About

I Am Garland, designer of Obsolete Project, from Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. An advanced diploma graduate from Blacksburg High School with multiple Virginia state championship accomplishments in soccer and track and field. I was a Division-1 Men’s Soccer student-athlete then graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Radford University in Virginia. After I graduated, I served as a Community Agribusiness Volunteer with the U.S.A. Peace Corps in Uganda for two years, because I sought to apply my knowledge learned and gained about how societal functions affect outcomes for healthy overall-wellbeing by allocation of resources in an environment. In Uganda, I worked at a Ugandan-founded-and-operated non-governmental organization and alongside Bantu families, farmers, caregivers, entrepreneurs, social workers, students, athletes, and volunteers, as we all lived in service of energetically striving towards the creation of a comfortable, happy, and thriving reality.

In service with the Peace Corps in Uganda, I worked with small-scale farmers and families to increase food security and production and adapt to climate change while promoting environmental conservation. I worked with farmers to increase yields and emerge into new markets for more sustainable income generation, spent time working with development banks, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and local municipalities to help spur community economic opportunities while frequently teaching in classroom settings and working with entrepreneurs and business owners to develop and market their products. I also helped progress Peace Corps Uganda national programming by being a Volunteer Trainer, Technical Immersion Host and Trainer, and working with Diversity Committee and Conservation Think Tank working/support groups.

Upon finishing my two-year service, I founded Omushana, a brand and social enterprise of which I designed clothing and with each sale would channel profit to purchase solar lanterns that would be provided to rural Ugandan homes. The One Garment for One Lantern business model aided over 500 homes of four villages by providing a replacement for the commonly-used kerosene lanterns which caused health and safety issues and risks. While solar lanterns not only solved those issues and risks, they also provided a cost-effective and more reliable solution in face of high kerosene access and use costs amongst another issue of prevalent power-outages causing secure lighting problems, whereby solar was a favorable and fortunate lighting solution, creating healthy overall-wellbeing outcomes for the shared environments we worked in service, inspired by the prevalent power of the sun.

Now, Omushana is a brand and social enterprise that remains inspired by the power of the sun. A force of business to be a source of light, which has the power to replace what may feel more dark, Omushana operates to provide sunshine for people who appreciate feeling like light, like the sun which shines so bright. And more than how our clothing generates that feeling by wear, the offer expands to inspire one’s feeling even more, as 9% of profit from each sale is channeled to support societal functions that affect healthy overall-wellbeing outcomes for-in shared environments, in service of a comfortable, happy, and thriving collective reality, here at Obsolete Project.

Omushana is a brand affiliate of Obsolete Project, as 9% of each sale comes to Obsolete Project.
- Omushana is…
  - Clothing that generates feeling like light, like the sun which shines so bright, by wear.
  - Clothing that provides feeling like light, like the sun which shines so bright, by profit share.
  - See yourself as the light, as the sun, feeling great, feeling bright! Even, a giver of light!
  - See yourself like a seed, which grows to create feelings that are high and bright, through the power of the sun as it shines.
- Omushana is Sunshine.

Garland has a B.S. in Economics from Radford University while also holding an MSc in Sustainable Development with distinction from the University of Sussex in Falmer, Brighton, East Sussex, England, ranked number-one in the world for development studies for many recent years.

Garland goes by Gaaoui as an artist - effectively with productions for one’s own activation of self for salvation… (‘gaa’ is an expression of wonder to the divine and ‘oui’ is an abbreviation, or inebriation, of operating under the influence of the divine. pr ˈgäˈwē) “321, 333, I Am the Son of the Most High.”

Garland realizes heart-fulfillment with helping others realize their potential and soul-aligned dreams while striding towards their own constant self-actualization.