|
|
|
|
|
REBUILDING TIMBUKTU: UN WORKING
WITH MALI TO "KEEP CULTURE SIGNIFICANT"
Jun 29, 2014
NEW YORK, NY - Two of the World Heritage mausoleums destroyed in
Timbuktu have now been rebuilt through a partnership with local
communities, the United Nations cultural agency said, adding
that it will need an additional $8 million to finish the
rehabilitation of the site and of libraries that could again
store hundreds of thousands of Malian manuscripts.
“We are looking for $11 million,” UN Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Representative to Mali, Lazare
Eloudou Assomo, said in New York.
The UN agency has been able to gather around $3 million through
bilateral cooperation and other funding, he said, but “if we
don't have the $8 million, it would be difficult for us to
implement our activities.”
Timbuktu was an economic, intellectual and spiritual capital and
a centre for the propagation of Islam throughout Africa during
the city's golden age in the 15th and 16th centuries. According
to UNESCO, the three mosques and the 16 mausoleums comprising
the property are part of the fabled city that was once home to
100,000 inhabitants.
The site was heavily destroyed by occupying extremists after
fighting broke out in January 2012 between Government forces and
Tuareg rebels. The conflict uprooted hundreds of thousands of
people and prompted the Malian Government to request assistance
from France to stop the military advance of extremist groups.
In March, local masons working under the supervision of Imam of
Djingareyber, and with support from UNESCO and the UN
Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA),
which is mandated in part to support the Government in cultural
preservation, laid the first earthen brick to reconstruct two of
the mausoleums.
“It's a long and complex task. The monuments look very simple in
their architecture but they are complex structures,” said Mr.
Assomo, who spoke alongside Vibeke Jensen, Director of the
UNESCO Office in New York.SOURCE UN News Centre
"TO
TIMBUKTU FOR A HAIRCUT.
A JOURNEY THROUGH WEST AFRICA"
by
Rick Antonson
-2.jpg) Author
and tourism executive, Rick Antonson, sets out on an
unforgettable journey to Africa, and chronicles his
adventures in TO TIMBUKTU FOR A HAIRCUT: A Journey Through
West Africa,, published
by Dundurn Press on June 7, 2008.
"To
Timbuktu for a Haircut is a great read - a little bit of
Bill Bryson, a little bit of Michael Palin, and quite a lot
of Bob Hope on the road to Timbuktu." &endash; Professor
Geoffrey Lipman, Assistant Secretary-General, United Nations
World Tourism Organization.
Historically
rich, remote, and once unimaginably dangerous for
travellers, Timbuktu still teases with "Find me if you
can." Rick Antonson's encounters with entertaining
train companions Ebou and Ussegnou, a mysterious cook called
Nema, and intrepid guide Zak will make you want to pack up
and leave for Timbuktu tomorrow.\
As
Antonson travels in Senegal and Mali by train, four-wheel
drive, river pinasse, camel, and foot, he tells of
fourteenth-century legends, eighteenth-century explorers,
and today's endangered existence of Timbuktu's 700,000
ancient manuscripts in what scholars have described as the
most important archaeological discovery since the Dead Sea
Scrolls.
TO
TIMBUKTU FOR A HAIRCUT combines wry humour with shrewd
observation to deliver an armchair experience that will
linger in the mind long after the last page is
read.
"I
left Africa personally changed by the gentle harshness I
found and a disquieting splendour that found me. Mali
was the journey I needed, if not the one I envisioned.
And I learned that there's a little of Timbuktu in every
traveller: the over-anticipated experience, the clash of
dreams with reality." &endash; Rick Antonson
Rick
Antonson is the president and CEO of Tourism Vancouver and a
director of the Pacific Asia Travel Association. He
has had adventures in Tibet and Nepal, and in Libya and
North Korea, among others. The co-author of SLUMACH'S
GOLD: In Search of a Legend, he lives in Vancouver.
