Carnet de Voyage is simply a description of the "Voyage" of my life: Where I am from, where I have been where I want to go. It's also a description of what I like to do, my favorite music. Simplement un "voyage de la Vie.
Oliver Ngoma, un artiste pas comme les autres. Sa musique restera toujours dans nos coeurs
Decouvrez quelques musiques de notre cher chanteur Oliver Ngoma qui nous emporte dans la douceur tropicale. I can take a day to listen to his music over and over again
Oliver Ngoma: Fely
Oliver Ngoma: Nge
Oliver Ngoma: Bane
"Adia"
Et bien d'autres de ses chansons que vous pouvez decouvrir sour youtube.com, daily motion etc.
La musique Gabonaise est diversifiee. Nous avons la musique traditionelle, l'ancien folklore, de la biguine, du rap et bien d'autres genre. Elle n'est peut etre pas vraiment connue internationalement comparee a certains autres pays Africains mais les chanteurs Gabonais comme le groupe Movaizhaleine mais aussi Oliver N'goma et Pierre Akedengue qui sont tous deux chanteurs de la biguine que j'aime beaucoup! sont assez apprecies dans d'autres pays.
Notre chere chanteuse Annie Flore Batchielillys reste une artiste tres authentique attachee a sa culture, son pays sa tradition. Une chanteuse tres poetique aussi appreciee internationalement. Il en est de meme pour Patience Dabany.
Actuellement au Gabon il ya une variete de nouveaux et d'anciens artistes remarquables a cause de leur originalites puisees dans leur source mais aussi de leur talent. J'aimerais partager quelques images et music du Gabon. Si vous appreciez laissez des commentaires. Merci!
Pour decouvrir la musique Gabonaise avec les differents artistes je vous invite a aller sur youtube et sur le site dolcegaboma, le premier espace multimedia Gabonais.
C;est toujours un plaisir d'ecouter Annie Flore batchielillys parce qu'elle me rapelle mes origines, ma terre. Decouvrez sa musique a travers cette video
Annie Flore Batchiellilys: Le Chant c'est Mon Champ
Si vous aimez le rap ou le hip-hop, vous ne serez pas decus du groupe Movaizhaleine. Leur style et leur textes font d'eux un groupe tres original. Decouvrez leur musique! dans ce site: http://www.myspace.com/movaizhaleine
Movaizhaleine: Engogol
"Bi Se Fe nale"
various artists from Gabon. J'essaye de poster quelques unes en esperant que vous apprecierez Enjoy!
The magazines that were given to me at Gabon embassy at Washington DC
Gabon has an oral tradition.
Gabon's map
Libreville's coast beach
Gabon is a country situated on the west coast of Africa. It is crossed by the equator line which makes it a country known for its rainforest and the diversities in its fauna and flora. Gabon was first discovered by a group of Portuguese navigators in the 15th century. They called Gabao meaning "Cloak" because of the shape of the Estuary side. It then later after the French arrivals on the territory was named Gabon. Gabon became an independent country in august 17th 1960. The capital and political city is Libreville which means Free town in English because of its slavery history past. Some random slaves went back to Africa on a ship and found themselves at the coast of Gabon that they named Libreville.
"Survivor" 2008 in Gabon
Many interesting events took place in Gabon such as a the 17th season of the well known reality TV show named Survivor in 2008. Also the African Soccer Cup took place in Gabon last year 2012. Some celebrities visited our national parks. In this post I just want to share some nice pictures of Gabon also I share pictures of my own Gabonese memories.
It is always a great pleasure for me to share some pictures of Arts and memories. I hope you will like seeing them! The selected pictures are from my own files for some of them and others are from other websites. Gabon uses a currency named CFA which is obviously not a powerful one but that's the one used in many countries in Africa.
