kweejibostories for complete series
updated November 22, 2012
the story of Soon Yee Cindy Cho's kweejibo clothing co., men's shirtmaker and shop, all locally manufactured articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti
this is part of a weekly series from June 2012 to December 2012...
November Segments of MadeInOakland :Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon
pages 39 to 40 literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
"Hurricane"
1997 also brings us Hurricane Georgia. she changes Kweejibo more than any other worker, no matter how courageous or loyal. she brings us "Buy Ten, Get One Free". this one teeny little card doubles and our numbers.
many men are silent and dream not of buying ten shirts, but of tens of shirts, and of choosing the free shirts after the enviable, epic struggle of picking and buying the preceding garments. the pride of the customer who could pick out ten shirts, without trying them on, just a quick flick of the wrist, a quick glance in the mirror, another wrist action and the shirt is on the counter. they are happy and proud in the big moment; the ever-growing pile on the counter. some act nonchalant, as if they don't even care about that eleventh shirt, free.
Hurricane Georgia has an interesting working style. she calls me "Mom" and compares her present life constantly to her childhood. she speaks often of playing “assistant mom” to her own mother, who struggled with raising several children on a small income while her husband was at sea in the navy.
our relationship at work and outside, can be tempestuous. one evening, as the whole gang does girls' night out, Hurricane starts to hit my arm in a manner that causes definite pain. "ha ha, we are not at work now, i don't have to listen to you!"
at the initial interview, Hurricane hides the fact that she has bright green dyed hair under a chic knit cap. she also omits to mention that there will be a new color of equal brightness every month.
after far too many disputes and drama, she is fired.
she decides that she will not go down easily and encourages staff insurrection as much as possible. she cajoles Martine to quit, who has been bored for years working at Kweejibo. However, she is our best seamstress in the store staff, though she is also the most diffident of sales people, and could not be persuaded by me ages ago to quit and find work that motivated her. fifty percent of the staff are gone, since I have only four people in the store and aiding production. Her work unfinished, the Hurricane attempts to persuade Sue, our newest employee to quit. When she is unsuccessful, she attempts to drop friendly words in my ear of Sue's terrible temper. a month later, she would tell me, "you were right Cindy, you were a good Mom to us all".
after some more months of stormy behavior, she is "over this city, it only take a couple months to get a town" she is gone, back to the east coast. she becomes the center of her own style crowd, and eventually starts her own boutique in New York city. she contacts us in 2008 to see if we would sell her some product to put in her new store...articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
pages 35 to 36
"X-Large"
Patrick, Martine's boyfriend, alters our business permanently. he designs double-tiered rolling steel shirt racks with the bottom rack angling slightly out from the top rack. the angle allows for better visual and physical access to the bottom rack garments, which would normally tend to be neglected. the double rack permits us to double the inventory.
i discover at long last something that possibly many other retailers have known all along. if one doubles the inventory, one can triple the sales. the more choices, the more one is encouraged to attempt to browse. A customer thinks, there has got to be something here for me. however, the store also becomes crowded, even claustrophobic, with less floor space, less space to place lighting fixtures for actually seeing merchandise, less space for breathing.
what will our customers think of an absolute spartan lack of decor, and of shopping in a closet? At this era, they love it. strangely, they feel at home with the concept of being crammed in a closet, loud music, crowding in with other customers. they do not mind trying to hold shirts up to the light to see what they are buying. the customers revel in it. it is so cozy, a remedy for the lonely. a nightclub in a closet. during the day. articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
this is a time of minimal decor, where customers care almost more about the music you play, than the clothing. one loves the tiny store with almost no dressing room. who needs that when you have a deejay with headphones spinning records as your salesperson? the same experience can be found in BPO or Behind the Post Office, a men's clothing shop in the next block. the original site of BPO is amazing. If we are a bedroom, they are an just a closet.
Kweejibo has no records, just c.d.'s and an old c.d. player. they do not buy shirts, they buy the experience of trying on clothes picked out by stylish girls playing Public Enemy, P-funk, Tribe Called Quest. Haight Street is the eternal dayclub, and different shops provide the mini nightclubs that complement the entire scene. articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
the evening of new year's eve, a half hour before closing, a young gentlemen comes in who cannot be more than twenty eight years old. he is clean-cut, considerate and polite to us, yet somehow scary. some instinct tells me not to kick him out at closing time. he piles over twenty shirts on the counter to purchase. then, he unzips his backpack, and pays with stacks of fifties and hundreds inside the pack. we put no dent in the stacks therein. he looks good in our shirts.
at bill paying time, one cannot afford to turn away sketchy money. I have standards, I did refuse the one certain counterfeit bill in his possession...
I am from Burma and was weaned on groceries from the Burmese black market, as my parents had no other sources for certain daily necessities. black market is also a way to smuggle money into Hong Kong from Burma. so the story goes, my parents made the down payment on our home in the United States with these funds. my grandfather paid an exorbitant price for these transactions, possibly fifteen out of every twenty dollars went to the market. articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
updated November 9, 2012
pages 29 to 33articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
"image, plastic, hair"
we make plastic coats, short ones, long ones, with fur trim, dresses with trim of lingerie black satin ribbon. instead of zippers, lingerie and corset makers can use a an elaborate hook-and-eye system sewn onto black satin ribbon. This product attracts women with unusually prominent and firm breasts, very dry bleachy dyed hair. they often work on stages with long poles and get a lot of tips. they are funny and sometimes sweet. they are not shy.
our plastic phase also attracts incredibly fashionable young Japanese men, who are enthralled with long black pinstripe on clear plastic, black fur at the hem and cuffs. we love them. we cannot afford to snub or dislike anyone*.