APRIL 23, 2014
.png)
VANCOUVER'S
CATHEDRAL THINKER WHO WROTE TO TIMBUKTU FOR AN HAIRCUT RETIRES
Tourism Vancouver's Rick Antonson, the man who helped
bring the Olympics to Vancouver, is feted for his future-thinking
view of this city and the world
Martha Perkins — WE Vancouver
Stone masons
dedicated their lives to building magnificent cathedrals that
wouldn't be completed until long after they'd died. Cathedral
thinkers build on ideas that will live on long after they’re
gone.And that’s why Bard on the Beach’s Christopher Gaze calls Rick
Antonson “a good mason of Cathedral Thinking.” On April 22, Gaze
joined city and provincial politicians, a former premier, business
owners, devoted staff members and friends in sending Antonson off on
his journey from president of Tourism Vancouver to full-time
author. It’s fitting that the event was held at the Vancouver
Convention Centre because Antonson was one of the people who fought
to get it built. He was the one who shepherded the crazy idea of
hosting the Winter Olympics in Vancouver through to fruition and
then realized that if we’re inviting the world to our city, we’d
better make sure there’s an easy way to get them from the
airport. “It was his charm, his shrewdness, his ability to motivate
people” that made it all happen, said former Vancouver mayor and BC
premier Mike Harcourt. “He convinced us we should go after the
Olympics. Do you remember how hard that was to sell?” “He saw the
future,” said John Furlong, the president and CEO of the Vancouver
Organizing Committee. “Rick was the holder of the idea of his
times.”Gradually, Furlong says, Antonson’s confidence in the city’s
ability to host the 2010 Winter Games spread to a belief that “no
matter what came our way, we could achieve great things…. [His]
legacy will be profound.” Antonson’s belief that tourism can be a
force for peace has its roots in his own life choices. He always
told his two sons, Sean and Brent, that they could do or they could
have. “We did things,” Sean said. Their house was filled with maps
and books and when they weren’t camping in far-off places across
Canada, they were taking train trips across Siberia or evading their
watchers in North Korea. “Dad has a way of being in the moment,”
Sean said. No matter how much chaos was happening around them, he’d
stop, throw open his arms and say, “Ah, we’re here. Take a moment to
think about it.” “He taught us that the world is bigger than what
you can see from your doorstep.”While Antonson loves to sleep “under
a million stars,” he often jokes that his wife Janice prefers beds
in a five-star hotel. Together for almost three decades, their beds
have not always been on the same continent. She’s currently general
manager of aeronautical development and marketing for North
Queensland Airports which is why, after Antonson officially retires
in June, he’ll be moving to Cairns to join her. “He’s always been
there for me through all the time zones,” Janice said. And while her
husband always deflects praise by saying he’s the one who gets to
take the collective bow, Janice outlined some of his accolades: a
member of the Canadian Tourism Hall of Fame, the recipient of an
Honourary Doctorate of Laws from Capilano University, and recipient
of the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal. (Recognizing that the
last thing an inveterate traveler needed was more “stuff”, Bob
Lindsay, the chair of Tourism Vancouver’s board of directors,
announced that a $1,000-a-year bursary for a student who
demonstrates “leadership potential” has been established in
Antonson’s honour at Cap U.)As is his wont, when it was Antonson’s
turn to speak, he said “Tonight’s about the many, not the few.”
Addressing the 600
people in the ballroom, he said, “I see people who think of the
bigger things.” He praised their willingness to “play for higher
stakes…. You wanted more and were willing to take that risk…. My
great good fortune has been to live in the same time as you.” The
Olympic bid could have died from a thousand cuts, given the many
arguments against it, and reports of not only its death, but that of
the convention centre, were often greatly exaggerated. But as he
prepares to retire, Antonson said it is not time to stop. The “fight
to get it right” must continue. The convention centre should be
expanded on the east side. Looking out through the
floor-to-high-ceiling windows that provide a stunning view of Coal
Harbour and the North Shore mountains, “I think of the people who
want to build up those mountains. You’d lose the reason why people
say Vancouver is spectacular by nature.” Antonson dreams of the
camping trips his grandsons, Riley and Declan, will take across
Canada and then getting their passports so they can explore the
United States and then “dozens and dozens” of countries. But why
can’t that freedom to explore be shared by children around the
world? Children living in Syria and the Sudan can’t even travel to
the next village without their lives being in danger.
