AFRICAN MODES OF KISSING

West African culture has a low to moderate tolerance for intimate public display of affection (PDA), hence it is safe to state that you shouldn’t expect to see African couples in such ‘mawkish behavior’, much less kissing and fondling each other in the open.

That stated, we begin to wonder how Africans practice the most common ‘first-base’ display of affection, kissing. If public fondling and kissing is frowned upon, how do these people learn how to kiss? Are most African nations raising generations of ‘bad-kissers’?

The above queries birth another set of questions: How do Africans kiss?, What is the Act or Art of African kissing? Is kissing a cultural practice “borrowed” from the west?

These questions have been thoroughly answered by one of MAQ’s favoirite lifesyle vlogger Omotoke Makinwa and phenomenal Nigerian video-artist Zina Saro-Wiwa.

An important note Zina received in response to her film

Just received a fantastic response from a chap called Sol Goshu about kissing in Africa. In his case Ethiopia:

“I’m an Ethiopian-Canadian who was born and raised in Addis until i was 16 before moving here. Growing up, every rainy season (that would be summer here), despite my mother’s protestations, my grandmother used to pack us all in her battered pick up truck and drive us for weeks on end all around the country, meeting distant relatives, visiting national parks, ancient churches, monasteries, villages, open markets, in the hopes that the endless days of adventure on the dusty roads would counteract the British education my mother’s generation considered the salvation to our future.

One summer, she took us to the south eastern region of the country, dominated by the Gurage, Arusi, and Gambela peoples. The one thing that to this day strikes me to my core is the expansive expressions of love I witnessed in these communities. One example i’d like to give you is from the Gurage people we stayed with. The Gurage are polygamous peoples who are predominantly Muslim and subsist on pastoral farming on the lush green lowlands right next to the province of Shoa. They live in communal compounds where the huts of several wives encircle the main hut that belongs to the man of the house. I’ve never witnessed such harmonious love among the women and with their husbands that for the western eye would border on polyamory. Every morning, the women would greet each other quite affectionately, with a traditional kissing method that is almost uncomfortable to witness in its depth of expression and love. They would begin by cupping the back of each other’s heads and tilting slightly to opposing sides, then they would start pecking the sides of each other’s lips in rapid fire for several minutes. The length of this kissing style can range from 10-15 quick pecks to several minutes of rapid fire corner of mouth kissing that is interspersed with squeals of delight and adoration depending on how long the two people have been apart.

Another powerful example is of my own people who are northerners from Gojjam, colloquially known as the horniest people of Ethiopia as we do not practice female genital mutilation and our women are quite expressive sexually. While kissing openly in public is not the primary form of love expression for the northerners, Gojjam, Gondar and Wollo peoples accept and celebrate public displays of affection. Every week, on market day, young men and women are often caught making out under the woman’s netela (a thin long white cotton scarf worn by our women) after a very specific courting and baiting tradition. If a man is interested in a woman, he would throw a lemon or a lime at her lightly until she collects several in her netela. she would then walk with the lemons out to the nearby fields dropping them one at a time as she walks on, a coy call-and-response that lets him know she is interested and heading somewhere a bit quieter. in the fields, you would pass a huddled couple making out like crazy under the thin veil of the woman’s netela and giggling and teasing can be heard along the pathways.

These two examples are of many that come from Ethiopian tribes and traditions.”

Leave your comments, as we work on a follow-up on the subject of African kissing.

Follow and learn more about Zina Saro-Wiwa’s work HERE

About the Artist

Zina Saro-Wiwa is a British-Nigerian film-maker and video artist. She makes documentaries, experimental shorts, music videos and video performance pieces. www.zinasarowiwa.com

via Mark Lanning & Edgar Davids

Football. In Senegal it is a  dance, in Ghana it is a bloody musical, in Cameroon  it is  a religion. 

Eyes closed. Picture this.

It is a Friday morning every one is rushing to work earlier than usual, if you are not much of a football person you ask your family “what’s the rush ?”

Answer: “Cameroon is playing Nigeria…quarter finals ohh its going to be fire”

You have a mini heart attack, no TV for you (because almost every local channel will be on the game) and no hanging out with your friends after work. Yes it really does suck to be on the “I hate football island”, with a population of you and a few other “loser”.

