Garifuna

Tuesday night my roommate Nico invited me to a free dance performance... Garifuna dancing from the Atlantic coast. The Garifuna are people of African and indigenous American descent. It was pouring when the bus dropped us off in front of the Spanish-Nicaraguan Cultural Institute, and the power was out. The place was full though. Lit by candles, the drummers came out on the small stage and began playing, so you could imagine being on a Caribbean beach. After about 20 minutes of drumming, the lights came on and the dancers came out. They spoke about the history of their people. They had come on slave ships to St. Vincent island in the 1500´s from west Africa, intermarrying and living together with the indigenous Arawaks who already lived on the island. in the late 18th century, as a result of fighting between the English and the French over control of St. Vincent, the Garifuna were deported to an island off the coast of Honduras, and then to the mainland. Today they live on the Atlantic coast of Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and Nicaragua.

The main dance form that they presented was Punta, which involves really fast and furious hip shaking. The dances they presented used symbolic movements representing important activities of daily life. My favorite part was when they called up people from the audience to participate. The volunteers (including me.. how could I resist?) did a dance called AEIOU, each one doing the dance in turn. Then there was a Punta dance party. I'm going to get to the Atlantic coast before I leave no matter what!