March 23, 2006
Téléphone Trottoire
In a country where free speech has been censored for over forty years, Congolese people spread information while standing on the pavement – by ‘Radio Trottoire’ (sidewalk radio) or ‘pavement radio’.
Mongrel’s Téléphone Trottoire (sidewalk telephone) is a radio programme that can be passed between telephone users, encouraging London’s Congolese community to share music tracks and news extracts and discuss them over their phones.
... “Telephone Trottoire” randomly phones up radio listeners and plays them tracks from the “Nostalgie Ya Mboka” music archive or news extracts from “Londres Na Biso”. Each listener then has the option of recording a response or passing the call on to another number of their choice. Congolese music and culture will eventually ripple out to anyone with a phone number.
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