African Couple Launch SAWA African Trivia Card Game
Thato and Kioko Mwosa are on a mission as artistic innovators to celebrate and educate others about African Culture. Their combined talents have touched the lives of thousands through filmmaking, screenwriting, education, illustrating, playwrights and most recently game inventing with their new game, SAWA African Trivia Card Game.
“We believe when there is a lack of something, there is opportunity,” says Thato Mwosa. “That opportunity gives us a chance to further our mission to educate and celebrate African Culture instead of complaining about what is missing.”
For example, when the couple’s daughter Tuli was one year old, they found very little black/brown ballerina décor for her ballet themed bedroom.
“That sparked an idea to create my own illustrations that represented girls of color,” says Thato. “The result was Tuli Art where you will find an array of brown/black ballerinas in different poses wearing bold and vibrant costumes.”
The birth of SAWA African Trivia Game was much the same. The Boston based couple always enjoyed hosting game nights with friends. Their collection includes Trivial Pursuit, Monopoly, Taboo and a new favorite, Black Card Revoked. Because of their love of games, they decided to look for African themed games. To their disappointment, they discovered that African card games were scarce; in fact, the games they came across were mostly regional or based on Safari Animals.
“We saw an opportunity,” says Kioko Mwosa. “Thato and I wanted to create a game that would celebrate African culture and at the same time educate people about the continent. We want to dispel myths and misunderstandings about Africa.”
SAWA is an edu-taining, trivia card game that promotes a positive narrative and image about the continent in a fun way. Since Thato is from Botswana and Kioko from Kenya, they realized all the interesting differences from their own home countries and wanted to share fun facts and trivia about the whole continent.
The couple spent years doing research on every aspect of the continent including pop culture. The results were a stack of 300 cards categorized into six major categories: History and Politics, Geography, Arts and Culture, Cinema, Sports and Business and Technology.
“We wanted a fast-paced game where people would be learning while having fun,” says Thato. “Kioko and I want to dispel the myth that Africa is a poor continent plagued with endless wars and deprivation; the media perpetuates ‘the dark jungle continent’ narrative and we want to change that.”
SAWA Trivia stems from the Swahili word sawa meaning “it’s all good.” The game celebrates the diversity of the African continent and contribution of African people in all fields including innovation and technology.
The game launched in December and quickly became a hit with the Mwosas’ circle of friends and now the game has caught the attention of educators.
“We are honored and excited to be working with Boston University African Studies Center K-16 Outreach Program to share our game with educators from Massachusetts in an upcoming presentation,” says Kioko. “We are also working with Syracuse University on a presentation to graduate students in African Studies. It is our goal to work with universities and educators nationwide or even worldwide.”
It is the couple’s dream to get SAWA African Trivia game into the hands of as many people as they can to educate and entertain.
As the game box says:
If you are African, this game is for you!
If you love Africa, this game is for you!
If you are from the Diaspora, this game is for you!
If you think you know Africa, this game is for you!
If you want to learn about Africa, this game is for you!
SAWA African Trivia Card Game is available on Amazon, at https://sawatrivia.com or Frugal Bookstore in Boston. The goal is to expand distribution to other retail outlets in 2021.
Besides the entry into the game industry, the couple is also gaining accolades as filmmakers. Thato is an award-winning screenwriter and filmmaker and recently the Mwosas worked together – Thato as the writer and director and Kioko as executive producer – on Memoirs of a Black Girl, a coming of age story of a girl and her friends who are forced to grow up and make tough decisions.
“Until Africans can tell their own story, the story told about them will be skewed or distorted because the lens is coming from a different angle. What drives me as an African filmmaker is taking control of the African narrative and using the camera to give a counterimage,” Thato said.
The film recently debuted at the Boston Globe Black History Film Festival. It will also screen at the Pan African Film Festival (Feb 28-March 15) and Through Women's Eye Film Festival, produced by United Nations Women (March 4-8th)
If you would like to learn more or reach out to Kioko and Thato Mwosa, you can find them here:
Twitter @sawatrivia
Instagram @sawatrivia
Facebook.com/sawatrivia
www.thatomwosa.com Email: info@sawatrivia.com
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