Guyana folk festival – reconnecting to our cultural roots
DPI, Guyana, Monday, February 17, 2020
It was an evening of storytelling, music, dancing as the Ministry of Social Cohesion’s Guyana Folk Festival unfolded at D’urban Park on Sunday last.
Patrons both young and old were captivated as groups such as the Berbice Delights, St. Cuthbert Mission, Feel the Beat-Tassa Group, Otishka Drummers, Creative Arts, West Demerara Secondary School folk group among others took centre stage.
Audience members could not contain themselves during a dramatic presentation of the poem ‘Old Higue’ and many were out of their seats during pulsating performance between Tassa group Feel the Beat and Otishka Drummers
Games like hopscotch and sal-out brought back memories for many. A patron, Stacy Monah told DPI she gave it her all in a game of Chinese skipping.
“I can say that I have lost some calories while playing Chinese skipping…I barely made it to the arm and the words sugar and Mississippi got me through …it was fun; no one can say that they did not enjoy themselves,” Monah happily remarked.
Event Coordinator Esther Hamer explained that the event focused on reliving the country’s rich cultural aspects while also keeping it quite simple with exciting games.
“These are traditions we trying to preserve. Today our children leam more to technology – they are always using their tablets, phones watching television. So this is an effort to reconnect them and their parents to our cultural roots.”