On World Poetry Day, today: |21 March 2017

Foreign poets rally here for BlingBling Nod poetry festival

Seychellois poets will join their counterparts from around the world today to celebrate World Poetry Day and to mark this day the BlingBling Poetry Association has put up a week-long festival titled BlingBling Nod.

The opening ceremony is today at 6.30pm at the International Conference Centre of Seychelles (ICCS) and entrance is free to all.

BlingBling Poetry Association chairman Tony ‘Raspyek’ Joubert was joined by foreign poets ‒ Phinda Mkhonta of Swaziland, Jawex of Reunion, Little Jo of Madagascar ‒ when he gave details of the festival’s programme yesterday at the National Arts Council (Nac) conference room.

Nac chief executive Jimmy Savy was also present and Raspyek thanked him and the council for all the help given to BlingBling Poetry Association over the years and when putting up the festival.

“Thanks to the involvement of foreign poets, the festival will give us a good idea of the quality of Seychelles poetry and I am happy some local poets who had been away from the stage for a long while will be making their comeback,” said Raspyek.

On Wednesday, there will be a poetry insite at the Seychelles Institute of Teacher Education (Site) from 10am to 12 noon followed by a Brigade Intervention Poétique (Bip) from 1pm to 2.30pm at an undetermined site.

Raspyek noted that during Thursday’s ‘Kritik mon poenm’ (A critical eye on the poems) workshop, a number of poems will be analysed, adding that the authors should take the criticisms positively to improve on their future production. The workshop will be from 9.30am to 11.30am at the University of Seychelles (UniSey) Anse Royale.

Also on Thursday from 1pm to 3pm there will be a Brigade Intervention Poétique (Bip) at an undetermined venue and this will be followed by an open mic from 3pm to 5pm at the post office in Victoria.

There will be another Brigade Intervention Poétique (Bip) from 8.30am to 10.30m on Friday and in the evening as from 7.30pm at the UniSey Anse Royale theatre will see the Blingbling Rock during which poets will be accompanied by a band on stage.

On Saturday, winners of the ‘My Recipe’ contest will receive their prizes and finally at 6.30pm at the Treasure Cove hotel, Bel Ombre, there will be the ‘Poésie en douceur’ recital as part of the Francophonie activities taking place this week.

“Most poets have been looking forward to such a festival and I am sure it is going to be a success with the participation of 17 poets,” said Raspyek.

Phinda Mkhonta of Swaziland said he is excited to be here and has thanked everyone who has supported the Blingbling Poetry Association to create such a platform for artists to come together to share information because “the more you learn, you discover how much you don’t know”.

“Such a cultural exchange programme gives us artists the chance to exchange ideas and as critic Plato once said ‘there is no original idea, every idea is transformed from one to another’. This means we are not the true creator of what we create. It is through our inspiration, the things we see around that we get to create the different artistic works,” said Phinda whose poetry relates to the old African traditional style of expression, thought of humanity (ubuntu), entertaining, sensitising people’s moral being and social ills, promoting pride of the Swazi culture through creative outlets.

World Poetry Day is the occasion to honour poets, revive oral traditions of poetry recitals, promote the reading, writing and teaching of poetry, foster the convergence between poetry and other arts such as theatre, dance, music and painting, and raise the visibility of poetry in the media. 

Held every year on March 21, World Poetry Day celebrates one of humanity’s most treasured forms of cultural and linguistic expression and identity. Unesco first adopted March 21 as World Poetry Day during its 30th general conference in Paris in 1999, with the aim of supporting linguistic diversity through poetic expression and increasing the opportunity for endangered languages to be heard.

As poetry continues to bring people together across continents, all are invited to join in the BlingBling Nod festival.