Exploration and definition of a model of cultural performance investigation are a necessary step for accessing community resources that exist outside the Western social, political and cultural perspective.

Imipashi re-imagines Zambia’s rich resources in mythology, songs, dances, ritual and ceremonial practice to create a ritual performance for today.

Times of Zambia Lusaka, Zambia

 

In Zambia, Performing the Spirits

Shoeless and shirtless children ran cheering excitedly along side the ve-hicle as it bounced over ruts of red earth. As our Toyota Land Cruiser entered the circle created for our performance, we immediately became the focus of gathered attention. We drove across the circle of dry grass to a makeshift stage--a large wooden box surrounded with drums and puppets. Suddenly there was a spontaneous cheer from the crowd with arms waving, faces smiling and much whistling.

Our arrival signaled the beginning of the performance to the crowd who waited for nearly forty minutes in the warm, but not yet hot, African sun. There is a unique crystal-like clarity and gentle freshness that char-acterizes the winter sky of southern Africa. Its sharp blue providing a perfect backdrop for the colorful mosaic of colorful clothing dotted with beautiful black faces. We were in Kitwe the heart of Zambia‘s “Copperbelt,” formerly the world’s most productive copper, zinc, and tin mines until the bottom fell out of the international metals market in the early 1980s and first world countries started using laser optics in-stead of copper. Since then the Copperbelt Province, as the rest of Zambia, has been tail spinning in a whirl of foreign debt, inflation, un-employment, abject poverty, tribal in-fighting, and government corruption.

The Land Cruiser pulled behind our “stage box” to provide both backdrop and a backstage for our performance. Timothy Mugala, Le-nard, Milimo, and Jerry Jmuale who were drumming in a sweat at the box, nodded happily. At the center of the circle was shirtless Peter Piri, who was entertaining the audience with his traditional comic dances. Though from the Bemba tribe, Peter knew scores of traditional dances from many different tribes; he was presenting an impromptu, some-times bawdy, crowd-pleasing warm-up to fill the time. The audience fol-lowed every move of his torso and stomach as he rotated and punctuated the syncopating drum rhythms with his astounding isola-tions. As we jumped out of the white Land Cruiser, hundreds of children, like curious but cautious bees, gathered around us. Micke Renlund, the Finish producer of our performance. and I were probably the only “musungus,” white men, in the radius of miles.

Our presence, along with the performance preparations, was creating a big stir and much curiosity. Light Musonda, a small smiling man with a Buddha-like disposition, our stage manager, greeted us with a traditional bow of the head and touching of his heart. We did the same. Opening his ever-present notebook, he informed Micke and I of the situation and our state of preparedness. We had learned from our previous performing experi-ences that presenting an hour and a half performance in a found out-door space in Zambia had to have military-like organization in order to be successful.

Delays, complications, and anything-else-that-can-go-wrong-will, were common and seemingly inevitable. Nothing ever worked according to plan and the strangest, most unexpected things al-ways came up. Doing outdoor theater in Africa has its own mysterious laws and characteristics. I had learned the hard way to be prepared for the worst, hope for the best, refuse upset, accept and appreciate the potential of the ever fluctuating givens, and most importantly--improvise. That is how Africa itself works--and survives.

The children stood wide-eyed staring up at me like I was some space alien. When I wasn’t looking, some children ventured to touch my white arms, giggling with the novelty of my strangeness. For many they were seeing their first white man, and if not their first, the first they were able to touch. My white skin is in black Africa a contradictory and charged symbol of all and any emotion that can fit between what is feared and what is aspired to, and what is hated to what is envied. My white skin represents all that has historically terrorized black Africa, yet conversely now is looked to as a hope of survival. Children were everywhere, they are truly in a unique creatures living in a world of their own. Sweet friendly faces, curious, mischievous, and alive. It was for them we did our performance. Not that Imipashi was a children’s show, but because it was also a re-affirmation of the life and hopes they were so full of—a performance that spoke to the innocence in us all.

Light explained that everything was ready to go. Joshua Muyambo, one of our puppet makers was on “circle patrol” wearing his police-man’s cap and carrying his large stick. His job was to organize and maintain our performance circle. His stick and policeman’s cap were well-established symbols of authority. Two local men had been inter-viewed and hired for 100 Kwacha each (20 cents) to help Joshua main-tain the circle. They were given policemen’s hats too, but instead of sticks, long cardboard tubing to make sure they would not take their job too seriously.

Establishing and maintaining the circle was primary, for much of our audience had never seen such a theatrical performance before and would be uncertain about the extent of their participation. Our per-formance included a number of tribal dances and audience members often wanted to actively participate--which was fine to an extent. How-ever, lacking a known, pre-established sequence of events (as is the case with traditional performance), the circle was all we had to maintain or-der. Often times, as the show began the audience would multiply to up to three thousand people with those in the back pressing forward to see better. An orderly circle was essential for the protection of the first four rows of seated children. Vivid in our mind was the hard lesson we learned from one of our first performances, at Kaunda Square, a “com-pound” (village-like district) in Lusaka.

