Simon Mol

Interview with Simon Mol

Interviewed by Valentina Acava Mmaka

Born in Rome, Valentina Acava Mmaka grew up in South Africa during the apartheid regime. She is a Journalist, writer, poet and a translator from Kiswahili and English into Italian and a reporter for numerous NGO's on Africa.  She had always been committed to telling the Western world about African with an inside point of view. She has authored: "Il  mondo a colori della famiglia BwanaVal" / The colourful world of the BwanaVal family (Kabiliana, 2003); Jabuni: il mistero della città sommersa/ Jabuni: the secret of the submerged town  (EMI; 2003);

Writer Wins Freedom Award

Warsaw Voice - 29 November 2006

This year's Freedom of Expression awards, handed out by the International PEN Club and Oxfam Novib for activities promoting human rights, were presented in Amsterdam Nov. 18. Among the five winners of the prestigious award is longtime freelance contributor to The Warsaw Voice Simon Mol, a poet, journalist and playwright who has been living in Poland for seven years. Mol got the award for his theater and literary activities promoting the rights of Africans in Poland. He has founded the Migrator Theater, with a multinational ensemble composed of immigrants, mainly from Africa.

Of Life & Death

Life, Death, Life.
Light, Darkness, Light, Darkness;
Light, Life…
Nothing Can Stop Nature.
Not even Nature Itself.

Tackling Racism

By Simon Mol (Warsaw Voice, 8 November 2006)

Actors from Warsaw-based Migrator Theater, African soccer players in Poland led by Legia Warsaw’s Zimbabwean defenders Dickson Choto and Herbert Dick, and dozens of Polish supporters gathered in front of the City Council on Bankowy Square Oct. 25 for a street event described as “a theatrical football demonstration.”

The participants were all dressed in the red-and-white colors of the Polish national soccer team. The event was spiced up by a spectacular performance by a Capoeira group led by João Carlos do Nascimento, a Brazilian expert in the martial art, and his Polish students.

Children listening to rhythm of African drums

Gazeta Wyborcza, Lublin ( 2006-11-19)

Last Sunday in Gardzienice about a hundred children learnt a Togolese dance and took part in a Congolose ritual to welcome New Year.

“Children are open-minded and do not think in stereotypes. Thanks to this kind of meetings we have an opportunity to inplant in their heads a positive image of Africa,” says Simon Mol from Cameroon, head of Migrator Theatre. Thirteen  members of the multinational group held a workshop with children from nearby villages, drawn from local primary schools in Stryjno, Piaski and Gardzienice.

Gospel

By Rebecca Steel 

Hidden among the bleak tower blocks of Bielany is a little cultural oasis - Bielański Ośrodek Kultury (Bielany Cultural Centre). I made my way there last night to see the Migrator Theatre perform a gospel concert.

Migrator Theatre is a group of young artists - some asylum seekers, some refugees, some Poles - who try to bring a bit of multicultural life to Warsaw, and Poland as a whole.

Touching Ghosts

In that glittering, gliding infinity between
Now and Then,
Night and Day,
Here and There
And Life
and Death
Ghosts wait;
Their  wails and laughters
reach us here, now, now-and-then.
Their touch makes us brave; thus we breath forth art and freedom.
Warsaw, 02/09/06: 01:15a..m

MIGRATOR ACTOR STABBED! The eighth performance of Simon Mol’s RACE of STAMPS ends in bloodbath

Attack on Moroccan actor (Radio Polonia Online)

Police in northern Poland are holding four men in custody for brutally attacking a Moroccan actor during a festival which was meant to make young Poles more aware of the dangers of racism. Eyewitness reports suggest that the attack on the Moroccan was an act of racism.

This report is by Bogdan Zaryn.

ATTACK ON ABDEL WAS RACIALLY MOTIVATED: DECLARES WITNESS

Marcin Wojciechowski, Gazeta.pl

The Olsztyn Police have arrested two more suspects in connection with the attack on the Morrocan, Abdela Mandili, which took place during the International Theatre Festival in Wegajty. At the moment there are five suspects in police custody.