And that’s where the message of tourism being an
ambassador for peace comes into play.
“Tourism,
more than any other industry, takes down barriers,” Antonson said.
“We’re about bringing people together and celebrating our
differences.”
His books — Route
66 Still Kicks,
To Timbuktu for a Haircut and the yet-to-published Full Moon
Over Noah’s Ark — are not armchair guides to the places he has
visited. They are an invitation to share his quest to better
understand “the 260 nations that call this tiny planet home.”
Once we do that, we can join his call to action to ensure “that
safe passage and freedom to assemble are fundamental rights.”
These
are the words that were used to describe Rick Antonson at his
retirement farewell: Outstanding leader, wise, thoughtful, kind,
motivational, visionary, full of charm and grace, smart,
intuitive, genuine, creative, one of the good guys, a walking
ambassador, mentor, teacher, careful listener, dedicated,
enthusiastic, great friend, gift from God, adventurous,
outstanding contributor to the vitality of our city, humble. To
sum up: “If the world was full of Ricks, it would be a much
better place.”
Timbuktu:
City of Mystery
Mariama
Ludovic
Salt comes from the north,
Gold comes from the south,
Money comes from the country of white people,
But the words of God, Knowledge,
Stories and nice folk tales,
Can only be found in Tombouctou"
There is
a Tuareg proverb which says,
"It
is better to see for oneself than to be informed by a third
person." On these words we will invite you to put Tombouctou
on the top of your twenty first century agenda. Located near
the river Niger and at the terminus of the great
trans-Saharan caravan route, Tombouctou became fabulously
wealthy in the 13th 15 centuries. Loaded with blocks of salt
and other trade goods huge convoys of camels would spend
weeks crossing the unforgiving Sahara to reach Timbuktu. It
was here that salt was traded pound for pound with African
merchants bringing gold and ivory along the Niger from the
heart of Africa.
At
its height in the 16th century, the city had 100.000
inhabitants and became not only a centre of commerce but
also an important seat of learning and religion. The city
was fiercely Islamic and the fact that non-Moslems were
totally banned from entering the city only added to its
mystique.
TIMBUKTU: THE PEARL OF
THE DESERT
(more
on next page)
Timbuktu was formerly a
great commercial trading city and an international center of
islamic learning. The city was probably founded in the late
11th century AD by Tuareg nomads. Timbuktu was a leading
terminus of trans-Saharan caravans and a distribution point
for trade along the upper Niger. Merchants from northern
African cities traded salt and cloth for gold and for black
African slaves in the markets of Timbuktu. The visitors will
discovered the ancient mosques including the famous Sankore
whose reputation spanned all across north Africa and Europe
as a leading islamic academy for centuries. Most of the
ancient books (some dating from the 14th century AD) are
still preserved at the Ahmed Baba Center . Tuareg formed one
of the most ancient tribal people of the Sahara. They speak
a Berber language, Tamacheq, and have their own alphabet. In
ancient times, the Tuareg controlled the trans-Sahara routes
and substantially contributed in the expansion of Islam in
sub-Saharan Africa even though they retained however some of
their older rites. Today, the Tuareg symbolize the mysteries
of the Sahara and continued to be seen as the Masters of the
Desert.
Photo
Credits: Mariama Ludovic, Westair. Bamako, Mali
Mariama Ludovic de
Lys, Director
Company name : West Africa Tours
email :
westair@afribone.net.ml /mariamaludovic@yahoo.com
tel : 223 228 8157 /fax : 223 228 52 32, BP E 1642, Bamako
/Mali
|
Introduction
by Jerry W. Bird, Africa Travel Magazine
Editor