by Dzekashu MacViban
I haven’t totally recovered from Nairobi—in a way, I don’t think I ever will. How does one recover from such a nice town and such awesome people? How can I ever forget the friendly and funny Moving Africa participants? When will I see them again? They are still as lively in my memory as they were in Nairobi— Kojo Laing’s famous talks about mutation and later religion; Feling Capela, constantly behind his camera; Ntone Edjabe, always philosophizing; Chuma passionately talking about his goal of reading his work in as many cities as possible, Sylvia and her interesting alternative fiction and humor; Kivu, with his love for Tusker and good movies; Joseph, who is highly concerned with the growth of south Sudan and wants art to shape the nation.
Kwani is undoubtedly the most influential journal to have emerged from sub-Saharan Africa, and if anybody doubts this fact, the biennial Kwani literary festival is enough to shut them up. The 2012 Kwani literary festival was full of people from all walks of life and the venues were usually full (at the premier screening of Nairobi Half Life, the Goethe-Institut in Nairobi was full and had our (the Moving Africa participants and I) space not been reserved, we’d have had to stand up — this is how we measure a culture-conscious country.
The literary festival was full of writers, journalists, photographers, students, tourists, bloggers, fashion designers, literary enthusiasts, and disc jockeys, just to name a few. Talking about DJ’s, I met so many talented DJ’s in Nairobi — DJ Zelalem, Raphael & Sharon (from the World’s Loudest Library) and Ntone Edjabe, whom I consider to be an iconoclastic icon, one of a kind.
The theme of the festival, Conversations with the Horn, is a laudable choice cognizant of the tribulations of the region and the growth of new nations, and it attests to the fact that Kwani is concerned with the evolution of the region and the role culture can play in bridging divides and borders (the Chimurenga Chronicle’s editorial bemoans the fact that everyone who can is building a wall [border]).
The social media does not seem to have any secrets for Kwani. Kwani did not fail to make sure that those who couldn’t make it to the festival could follow it on the internet. The whole festival was streamed on Kwani’s website and highlights were posted on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. But it was on Twitter that Kwani had a mammoth presence during the festival. The hash tag #kwanilitfest was all over Twitter, and it wasn’t only @kwanitrust that was tweeting, because their numerous followers were sharing their thoughts on Tweeter and it was as if there was a mini festival on Tweeter given people kept tweeting late into the night, long after the events of the day were over.
Networking was the order of the day during the festival and I didn’t miss an opportunity to promote Bakwa Magazine (a magazine of art culture and photography which I started about a year ago).
We had an amazing tour of the Goethe-Institut and the Kwani Trust venues. The folks at the Goethe-Institut and Kwani are fabulously friendly and kind— thank you. I had the most awesome time in Nairobi (no close encounters with Nairobbery) and there is so much about this city that I fell in love with. These days, my muse has been in Nairobi mode, and there is some fiction and poetry in the pipeline.
