A Global Un-Fashioning
The bag goes under several names depending on time and place, but to me, the Chinatown tote has always been my Dalston shopper. It conjures up memories of my grandmother’s cupboard under the stairs in East London where she would store heavy and bulky items not needed for everyday use. In this cupboard, there would also be large quantities of dried goods and a twelve pack of Supermalt; split and offered out every time I went to visit (no matter how many times I protested my dislike of Supermalt, eyebrows would be raised and my grandmother would point to the iron content).
My Dalston shopper had other personal histories. Back then, I could tell that the large nylon bag, slightly fraying at the edges in my grandmother’s cupboard had been well used for all manner of errands. No doubt they would have relied upon the strength of my mother and aunt to carry them back and forth from the markets in Walthamstow or Whitechapel (probably with a twelve pack of Supermalt underneath the yams, plantains and bags of rice). But to me, that nylon bag was the Dalston shopper. I gave it this term, almost retrospectively after a few years of living in Dalston, where they decorated every other market stall. During that time it was just my laundry bag which I would carry to the laundrette to use the tumble dryers round the corner from my tiny studio flat on Kingsland road.
I then tried to fashion it into some sort of handbag, finding a miniature version with long enough straps to fit comfortably under my arms. I re-appropriated the bag years before the many ’designer’ variations seen today. Yet, even then my Nigerian aunties (not by blood, but by respect) in Dalston market would give me a second glance as I carried what I savvily felt was a street style trend waiting to happen, and whilst I roll my eyes at myself as I write, I was right.
Their second glances were framed by painted faces of confusion. The Dalston shopper didn’t carry the necessary daily essentials of laundry or food, but my attempt to fashion it into a handbag meant that it contained my daily essentials; money, keys, cigarettes, lighter, make-up and phone… essentials, always checked off in that order as I left home. The history of this bag within my family, from my mum lugging it back and forth as a teen, my grandma using it to store goods under the stairs, and me repurposing it as a fashionable accessory, had both a history to come as a fashionable item and a history past, outside of my immediate family.
As mentioned, my Dalston shopper is also termed ‘the Chinatown tote’ and holds its own history. The Chinatown tote is the name given in America, specifically New York, where the large totes hold counterfeit copies of luxury designer bags, peddled along Canal street in Chinatown. I picture transactions out of the Chinatown tote to be like that of the episode in Sex and the City where Samatha and Carrie head to the valley to buy fake Fendi.
Whilst the Chinatown tote has a closer relationship to my fashioning of the Dalston shopper- carrying intimate and personal items- the Chinatown tote is a carrier of desire, aspiration and status because of the counterfeit items it holds inside. Ironically, these nylon bags are also a symbol of desire, aspiration and status because they are really a symbol of the displacement and migration of diasporic groups, in which carrying intimate and personal items is not just about desire, aspiration and status, but in the context of survival and hope.
To my aunties, the Dalston shopper may remind them of the ‘Ghana must go’; the name give to the same nylon bag. ‘Ghana must go’ is a Nigerian pidgin term given to the bag as a quick and cheap way of packing one’s belongings during the expulsion of immigrants between Ghana and Nigeria during the 1960s to 1980s (Mackinney-Valentin:2017). Two million people were expelled from Nigeria, many of whom had travelled an open road from Ghana in search of work and prosperity, as Nigeria, an oil rich country became Africa’s wealthiest, earning the title ‘Giant of Africa’ in 1974. But when the oil crash came and prices dipped, the country so reliant on selling its oil reserves, begun to turn inwards. As prices for goods skyrocketed and the US begun to produce its own oil, Nigeria was left with both excess supply and falling demand. By 1982 the boom was over and 90% of Nigeria’s oil reserves had been wiped out (Oyibo:2019).
In a fight for political power, many leaders protested the influx of Ghanian migrants, blaming them for the fewer jobs and influx of crime. On January 17th 1983, Nigeria’s then leader, Shehu Shagari, declared the expulsion of undocumented migrants living in the country, half of whom were Ghanaian. This declaration stated that if they didn’t leave, then they should be arrested and sent back to their homes, explaining that illegal immigrants, under normal circumstances, should not be given any notice. Rumours started to swirl that the government had employed locals to enact violence on Ghanians who stayed past the deadline.
Whilst Nigeria was condemned for its actions, some believe that this was only a matter of a time and perhaps a payback for when Kofi Busia, the Ghanian prime minister in 1969, invoked the ‘Aliens Compliance Order’, which saw the deportation of an estimated 2.5-million undocumented African migrants… the majority of whom were Nigerians (Oyibo:2019).
This sent shock waves to the large number of Nigerians living in Ghana, as many who had married Ghanaians, raised children and had settled in the country, were still subject to expulsion.
With each journey between borders and in search for a new life, those nylon checked bags were everywhere, filled with belongings and becoming lighter only to sell off what could no longer be carried to raise the money to pay fares which had often doubled.
For younger generations, the long tension between Ghana and Nigeria is mainly expressed in friendly social banter, through debates of which country has the better accent, music or cooks the best ‘jollof rice’. This tension is a friendly rivalry with younger generations having little knowledge of the expulsions between the two countries, nor is there any real hostility. But the nylon checked bag remains to be a recognised symbol of movement, immigration and often forced migration not just in Nigeria or Ghana, but all over the world. These bags have become globally recognised as they are purchased in countless markets all over the world as well as department stores and boutiques, since designers such as Marc Jacobs and Louis Vuitton appropriated them, meaning that the one dollar bag is now according to these design houses, worth hundreds.
In Germany these bags are known as the ‘Turkenkoffer’ or ‘Turkish Suitcase’, in England they have been referred to as the ‘Bangladeshi Bag’ and for Ghanians; “Efiewura Sua Me”, which translates as ‘Help me carry my bag’. It is commonly referred to as ‘the Guyanese Samsonite’ in Trinidad and in Hong Kong, they are known as the ‘homecoming bag’. Whatever name is given to them, rarely gives any indication of the intimate and personal belongings inside or the stories which are are woven into them.
Each bag is a symbol of aspiration, desire and status, and within each, carries stories of people’s lives, histories, hopes and losses. Every object has a history, including ‘fashionable’ ones.
Further reading;
Mackinney-Valentin, M. (2017) Fashioning Identity: Status Ambivalence in Contemporary Fashion. London: Bloomsbury.
Oyibo, C. (2019) Oyibos Online :‘The Ugly History of Africa’s Most Famous Bag’.
http://www.oyibosonline.com/ghana-must-go-the-ugly-history-of-africas-most-famous-bag/