Podcast | Where were you on January 14?

Throughout the year leading up to the tenth anniversary of the revolution, Inkyfada takes a look back on the events of January 14, 2011 in Tunis, through the personal accounts of individuals who were there. An alternative documentation of contemporary history based on many different perspectives.

Episode 6: a Battlefield

the Editorial Team
| 14 June 2020 | 22 minutes
May 13, 2020. Oussema, the sound engineer at Inkyfada, finishes the final details of the fifth episode of the series. He starts to share snippets of his January 14: the demonstrations that preceded, the awareness of the danger, the communal adrenalin rushes, the solidarity between comrades. Everything united against a single enemy - the police. Tunis was transformed into a battlefield, with its spoils of war, its trenches, its victories, its wounds and its victims. In this sixth episode, Oussema share his experience, while editing, mixing, and doing the sound design for his own story. 

Episode 5: Open Doors

the Editorial Team
| 14 May 2020 | 24 minutes

January 14, 2011. Like thousands of others, Bakhta El Cadhi, a trade unionist and feminist activist, and her daughter Haifa Jmour head to the protests. When police violence breaks out, they are separated and obligated to take refuge in different apartments in the city center, just a few dozen meters from each other. But behind the doors of these apartments, their experiences of this historic day will greatly diverge.

Episode 4: a Police Station on Fire

La rédaction
| 14 April 2020 | 33 minutes
January 14, 2011. A house in La Goulette which serves as HQ for the Revolution, a dozen friends, and a protest to prepare for. At 11am, they head towards the city center. Separated for hours and after many twists and turns, they each find their way back to La Goulette. When they arrive, the police station next to their house is in flames, and the group reluctantly decides to put the fire out. More than nine years later, digitally connected across different countries, Ghazi, Marion, Virginia, Wissal, Boumjida, Tarek, Juliette, Hayder, Charlene and Harzalli remember this unforgettable day and night. In the midst of the COVID-19 epidemic, they also compare this current moment to the past.

Episode 3: A Night at the Hotel

the Editorial Team
| 14 March 2020 | 30 minutes

January 14, 2011. Nedra Ben Smail, psychoanalyst, cancels all of her sessions for the day. An "intuitive" call pushes her to go to Habib Bourguiba Avenue, like thousands of other demonstrators. Just as the police begin the crackdown, using batons and tear gas, more than a hundred people take refuge in her hotel, the Carlton, just opposite the Ministry of Interior. When the curfew is declared, she will have to manage the situation, the police, and her own relationship to the violence of the moment. She retells the events of this evening, where she is both a witness and protagonist of moments that will "break into" her life and mark a collective and individual upheaval. An audio story of a night at the hotel.

Episode 2: The View from Above

the Editorial Team
| 14 February 2020 | 24 minutes

January 14, 2011. In this second episode of the series, photographer Hamideddine Bouali's destiny changes right after celebrating his 50th birthday. Hamideddine says it himself, he was not an activist, and "like most Tunisians" he was afraid. Before, he captured photos of Sidi Bou Saïd or the Medina, but on this Friday, January 14, he found the courage to immortalize this historic day "at close range." From rooftops and balconies, he documents unprecedented scenes, following the procession of Helmi, a young man killed the day before, to the front steps of the Ministry of Interior. The photographer tells the story behind the images stored in Tunisia's collective memory. 

Episode 1: Ben Ali Fled

the Editorial Team
| 14 January 2020 | 20 minutes
January 14, 2011. Like thousands of Tunisians, Imed heads to downtown Tunis to demonstrate against the Ben Ali dictatorship. Avoiding police repression and a curfew set for 5pm, Imed takes refuge at his friend Zein's home, situated above Café Univers: the mythical bar on Habib Bourguiba Avenue. Night falls, the streets are empty. Imed hears a voice that breaks the silence: "Ben Ali fled!" Abdennaceur Laouini, a lawyer known in militant circles, defies the lockdown and goes out to express his joy after learning that Ben Ali had fled the country. Imed joins him, takes out his phone, and films a video that will become a symbol of this historic day.
inkyfada.com is a project of the association Al Khatt