The incident has eually attracted the attention of the Ombudsman, Janusz Kochanowski, “He asked the prosecutor in Olsztyn to forward all related documents to him, establish exactly whether the attack was racially motivated and also to investigate whether those who were responsible for security during the festival did fulfil their responsibilities,” said Stanislaw Wilenski from the Ombudman’s office.

AFRICA... MY AFRICA - The Critics Speak

Africa My Africa, a multicultural, multinational musical spectacle is the story of Africa over three centuries told in one hour, performed by African and Polish actors. It is a spectacle without dialogue with music as the dominant factor. It’s a method through which it’s Cameroonian author hopes to bring Poles closer to the problems of Africa and show the similarities between Africa and Poland—
Justyna Débik, Tomasz Michniewicz— Polish Radio

Africa... My Africa at Punkt

Pictures by Artur Stopyra of "Deutsche Rundschau (Germany)

Post –Unification Anglophone Exile Poetry: Introducing Simon Mol & Kangsen Feka Wakai

By Bate Besong, Ph.D

Forthcoming: Inter’Actuel, 2006 (ed) Professor Robert Fotsing Mangoua, Universite de  Dschang, Cameroon.

Abstract
Anglophone Cameroon poetry, just as its dramaturgy and prose fiction counterparts, is a product of two distinct soci-aesthetic forces: the received traditionalist aesthetic practices and the aesthetics overdetermined by the nuances of Re-unification. The research seeks to correctly apprehend the artistic focus and ideological primogeniture of Anglophone exile poetry from an ideo-aesthetic perspective since, in the main, a study of Simon Mol (2002, 2004) and Kangsen Feka Wakai (2006)cannot be separated from the socio-historical,socio-political and socio-cultural contexts of “horizontal colonialism” [Doh 1993:]

By Bate Besong, Ph.D

Forthcoming: Inter’Actuel, 2006 (ed) Professor Robert Fotsing Mangoua, Universite de  Dschang, Cameroon.

Abstract
Anglophone Cameroon poetry, just as its dramaturgy and prose fiction counterparts, is a product of two distinct soci-aesthetic forces: the received traditionalist aesthetic practices and the aesthetics overdetermined by the nuances of Re-unification. The research seeks to correctly apprehend the artistic focus and ideological primogeniture of Anglophone exile poetry from an ideo-aesthetic perspective since, in the main, a study of Simon Mol (2002, 2004) and Kangsen Feka Wakai (2006)cannot be separated from the socio-historical,socio-political and socio-cultural contexts of “horizontal colonialism” [Doh 1993:]

Finally broken - a portrait of a young poet, activist and political refugee

By Michiel Drost (Medianet)

As a young journalist critical of corrupt governments in his home country Cameroon and Ghana, Simon Mol, now 33, ended up in jail twice and was tortured. He refused to stop although he could. As a political refugee in Poland he has been fighting discrimination and for refugee rights. Now, the one-man-institution who inspires thousands is on the verge of giving up.

He is the co founder and secretary general of the Polish Association of Exiles, the founder and editor-in-chief of the Voice of Exile magazine, a play writer and director. But above all, Simon Mol is a poet: “Poetry is my religion”, he says. All this work doesn’t benefit his personal life though, “I don’t even have my own accommodation or money to eat tonight.”

Simon Mol: Football in Africa is a personal and social healing factor

Interviewed by Nicole Selmer of fanguide2006

Nicole Selmer talks to Simon Mol ahead of the World soccer bonanza in German, here are excepts:

N.S: You have the opportunity to compare Europe and Africa, Poland and Cameroon, in many ways – even with regard to football. What, if any, is the difference between football fans in both countries or continents?

Artistic Exile for Artists from the Black Land

By Julia Sawicka (Originally published in Zcie Warszawy)

They can’t return to their home countries because of wars and conflicts going on there, and they are afraid of persecutions. In Poland they have found a second home.

They come from a multicultural and colourful continent. Although they come from different countries, speak different languages and being brought up in different cultures, for Poles they are all exiles from Africa. In Warsaw they are represented by the Association of Exiles, where we can also find refugees from other continents. Simon Mol from Cameroon is one of founders of this association.