Gabon is a French speaking country situated in West central Africa. The capital city is Libreville. Gabon shares its borders with Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon and the Republic of Congo. Also, the country is located on the Atlantic coast. The Gabonese land is mostly covered with rain forest but also with savana, and mountains such as the Cristal Mountains and the Chaillu Massif. The Ogooue is the largest river (1200km) in the Plateaux Batekes. This river was discovered by famous Europeans explorers such as, Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, Mary Kingsley. . .
picture of the British explorer woman: Mary Kingsley
A little bit of History event again: A young man named "El Yanga" or simply Nyanga (Like the name of one of the provinces of the country) who was from a Gabonese royal family. An African abolitionist and leader of slave rebellion in Mexico. He was kidnapped from Gabon to Vera Cruz/ Mexico where he later became the head of a group of slaves revolutionist. That event happened around 1570. If you are interested, you can read his story at this link: http://www.aaregistry.org/historic_events/view/yanga-african-abolitionist-and-rebel-mexico
The Gabonese Gray parrot known for its ability to speak like humans. He is our national symbol
He is so smart!!
Libreville
coins and an image from done by the Gabonese humorist Lybek
Natural landscape: The artisanal bridge at Poubara
Poubara waterfalls
some archives that I keep with me
A woman's face in a Mbigou stone A little bit of History again: There is an old St Paul's cathedral named Donguila Mission in the Estuaire province. That cathedral was built in 1878 by European missionaries. Many tourists from other countries like to visit this piece of History and because they like the landscape. The Mission Donguila is built on the coast of the Komo river. Donguila is my village!!
Donguila Mission was involved and still is involved in social activities with the help of missionaries. The Mission has a school that was already active many years ago. The first president of Gabon attended the boy school of Donguila. Also,Mary Kingsley a British explorer during her trip in west Africa went through the Oggoue river, the Komo river and went to Donguila as well.
The story of Mary Kingsley has always impressed me because she was not only a woman but she was a woman explorer. She was a really brave woman. She wrote a book about her trip in West Africa.
Donguila Mission is built on River Komo This is a picture of how it looks inside the church
I was lucky I did the trip on boat few times from Donguila to Libreville. Donguila is on the opposite side of Pointe Denis. Pointe Denis is not far from Libreville the capital city and it was a really good experience!! I hope to do it again.
This is the Komo River. The view from Donguila Mission (Not my picture)
Gabonese flag
The Gabonese flag is green, yellow, blue (Green to represent our rich rainforest, yellow for the sun and blue for the ocean since the country is on the coast of the African continent) Because of its natural resources the country is known for its oil exploitation and its international exportation of the natural resources. Many international oil companies are based in Gabon.
Gabonese engineers
Gamba is a little town in Gabon and they do oil exploitation. It has very natural landscape. I went there I think four times and I loved the nature!
Also the exploitation and international exportation of its woods (The okoume a gigantic tree)
Une oeuvre d'Art du peintre Gabonais George Mbourou
My postal cards! Le Gabon en couleurs!
Une danseuse Gabonaise. (Art work from a Gabonese painter Georges Mbourou. A woman dancing in a traditional clothe and holding a little drum on her hand) ) Oeuvre du peintre Gabonais Georges Mbourou
Mes cartes postales que je garde precieusement!
A little bit of culture: braiding our hair. It is common.
Also, I wanted to show you some of the traditional masks that we have. They were used for special events and circumstances. They all have different meanings
What about the traditional dances. There are many of them I can only put a little bit:
Vickoss Ekondo: "Lost Voices"
Another style that I share it's a traditional dance called DeGaulle. This is funny story. As you can see men and women complain about the same thing it doesn't matter where you are from lol! Enjoy!
In Gabon like in other countries we make movies and TV series.
I share some of TV series that were recently produced. The actors speak in French unfortunately there is no translation. However I invite you to watch them if you can...You can find some of the episodes in youtube.com. The comedians are good! You will like the suspense, drama etc. Have fun!
"Kiara"
Another one that I recently found out. I like the theme of this TV serie. The name is "Ndossi"
The natural landscape of Gabon is simply beautiful I share some pictures I hope you will like them as well.
