Embassies Open Door Day

Lesotho – Berlin hosted and participated, for the 8th time, in the All Nations Festival on 10th July, 2010. This is a yearly festival organised and coordinated by the Berliner Gessellsschaft für International Begegnung e.V (BGiB). It is a voluntary initiative to allow members of the public a view into how foreign embassies based in Berlin operate. It is an excellent opportunity for embassies to showcase their respective countries's culture, tourism, traditions, history as well as trade and investement opportunities by using the yearly themes chosen by the organisers.

In 2009, the theme was HEADDRESSES/HEADGEAR. This presented the Kingdom of Lesotho Embassy an amazing opportunity to showcase the famous Basotho hat, MOKOROTLO. The hat takes its conical shape from the Qiloane Mountain,which can be viewed from the Thaba - Bosiu Plateau, the home of the Great founder of the Basotho Nation, King Moshoeshoe I from which he and his people tirelessly fought battles to protect the present day Lesotho from invaders.

The Basotho hats, are woven from unique grass, found only in the cold higher areas in Lesotho, called Moseeka, They are woven both by men and women for local use and for export. Apart from the hats, they make mats (Meseme), containers for grain (Liroto) and brooms for sweeping the floor (Mafielo), as well as sieves (Methlotlo) for filtering traditional beer.

This year’s theme - BIRTHDAYS - has once again created another window of opportunity for the Embassy to demonstrate how birthdays are traditionally celebrated in Lesotho. Visitors to the embassy experienced live demonstrations and re-enactments of how the announcement of the birth of a child is celebrated.

Traditionally, the most important occasion celebrated is the announcement of a child’s birth. Ululations will erupt from the newborn baby’s home signalling to the other members of the community that a baby has been born. Someone will rush to find the father and splash him with water, to which he will shout, “What is happening?” and in turn the answer will be “you have a baby girl”.

The water symbolizes the female (girl) someone whose one of the responsibilities will be fetch water for domestic use.

If a baby boy is born, someone will rush to find the father and give him a slight beating with a stick to which he will ask “what is happening, what have I done, why are you whipping me? And in turn the answer will be “you have become a father to a baby boy”.

The stick and the beating symbolize the arrival of one who will grow to become a strong man, one who will protect the family.

Then members of the community will bring gifts to the new baby’s home and grandparents will present the baby with lucky charms to protect him/her against bad spirits.