Grandmother's Ghost

My
Grandmothers ghost,--
Good, faithful, over and above
Keeps an eye on me.
I lean on Her when a foe’s chagrin
Strives to slur, slay, enslave my soul.
Amid despair’s raging storm I feel Her breathe,
Kindling hope... painting, pointing, paving the way—
Smiling when the rays of a friend’s joy
warms the walls of my weary lonesome soul.
Grandmother’s ghost in my dream, reveals;

telling tales that become tools during the day.
To Her I look, when the weather, in the silence of the night
reveals feelings fighting to blight my flight...
Delay me not to asleep, for Grandmother’s ghost, across the edge,
is waiting to divulge what plans tomorrow holds for me.

(Dedicated to Mba'mba Juliana Etonde)
Warsaw 3:27a.m. - 14/03/06

My Rosy Remains

Could it be that the unrelated burden forced on Nature’s
blush birthed a demon’s gloom wasting to cloud my smile?
Where does its journey end?;
when she sighs, saying,
‘behold my goal— a Star; bright,......far afield, out of reach’?
Is this enough to ruin because I won’t belong?

Your fresh-dawn will soon be here...

I am a game; a fast fleeing deer...
you can own only after bringing down with all you got;
a cruel, blind bullet.

Warsaw, 23:34  - 21/2/06

Siesta on Stellar fields with the Goddess of Mount Africa: On the Poetry of Simon Mol

By Magdalena Jakubczak - Originally published in Siecmilosci (Translated from Polish by Agata Grabau)

“Africa O! Africa,
When will you rise from slumber to shake
Down dusts from your eyes, Africa?

When will Pharaoh roar,
Or Magi turn bombs into bread Africa?
When will Nubian dance raise the dead,
Or Ashanti drums scare the foe...
O! cradle of creation?”

From Buea in Cameroon to Krakow: Fire-Eating Poet Simon Mol

“Everybody is a poet in Cameroon, just that not everyone writes poetry”, Violetta Zygmunt artistic coordinator of Stigmator Theatre’s cyclic meeting with foreign poets quoted the words of her guest. The poet, who writes under the pseudonym Simon Mol is a political exile from Cameroon . His real name is Moleke Mo-Nije. On Saturday February 25th he came to Krakow from Warsaw, where he lives and works since 1999.

Son of Efasamoto: I Stand Accused

Simon Mol.

‘Golgotha’, Christian Mystics hold, ‘is the mountain of victory’.

...it is the nature of ‘Man’ to have multiple faces. It adds thrill to the art of living. In this respect I have more than one face; there are those who like me as an artist and hate me as an African. There are some who like me as a footballer and hate me as a social critic. There are those who like me as a poet, and hate me as a journalist; the list goes on.
....yet, if I had a false face I would be in jail after seven years of sojourn here. For how long can one hide in a foreign land… particular in a place where you are not liked? I would have been exposed with delight by my enemies whose number seems to be growing by the hour. The real reason that can send me to jail here, if it’s a crime, is poverty… real and racially imposed, which I shoulder with the patience of a sacrificial lamb. In a nutshell, this is the prize for daring a system… an ideological tradition that feeds on the humiliation of ‘the other’. My ‘would-be-assassins’ are testing the ground. This, I can declare, adds thrill and further uncertainty to an already existing suspense.
‘Golgotha’, Christian Mystics hold, ‘is the mountain of victory’:-

People of Stamps and Seals

By Aleksandra Krzyzaniak-Gumowska (Gazeta Wyborcza)

- “F…! - A tall man in a Muslim head cover is walking in circles and cursing out.
- “F…!, F…!, F…! When are they finally going to give me this fucking decision!? An Arab, Mustafa who’s waiting for a decision to his application for asylum, fumes during a rehearsal by Migrator theatre at the Ethnographic Museum yesterday:


Actors during the rehearsal of the "Race of Stamps"

Simon Mol's Race of Stamps Premiers in Warsaw, Poland

Simon Mol’s play Race of Stamps, directed by Polish director Mariusz Orski, shall be premiered on January 22nd at 18:00 at the National Ethnographic Museum, ul. Kredytowa 1.,  in Warsaw.

Simon Mol's Race of Stamps: A Review

Journeys in a new Homeland by Simon Mol struck me as a provocative play after reading it. Race of Stamps is another provocative play by the author – Wojtek Laciski, Polish Radio Bis.

