We had to go out but could not speak out or protest, as if everything was normal,” she added. “In besieged Tripoli there was a huge pressure on us and we had to go to school, work during the conflict, almost against our will. Musrati stayed with her family in Tripoli, one of Gaddafi’s last bastions, during the uprising. “It was like an escape from reality, offloading one’s emotions and feelings,” she explained. Samira Musrati, a 22-year-old nursing student at the University of Tripoli, recalls how during the uprising she managed to preserve her sanity by drawing anime characters. He began to draw anime and Japanese manga in May 2010, almost a year before the revolution.įor many Libyan youth, d rawing anime was a form of resistance during the authoritarian Gaddafi regime. Torn between his native Libya and the Greek culture of his mother, he found in Japanese anime a refuge from the oppressive, outside world. Her love reached out to evil people and changed them,” he said. “I discovered what real love is, I mean universal love. Sailor Moon, who fights for good against evil, appealed to Ben Mansour’s sense of compassion. He loves to craft dolls and is passionate about Sailor Moon, his favourite Japanese anime character. Fluent in Arabic and Greek – his mother’s native tongue – he also speaks good English, French and Spanish. “I prefer to live an imaginary world than live reality,” Ben Mansour said. He is more Cartesian than me.” Though disheartened and frustrated because of his father’s dismissal, he continues to draw in secret. “He thinks this art has no future and no career prospects. “My dad is against the fact I draw animes,” he said. Zacharia Ben Mansour, a 22-year-old student at Tripoli University, shyly showed Al Jazeera some of his latest artwork on his iPad. Today’s anime makes use of modern technologies. The first commercial Japanese animation appeared in 1917, with the instantly recognisable anime style emerging in the 1960s as the works of Osamu Tezukaspread across the world. Many of the older enthusiasts reminisce over their favourite childhood anime characters – Grendizer, Hikaru, Duke Fleed – 1980s Japanese cartoons, dubbed into Arabic. The art form has peculiarly drawn together Libyans of different ages, with fans in their thirties and forties. The answer may not be obvious, but, for some young Libyans, these famous Japanese anime characters inspire them to imagine a world of their own, away from the tough reality of post-Gaddafi Libya. Tripoli, Libya – What do Naruto, Sasuke and Sailor Moon have in common with disenfranchised north African youth?

Anime outline