Once upon a time there was Malaki ma Kongo in Paris

On january 6th 1608 - exactly 402 years ago - a Kongo prince, Nsaku ne Vinda - the first Ambassador sent from the king of Kongo to the Vatican - gave back his soul in Rome (Italy). The mission Ne Vunda was given was clear: tell the Pope that the men he sent to Kongo to bring the message from God made instead a pact with the slaveholders. These priests became actually the legal representatives of such slaveholders in the African continent.

It took 4 years of sailing to leave from Mbanza Kongo to Italy, up to the port of Livorno. The sailors from Kongo had to be very careful too, because it was the time when enslavery was at its most. Therefore these sailors risked to end up into the enslaveholders' hands and finally to the fields of cane sugar in Cuba or elsewhere in the American continent. A big part of this delegation from Kongo didn't arrive to the final destination: they were 22 people when they left, but only 6 of them arrived to the Vatican.

It is therefore also in the memory of Ne Vunda that the XIXth edition of Malaki ma Kongo - the three-continental festival of Peace - will be celebrated on sunday april the 17th, from h. 10:00 to 22:00 at 15 Hall Olympe de Gouges, rue Merlin, 75011 Paris, underground stop: Père Lachaise,
The theme will be: celebration day of African cultural variety for a solidarity with its territory.
(map)
We wish to see many of you at this Malaki festival in Paris, to look into each other's eyes and ask each other a question to know: WHAT ARE WE ABLE TO DO FOR OUR VILLAGES?

Generally speaking, those ones who possess means don't have enough time and those ones who possess time and skills don't have means. But what can prevent us to combine our energies or to hang on to the exhisting systems to re-give hope and confidence to our territories that are bruised by the political and military lunaticism of this time of closing centuries?

Very often we wait for foreign evangelists to come to us to promise miracles to be accomplished. But in these days the Occident is blinded by the international crisis and China has sacrified Mao for money. Let's therefore arrange ourselves with the means we've got.

What's Malaki ma Kongo?
Malaki ma Kongo was created on april the 3rd 1991 in Brazzaville, Rep. of Congo. Malaki ma Kongo was at first presented as a festival promoting the originary culture of deep and eternal Africa, through shows. Its backbone is always theater. Despite the fact that the festival's aim is to promote Kongo culture, Malaki ma Kongo festival is open to the cultures of the whole world...

Malaki ma Kongo is a “pret à porter” festival, able to move not only from country to country, but also from continent to continent. Malaki ma Kongo is one of the rare African cultural meetings (in the modern sense of the term) whose organization and especially orientation do not want to have influences or inspirations that are external to the African cultural logics. Malaki ma Kongo is made of unpublishe shows inspired by the rich tradition of the territory , as much as living, eating, drinking, speaking as our ancestors used to do in the old good time of cultural virginity, before Portugueses arrived. A flashback in the past to remember Ngoma ya Kongo, the party big drums that used to accompany fields of crickets and frogs to flourish exciting dance of nighthawks.

Confiding in your presence to the festival, a condition sine qua non for the survival of Kongo cultural Space, we remind you the last words of Ne Mvita Kanga (Antonio), king of Kongo,at h 17:30 in Mbuila: "Kongo tadi, ka di basué, ba nsinga." (The kingdom of Kongo is a stone that mustn't get crumbled. It instead must be cords that stretch but never break).

Malaki Ma Kongo - Italy
Masengo Ma Mbongolo
+39 349 33 29 339
info@malakimakongo.net
www.malakimakongo.net

Home > Festival in Paris 2010 > Once upon a time...

HOME