As the crowds gathered there the circle grew tight around the performance and almost swallowed us whole. Small children had been stepped on and people started shoving, pushing, crying, and screaming. We found ourselves helpless and in a sea of a few thousand people; I will never forget how the crowd instincts of curiosity developed into panic, then escalated into a survival frenzy. Maintaining the circle was our responsibility and an issue of public safety. Our performance of Imipashi, which means “the spirits” in Bemba, had evolved from the Litooma Project, a three month program of work-shops, performance development, and touring.

The idea and ambition of the Litooma Project was unlike anything Zambia had seen before. It was a first-ever national theatre project, bringing together performers from tribes (who were sometimes rival) all over Zambia. What evolved was Imipashi, an allegory inspired by a well-known Lozi myth, tracing the journey of the Zambian people from creation to the corruption of pre-sent day nationhood. Never had such a “national” theatre project ever been attempted.

The idea and objectives for the project also struck a cord with a wide array of funders contributing to the project: the USIS; the British Council; Finnita, Finish Development Aid; SIDA, Swedish Economic Development Organization; NORAD, Norwegian Overseas Develop-ment; the Embassy of the Netherlands; and FVS, the Finish Volunteer Service, Micke’s generous employer and host of the project. The Zambian Department of Cultural Services contributed the equal of nearly $1000, the largest amount they ever gave to a single art project.

The three week workshop, six week rehearsal and development, and four week performance tour, was budgeted at $28,000. An unheard of and unprecedented amount for a performance in a country where the aver-age wage is 40,000 to 80,000 Kwacha per month ($35 to $75.) It was the first nationwide performance project ever initiated in Zambia. The project created much discussion and anticipation--what performance should always do--but with opportunity came the sharpened double edge of responsibility.

A Finish actor and an American director from Alaska--two white guys--made idealistic plans for assisting Zambian performance in a way they deemed necessary. What a strange and unpredictable place the world of the late 20th century has become, bringing unlikely people by chance to unlikely places to do unheard of things. Familiar fears of being presumptuous, meddlesome outsiders, and nothing more than a so-phisticated and subtle new wave of cultural imperialist gnawed at my thoughts when we began the project.

There was however, as with my other projects with indigenous people, a sense of responsibility to re-spond and assist where I could. There is a need to do something meaningful and lasting. Being a white man with the advantage of education, opportunity, and resources is a power to be used or abused. Or it can simply lie fallow.

Light and Micke had arrived hours before and had positioned the performance across the dusty street from the Kitwe market, an ideal set-ting. I had arrived late because we had only one vehicle and had to make three trips to shuttle people from Copperbelt University, where we had spent the night in dilapidated dormitories, to the performance site. We had been promised a bus for this part of our tour.

But when we went to University of Zambia in Lusaka to retrieve the bus, we were met by several machine gun toting military men. The government had shut down the University after a long running dispute between faculty and administration had come to a head. The Zambian president had fired the entire faculty—including those with tenure. Set back but un-daunted by the sudden turn of events, the majority of the cast traveled for five hours on commuter buses to Kitwe. The props, costumes, Micke and I (the only two licensed drivers), and five cast members stuffed, piled on, and comically over loaded the Land Cruiser and drove to Kitwe.

The road we drove was notorious for its anything-goes-driving, car jackings and murder, drug running, and smuggling of stolen goods. It is the major highway through Zambia connecting Tanzania in the north to Zimbabwe and then South Africa to the south. It is a road also known for prostitution with women crowding the waysides and truck stops. Prostitution is so widespread, forced mainly by poverty. The road is known as the “AIDS Highway;” truck drivers are blamed for the rapid spreading of the disease throughout the region.

The location for the performance was perfect: in an open field across from the market. The Kitwe market was the center of the town’s daily social and commercial activity. The open-air market, thick with shanty stalls of weathered wood, was protected from the sun by a sea of colorful material.

The market was a warren of narrow, labyrinth-like passages, where vendors sell fruits, vegetables, oils, maize, dried fish, house wares, auto parts, and used clothing donated by first world chari-table organizations. The market was the best place to draw an audience and would be where, with a nod, Light Musonda sent several of our “Spirit Performers”—the performance had begun. Four groups of two performers each, went to the market, two groups went to a housing area, and two to a nearby area full of textile shops.

The masked Spirit Performers had developed a repertory of per-formance sketches, songs, and comic routines to disrupt daily activity and invite audiences to our performance circle. The idea, inspired by several different festivals and ceremonial events indigenous to Zambia, served to announce our performance as an event similar to a festival or traditional ceremony.

It was also an exciting way to draw in a larger audience; it was a way for us to stir up the community and generate much excitement. It was a device I had used with great success while working with the Zulus in South Africa. It gave me a special delight to sit in the circle with the children watching their expressions as they heard screams of delight and surprise coming from the distance.

The Spirit Performers had made contact and the air became charged with anticipation.

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