Saturday, June 13, 2009

African fiction

This week's Soundtrack Saturday post at Popdose centers on the 1988 film Coming to America, in which Eddie Murphy plays a prince who lives in the fictional African country of Zamunda.

On the seventh season of 24, which ended last month, some of the bad guys were from the fictional African country of Sangala.

If one were to create a fictional map of "the dark continent," would Zamunda and Sangala be anywhere near Matobo, the fictional African country in Sydney Pollack’s The Interpreter? (Ivory Coast native Isaach de BankolĂ© played the prime minister of Sangala this year on 24. His name? Ule Matobo.) Wikipedia has an entire page devoted to fake African nations, which makes me wonder if the continent's biggest import is intellectual-property lawyers.

My friend Paulina recently moved to Kenya for a contract position with the United Nations. Apparently it's a real country, but the name could use a rewrite. How about Kinjanja? Or even Kwanzaaland? I'm looking forward to your second draft, Paulina.

Speaking of the Democratic Republic of Kareemabduljabbar, the Associated Press reported on April 30 that thousands of Kenyan women had stopped having sex in order to protest the bickering of their country's male leaders. "We have seen that sex is the answer" when it comes to avoiding civil war in Kenya,
said Rukia Subow. It's hard to disagree with that assessment, ladies, but a man's gun, literal or otherwise, is inevitably going to off, with or without your help.

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