MedinaPedia

« You really use Wikipedia to do research ? How lazy and superficial ! »

A sentence I have been hearing for years, whether in high school, university, work or anywhere else. Eventually, even I started underestimating people who use Wikipedia as a credible source, despite the fact that I kept using it secretly. I had stayed this way until three years ago when I fell in love with the Medina of Tunis and tried to discover it. To be honest, I didn’t try to buy or borrow any history books to read. It was summer and I wanted to have an exciting adventure. So what I did was that I went directly to the Medina with a map and tried to find the historical sites and some basic information about them using my phone. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything about most of the Medina sites in Wikipedia. I found some PDF versions of historical books, but as I said earlier, I didn’t want to spend my day locked in my room reading a written description about a building that I can visit for real and enjoy directly. Also, all I was looking for was just some simple information like when and by whom the building was founded, the origin of its name, the original use of it and some old photos of either of how it was before, or current ones (especially if the place is not allowed to public access). So as you can see, I didn’t reach my goal to get to know the Medina better and discover its wealth and beauty, until last September when I met the MedinaPedia team and joined it.

MedinaPedia is a project in which members do research about different buildings in the Medina, collect photos of them and assemble them in well-structured Wikipedia articles. At the begining, I was terrified : Are we going to write the history of our Medina and share it on a worldwilde platform? We’re not even history students. What if we write false information? Do we have proof of our credibility? Our language is not that sophisticated, what if we make grammar mistakes? And mostly, how are we going to write a Wikipedia article? We don’t even know the codes and the tools of the platform. But thankfully, our coordinators and the trainers believed in us. And after some training sessions and a lot of questions, writing or translating the article became an easy task. But the main important thing that was for me the most enriching part, was having access to the library of Dar Lasram and some of its precious documents about the Medina (I had to read some books, but this time it was interesting). It made me discover many amazing facts about my Tunisian roots which made me more proud of my background and strenghthened my passion toward it.

Apart from the personal impact MedinaPedia had on me, it had a larger impact on my society and other people interested in the Medina’s treasures. Because thanks to the articles we wrote and shared, the secrets of the Medina’s palaces, mosques, medrasas and souks, are now revealed. Now any visitor or local wanting to get informed about a specific building, will most likely get a basic description of it and won’t have to get through the disappointement I’ve been through in my first attempt. And the impact that I doubted will happen at the begining was more clear during the Interference Festival in the Medina. I was a tour guide, and all the knowledge I got while writing the articles helped me accomplish properly my mission when presenting the sites for the visitors. None of the visitors I guided during the festival believed that I am a medical student and that I have no relation with history school.

At the end of every night during the festival, I would check the statistics on my Wikipedia account, and I would find a huge number of views on our articles. This proved that many like me, used Wikipedia to know more about the places they visited. And thanks to MedinaPedia, all their eager was fullfilled. And for sure, they are Medina lovers now.

So now, I am proud to say that not only I use Wikipedia for my researches, but also, I write them.

P.S: Link to all my Wikipedia contribibutions: https://tools.wmflabs.org/guc/?user=Houssem+Abida

Public Taste

Public taste ! That was the word of the day for me. It was in a small debate about litterature in Tunisia when a participant (who turned out to be working in a publishing house) mentionned it by saying : we cannot publish and sell every book that is submitted for us because we are responsible of protecting the public taste that we respect and guarantee a minimum level for our readers. According to her and some other participants, not everyone has the right to write or produce. Not everyone is creative or smart to « bring a plus » or add something to the Tunisian artistic heritage.  They think that because of the development of communication technologies and mostly the freedom of expression after the revolution, we are witnessing a new phenomen where everyone claims  to be an artist and writes something trying to share it with others. Also, this group finds that unfortunately, some of the famous writers we are familiar with their names  are over-rated and don’t deserve that much of recognition. While on the other hand, others who are worth the respect and the following ,are not enough famous need more appreciation. Finally,  they believe that it’s our fault as a community and youth specifically to not know about them and just read what the « over-rated » writers produce .

Well, my question is, based on what criteria you  judge a book or an art work in general if it is worth the recognition and the success he got ? Based on what criteria you give the right to someone to write and produce and deprive someone else of that right ?How do you know if he’s creative enough or not ? is it based on your personal taste ?Your surveys results ?The critic experts articles ?

Actually, don’t you think that the commercial artists you diminished their value changed millions of readers lives ?Made them smile even for a second or take them to another imaginary world none of the artists you’re defending could guide them too ?Don’t you see any creativity or power in attracting people to your thoughts and keeping them attached waiting for the upcoming books ?

