My dad used to explain that people are only able to see things that relate to their lives in some way. Our minds must filter all of the input we are receiving from the environment and it chooses to concentrate on things that can be connected to something in our existing life. To illustrate this concept, he told the story of an researcher who took a villager from a stone age society in the jungle to New York City. The struggle the villager was facing at the time was one common to those that practice swidden farming. The bananas which the people eat everyday were being grown far away and now people in the villager were devoting much of their resources to transporting the bananas back to the village. What the villager noticed was not the towering skyscrapers, blinking lights, ethnic diversity, noisy urbanity or amazing technology. What he noticed was the one thing he could use to make his life better. When asked what the villager noticed and learned about New York he described a device that could help him transport bananas. The researcher thought he was talking about a car and started to explain how they needed gas and would not be practical back in the jungle, but as the villager clarified, the researcher noticed he was talking about something more fundamental. The villager discovered the wheel.
As many of you know I have recently purchased a house. In the American custom of house buying it is expected to save up from 5-7 years so as to make a down payment on a house and then another 30 years to pay off the loan. One way of thinking about it, is that your are building (wealth to build) the house for 37 years. The time to build this house affects other aspects of life as well, such as saving for retirement, perusing further education and starting a family. So while I was in Dorze village in southern Ethiopia, I was surprised to learn that it only takes about 3 months to build a house that will stand for 60 years. I started thinking, what if I could just buy some land in Minneapolis and build a Dorze house. It will not have all the comforts of a modern home, but is it less than the comfort of being debt free? I could also buy a lot of comfort with the money I am not paying on a house. After the repressive reality of city codes, peer pressure and cold winters set in I tried to abstract this idea a bit to see if I could still extract value from it. Why are Dorze houses build in only 3 months and can last for 60 years? There are several reasons all of them integrated within society, environment and physical mechanics. First the house is built with local materials. None of the cost of the house is tied to transportation. What would a house built entirely of uptown materials be? What kind of trees do we have here? Any strong grasses? What is the consistency of our sand and mud, could be used to construct buildings? If anything broke in the house, I could just walk around Lake Calhoun to find the materials I needed. Also the entire village bands together to build the house. What if I could take the therapist skills of my wife, electrical engineering skills of my roommate, retail, technical writing and broadcasting skills of my housemate, and pediatrician and architect skills of my neighbors to create a house? And then when it was time for their house I could use my interculturalist skills to help build there’s. Also, everybody builds the same style of house. When I look at suburban developments, I see this method is being used to reduce cost. But what if our houses were all the same? Why must we have individual houses? Does a house represent so much of ourselves, so we must create an entirely new creation? Finally, the thing that was truly impressive about the Dorze houses was how function was intimately tied to design. The barn portion of the house acted as central heating for the people. The breath of the animals kept people warm while sleeping in the cold Dorze evenings. Also, the houses were built up to 50 meters high. This height would slowly shrink as termites ate the bottom of the house. Termites were an assumed threat and houses were built higher to account make up for the eventual shrinkage. Just like buying a larger size of close that will shrink in the wash. What would our homes look like if function were integrated with design? It would be nice if somehow the time I spend on the internet would vacuum the floor. Or the cat I keep for company would actually keep me warm in the wintertime.
The Dorze house will continue to stay in my mind to challenge current scripts I have about how to live in a space.
Another concept related to the Dorze hut that I have been pondering is chosen simplicity and minimalism of materials. Individuals choose to not collect excess clothing, decorations, kitchen utensils, or other items. We collect so many things....why do I have to have 6 different head scarves, 7 pairs of black socks, 4 lamps in our bedroom, and 3 pairs of glasses-well that one I will not question, but why do I save my old glasses or my old books? Why do we collect these material goods? Why don't we think, well, I can wear this one or two head scarves over and over instead of I need 6 of them (in which I really only like the one or two anyway).
ReplyDeleteHow do we stop collecting? What are the benefits we receive from collecting? What are the benefits of simplicity and minimalism?
Love this post, Alex. That hut is fantastic (although looking at the thumbnail version, it quite charmingly looks a little like Admiral Ackbar). Our culture is ridiculously specialized, which allows our technology to advance rapidly, but our houses cost more because we have to hire a long list of specialists. You need crews specialized in concrete, putting up the walls, roofing, installing drywall, the insulation, electrical, even the painting. And then you need someone who is specialized in overseeing all the different specialists: the general contractor. In the Dorze village, the community has a collective identity and the collective knowledge and skills to build the house. I don't even think most Americans know the anatomy of a wall section, let alone how to put up a building. I think our culture would benefit from spending more time working together and sharing our knowledge with each other rather than holing up in our specialized enclaves.
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