She agreed and so we started brainstorming names for our company. I liked the fact that the inspirations came from all around the world and it made us limitless and boundless. I imagined our clothes being popular culture. She had the vision of our clothes being worn by celebrities. She was thinking niche and exclusive but also a "ready to wear" range. I loved the word "Culture" because it has a connotations of expression, artistic and creative. Our clothes would be handmade crafts that transcend time and created trends. I suggested we use "Cultured" as a name. She absolutely loved it!

I registered the company and started work on our logo and website. I send her a couple of drafts and she chose the logo that's still our official logo. I worked on our website and it's still active, take a look "culturedrituals.blogspot.com". Lethabo enlisted help from her designer friend Athenkosi and we started creating. We bought fabric and started work, the enthusiasm was unbelievable! We created our first range and had a photoshoot. It was great, people loved our work. The momentum slowed down when our sewing machine broke down. Bad timing, it was too soon. We couldn't fix it, it was too expensive. Lethabo also started Law School and Athenkosi committed to his tertiary studies full-time. I took up a call center job so I can put myself to Varsity and still push the dream. I had a grand vision and I knew from the start that capital would be an issue and I never wanted to be limited so I searched online for options. What caught my attention was trading Binary options, the worst option ever, it's equivalent to burning your money, just pure speculation, but I needed quick results. I lost a lot of money because of desperation and foolishness. I still can't believe I fell for Binary Options and Trading robots, it's so embarrassing. Binary options led me to Forex, which is better because your money doesn't disappear all at once like poker and there's the illusion of control because you have technical analysis and candle sticks but it's still speculation and I lost even more money there. But it helped me, I am grateful for the experience, I am wiser. It's okay, I fought for my dreams with everything I had and I have no regrets, there's nothing I could have done better, I am proud. 

I am grateful for Lethabo and Athenkosi, thank you God for that wonderful gift. Also thank you for coming to my 21st birthday celebration Lethabo, I really appreciate it. Maybe one day we will have the opportunity to rekindle what we started. What we did was amazing especially considering we were scattered all around. I was in Alex, Lethabo was in Tembisa and Athenkosi in Kempton Park but we all showed enthusiasm to meet up at the mall 2 times a month to discuss business. We were so professional and committed. No excuses, no postponements, everyone was always present. We had memos and agendas, it was greats. We showed desire, we showed initiative, we gave everything to the process.