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I go to Goodwill stores periodically to check for old books...u would be surprised at what u will find there...i was leafing through the "National Geographics" when the above heading caught my eye...needless to say i picked up the copy...it was published in December 1967 and is a lengthy article, replete with pictures....this part made me pause and smile, only because it showed a gentlier time...hope u read it without any thoughts to politics or anything else...just enjoy, hopefully.....
by James Cerruti....Asst Editor
"I felt I would like Jamaica the moment I set foot in Kingston's Palisadoes Airport. Rushing for my luggage in the forceful American style, I caught out of the corner of my eye a sign that read "Waving Gallery." Not, you will note, as in most airports throughout the United States: Observation Platform Admission 10cents). In this vivid little phrase Jamaica said to me:"Yes, an airport is a technological wonder and a money-maker, but remember, please, it is also a place of deep emotion."
Sensing the change of national mood that my 600mile flight from Miami had brought, I slowed my pace. Here,I thought, are people of the heart, people sensitive to human values, even in an age of jets and lucrative tourism.
Seven weeks and more than 2000 miles of journeying on the balmy,green, and mountainous isle ("the most lovely that eyes have seen," Andres Bernaldez, Columbus' chronicler, fairly called it) confrimed my first insight.
I came to Jamaica on CHristmas Eve, and my wife Hannah and our three children were along to spend their two holiday weeks with me. In the dusk the airport thermometer read an un-Christmaslike 79 degrees F., and the clock said 7 p.m. We were hurrying to our hotel in Port Antonio on the North Coast,78 miles away by the shore road. We thought our excellent driver would get us there for dinner, and he did-at 10 o'clock. Distances over Jamaica's tortuous roads cannot be reckoned by superhighway speeds.
But what matter? Jamaicans have an expression that eptiomizes the national mood:"Soon come." And along the road to "soon come" lie many pleasures.
Towns on our way jumped with the spirit of Christmas Eve. The population strolled along the roads, dressed in the blazing reds, greens and yellows so dear to the warm Jamaican heart. Some girls wore comical Christmas hats, but others bore their shoes on their heads instead, saving them for the evening's dance.
In Morant Bay and Manchioneal, carnival grounds glittered with strung lights, loud-speakers roared rock-and-roll, and men gathered at tables, gambling at dice and pitch-and-toss.
"We call dem coney islands," our driver told us tourists. "Don't know how dem got dat name doh."
Of all the resorts on Jamaica's famous North Coast, I think I like Port Antonio best. One of the island's smaller cities (population 7,830), it is still a working town. It is principally a banana port as well as the chief shopping center for NE Jamaica, with its buzzing Musgrave Market and its "Chinee stores" ( as all grocery and general stores are called, because Chinese merchants run many of them.)
Strolling through the town on Christmas Day, we felt its grass-roots flavor strongly. Here, in microcosm, was the real Jamaica.
In the yard of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, a crowd gathered round a strange figure of a man wearing a Joseph's coat of many colors and patches. He carried a shepherd's crook, a pink bouquet, and a straw basket full of religious tracts; he wore his hair in long, tightly plaited ringlets.
He was preaching in the full patois-a blend of African and colonial English usage with totally unexpected intonations. What hope of understanding when I was baffled by just a little phrase like "Wa' fe do?"-What's for to do? What's to be done?" A snatch came across:"evuhbody think uh money. Gi' i no money. Peace and love!"
The plaited locks, "peace and love," the use of "I" in the objective case are all marks of the controversial Rastafarian sect. The Rastas appeared about 30 years ago, demanding "repatriation" to Ethiopia; calling Haile Selassie by his precoronation name of Ras Tafari, they proclaimed him God. Like this preacher, they are generally mild men whose povery is religious, but some Jamaicans view them warily.
Prime Minister Hugh Shearer told me later, "There's an element who infiltrate and seek to use the movement as a disguise for misconduct. But the genuine Rastafarian is not a drug addict or a danger. I've had no problem with the movement."
In a side street just past the church, we came on the John Canoe dancers-probably so called from dzong kunu , meaning "terrible sorcerer" in the African Ewe language. In the country towns, all week between Christmas and New Year, local groups get themselves up in colorful rags, feathered headdresses, and black masks with features outlined in ghastly white. They dance and shout to and African rhythm of drums and flutes, brandishing wooden spears and axes. A dozen of them capered before a little house graced by a huge poinsetta bush, begging shillings fromt he occupants.
