basket carrying

As you’ve seen in some of the pics I’ve put up the women here carry things on their head with amazing ability. The loads are very often enormous but they don’t have to be. I’ve also seen women carrying keys, or an umbrella or one stick on their head. Guess it is a good way to keep your hands free. And they carry the most unbalanced (at least that is how it looks) loads at the perfect angle to keep them up on their heads. Amazing. Someone pointed out that if it is your livelihood (they often are carrying what they sell around on their heads) then you would probably get pretty good pretty fast so that you wouldn’t lose any capital. True but still. So Saturday at the market Ngari (Australian volunteer working in the hospital lab) was buying baskets and tubs…so I filled one with my shopping (to help her carry her many baskets, of course)…and then I tried to carry it on my head. Got some strange looks but they were also impressed (I think). It did make it nice that it wasn’t so bulky around where everyone walks and you have to constantly maneuver around things. But my arm got tired holding it up (no I can not balance it without the support) and I think it takes some training…because it was too heavy and gave me a headache after 3 minutes (if that). But it made for some pictures (don’t know if they were any good as I haven’t seen them yet).