Just the word Algiers makes me think all sorts of orientalist thoughts. Delacroix paintings of large women lounging in hamams, men in jalabas muttering strange incantations, and colonial period women strolling along the sea in large white hats and matching shoes. Algiers is a big dirty city.
I am staying with my step-mom’s sister at the foot of the great monument of colonial France: the cathedral Notre Dame d’Afrique. Yesterday we went to visit the mausoleum of Saint Sidi Abdel Rahman. The caretaker told us that Sidi Abdel Rahman was said to have had the power to cure women of infertility. Then he told us that the American he admires the most is the actor from Colombo.
We also visited a small museum of traditional Algerian art in the casbah. Traditional Algerian art seems to really mean Amazigh handicrafts—bowls, jars, olive press, the bride’s trousseau, jewelry…most of the pieces were labeled 20th century. There is something eerie about seeing objects that my Grandmother used in a museum. It’s the same with the Tamazigh language. People here are surprised when I tell them I want to first be comfortable in Kabyle before I start to learn Arabic. The Grandparents here in Algiers speak Kabyle. Most people my age and older whose parents spoke to them in Kabyle understand it and speak it. But it’s rare that the younger generation understand much of anything. And that’s how a language dies out I suppose. Little by little everyone forgets one word at a time. And our grandmother’s everyday objects end up covered by glass in a museum.
I am here in Algiers to attend the Festival du Théâtre Professionnel at the Théâtre National d’Algérie (TNA). Last night was the opening and I finally meet up with Omar Fetmouche—the director of the Regional Theatre of Bejaia (TRB), where the Kabyle Folktale Project will be housed, before the show. I risk driving my step-aunt mad because the shows are at night and not during the day. Only a certain group of people tend to have a night life in Algeria. It is rare for a woman to attend a performance of any kind alone especially at night and expect to get home safely on her own.
*
The opening of the Professional Algerian Theatre Festival was quite a snazzy affair.
I am staying with my step-mom’s sister at the foot of the great monument of colonial France: the cathedral Notre Dame d’Afrique. Yesterday we went to visit the mausoleum of Saint Sidi Abdel Rahman. The caretaker told us that Sidi Abdel Rahman was said to have had the power to cure women of infertility. Then he told us that the American he admires the most is the actor from Colombo.
We also visited a small museum of traditional Algerian art in the casbah. Traditional Algerian art seems to really mean Amazigh handicrafts—bowls, jars, olive press, the bride’s trousseau, jewelry…most of the pieces were labeled 20th century. There is something eerie about seeing objects that my Grandmother used in a museum. It’s the same with the Tamazigh language. People here are surprised when I tell them I want to first be comfortable in Kabyle before I start to learn Arabic. The Grandparents here in Algiers speak Kabyle. Most people my age and older whose parents spoke to them in Kabyle understand it and speak it. But it’s rare that the younger generation understand much of anything. And that’s how a language dies out I suppose. Little by little everyone forgets one word at a time. And our grandmother’s everyday objects end up covered by glass in a museum.
I am here in Algiers to attend the Festival du Théâtre Professionnel at the Théâtre National d’Algérie (TNA). Last night was the opening and I finally meet up with Omar Fetmouche—the director of the Regional Theatre of Bejaia (TRB), where the Kabyle Folktale Project will be housed, before the show. I risk driving my step-aunt mad because the shows are at night and not during the day. Only a certain group of people tend to have a night life in Algeria. It is rare for a woman to attend a performance of any kind alone especially at night and expect to get home safely on her own.
*
The opening of the Professional Algerian Theatre Festival was quite a snazzy affair.
A marching band paraded in on to the stage and played “Kassaman”, the Algerian national anthem, Madame la Ministre of Culture opened the festival with a long speech, 10 actors in costume held spears that made up a sort of grand entryway for old time Algerian actors, directors and producers to come on stage and accept an award from Madame the Minister and the director of the TNA. Two Algerian television personalities hosted the evening…my step-aunt watched the whole spectacle agog as she saw all these famous Algerian actors parade across the stage.
We thought we would need tickets but we just walked right in. My step aunt said to the man at the entrance to the performance hall: "this is an actress come all the way from America here to meet with Omar Fetmouche." And the guy at the door hurried into the hall, found Fetmouche and placed us in the third row!
My step-aunt and I walked halfway home this evening and really—this country at night becomes a place for young men to run around and hiss at any woman who is unfortunate enough to walk by. I really wish their mother’s or sister’s or auntie would tell them “you know young (insert name here) hissing at a woman in an aggressive fashion will get you no where on your pitiful march to find a wife.” Honestly.
Once home I asked my step-aunt’s mother-in-law if she happened to know any Kabyle folktales. She knew a few but she repeated the lament of most Grandmother’s “it’s the TV now that has become the story teller not us the Grandmother’s.” I got a couple of songs recorded and one folktale (one that my great aunt told me last week). But the real success of the evening (voir in my own “political” way) was when 5 of us sat down and she started testing my Kabyle to see what I knew already and what practical things she could teach me. Her daughter, who grew up here in Algiers, understands Kabyle but doesn’t really speak it learned along with me.
When learning Kabyle oftentimes I feel like I am running up a down escalator.
No comments:
Post a Comment