We joined the watching crowd,and the dancers scampered up to us, shouting "Hi Whites!". One handed my 12 year old a spear and hatchet and danced at him. Jimmy danced back.The crowd cheered, "Come on White!" And somehow learning his name, they clapped him on laughing cries of "Jemmy, Jemmy, Jemmy John Canoe!"
I also began to call, "come of Jemmy! come on White!" An elderly man turned to me with gentle if illogical reproachfulness: "We don't make nothin' of color here. All skin de same." Though "white" was being used in a friendly, prejudice-free way, what was all right for Jamaicans to say was not all right for a white tourist.
Such human contradictions are prevalent in Jamaica. "Ever see any country more beautiful than this?" a JAmaican will ask you proudly, and in the next breath will beg you to help him emigrate to the United States. In this earthly paradise, a disconcerting number of Adams and Eves dream only of escape. As a popular Jamaican ballad puts it:
If I hadda wings of a dove,
I would fly,
Fly away,
Flyaaay awaaay,
And beeee at rest.
But in typical Jamaican style even discontent is expressed in laughing song.
......we visited Col Walter James Robertson, aged 93, for the past 16 years chieftain of the 1500 Cockpit Maroons. He asked me to sign his guest book and showed me an earlier handwritten entry dated January 15, 1964: "We bring greetings to Colonel Robertson and the Maroons from President Lyndon Johnson and the people of the United States." It was signed by the late Adlai E. Stevenson, Permanent U.S. Representative to the U.N.
Walking back to the car, I was stopped by a man in rough working clothes, who introduced himself as "Mann O Rowe, Secretary of State- like Dean Rusk , you know. Iwant to show you something."
Mr. Rowe, a political rival of Colonel Robertson, went into his house and came out with a package wrapped in old newspapers,w hich he tenderly unfolded. Inside, neatly handwritten, yellowed and cracked, was a copy of the independence treaty.
With his finger, Mr ROwe underlined the word "...shall be for ever hereafter in a perfect state of liberty...."
"You see," he said proudly, "we are a sovereign power."
....A tradition of the Christmas season in Kingston, as in England, is the Pantomine. The Kingston version is a brightly costumed musical built around a different Jamaican theme each year. I saw "Morgan's Dream of Old Port Royal," a bouncy spoof of the exploits of Henry Morgan, the 17th century buccaneer who became lieutenant governor of the island. After the performance, I went backstage to meet Louise Bennett-Coverley, feminine lead of most Pantomines. Known fondly throughout Jamaica as "Miss Lou" or "Aunt Lou", she is a folk poet and an outstanding student of the Jamaican dialect.
A pleasingly plump lady, Miss Lou taught me how to talk Jamaican:"Now, walla walla is like mecky mecky, all dirty and messed up; only walla is for people and mecky for things. The opposite is boonoonoonooos , any thing or person that is very sweet. But, when we say Dat boog, mon we mean it's pretty low-that comes from the Ashanti."
As we parted, Miss Lou said, "Walk good. Now that's real Jamaican. It's our way of saying goodbye and it doesn't matter if you're walking, driving or flying."
To find folk talk and folkways in action, I did not have to leave Kingston. In the Trench Town district, behind a little shop where he sells Sno Cones, Mallica Reynolds holds forth on Sunday nights as Kapo. This is the ritualistic name he assumes as leader of the Pocomania cult, a revivalist group.
For four hours, in his rude cement-floored chapel, Kapo preaches to his flock and leads such hymns as "Every Day There Will Be Sunday, Bye and Bye." THe orchestra of drums, maracas, and tambourines beats out an irresistible rhythm as women in red-plaid dresses dance before the altar, exhaling violently:'Hup! Hup! Hup!"
The repeated exhalation causes hyperventilation, an abnormal loss of carbon dioxide and soon one of the women falls semiconscious to the ground. The dancers move around her, singing while she writhes, and Kapo shouts, "I glad to see Sister Forbes break de barrier! Gabriel, put her away, take her dis way!" Sister Forbes gradually recovers and returns to the dance.
After the ceremony, Kapo, still in his turban and flowing gown, showed me the studio in his home behind his shop and chapel. There he carves magnificent primitive statues out of lignum vitae. One of Jamaica's best-known sculptors,entirely self-taught, he also paints startling primitive oils."...