Of course I cannot deny the fact that there are writers who deserve to be more known and under the spot. But that dosen’t mean that an artist is more important than others. Each one has his own special style that attracts a specific kind of followers or readers. So why stopping someone from writing under the pretext they are not enough creative or smart to do so. Why saying it’s a bad phenomen we’re witnessing that everyone is trying to write and publish? Let everyone express their thoughts and feelings .They are humans and they are creating something human. So for sure other humans on this earth will connect to it. Even if it reaches only one person’s heart ,that’s more than enough. Because isn’t that what art is all about :seeing what you live,feel,wish,hope for in someone else’s work ? getting inspiration ,motivation and power to survive and continue the daily struggle of life ? isn’t art letting all the energy prisonned inside of us get liberated and shine on others ? I believe art is the best way to link people and reach cohesion. So why cutting this beautiful link and depriving some people of their right to live and to inspire others to live too ?Everyone has his own problems, concerns, hopes and dreams that makes our different tastes and ways to see life. So why looking for a « public taste » that extract this beautiful enriching difference that makes us humans and just turns us into animals who look for the same things ?

Photos: Medina Book Club

Rencontres fortuites

Ce qui nous emporte dans l’exiguïté des choses
Ne peut provenir de la vastitude
Nous passons notre vie
A rêver de l’immensité de l'horizon et
Nous finissons tôt ou tard par
Nous retrouver coincés dans
          [l'étroitesse du monde

Mais où vont nos pieds
Quand ils n'ont point d'adresses ?
Nul n'est doué pour les rencontres fortuites et
A la recherche d'un destin,
Des pas ne cessent de se faire
Alors pas ne cessent de se faire
Alors que tout, s'est depuis longtemps arrêté.


Slaheddine Haddad
A La Goulette, une envie désordonnée de Petite Sicile.

In New York

Participating in the ECOSOC youth forum was probably the most exciting experience for me. Apart from the fact that it was my second trip ever and to one of my dream destinations, it was very enriching for me whether it was on an intellectual, professional or even emotional level.

 Since the first day we arrived, we didn’t stop having activities that allowed me to meet new people from different ages, backgrounds, countries and beliefs. The one thing we had in common was our eagerness to know more about  each other’s experiences and success stories and learn from each other’s mistakes. During the first two days, we participated in the youth forum in the headquarters of the United Nations. I got the chance to meet in person and talk with worldwide leaders like Trisha Shetty and Ahmed Al Hindawi with whom I had deep and rich conversations. I got to discover how it works at the United Nations, and the most exciting part was meeting with the official Tunisian delegation. I am still in touch with the Tunisian youth ambassador Mohamed Ghedira who turned out to be a medical student like me (we connected through our guilt for skipping classes). We were honored to be invited to the breakfast meeting organized by his team and be part of the Tunisian delegation.  I also met Tunisians who work in non-Tunisian organizations like the Spanish mission and the french-speaking world organization who were very welcoming and invited Hayfa and me to their side event.

After that, we had a very busy schedule for the remaining days. We had meetings with the Jordanian, Saudi and Danish embassies where in each one, some of the finalists of the Youth Leadership Program presented their projects. I got the honor to present in front of the Danish one with the presence of some UK representatives. What I liked about the ambassy meetings was the difference between the welcomings, which reflected each country’s culture and history.

Another interesting activity we had - and this was the one that affected me emotionnally - was visiting an exhibition in New York University of an American Palestinian artist called Jacqueline Reem Sallom The idea of the exhibition and the artworks really touched me and inspired me for a cultural project in Tunisia with the collaboration of the artist herself .

When it comes to my project InstaDoc, I got huge technical help during a meeting we had with some of the Governance Lab experts from New York University. My main concern about my mobile application was how to attract investors in order to finance it. Also, they showed me some similar ideas in other countries and focused on the pros and cons of each one.

One amazing person Hayfa and I met (and fell in love with too) was Usen Esiet, the associate social media analyst in the UNFPA. He made us in charge of the UNFPA instagram account. He introduced me as well to an awesome Palestinian makeup artist with whom I had a whole afternoon conversation about arts and their role in advocating social problems. And one other amazing thing he did for us is showing us a 5D short film about children marriage in the Syrian refugees camps and introducing us to the filmmaker himself. It was a very strong and tough movie that made me ask a lot of questions.

I can’t forget how much this trip made me bond with my friends, the fellow participants from the other arab countries. I discoverd a lot of interesting things that made me love them and want to be like them, such as the strong personnality of Dima from Lebanon, the caring heart of Omnia from Egypt, the joyful spirit of Assil from Jordan, the spontaneous reactions of Waad from Kuwait, and  the peaceful artistic soul  from my dear roommate Ahmed from Palestine. They are all my idols and my new international family.

