First Photos and Preliminary Report from the Africa Travel Association’s 32^nd Annual Congress in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia as well as Afropop’s First research visit to Ethiopia.

By Sean Barlow,
Executive Producer, Afropop.org

The African Travel Association (ATA) recently held their annual conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia May 6 to 11^th which I participated in. We had a very productive three days of panel discussions, networking, country-sponsored banquets, and of course delicious Ethiopian coffee breaks. It was wonderful to meet new friends and colleagues from Tanzania, Kenya, Benin, Togo, Uganda, Egypt, Nigeria (definitely the best dressed contingent!), South Africa, the USA, Senegal, Mali, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Zambia, Malawi, Djibouti, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Cameroon, Congo, and of course Ethiopia. One hears about the importance of developing tourism in Africa in terms of earning much needed foreign exchange, employing people and reducing poverty but it becomes much more real when you meet the key people with the passion and business smarts who are at the heart of growing this vital part of Africa’s economy.

The ATA honored me by inviting me to speak before this powerhouse audience of tourism and culture ministers, investors, hotel and airline executives, local tour operators, international tour agents, media partners (which includes Afropop), and others. My topic was “Promoting and Marketing Cultural Tourism in Africa.” This sector has tremendous growth potential as high quality music festivals on the continent—such as the celebrated Festival in the Desert in Mali and the Sauti za Busari Swahili fest in Zanzibar--attract visitors and a chance to interact with locals. In general, cultural tourism can mix the delights of modern urban Africa with eco-tourism, safari tourism, adventure tourism, heritage tourism, and why not, beach tourism for a chill-out at the end of an intense cultural experience.

More details on my talk will be forthcoming in a full article about the 2007 ATA gathering but I’m glad to report that many people told me they found my presentation stimulating. And I hope that some good comes out of it—for the tourism sector, for Africa’s image as s an attractive destination for prospective tourists who are interested in experiencing African culture firsthand and interacting with people (not just going on safari), and as always, for helping the continent’s artists and everyone associated with the creative industries make a decent living.

The highlight of the conference for me was when we all loaded into a chartered Ethiopian Airlines prop plane and flew north of Addis to the ancient city of Lalibela where we toured the extraordinary 10^th to 12^th Century Orthodox churches literally carved down into massive solid blocks of rock. One hundred Orthodox priests greeted us, swaying and chanting and parading under brightly colored umbrellas.

The true high point came afterwards when we crept down a dirt road to Lalibela Hospital for a ceremony to signify the donation of a container of medical supplies worth some $300,000. Respect to MedShare for their generosity and to ATA for organizing this contribution. As we entered the hospital grounds, some 50 girls and boys entertained us with singing and fantastic, five-person tall gymnastic formations. Glowing smiles all around.

My twin mission in Ethiopia of course was gathering materials for a musical report on Addis for Afropop Worldwide on public radio and Afropop.org on the web. A full web feature on that is forthcoming. But for now, I’ll just say I most enjoyed the azmaribets (minstrel houses) where women artists/club owners held court. Local people trickle in around midnight and the singing, improvised verse making, dancing, masenko (violin) playing, and more continues to the wee hours. I led a group of ATA delegates as we slipped out of the conference hotel one night. The chorus girls pulled us on to the dance floor at Mimi’s azmaribet to do Ethiopian shoulder-shaking, neck-twitching dances. What fun! Other favorite moments for me included meeting legendary singer Mahmoud Ahmed and his band performing at a wedding party, hanging out with number one producer Abegasu Shioto at his home studio as he deconstructed track by track the modern Ethiopian pop sound, club-hopping on Bole Road on Saturday night where one club might have over thirty different acts in one night (it’s a competitive scene! Felt like a vaudeville show); meeting rising pop star Tsèdènia Gèbrè-Marqos, hearing sax artist extraordinaire Yared demonstrate the pentatonic modes that help give classic Ethiopian music its thrilling, trademark sound. More to come as more live recordings and interviews are in the process of being done for Afropop. We simply must return to do more work focusing on the rich musical life of Ethiopia. Thanks to Heruy Arefe-Aine for his help in Addis!  

Special thanks to our colleagues at Ethiopia’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism led by Minister Diri and to the New York based ATA staff led by Executive Director Eddie Bergman, Rene Taylor and Natalie Philippe for organizing the conference and to Ethiopian Airlines for making travel to Addis possible.

For more about Ethiopia and musical cultures all around Africa, the Americas and the Middle East, visit www.afropop.org. Note that our weekly radio program, Afropop Worldwide hosted by Georges Collinet, will soon be available in on-demand streaming format on Afropop.org. Readers can contact us at info@afropop.org. Also visit ATA’s web site for their report and photos of the conference as well as extensive information about travel to Africa.

View Sean Barlow’s article, “Beyond Safaris: Rebranding Africa for Cultural Tourism” featured in the Spring 2007 edition of The Africa Journal from The Corporate Council on Africa.

Afropop in Addis Ababa Photo Gallery


































































































































Contributed by: Sean Barlow

First published: www.afropop.org