Your brother, who absolutely lives for soccer, can’t wait to leave work early and join his friends for a fun game night.

The game started fifteen minutes prior to your getting off work and everyone is rushing home, the traffic is not so bad, in fact you and a few nobodies are still on the road. Anyone who couldn’t get home on time is at the nearest bar and hotel lobby.

You get home and the television(s) is (are) occupied. The streets are dead silent, yes you can almost hear the tad poles and crickets in the late afternoon. 

You don’t need a television to know what the score is since you will soon hear, what seems like the entire country, shout “goaaaalllllll” or “Ohhhhhhhh”.

Count each holler carefully and your prediction will almost be accurate.

Needless to say the only creatures you’ll see on the streets, of Yaoundé for example, are stray dogs and sales people, focused on their radio or running out of the bars once in a while to make sure their merchandise is untouched. 

This is the standstill state of affairs until the game is over and the people are done raving about the results.

Oya open your eye!

If you hate football, in a country like Cameroon, then you have time to reflect on how a single occasion like an important football match can unite the entire nation, at least for a little over an hour.

It is a beautiful, even magical phenomenon.

What better way to peep into the culture of football than understanding street soccer, which usually occurs on the weekends in your average neighborhood’s  playground/junction.

Interesting fact

African kids learn to create their own footballs from absolutely anything they can find at home. Sometimes, the better the quality of street balls you find, the better the economic status of the neighborhood you are in. 

Below are images of street soccer taken by Mark Lanning, and videos of street soccer challenges orchestrated by Edgar Davids.

PRESS PLAY AFTER EACH PHOTOGRAPH

Starting at the inner corner of eyes, apply the lightest yellow, followed by medium yellow, then medium shade orange and then the deepest orange. BLEND.

Add reddish brown (or any color to help transition from lids to brow bone highlight) and a bit of black to crease for added depth.

Sweep shimmery light gold shadow on brow bone and dot the same color to inner corner of eyes to open them up.

Repeat the color sequence on bottom lash line area (yellow light, yellow medium, orange medium, orange deep).Use reddish brown and black shadow to merge top and bottom lid colors.
 

Line top lid with black liquid liner and flick it up and outward to elongate eyes Line inner waterline with black pencil. Apply mascara

Throw in some blush for your cheeks, lips and you’re done.

A quick and easy look to add more color to your summer.

If you are a West African child you probably received messages suggesting that dreads were for vagabonds, natural hair for kids and freshly permed hair for young adult women. In America, that natural hair of yours won’t get you a job at the news desk, or at that law firm, so all the ladies sporting their natural(virgin afro-kink)hair will definitely wig or weave it up on the weekdays. Sad but true, regardless of where you find yourself on God’s good earth, be cognizant of the political nature of your hair, especially if you hair screams Africana.

“HAIR IS POLITICAL” Chimamanda Adichie & many others before her

This statement is far from new, but remains as relevant in 2013 as it was in the 60′s. Take a good look at the images below and watch the brilliance that spews from the mouth of miss Chimamanda as she introduces her newest novel “AMERICANAH”, and the role of hair in the interracial relationship of an Africana in America. Needless to say we absolutely love her work.

YES.MY HAIR IS POLITICAL.

A  M  E  R  I  C  A  N  A  H

The Ikenga Super Stars of Africa are one of our absolute favorite classical Nigerian music band. Below are our top five tunes. There is no limit to their musicality, you’d have to listen to feel it. 

#UP NAIJA

The Ikenga Super Stars of Africa, led by Vincent Okoroego, a former member of Steven Osita Osadebe’s Nigeria Sound Makers were a leading Igbo “guitar highlife” group of the seventies and eighties in Nigeria. The Ikengas called their style of music “Ikwokilikwo”, a fast-paced form of highlife popularized by Oliver de Coque and Godwin Kabaka Opara of the Oriental Brothers, amongst others.

The band went on to record several LP’s, while establishing themselves as one of the most beloved Nigerian groups of all time, not only in their homeland but across Africa and in Europe as well.