Project Stages of the World shows in Arouca that “We Are All Migrants”

O show, integrated in the project “We – Stages of the World”, has artistic direction of Miguel Hernandez, of the Teatro do Bolhão, was developed in a participatory process for months, and is built “from the collective memory of the territory”, according to the presentation of the project.

“The public is challenged to revive the spirit” that took so many from Arouca, in search of better living conditions, and to find common points with those arriving.

The show also shows “how movement and displacement are part of the profound history of this place and of humanity itself”, through the evocation of the peoples who have passed through the region over the centuries.

“We are All Migrants”, according to the presentation, calls for real and fictional stories, through participants from six countries – Portugal, Ukraine, Brazil, São Tomé and Príncipe, Cuba and Switzerland –, gathering nationalities that inhabit the village, “exploring causes, desires and consequences of migration: the hope of a new future, the difficulties of integration, the risks of illegal migration, longing and distance.”.

Running in the Brandão de Vasconcelos Square, meeting point of Arouca, “We Are All Migrants” part of the question “What unites us all, regardless of our origin?”

The answer, according to the creators of the show, “is in the universal experience of migration, a crossing that, at different times and for different reasons, shaped stories of the Aroukian families and continues to shape the lives of those who come to the county today seeking a better life”.

Human mobility, they recall, “is a constitutive feature of our identity as a people”.

“ The objective is clear: to promote the inclusion and integration of the migrant population in the local community, creating a moment of shared celebration where there are no isolated protagonists, but a collective voice built by all”.

The show, in which “all are protagonists”, thus gathers “on the same stage, voices, faces and talents very diverse, migrants and locals, young people and adults, amateurs and figures recognized in the life of the village”.

In the cast are 13 people from the migrant community, “who voluntarily and courageously agreed to expose themselves through art”, overcoming barriers of vulnerability.

In these 13 – five women and eight men – there are five Santomians, five Ukrainians, one Brazilian, one Swiss and one Cuban. Eight are students and all others work “on their own and/or on others”.

There are also choir groups and collectivities of Arouca, amateur theater groups, students of music, dance and theater, a group of concertinas, and also “very well known and dear figures [...], which bring complicity and affection, helping to create the atmosphere of shared celebration that the project seeks”.

Among these figures are the “Mr. Rouxinol, habitual presence at municipal events”, Manel, “very dear person” who “rejoices any party”, the junior team of Football Club Arouca and “Mr. Melo”, with the giant flags supporting the team.

The project “We – Stages of the World” is promoted by the Associação de Desenvolvimento Rural Integrado das Serras de Montemuro, Arada e Gralheira (ADRIMAG), with the Teatro do Bolhão, and is born from the “deep convention” that “art has the power to build bridges where there are walls, to transform the unknown into a family member and to celebrate diversity as a collective value”.

The initiative focuses on the social inclusion process of migrant communities in the municipalities of Arouca, Castelo de Paiva and Vale de Cambra, and part of the “diagnosis that the migrant population faces complex challenges”, such as discrimination, housing segregation and exclusion in the school and work context.

Under the project, supported by Portugal Social Innovation and NORTE 2030, the show “Palcos do Mundo — Fábrica” was premiered last year in Vale de Cambra. The third and final production will debut in 2027, in Castelo de Paiva.

From the work in Arouca, and for the future of the village, the project’s mentors dream of a “stronger community, precisely because it is more diverse: a territory where the local community and the migrant community recognize themselves as partners in the same development project, building together a plural and vibrant identity”.