“About the most massively useful thing”

Some local ladies rockin' pagne.

If you have ever read Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy you know that Adams has said that, “A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-boggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.” 

I think Adams may have been a little confused; I think he meant to say “pagne is about the most massively useful thing.”  Pagne [pon-ya] is a colorful cloth that many people in West African countries use to make their clothes and really use it for everything else.  My preference is for the good looking handmade African-made pagne called batik.

Of course I have clothes made of pagne, but I also have some spare pagne around for everything else in my life.  I use pagne for a sheet, for a towel, a wrap to throw on and walk around my compound, a cover for my couch, curtains, table cloth, a rag to clean up, a head scarf, and a baby carrier.  Pagne is an item I always pack when I am traveling.  It is so utilitarian I wonder how I ever functioned without it back in the states.  I suppose I had a dozen different things back home that served the function of this one item.  It’s nice to grab just one thing to do it all, maybe using pagne will be one of those things I bring back home with me.