Seasoned and accomplished dressmaker, Shirley Hardeo, is a ‘Special Person’

May 24, 2020 News, Special Person

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“I saw an opportunity to help and I started sewing masks so that people could protect themselves. I sewed about a hundred and shared it out to family, friends and people around the neighbourhood. Then my son saw an advertisement online for persons who could sew to make masks. We called the number and the very next week, I was filling orders for hundreds of masks.”

By Rehanna Ramsay

 

There is seldom anything that Shirley Hardeo takes more pleasure in than satisfying her customers.

 

The dressmaker/seamstress, known to many as “Aunty Shirley”, has for more than five decades used her skills to help hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Guyanese look their best for life’s defining moments.
Today, she wallows in the memories of helping to get blushing bridal parties, glitzy dance troupes and even graduation posses ready for their big day. The seamstress is humble and thankful to have played even a minute role in making those moments special.
To say the least, these are among the many reasons, Hardeo was chosen to be Kaieteur News’ ‘Special Person’ this week.
Not only did her work as a seamstress help meet her clients’ demand to look dapper — she can point to seasons in her life which she used her skills to save the day, literally.
The seamstress spoke candidly of how the trade, which she inherited from her mother in difficult times, provided solutions for her household, community and even the nation.
Her most recent task of singlehandedly sewing thousands of facemasks for citizens across the regions to get through the COVID-19 pandemic, gives credence to this.
Also, Hardeo believes that the work of seamstress/sewing woman, (tailor) in the 21st century, should never be seen as redundant.

She noted that though her trade may be considered “a dying art” by some, it can seldom be substituted.
“There is just something about having your clothes tailored to suit you,” she said.
“You don’t always get that effect from machine- made clothes but as a worker (seamstress) you can get it done,” Hardeo added.
SELF- TAUGHT
Commenting on her choice of profession, Hardeo recalls the first time she was introduced to the needle and thread.
“My mother was a seamstress. As a girl, I would always watch her and my older sisters sewing.
But as I grew older, I would collect pieces of cloth they didn’t want, thread the needle and mimic them.”
By the time her mother realised she could sew, Hardeo said she was in her early teens.
“She would call on me to do the hemming and sew the buttons on clothes she made for people,” she added.
To be included in her mother’s work, Hardeo said, helped her to cultivate a sense of purpose. It was her mother’s livelihood and it helped to support the household, which consisted of her father, mother and seven siblings.
She explained, “We were eight children born to my mother, Ramdai, a seamstress, and my father, Hardeo Hiraman, a book-keeper at the Leonora Sugar Estate.

As a virtue of her father’s employment, Hardeo recalled that the family benefitted from estate housing.
They lived in the junior staff compound at Leonora, West Coast Demerara and the Logie Housing Project at Diamond East Bank Demerara, before finally moving to their own home in the neighbouring village of Grove.
Hardeo noted that her family was of modest means, but her parents always did their best to ensure they had a comfortable life.
“My father was a book-keeper, so naturally he wanted his children to have an education. My sisters, brothers and I went to the St. John’s Anglican School at Anna Catherina.
Then, when my older brothers, Derrick and Dennis, finished primary school, they went on to attend the Guyana Oriental College in Georgetown.”
She recalled that life was going in a relatively good direction until the patriarch of the family died suddenly. She was thirteen years old at the time.
“I remember my eldest sister, Sheila, had just returned from England where she went to spend time with my aunt, when he died,” Hardeo said, obviously saddened by the memory.
As a result, she noted that her mother was left to fend for all eight of her children.
“Luckily for them,” she said that her “older brothers had completed their high school education and were already employed.”
“One of them was a welder and the other an architect at Toolsie Persaud Company Limited. My older sister continued to sew to help my mother to provide for the family,” she said.

In fact, she noted that the Estate where her father worked allowed them to stay in the housing complex until they were able to get a home of their own.
“My mother received some insurance from the estate in 1966. She took the money and bought a property in Grove Housing Scheme.”
After the family settled, Hardeo noted that her mother continued to sew to help cover household expenses.
By this time, an adolescent Hardeo had become increasingly good at sewing. She had lots of practice —taking pieces of cloth her mother threw out and sewing little doll-like clothes.

At the age of thirteen, Hardeo was skilled enough to sew her own clothes. In fact, that is exactly what she did.
“My mother allowed me to sew with needle and thread but never with the machine. So I would wait till she wasn’t around to go on the machine and sew.”
She did this continually, until one day, the needle caught my finger and broke.

