Now l should like to tell the dockside tales of Bahia. Old sailors who mend sails, pilots of sloops, tattooed blacks, rogues, all know these stories and these songs. I would hear them on moonlight nights on the Market wharf, in fairs, in small ports around the bay, next to huge Swedish ships at the piers in Ilheus. Iemanja’s people have much to tell.
(from Sea of Death by Jorge Amado de Faria, translated from the Portuguese by Gregory Rabassa)
New Spirit and the OpenRestaurants Festival take you to a special journey, when Alliance House is transformed, for one night, into a ship that will take you on the voyage of your dreams in a city with no sea. On a night that combines two art forms — food and performance — we will sweep you away, deep into a fantasy of food, voyages, and the sea, as only the stage and the table can do.
We will sail our ship upon the waves of imagination — from the moment you climb the gangplank and we plot our course for the open sea, to a sailors’ celebration rich with Mediterranean dishes and ouzo poured out astern like water, to an umbrella party on deck. Your voyage comes with a show by performance artists together with works of sound, video, lighting, and music that will immerse you into the world of sailing. All these activities, together with the Pandora Collective and a show by the Yanookis Taverna band, will take you to exotic destinations that you never dreamed of.
Pack only what you need, and don’t forget your curiosity and your appetite!
19:30 Door Opening
19:35 Wandering all over the top floor level
21:45 The main event at the back of the ship in the basement of the Alliance House
*The food that will be served is Kosher, but without Kosher certificate
Photos credit: Tomer Foltin