IN THE PUBLICATION’S OWN WORDS
The story of this edition
Aoussou Festival — 59th edition · 2018
- Along the tourist road (the corniche) overlooking Boujaafar beach in Sousse, Tunisia, floats bearing symbols and giant puppets that capture the character of the coastal city paraded past one after another, launching the 59th edition of the “Aoussou Carnival”.
- On Thursday evening the city pulsed to the beat of music, colour and drums, before a crowd of close to a thousand spectators, according to security sources.
- Among the floats that tend to draw the crowd’s attention is the “Aoussou” float, which carries the “god of the sea” and re-enacts a historical legend.
- The figure appeared wearing the shirt of the sports club of Tunisia’s Sahel region, Étoile Sportive du Sahel.
- The “Bounty of the Sea” float, for its part, displayed what the Mediterranean offers the people of the Sahel: fish, coral and other marine riches.
- The performances during the “carnival”, which lasted more than two hours, were varied: Tunisian Sufi troupes and dance tableaux with more elaborate and more varied routines, joined by parade troupes from Nice, in France, as well as from Algeria and Russia.
- The carnival is part of the “Aoussou Festival”, which coincides with the 61st anniversary of the proclamation of the Republic, on 25 July each year.
- “The festival drew large crowds for the fireworks (a tradition the organisers keep up on the eve of the carnival).”
IMAGE FROM THE ORIGINAL PUBLICATION