What's a doshak?

Well, the short answer is: a piece of "furniture" that makes "decorating" a room pretty easy.

The real answer is: pieces of foam covered in fabric, laid end to end, that provide seating for family and guests.

In this culture, it is what people prefer to sit on to eat, watch TV, visit, etc.  Our entry room into our house will have doshaks lining the walls so that when new friends come over, they will feel at home and comfortable.

Having doshaks required a trip to a market.

There are several markets in town, and I like all the ones I have been to.  They remind me of Arua, so it's quite a "familiar" feeling.

This particular job called for an interpreter, so I went with a young lady who has been here a year, and is really getting around well in the language.  She took me to "her guy," and we started the process.

Material first.

As you can tell, choosing material can be a little overwhelming.  Hanging above are rugs or material for curtains, and in the bins below, there is material to make blankets.  

I kind of had in my mind we would look for a greyish color, but when I got there, I saw that these people really favor brown (the color of the sand that blows in their windows and doors).  

So I started to narrow it down between some browns.

 And then Kylie saw this peeking between two bolts of fabric.  It was feeling forgotten because no one here really wants grey.  But we do!

These gentlemen measured out 18 meters of this fabric for us.  And then it was time to find a tailor.

 

Oh wait!  There's a tailor on the other side of these bolts...right next door.

Hello, tailor, in your teeny, tiny room.

 They were busy making curtains for someone, but the nice man in the back allowed us to place our order and leave the fabric with him.  However, he wanted to know what size foam I was going to buy.

Huh?

So...we went to the stall right before the bolts of fabric (we had walked through it on our way in), and we had to choose between 5cm, 7cm, and 9cm of thickness.  

I went with the thickest, because if I'm going to have to sit on the floor for long periods of time, I don't want my hind end hittin' the tile.

We went back to the tailor and told him the size of foam and where I would like the zipper.  He said it would be ready in three days.

My friend has language lessons near that market, so she said she would get pick them up for us.  They were delivered Wednesday, inside out, and Doug and Kylie figured out a way to get them on. 

Now you know what a doshak is, and we have one more thing checked off our list. :)