 

“I had to be rushed to the emergency room. The doctors removed seven pieces of needle from my hand. I thought to myself ‘I learned my lesson’, but that was just for a while,” she mused.
As her finger healed, the desire to sew returned. She got on the machine again, but this time, with her mother’s permiss

ion. The young seamstress had taught herself most of the tricks from watching her mother sew.“The only thing I believe I ever asked her, is how to sew an inside pocket and the rest of it was from trial and error,” Hardeo noted.
As she grew older, Hardeo recalled that she began to experiment with the NECCHI electronic sewing machine.
“I made several pieces and earned money. My first outfit was bought for $25 a piece that would translate to around $3,000 per outfit and that wasn’t bad for a thirteen -year- old girl,” she said.
ON DEMAND
Given the circumstances of a single-parent household, Hardeo did not finish secondary school and went on to marry at the age of seventeen.
She recalled that her husband also worked on the sugar estate and she took hiatus from sewing for about a year.
“I had stopped sewing until my first baby was two years old.” By the time, she returned to her trade full time, word about her outstanding sewing work had really gotten around; she was popular.
“I started sewing from wedding dresses to graduation gowns, clothes for dancers, window curtains…practically anything.” Given the added workload on her, Hardeo opened a workshop training six young women in the art of sewing.
“It brought me much pleasure to know that I could help them be independent.”
At this time, Hardeo was a doting mother of two young children—Surrendra and Suzy.
She spent most of her days behind the machine, filling out orders.
“I would wake up early and prepare myself because I had my family to take care of.
People sometimes ask me how I did it, I tell them for me it’s what I do no matter how demanding; I take a break and get right back to it,” she said, noting that she finds solace in knowing there is something that she can do to make people’s lives better.
“That’s what keeps me moving.”
Then when she and her husband split, Hardeo turned to another place for solace –her faith.
“I became a Christian and started taking my children to church because I wanted them to have some form of stability. I think it offered them the values needed for a decent life.”
Hardeo believes that as a mother that was one of the best decisions she made for her children.
She beamed with pride as she spoke of her children and grandchildren.
“They all turned out so well and they are active in church today. My daughter sings in church and is on the women’s group. My son plays the guitar and my 27 year-old granddaughter plays the drums and the other is a worship dancer at Bethel Pentecostal Church.
My little granddaughter, Jade, is also involved in activities. She was an angel in the Christmas play last year,” she shared.
She added too, “I am forever grateful for how they turned out…My eldest son is a contractor for Rubis Service Station; my daughter has her own hair salon and my last son, Vijai, is a graphic artist.”
The seamstress noted that she sacrificed a lot to ensure her children had the best life possible.
“I remember when my oldest son was getting married, I worked 24 hours – from sun-up to sun-down – to make sure that everything was in place for his wedding.”
ESSENTIAL WORKER

The seamstress who shares a home with her youngest son, daughter and granddaughter, has been working through the pandemic.
She has sown thousands of cotton facemasks which were distributed to persons via the Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC).
She said it all started with a personal desire to help protect herself and those around her.
“I saw an opportunity to help and I started sewing masks so that people could protect themselves.
I sewed about a hundred and shared it out to family, friends and people around the neighbourhood.
Then my son saw an advertisement online for persons who could sew to make masks. We called the number and the very next week, I was filling orders for hundreds of masks.”
The NDC worked in collaboration with the People’s Progressive Party/Civic—the political party had launched a campaign to distribute homemade facemasks to communities across the country.
The party had appealed to the seamstress and those who could sew to join them in their quest to safeguard Guyanese against the spread of COVID-19.
As part of the production team, the seamstress found her skills was once again essential to providing relief to people.
Within the first week, she made 300 masks and handed them over for distribution.
And in the weeks that followed, her production doubled and even tripled—making her the single top producer of facemasks along the East Bank Demerara corridor.
To date, she has singlehandedly produced over 2,250 facemasks for distribution.
She noted that the task was more an act of charity.
“I choose to do it to help people because I don’t see it as a job. My work slowed up since the start of COVID-19, but I would still get people asking me to do work from time to time.
For instance, Herman and Sons —a tailor shop I worked for early on, has been asking that I fill some orders for them but for now, I am taking things a day at a time,” she said.

 

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