Safi – The Kanat Zaman festival opens in Safi today and runs through July 12, marking its fourth international edition under the slogan “From Every Land a Story.”

The program will bring together troupes from Spain and Italy together with Moroccan performers, around a single idea: reviving the old heritage of Safi and trading it with cultures from abroad.

It is organized by Association Historya, in partnership with the Safi commune and the provincial directorate of culture, and in cooperation with act4community.

A name for the old days

The festival takes its name from a Moroccan expression referring to days gone by. 

“We chose it because it evokes the past, the old stories and tales people used to tell,” Imane El Falhi, the association’s secretary-general, told MWN Lifestyle magazine.

The slogan grew out of that theme. “We wanted it to be an international edition, with people from different countries, where everyone comes to share their own culture,” she said.

From a youth group to an association

Historya began before it had a name. When El Falhi joined in 2023, it was still a collective called Asatir Asfi (Legends of Safi), a band of young people who ran activities for children and small charity drives.

“Then the idea came to move from a group to an association, and we called it Historya, because what it does stays in history,” she explained. The association is now five years old, and it widens its program each year.

Bringing the world to Safi

Reaching performers abroad came down to a single contact. 

“We met someone living in Safi who is of Italian origin, and he put us in touch with groups from other countries,” El Falhi recalled. The association covered the visiting troupes’ essential needs so they could take part.

This year’s guests headline the bill. The Italian group Briganti teaches pizzica, a folk dance from southern Italy, through sessions of traditional dance, rhythms and popular song. 

The Escuela de Flamenco El Boti will bring flamenco from Spain on July 11 and 12, in what the school calls its first performance outside the country.

Five days across the city

The visiting delegations arrived on July 8 for a reception and a guided tour billed as “Discover Safi,” and the festival opens to the public today. 

The mornings fill with workshops at the Maison des Arts et de la Culture(the City of Arts and Culture), and the program spreads across the city from there.

Its heart for Safi comes on July 10, when the festival will recreate Safi’s old souk at Dar Sultan. 

“We will recreate the old souk of Safi at Dar Sultan, the way it used to be, with the figures who once filled it,” El Falhi said.

July 11 will widen the frame with an afternoon symposium on heritage and evening street performances at Independence Square. 

The nights will lean on the city’s own traditions of songs, poems and stage plays, before a closing ceremony ends the fourth edition on July 12.

A festival built on memory

El Falhi framed the whole effort as an act of remembering. “The idea is not to forget our old heritage, and to give the young generations who don’t know that era a chance to discover it,” she added.

Through July 12, Safi tells its oldest stories, and gathers a few new ones from across the sea.