Comoros 06-19-13 The students I am working with are extraordinary. They want to find a way to create opportunities for themselves through their studies in the university, through using the tools they are gaining in the workshops and through working perhaps with the university, perhaps with the tourism department, to tell the stories of Comoros, theirs as well as the old tales, to visitors of their country. Tourism is not an industry here. There aren’t trinkets. I can’t even find a post card to send my kids. It isn’t a concept. They are a young country, just out of colonial rule by France (one of their islands is still under French control) and they are just now figuring out new ways of economy and technology. IT is a beautiful island, with a rich history and heritage, only the world doesn’t know about it, and they haven’t developed a way to tell their own story beyond this area of the Indian Ocean. Their stories are rich and important. Their language is beautiful and sounds soft like music, and becomes easier each day for me to understand and speak. Their dances—and they have many of them—in each village—are time capsules. The dances and singing and drumming- each one tells a different story and has a different purpose, and reach back in time to the days of the kings and the sultans. Their legends are the stuff of magic and storybooks, only they are difficult to find anywhere but here, on this island, in the oral tradition of the people. I have seen some books—yes, some people are beginning to write the stories of the grandmothers. And the stories are alive and well, even among young people, as today, each student, during the second half of the day, took turns sitting in the chair in the Bangwa (circle) and told an old story. They were there for each other, listening, helping with sounds and music where needed, and clapping and saying Marahaba (thanks) at the end of each story. The legends are still alive. The work we have been doing together will, (they and I hope) ignite a passion toward sharing on a broader level, in such places as the museum, the American Corner and the Tourism Department at the University. Comoros only in January began a tourism bureau. As they begin to look at tourism opportunities in these early stages, we are hoping that story will play a key role in their interpretive centers, and ill offer jobs and opportunities as guides to those who are trained in telling, gathering and sharing their stories. Today, we saw first-hand some of those opportunities in action. The students took some of the stories they had told, and developed four scenes that they performed inside the museum. They performed the stories in front of artifacts that had a relationship to the stories. In this way, we linked the intangible art of storytelling with the tangible artifacts, and brought new life to the old artifacts, and new meaning to them. The story of being lost at sea for three days and feared dead was performed in and near the pirogue. The story of unity of family and the harvest was performed by the agricultural artifacts. The story of the importance of education was performed next to a very old piece of writing, an old kind of slate board which people wrote verse from the Loran that were spoken to them, and wrote on the boards with charcoal and water in the morning to memorize for the afternoon, and then erased and wrote upon them again to memorize the next verse. Education has been an important value in their culture going back to the seventh century, to the time of these artifacts. They were imaginative in their interpretations, and also very exact in the language. You will not hear many “short” Comoran stories. They want you to know all the facts! I worked with them quite a bit today on theatrical storytelling rather than podium type storytelling. We worked on using action sometimes instead of words. They were just marvelous and I captured a lot of it. So did Baktash. He is a wonderful student who was here working with Bryce on the American corner. He is a film student, too, so I invited him to join us on the adventure and partway through we decided to make a documentary about the process and work. So He is capturing everything. I will post some once I am in the states, where the internet is faster. Jimmy Neil and I did an interview at the American corner today, about our project. (Yes, here is that Mzungu on the tv again!) Jimmy Neil did a great job. He also met with the Unesco agent from here yesterday while I was in workshops, and today he and Lantoo (my hero from the US embassy in Madagascar who solves every single challenge) met with the head of the tourism classes at the university. Jimmy Neil’s meeting leaders and building bridges, and I’m doing workshop stuff and going to events, and it works out great. I am in my room now, freezing out the mosquitoes. It was much warmer yesterday and today, and with the moisture, it brought out more mosquitoes. I use Deet outside, but they were still some in my room. Ted Kontek, the ambassador, told me and Jimmy Neil his trick- he turns his room AC to 18 degrees and any insects become comatose! So far, so good, nothing buzzing near me anymore! I am looking forward to brushing my teeth again without fear of typhoid. I got my shots, but the nurse still told me to close my eyes and my mouth in the shower, and only use bottled water to brush my teeth and rinse my toothbrush. A short report on animal sightings: various goats, cows and chickens in the road and around the hotel, in between the traffic, mongoose, giant Scooby doo sized bats that could pick up a small dog, long horned something or other huge animal, and butterflies and birds galore. And a lizard scared the bejeebers out of me in the already scary toilet. (Well, OK, it was a hole.) Oh, and spiders the size of baseballs. But nothing poisonous. Massa Mumema. Lala Nunu. (Sleep well, good night).
Posted on: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:12:14 +0000
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