Octogenarian turns trash into gold

Over the past 67 years, Deka has raised his 17 children through his artistic crafting business. The crafter has been providing for his family through selling rubber mats, metal collecting dustpans and flower containers, which are made from recycled objects. In an interview with Arts & Culture, Deka said he was born in Rhodesia, modern Zimbabwe during the pre-colonial era in which there was almost complete absence of wheeled transport and the people back then relied mostly on animals for transportation.

Just a year before his family relocated to the then Bechuanaland Protectorate in 1955, the octogenarian started teaching himself the art of crafting different objects. At the age of 14, he started turning used tyres into rubber mats. Deka said he then took one of the sample rubber mats in an attempt to sell it along the streets of Harare. “Surprisingly the rubber mat was purchased on my way to the selling point. The same man made orders for six more rubber mats the same day.