La SAPE. Société des Ambianceurs et des Personnes Élégantes, in other words, Society of Tastemakers and Elegant People. You could probably imagine this group of people being set anywhere in the world except for Brazzaville, Congo.
This group of elegant Men and Women believe in the beauty that is life and transmits it through their choice in clothing. Pink, green, blue, yellow, skirts, trousers, vests, pocket watches are all acceptable as long as you are creative, young-hearted and peaceful.
Guinness Ad. Full documentary at the end of the article.
Congo has a long history of being a violent country, and Brazzaville was no different. Recently, the city has come to peace, and the Sapeurs were able to express themselves again. The Guinness label smartly used these men who come from a poor background as an advertising campaign because they know how to appreciate what is given to them.
Now you see, it is not about the brand of the clothes, where they come from, or even who owns them. They share, they make and mix-match to make sure they are as elegant as they possibly can. They are creative, they are happy, and they use this little bit of joy to overcome their worries. They are able to choose who they want to be, and they choose to be the best at it.
"Being a sapeur is not about the money (...) Its not the cost of the suit that counts. Its worth of the men inside it."
Just a day before I was presented to the marvellous life of the Sapeurs, I had a lecture about Theodor W. Adorno, an associate at the Institute of Social Research, in the School of Frankfurt. The school was the creator of the sociological discipline of critical thinking, and Adorno himself had a very critical view of society.
Being born in a Jewish house, he had to flee the Nazis to England where he situated himself in the prestigious Oxford University. After living through the War and its destroyed cities, Adorno claimed nobody is entitled to create poetry or art after the events of the Holocaust. He strongly believed his manifest of how a piece of art, whatever medium it may be, should never make us confortable or happy because the world itself should not be a happy place.
"To write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. And this corrodes even the knowledge of why it has become impossible to write poetry even today.
Critical intelligence cannot be equal to this challenge as long as it confines itself to self-satisfied contemplation"
T. W. Adorno, "Cultural Criticism (Kulturkritik) and Society" (1949)
He later mentions how poetry should be made, if the people who were involved and taken to concentration camps wanted to use it as a way to express themselves. For him, this would be the only truly meaningful type of art.
It is entirely understandable for someone who has suffered to grief over impacting events. The holocaust has no doubt had an effect in the whole world as it is spoken of until today. It is extremely important for us to understand current events, and use it as means of growth. Its is even more admirable to overcome these events without diminishing them.
The community that resides in Brazzaville has indeed suffered long years of war, and through embracing it as part of their pasts, they moved on, deciding to reach our for a path of happiness. It doesn't matter what event is a worse event - we shouldn't compare the Second World War to Congo, or the Gaza Strip, or to anything else for that matter. Each event will impact differently and deeply the people involved and is their own decision to choose to move on or not.
I want to live as a Sapeur, and I hope to keep on living as joyfully as them even if life presents me with a harsh situation. We should not hold on to the past, neither fear the future, but always live in the present.
Live with "joyeux de vivre".
Congratulations Guinness, for reminding me to live colourfully and creatively. Congratulations for the members of the SAPE for knowing how to live. For the full documentary:
Guinness Short Documentary.