Migrator Theatre announces the premier of Simon Mol’s play Race of Stamps, directed by Polish director Mariusz Orski, on January 22nd at 18:00 at the National Ethnographic Museum, ul. Kredytowa 1.,  in Warsaw.

Xmas Thoughts

To be a poet is to inherit a curse.
Coming to terms with this is a great, stimulating challenge;
in the course  words are captured and feelings made prisoners
... and thus art is born'.

Random Notes from my Diary

I would rather go to hell alone, knowing I was fully responsible for all my thoughts and actions. I won’t be able to live with myself in hell, if it so happens that I looked around me and saw a friend or several people who came alone with me to hell as a result of believing in what I believed in. Or that I convinced then knowingly or knowingly to follow the path I did; the path that finally landed me in hell.

Great Applause For Simon Mol

By Joanna Woźniczko (Gazeta Wyborcza)

He fled Cameroon to Ghana, and from Ghana to Warsaw. Now he feels that here is his home. In Warsaw he founded a Magazine for exiles. Yesterday ‘Voice of Exile’ celebrated its jubilee:

Simon Mol came with a black leather file during our meeting. With a mysterious smile he opened it and pulled out an African newspaper: printed on scratchy paper. This opposition newspaper caused him to be thrown behind the bars; “Before my arrest I was working as a journalist. I was writing for a pro-government newspaper in order to win my bread and at the same time I also wrote for an opposition newspaper. Not long afterwards I was handed an ultimatum; you either abandon the opposition newspaper or you get banned from practicing journalism. I decided to carry on with the opposition newspaper,” Simon narrates.

A Word with Hollywood Star-maker SYD Field

By Simon Mol

‘Film is the future’. Beneath this single simple phrase prowls the entire screenwriting philosophy of Syd Field. Ardent faith in his self-style doctrine and diligence in sorting details both in scripts and life, added up to project Field as a leading authority in screenwriting along the comfy corridors of Hollywood. For this reason and others, the organizers of the Hartley-Merril International Screenwriting Prize had Field fly to Warsaw to address a group of aspiring screenwriters drawn from across the globe (except Africa) in a 2hr workshop, to mark the 2005 Eastern European Screenwriting Lab. This was how I met the sturdy soft-spoken humanistic artist whose sentiments could be felt in his words and works. To him film is serious business.

Art Ambassador

Simon Mol (Moleke Mo-Njie)

(The Second Renaissance; World Forum of Cyframatics) Villa San Carlo Borromeo, Milan (Italy) Nov’ 29-Dec’ 5, 2005)

On ALITALIA flight nr. 555 from Warsaw to Milan last Tuesday, Noember 29th, I picked a copy of the Financial Times and flipped through to the space reserved for Art critics – on page 10. An article written by Samson Spanier tilted The Critics, captured my attention. Somewhere between Spanier states and I quote, ‘Giambologna, the great sculptor after Michelangelo’s death, was said to care nothing for money because he wanted only artistic glory’. True to this line of thinking, here is what Simone Fortuna wrote to the Duke of Urbino in 1581 about Giambologna: "He is the best sort of man one could ever want to meet, not greedy at all, as one can tell from his being so poor: all that he wants is glory and his greatest ambition is to rival Michelangelo.

THE OGONI EQUATION: Remembering Ken Saro-Wiwa

By Simon Mol

‘In today’s world only the powerful can pride themselves of a place called home. You can’t even say ‘Our World’ as there are those who own it, including you!’

Civilisation had indeed come a long way. Merely five years from the new millennium when the world was priding itself of great democratic achievements, the struggle for socio-political, economic and environmental justice was dealt a terminal blow when the Nigerian activist and writer Ken Saro-wiwa and eight others; BARIBOR BERA, SATURDAY DOBEE, NORDU EAWO, DANIEL GBOKOO, BARINEM KIOBEL, JOHN KPUINEN, PAUL LEVURA and FELIX NUATE, were hanged in broad daylight for lifting the voice of the Ogoni people of the Delta State of Nigeria. It was on the chilly morning of November 10, 1995. The world is still to come to terms with the ghastly act, which was perpetrated by a horde of self-declared Statesmen

"Standstill Moment" at the Bielañski Cultural Centre

The Bielañski Cultural Centre shall host the play Standstill Moment on Wednesday October 26., at 6p.m. The play shall be staged by the Migrator Theatre. We shall have a unique opportunity to encounter a cultural melting pot of African as well as European countries and learn more about the situation, problems and feelings of the actors living in Poland. In view of this coming event, Gazeta Bielañski requested a conversation with the organizer of the whole affair— writer, poet, journalist and Secretary General of the Association of Exiles in Poland – the Cameroonian Simon Mol.

