FOR THE NEXT 10 DAYS IT IS ALL ABOUT CREOLE CULTURE, HERITAGE, POETRY, SONG FOOD AND MORE
(Posted 20th October 2017)
Today is the first edition of the combined Festival Kreol and the Seychelles Carnival going underway, with much emphasis on reaching the grass roots of the Seychelles people and get them involved through many events beginning to unfold this morning.
The month-long event will be held under the theme: ‘Proud of my identity‘.
An authentic Creole village has been built in Victoria, the capital, where guest countries will have their own pavilions to showcase their respective culture and traditions.
Musical animation in Victoria, traditional dance performances, exhibitions, seminars on various topics surrounding the Creole heritage, fashion events showcasing professional designers and fashion students, are some of the events featured on the programme of activities.
The ‘Kanmtole Competition’ is among the most popular activities where school students as well as participants from workplaces and districts compete in showcasing their skills dancing the Seychelles’ traditional dances of European origin – known as the “kanmtole”.
Also popular is ‘Fon Lanmal’ a fashion evening featuring professional designers from Seychelles and other Creole countries, as well as students from the local art and design school. Classifying participants in separate categories, the event is aimed at showcasing talent in designing traditional costumes or culturally-inspired contemporary fashion.
New to this year’s Creole Festival is an International Serenade, in Creolo language referred to as ‘Laserenade Enternasyonal‘. This is the former Carnaval International de Victoria previously organized by the Seychelles Tourism Board that has been merged with the traditional serenade held each year during the Creole Festival.
Planned for Saturday October 28th, the International Serenade will feature participants from Seychelles, other Creole nations as well as guests from non-creole countries. They will parade the streets of Victoria depicting their respective cultures through colourful costumes, music, dance and other performances.
It is worth to point out that the Creole Festival is the archipelago’s main event that celebrates the Seychelles’ Creole origin and culture through dances, other cultural manifestation, literature and cuisine among others.
Seychelles, which gained independence from Great Britain in 1976, after centuries under different colonial rules, is a young nation that can trace its roots to the first settlement in the 1700s.
Once inhabited by French and British settlers, African slaves, and Chinese and Indian traders, the Seychellois population is today a mix of races and cultures that make up the Creole nation, a rainbow nation like no other in the world.
Creole, which is mainly derived from the French language, is the native language of the Seychelles, which resulted from the descendants of settlers from Europe, traders from Asia and former slaves from Africa, who later intermarried, forming the melting pot of culture which exists today finding their own means to communicate and understand one another.
Live reporting from the Seychelles main island of #Mahe will commence on 26th of October due to a delay of travel due to reasons beyond my control.