Of course my partner Hayfa from Tunisia was the biggest win for me in this whole experience. I got to meet and share some of our best and most embarrassing moments with an incredible, smart and joyful person I consider now as my little sister.

So as you can see, the Youth Leadership Program was not only a simple participation in a conference to present an idea and come back home. It was all about the precious exchange, the lessons and the human experiences I had during the whole week. Now after coming back to Tunisia, I am more loaded with extraordinary ideas I saw in New York applied in other countries. I have a larger network of professionals but mostly friends. I am more determined to be a better young citizen, and the best word I kept hearing the whole time, a real changemaker.

Heritage and innovation

Today we had a round table to discuss the issue of identity and cultural heritage with a group of young people coming from different backgrounds. «Does modifying our heritage or updating it threaten our identity and risks to destroy it ?» That was the question. What inspired us to organise this meeting was that we recieved a feedback saying that if we want to promote our heritage, organising wrokshops may not be the right choice.

We started with a definition of heritage, and one participant said that it’s «something we inherit from our parents and transmit as it is to our children» which makes it sacred and untouchable. According to her «You don’t have the right to modify it as it’s a proof of our history. Otherwise, we will lose what makes a building’s architecture Tunisian, a dish’s flavor Tunisian, a musical rythm Tunisian etc. and makes it something you can find everywhere in the world. She finds that we are living in an era where things develop quickly every single day, and if we apply that to our heritage as well, we won’t get to witness anything Tunisian reflecting our identity in just a matter of a few years.
As a response for that, another person stated that he cannot imagine himself transmiting to his children something that dosen’t have his own touch and that in fact, cultural heritage is the accumulation of our ancesters’ different footprints and that now we should add ours. The majority said that we do have to make heritage continue its natural evolution otherwise it will disappear by suffocating. But we need to introduce the adequate doses of «modernity» so that we keep the local identity. And to make that clearer, the participants started giving examples for innovation in cultural heritage. It appeared that almost all of them show that innovation in heritage means taking a work that’s already existing and updating it or adding some personal touches: turning an old house into a hotel, adding electronic music to a traditionnal song, changing some difficut words in a poem with easier ones to make it more understandable. Also, according the some, not everyone has the right to do it. In order to do such things, you have to be an expert in the history or the heritage of the country. Otherwise, modernity and external cultures can flood you and make you get an overdose of updating that erases the true identity.

From all of these statements and other reflections I made in other occasions, I could make my personal point of view toward this issue. Actually, when it comes to the definition of cultural heritage, if we make a small basic research about the history of any historical monument in our country (or in any other country in the world I believe ), we’ll find out that its current architecture is the result of years and decades of evolution and constant modification, whether it is Spanish, Turkish, Arabic, European etc. So who has the right to say that we should stop evolving, that our cultural heritage must remain the same and that our only duty towards it is to just protect it from any other new modification? I believe cultural heritage is exactly like a flower: if you keep it in a room hoping to protect it from external danger, it will eventually faint and die. Our culture depends on the surrounding cultures. It gets richer and wealthier by interfering with them. If we applied what some people thought of artists five centuries ago, our heritage wouldn’t be as it is now. Our current identity includes the modern items and the exchange with other cultures and that’s something most people deny. They consider it as just a manifestation of invasion and intellectual colonisation.

And when it comes to innovation, why does it always have to

be based on something already existing? Why does innovation mean only restauring  a building or rearranging a music piece? Why is the starting point for such a thing another artist‘s work claiming to revive it and make people hear of it again? I agree that it’s interesting and good to show what we have, but at the same time, doesn’t it create limits for creativity? Doesn’t it oblige the artist to always follow what has already been created and just add small modifications? Why can’t the artist’s identity be the starting point?

And this gets me to the last point I noticed: Identity and heritage are not only the arts we see, they are also the stories we hear, the locals’ way of life that, the communication manners  in the community. Even the place and the way we gathered today reflect some Tunisian criteria. I just came back from an exchange program and everyone noticed that we Tunisians have an extreme desire for having fun and partying, unlike participants coming from other countries. Well, for me that’s another aspect of our identity that we don’t really appreciate, or rather neglect. So why can’t all of this be a good material for new artistic work that reflects artistic innovation? And maybe the biggest question that I still didn’t find an adequate answer for - for those who said that innovation in cultural heritage needs to be done while repecting some doses of modifications - is : How can we know if we reached these doses?

By Houssem Abida

Edited by Nesrine Chemkhi

Photos :Amenallah Latrous