Landscape
I took this picture in a shop they were selling our Gray parrot. I was sad because it is one of our national symbols and the grey parrot of Gabon has something special compared to others it learns to speak like human, they are really smart they record things in their brain and they easily imitate human voices. Many parrots do not have this ability.
I don't really like the fact that they are sold out of the country. It saddens me to see them out because they represent a lot to us. I just hope that our government will do everything to protect our grey parrots and keep them otherwise they will disappear from our land.
We have different breed of elephants but the one that we like the most is the shortest one with big ears because they are foodie and funny. The name of this breed is called "Assala". Unfortunately, we have a lost a lot of elephants recently. Many were killed by illegal hunters ...It is really sad.
strolling on the Oggoue River
Oggoue river
Libreville
beach coast at Libreville
Okoume a giant tree
Like any other countries in the world,Gabon likes sports. We have a proud national team of soccer named "The Panthers". Some of the soccer players play for some other international soccer teams. Unfortunately our soccer team are not going to be able to play for this coming world cup of soccer 2014 in Brazil.
our soccer team' symbol
Gabonese soccer team in national colors.
We also had last year our first world champion in Taekwondo
Anthony Obame
raphia from Gabon
Gabon has beautiful women as well. We organize interesting events like election of miss Gabon pageant like any other countries. We recently had a new one for this year.
Our former Miss Gabon (For Miss Universe pageant in this picture).
Mbigou stone from Gabon
There are interesting touristic sites such as the Hospital Schweitzer established in 1913 in Lambarene a little town in Gabon (Moyen Oggoue). The hospital was created by Albert Schweitzer a German a theologist, a philanthropist and a medical doctor. Dr Albert Schweitzer worked as a surgeon and provided free health services to the population of Lambarene. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1952/schweitzer-bio.html
Dr Albert Schweitzer
Dr. Albert Schweitzer's hospital on the border of the river named Moyen Oggoue/ Lambarene (view from the top)
That picture was accidentally taken during the vacations and it ended up be one of my favorites why? Because this is a coconut tree and the sea there it's on the coast of Libreville. I can smell the sea through that picture (smile) the sand...From this picture you can see a portion of earth on the sea: This is Pointe Denis!
You might wonder how Pointe Denis looks like and where is it. Pointe Denis is a nice portion on earth in the sea like I just said and it is not far from the capital city Libreville It is just on the opposite and you can see it from the beach. People just go with little boat and they really like going there. It is a good place to go for weekends. Here are some pictures of la Pointe Denis (They have a Facebook page where they share all the activities happening there, tourism, protection of marine turtles...)
now I want to show you our happy and proud wildlife (fauna)
Hippopotamus swimming in the sea enjoying the water as usual.
Gorillas with silvered back a specie only found in Central Africa especially in Gabon
Elephants
cheetah
rainforest buffalo
It took a plunge! He likes the water too (smile)
the sunset at Libreville
Next, I want to share other types of pictures. Here are some pieces of Art from Gabon. Handcraft work I hope you will like them
Some pictures of Gabon laid on a hand made carpet done in vegetal natural raphia
handmade carpet done with vegetal fibers named raphia
An African woman with her baby on her back working
A handmade bag done with natural vegetal fibers called raphia. Some handmade flip flop made in raphia
envelopes and postal card things that I love!
Now a little bit of fashion:
a handmade bracelet done in a rainforest buffalo's horn
Traditional dress and necklace
A bracelet with the three colors of my country's flag made by my nephew for me
hand made slippers
Well I hope you enjoyed the presentation. Please drop some comments if you have ideas or experiences to share I will be glad to read them I will really appreciate it. Here a website where you can have more idea of tourism to Gabon http://www.bradtguides.com/destinations/africa/gabon/libreville.html
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Libreville (road on the coast beach)
My postal cards! Le Gabon en couleurs!
A little bit of culture: braiding our hair. It is common.
Libreville