I Dance

By Simon Mol

I dance, watching others dance
I dance seeing them tell their stories
in the language of the joyous spirit weeping within
I dance,
I dance,
I dance knowing it’s all too brief
the dance of the heart,
that of the Universe.

2:45a.m.
Enclava: 20/10/05

Beauty and sorrow in the city

By Joanna WoŸniczko (Gazeta Wyborcza, 23/09/05)

‘Joy and sorrow are international languages’, says Simon Mol, director of the play ‘Standstill Moment’, which was staged yesterday in Victoria hotel. Africans, Asians and Europeans took part in it.

‘Oh God all’s cool— cool girls, cool guys’, says the impulsive Angolan actor to the public; the performance of Standstill Moment by the group Migrator Theatre begins.

Stand-still Moment: A Review

Author and Director: Simon Mol

Length: 1 hour
Actors:
Exile Masters (Theatre group of the Association of Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Poland - Actors are drawn from over seven different countries)
Inspired by the poem the ‘Stand-still Moment’ this mystical, musical spectacle shows ‘the beauty and bestiality of a city’ through the combination of Caucasian, Oriental and African dances. Well knitted together, these cross-cultural ingredients rightly portray ‘Happiness and Grief’ as natural human legacies, irrespective of race or culture. Above all, the entire play displays the runs that the human emotional mechanism experiences in the course of incarnation.

My Humanity under Siege

By Simon Mol

September 9, 2005 pressed me to a crucial battle against forces plotting to snatch my humanity from its sacred sanctuary in my personality.

About a month ago I ran into two individuals at a shopping centre. It was close to midnight. We ran into a conversation and they said they were after work and were on their way home. They said they were scared to take a bus as it was too late. The previous day they had run into a group of young hooligans who harassed them. I offered them a lift to their destination, about fifteen kilometers away. On the way I realized that I was short of fuel and stopped at a filling station along Kondratowicza Street in Targowek. I don’t recall how much fuel I took. However I remember going into the shop to pay for the fuel. I remember this very well.

Has the African Woman a Voice?

With over 200 people in attendance, the debate 'Mama Africa: Has the African Woman a Voice’ went underway at Cafe Kulturalna, Warsaw, July 20th. There was a compelling representation of the African Community in Poland, creamed by diplomatic missions. Among them was the South African ambassador to Poland Her Excellency Mrs. Febe Potiegier-Gqubule, who was accompanied by first secretary Zola Nkatchani. There were two representatives from the Libyan embassy as well as the first secretary of the Angolan embassy.

Wojcieh Albiñski: A Literary Ally

Simon  Mol

In an age where one could postulate that the media has evolved into a form of popular religion, people read and react to what they read. The mind thrives on information, the body reacts to the dictates of the mind, and the human psyche, as a result of these reactions, soars or drowns. Hence everything is attributed to the written word, fictitious or factual. 

Call of the Jungle

Simon Mol

Number. Back to numbers;
One to Infinity
‘Now’ to the beginning lost in count
like a string of silk blown by the wind that falls—
winding its way through grass.

Rain—sound of Rain,
reign nonstop.
How to reach out Memory—
Grasp June again,
Squeeze those seconds
Touch Space, feel leaves,
Smile… hold on,
Smell dew in Jungle air and be healed over again?

Refugees in Poland bring attention to plight of asylum seekers with theatre

Michal Zajac (Radio Prague, 24.6.2005)

"Journeys in a New Homeland" is the title of a play written by a Cameroonian refugee, Simon Mol, and shown to Polish audiences by a team of refugee-actors seeking asylum in Poland.

The play opens with a symbolic argument between a drummer and guitarist. This, in turn, leads to a widespread bloody conflict.