Creative Minds of Botswana: IDEAS EXPO’s CREATIVITY video shoot

I’d like to believe Ideas Expo is one organisation that strives to encourage creativity in Botswana. I got a chance to hang out with them on Saturday at Thapong Visual Art Studios. This is where they were shooting a video on “Creativity” to build momentum for their upcoming conference.

It was really fun, I go to meet a lot of interesting people in the creatives’ sector, I embarrassed myself in the videos, and I saw a lot of superb art pieces. Thapong, perfect location for such an event! Well, the plan was just to get different young people who are in some way contributing towards building creativity in Botswana and get them to talk about “Creativity in Botswana”. We had a writer, a social media guru, a dancer/theatre person, a video developer, etc. And all these people are our very own countrymen. I got to represent the bloggers. Not very confident about what I said but I’m confident the video guy will remove my most embarrassing takes. I’m more of a behind-the-scenes type of girl. Anyway we’ll see.

One thing that puzzles me, and I’m sure puzzles you too, is why would they choose me? I mean I’m just a lil ol blogger. All I did was take my love for advertising and share it with the world (or country, since the following is yet to increase). I love this saying, “everyone can make a difference, no matter how small a role you play”. To me being creative is about letting your mind loose and not being afraid of what people might say. Ok I’m lying, I AM afraid that people might slay me for writing about their adverts, or criticize me for writing a crappy review, but I still do it anyway...Why? Because those are my thoughts and I can’t help but be me!

All I’m saying is don’t be afraid of being you. No matter how weird, abnormal, or unconventional you and they rest of the country may think your idea is. So you like to go around collecting rubbish and building stuff with it, so you are a guy who loves to wear tights and twirl around in circles to the rhythm of the samba, so you love to spend the whole day in your room cutting up adverts from the magazines and sticking them in your scrapbook.

Yes i understand that life is tough and you've got to pay the bills. Put on that suite and go sign a bunch of boring documents at that Bank, Govt office or insuarance company. But dont let your creative side die. Be you. Be different. Be creative.

Ba tlaa bua, ba tlaa lapa! Thats one thing IDEAS EXPO taught me.