My latest Azonto video, “SnowZonto” filmed around downtown Madison, WI with a little traditional African culture tied in. Hope you find this amusing! 
Enjoy
SnowZonto in Madison, WI
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Tag Archives: azonto
AZONTO: From Ghana, to West Africa, to the rest of the World
AZONTO….?
It’s a bird!? It’s a name!? No…. It’s a SUPER-MANIC dance that is taking over dance floors in clubs and parties world wide!
If you haven’t heard of it yet, I’m sure your Africans friends have. Pronounced, “ah, zone, toe”, kind of rhyming with “I don’t know” (Well…keep reading and you will!), Azonto is on its way to becoming one of the most popular dances world wide. Originated in Ghana, Azonto is an expressive dance, where you can basically do what ever you want while moving to the rhythm. Some popular moves include mimicking the following activities: washing your clothes by hand, calling out a girl you find attractive, making a phone call, and boxing. Sounds humorous, but so does “the moon walk”, and that seemed to impress people.
Azonto has blown up on youtube. From tutorials, to skits, to music videos, to battles, to Azontoing in public across the globe, Azonto is penetrating the international dance market rapidly.
Here’s a recently article on Ghana’s Azonto Craze.
This is the video I shot dancing Azonto around Ghana: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XBWG-UVzJg
But, if you really want to learn, I’d suggest watching one of the hundreds of tutorials on youtube.
Oh, and by the way, it’s like the most fun dance you could ever think of. It always puts you in a good mood (but makes you wish you were in Ghana where it’s acceptable to Azonto in any given circumstance), and there’s no “right” or “wrong” way to do it. You could be brushing your teeth, picking your nose, playing basketball, as long as you do it to the beat and make it look stylish. Not many dances easily migrate through language barriers, but Azonto, being as expressive and versatile as it is, has become a universal dance across the world.
Most of my friends know about it, mostly because anywhere we go that has music playing, I end up dancing by myself, even though other people look at me and think I am wasted and dancing like a fruit cake. I lived in Ghana for over four months, and it took be about 3 months to feel comfortable doing it, and another month on top of that to feel like I was actually doing it properly.
Azonto competitions have taken place in the London, Toronto, NYC, and Chicago. It’s coming soon to Madison. My housemates and I threw a party last weekend, and our friend DJed. During the party he played a short clip of an Azonto track, and people danced! They were already dancing before he put on the song, but hey, they DIDN’T STOP dancing!
I’ve been to Ghana, where kids learn how to Dance Azonto, mimicking the activities in the form of dance, before they learn how to do the activities themselves. I traveled around Ghana, and whenever I stumbled upon someone who didn’t understand English, they understood Azonto. Maybe I couldn’t ask what time the bus was coming and where it was going in the form of dance, but it always generated a smile!
Youtube: “Azonto” yourself, and see how many videos come up. It’s only getting bigger and bigger, and the later you jump on the bandwagon, the more you’re gonna think, “MAN! Jeremy was raving about that Azonto dance so long ago….I could have been the first one to whip it out in my friend group!” That goes for you, too, Grandma!
All love.
Jeremy Kwabena Ginsburg
aka
AzontObruni
Elmina Slave Castle
The Elmina slave castle was first built by the Portuguese (1482), but was taken over by the Dutch(1637), and then the British (1814). The Portuguese were known to have treated their slaves worse than the Dutch or the English. The castle was built about a few miles down the coast of Cape Coast Slave Castle, and there’s a watchtower right up the hill.
When we went to the Cape Coast Slave Castle (Barrack Obama went there on his visit to Ghana) a few months before, we toured it with our entire group. It was very emotional. We had a combination of whites, Africans, and African Americans on our tour. I feel like since everyone knew each other, people felt more comfortable to get emotional.
The Elmina slave castle was known to be more intense tour; it was one of the most popular castles used for slave trade. At its peak, around 30,000 thousand slaves strutted out of the infamous “door of no return” per year. Even if the castle averaged 10,000 slaves a year, you’re still looking at over 4 million slaves over 400 year stretch. AND THAT’S JUST ONE CASTLE!
Women were asked to lift this 25 kg cannon ball…if they did not succeed they were whipped 40 times.
As we walked around the castle, we were brought into large cellblocks that held hundreds of slaves at a time. You could still smell it! The smell of death: a built up of body odor, urine, feces, and lost hope. People talk about slavery occurring so long ago, almost as it’s just a story to learn from. But, being at this castle made it clear how REAL and recent it is.
We were on a group with some other foreigners, and a group of adults that were joking around throughout the tour. That kind of lightened the mood, which was less depressing, but it also hindered our experience. We were told about the female slaves that would be allowed to shower and get clean only so the masters could rape them. We saw the trap doors that allowed the guards to secretly rape the slaves AGAIN after they had been raped by the head of the castle. So sickening. So gruesome. So sad.
What’s crazy to me is that outside of the slave castle, normal life goes on as if there is no depressing historic sight near by. The town is not built on tourism from these castles at all. At first I didn’t like it. Hundreds of years of suffering, millions of lives lost, generations of enslavement, and unless you stepped foot inside the castle, you would have no idea how disheartening Cape Coast’s history is. Yet, the sight of kids playing basketball, people hanging out by the water, and sailors setting off for a nights work represented freedom. 
These sights are constant reminders that the past in the past. As important as it is to remember what has happened and to also learn from it, it is also important to move on in life in order to live a life filled with freedom. The workers outside of the Elmina slave castle may not live a luxurious life, but they’re finally free. Free from European rule. More importantly, they are free from enslavement.
Cape Coast is filled with churches and other buildings built by the Dutch, Portuguese, or the English. Those tall buildings serve as a reminder to all of the people of Ghana how far they’ve come.
All love.
Jeremy Kwabena Ginsburg