....the article goes on and depending on the interest indicated i will post the rest ...i just found it refreshing....
by James Cerruti....Asst Editor
"I felt I would like Jamaica the moment I set foot in Kingston's Palisadoes Airport. Rushing for my luggage in the forceful American style, I caught out of the corner of my eye a sign that read "Waving Gallery." Not, you will note, as in most airports throughout the United States: Observation Platform Admission 10cents). In this vivid little phrase Jamaica said to me:"Yes, an airport is a technological wonder and a money-maker, but remember, please, it is also a place of deep emotion."
Sensing the change of national mood that my 600mile flight from Miami had brought, I slowed my pace. Here,I thought, are people of the heart, people sensitive to human values, even in an age of jets and lucrative tourism.
Seven weeks and more than 2000 miles of journeying on the balmy,green, and mountainous isle ("the most lovely that eyes have seen," Andres Bernaldez, Columbus' chronicler, fairly called it) confrimed my first insight.
I came to Jamaica on CHristmas Eve, and my wife Hannah and our three children were along to spend their two holiday weeks with me. In the dusk the airport thermometer read an un-Christmaslike 79 degrees F., and the clock said 7 p.m. We were hurrying to our hotel in Port Antonio on the North Coast,78 miles away by the shore road. We thought our excellent driver would get us there for dinner, and he did-at 10 o'clock. Distances over Jamaica's tortuous roads cannot be reckoned by superhighway speeds.
But what matter? Jamaicans have an expression that eptiomizes the national mood:"Soon come." And along the road to "soon come" lie many pleasures.
Towns on our way jumped with the spirit of Christmas Eve. The population strolled along the roads, dressed in the blazing reds, greens and yellows so dear to the warm Jamaican heart. Some girls wore comical Christmas hats, but others bore their shoes on their heads instead, saving them for the evening's dance.
In Morant Bay and Manchioneal, carnival grounds glittered with strung lights, loud-speakers roared rock-and-roll, and men gathered at tables, gambling at dice and pitch-and-toss.
"We call dem coney islands," our driver told us tourists. "Don't know how dem got dat name doh."
Of all the resorts on Jamaica's famous North Coast, I think I like Port Antonio best. One of the island's smaller cities (population 7,830), it is still a working town. It is principally a banana port as well as the chief shopping center for NE Jamaica, with its buzzing Musgrave Market and its "Chinee stores" ( as all grocery and general stores are called, because Chinese merchants run many of them.)
Strolling through the town on Christmas Day, we felt its grass-roots flavor strongly. Here, in microcosm, was the real Jamaica.
In the yard of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, a crowd gathered round a strange figure of a man wearing a Joseph's coat of many colors and patches. He carried a shepherd's crook, a pink bouquet, and a straw basket full of religious tracts; he wore his hair in long, tightly plaited ringlets.
He was preaching in the full patois-a blend of African and colonial English usage with totally unexpected intonations. What hope of understanding when I was baffled by just a little phrase like "Wa' fe do?"-What's for to do? What's to be done?" A snatch came across:"evuhbody think uh money. Gi' i no money. Peace and love!"
The plaited locks, "peace and love," the use of "I" in the objective case are all marks of the controversial Rastafarian sect. The Rastas appeared about 30 years ago, demanding "repatriation" to Ethiopia; calling Haile Selassie by his precoronation name of Ras Tafari, they proclaimed him God. Like this preacher, they are generally mild men whose povery is religious, but some Jamaicans view them warily.
Prime Minister Hugh Shearer told me later, "There's an element who infiltrate and seek to use the movement as a disguise for misconduct. But the genuine Rastafarian is not a drug addict or a danger. I've had no problem with the movement."
In a side street just past the church, we came on the John Canoe dancers-probably so called from dzong kunu , meaning "terrible sorcerer" in the African Ewe language. In the country towns, all week between Christmas and New Year, local groups get themselves up in colorful rags, feathered headdresses, and black masks with features outlined in ghastly white. They dance and shout to and African rhythm of drums and flutes, brandishing wooden spears and axes. A dozen of them capered before a little house graced by a huge poinsetta bush, begging shillings fromt he occupants.