*Reference to the film "The Philadelphia Story" : One of the characters, Elizabeth jokes constantly about her very thin wallet, "I'm just a poor photographer. I can't afford to hate anybody."
1995 blends into 1996 and we are further in debt, barely managing the bills. i am kept going by loans from family members, even from my best friend's brother who works on Wall Street. my best friend says, "i am gonna be really mad if you don't pay him back..." i make regular payments.
i decide to convert the store entirely to men's wear. this decision inspires a storm of protest, even from Rina, my staunchest ally. she believes that there are dark days ahead on this new course. i am spurred on either by my belief or by my desperation.articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
"BonBon and Martine"
the formidable BonBon. she comes to work at kweejibo in 1995. her parents named her after someone in "show business". her face is a mixture of both Jean Harlow and Marilyn Monroe. she is almost a head taller than both women. her usual garb; some sort of close-fitting buttoned shirt, that can be left open at the bottom, with the loose ends tied up tight under her chest to reveal her curvacious belly. she often wears hip and thigh-hugging pants, that flare open wide from the knees, a mixture of both Seventies and Thirties style. she looks great in white with red polka dots. articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
she has extravagant platinum-blonde ringlets, abundant in length, and yet curling closely to the head to create volume rather than cascading down the back. all this takes time. so she informs us that we had best step back and constantly appreciate the glory of this effort.
she is self-professed, "high-maintenance". "i get up at six-thirty every morning to get ready, this is work!" she does not have to leave the house until ten a.m. for work. "baby, i gotta get up, make my first pot of coffee, i undo my rollers, which i put in every night, without fail. before the rollers, i gotta iron it out every night. all this does not even include makeup and wardrobe! it's not easy, but i'm worth it! of course, i'm high-maintenance! Please, don't hate me for being beautiful."
she comes into work one day triumphant. she sees an elderly black man on the bus, dressed impeccably, suit, vest, complete with tasteful hat and feather, elegant alligator shoes. she goes right up to him and says, "you look fabulous! marvelous...when i looked at you, i thought, that man looks like something, i gotta tell him how fantastic he looks!" he makes his rejoinder with a slight cock of the head, "when i looked at you, i thought of somethin', too...."
she continues, "age is nothing to me when someone looks marvelous...also, i used to be afraid of fat people. that is, until i had this friend who was fat but really knew how to dress impeccably, he taught me to get over my fear of fat people," all this said with a satisfied, smiling yet earnest shake of her head, that of someone who has learned an important life lesson.
she claims constantly that she can bike in (high) cha cha heels and is uncomprehending as to why this and other similar qualities does not entitle her to a raise or exempt her from tedious tasks. so, she gets long artificial nails which make those tasks impossible.articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video
she gets a part-time job using her telepathic powers on phone readings for the Psychic Network and loses her temper one day at me, shouting angrily "you should give me more direction! i am not psychic!" on this day, i am shocked when i view her hair unironed, uncovered. this is one especially bad day where she is so frazzled that her guard, her armor is down. her hair is more dirty blonde today, than platinum, more frizzy and long than close ringlets. there is no desire on my part to penetrate her usual glib exterior, her vintage Hollywood gloss. we want to keep intact the image we have of others; intact, bright and shiny.
her name originates indeed from a real life gangster's moll, a friend of the family. her father did indeed do “errands” for mafia and her mother dated men in this line of work.
she claims to carry portions of her knife collection in her purse. she raises eyebrows at City Hall, emptying out her purse for the metal detector. she is also supposed to have a gun. i do not ask to see it.
BonBon explains that she is a little "unusual" because she had trouble sleeping at night even as a child. her mother passed BonBon off to her sister to raise, as her sister did not mind being keeping the same hours.
BonBon can be hilarious, almost a joy, definitely always a presence who takes up a particular amount of space. she also has a particular way of dancing, a bit Seventies and she demonstrates this regularly in little dance breaks, in addition to those for coffee and cigarettes.
no one believes BonBon's claim that she can type seventy words a minute. years later, when BonBon has long left our establishment, my friend Tom tells me the story of how he worked in an office with a blonde bombshell with ringlets and with a stripper's name, who made the most eerie sounds typing at a remarkable speed with Lee Clip-On Nails. he could hear her all the way down the hall and the sound gave him the oddest feeling.
she becomes fast friends with Martine, an awkward, shy but lovely woman who has excellent and varied sewing skills. Martine is enthralled, a fan, but as BonBon informs me one day, "i am starting a cult, and i am trying to convince Martine to be my first member but she refuses."
articles author art journal museum gallery exhibit Book Murakami south east Asia Bangkok crafts ceramics clothing designer film review movie director actress actor Europe France French Paris street-life fashion photographer show mode models graffiti Haight Japan local magazine manufacture icon literature Group music news performance San Francisco Reading writing style short story-ies seventies small business micro travel Thailand underground voyage video