From Agim XHAFKA
I am sure, they know him as Uncle Braho. Few know that his name is Mehdi Malka. This is what happens when you fill the role with so much juice, with so much authenticity and art that the name your parents gave you escapes.
Mehdi is my old friend. Very old, not from elementary school, but later. When he was an artist with a big A.
I had the chance to become his producer for a few years and I’m sure we had as good a time as he and today he brings me as an example in every project he has.
People already know Uncle Brahon and the other roles by heart. That’s why I’m telling you some details that the general viewer doesn’t know.
First, Mehdi is the biggest book lover in the world. He also has a washing machine manual, he takes it with excitement, pulls the lids and feels it so much that it seems as if he is about to undress a woman when he opens the pages one by one. Since childhood the same.
Growing up an orphan, in great poverty there in the beautiful Memalia, as he often calls it, he spent most of his time with books. From pearls to classics to moderns. So when you tell him a joke, he catches it at the first word and laughs out loud.
You were showing him drama, he starts crying. When he gets the courage to tell him a long novel, he is happy. He brings his face next to yours, ready to enter inside. That he lives the art. Even on stage, even in books, even in coffee.
He is now retired. For its own blackness. Because he has a stack of projects, but because he cannot avoid that he needs money. With his pension of 200 euros per month, he can’t even pay for the lights. That the lady was left without a job for so many years, that even the girl who works needs those few lekas for herself.
There is also a boy with sharp eyes and an open mind, but the girl seems to have more room in his heart. Mehdiu begins with the words: “Speak, father’s sister!”
Uncle Braho has a role gallery. Too much fatigue for them. But he had his life as two distinct halves. Until he was approaching his forties, he worked as a miner and driver. Then as a class artist. As happens to great artists.
I often drink coffee with Mehdi. You can find it there at the artistic bar “Corne” near the guard. It happens to me that when I feel a little sad or stressed, my feet take me to Mehdi. How a popular doctor heals you with a warm word, with long experience and with his problems that compared to mine are mountains on mountains.
Mehdi, I love you so much. That you are a great artist, a good friend and a friend who has rare friends.