We joined the watching crowd,and the dancers scampered up to us, shouting "Hi Whites!". One handed my 12 year old a spear and hatchet and danced at him. Jimmy danced back.The crowd cheered, "Come on White!" And somehow learning his name, they clapped him on laughing cries of "Jemmy, Jemmy, Jemmy John Canoe!"
I also began to call, "come of Jemmy! come on White!" An elderly man turned to me with gentle if illogical reproachfulness: "We don't make nothin' of color here. All skin de same." Though "white" was being used in a friendly, prejudice-free way, what was all right for Jamaicans to say was not all right for a white tourist.
Such human contradictions are prevalent in Jamaica. "Ever see any country more beautiful than this?" a JAmaican will ask you proudly, and in the next breath will beg you to help him emigrate to the United States. In this earthly paradise, a disconcerting number of Adams and Eves dream only of escape. As a popular Jamaican ballad puts it:
If I hadda wings of a dove,
I would fly,
Fly away,
Flyaaay awaaay,
And beeee at rest.
But in typical Jamaican style even discontent is expressed in laughing song.
......we visited Col Walter James Robertson, aged 93, for the past 16 years chieftain of the 1500 Cockpit Maroons. He asked me to sign his guest book and showed me an earlier handwritten entry dated January 15, 1964: "We bring greetings to Colonel Robertson and the Maroons from President Lyndon Johnson and the people of the United States." It was signed by the late Adlai E. Stevenson, Permanent U.S. Representative to the U.N.
Walking back to the car, I was stopped by a man in rough working clothes, who introduced himself as "Mann O Rowe, Secretary of State- like Dean Rusk , you know. Iwant to show you something."
Mr. Rowe, a political rival of Colonel Robertson, went into his house and came out with a package wrapped in old newspapers,w hich he tenderly unfolded. Inside, neatly handwritten, yellowed and cracked, was a copy of the independence treaty.
With his finger, Mr ROwe underlined the word "...shall be for ever hereafter in a perfect state of liberty...."
"You see," he said proudly, "we are a sovereign power."
....A tradition of the Christmas season in Kingston, as in England, is the Pantomine. The Kingston version is a brightly costumed musical built around a different Jamaican theme each year. I saw "Morgan's Dream of Old Port Royal," a bouncy spoof of the exploits of Henry Morgan, the 17th century buccaneer who became lieutenant governor of the island. After the performance, I went backstage to meet Louise Bennett-Coverley, feminine lead of most Pantomines. Known fondly throughout Jamaica as "Miss Lou" or "Aunt Lou", she is a folk poet and an outstanding student of the Jamaican dialect.
A pleasingly plump lady, Miss Lou taught me how to talk Jamaican:"Now, walla walla is like mecky mecky, all dirty and messed up; only walla is for people and mecky for things. The opposite is boonoonoonooos , any thing or person that is very sweet. But, when we say Dat boog, mon we mean it's pretty low-that comes from the Ashanti."
As we parted, Miss Lou said, "Walk good. Now that's real Jamaican. It's our way of saying goodbye and it doesn't matter if you're walking, driving or flying."
To find folk talk and folkways in action, I did not have to leave Kingston. In the Trench Town district, behind a little shop where he sells Sno Cones, Mallica Reynolds holds forth on Sunday nights as Kapo. This is the ritualistic name he assumes as leader of the Pocomania cult, a revivalist group.
For four hours, in his rude cement-floored chapel, Kapo preaches to his flock and leads such hymns as "Every Day There Will Be Sunday, Bye and Bye." THe orchestra of drums, maracas, and tambourines beats out an irresistible rhythm as women in red-plaid dresses dance before the altar, exhaling violently:'Hup! Hup! Hup!"
The repeated exhalation causes hyperventilation, an abnormal loss of carbon dioxide and soon one of the women falls semiconscious to the ground. The dancers move around her, singing while she writhes, and Kapo shouts, "I glad to see Sister Forbes break de barrier! Gabriel, put her away, take her dis way!" Sister Forbes gradually recovers and returns to the dance.
After the ceremony, Kapo, still in his turban and flowing gown, showed me the studio in his home behind his shop and chapel. There he carves magnificent primitive statues out of lignum vitae. One of Jamaica's best-known sculptors,entirely self-taught, he also paints startling primitive oils."...
....the article goes on and depending on the interest indicated i will post the rest ...i just found it refreshing....
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