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Carnival on Aruba is not so much an event as it is the small mini-happenings that make up the totality of the event. You just have to look for them. Let me give you an example:
Ever browse through your old high school year book and look at the home-room class picture? First you see the entire class and then notice the face that sat two seats in back of you – the face you seldom noticed, never spoke to (beyond the obligatory hello and goodbye) and consequentially never really knew. In looking at the class-picture, this student comes back at you through the ages and you start to feel the aura of that face. It is the face and aura of a stranger within a group. You then ask yourself – what was she like then and how about today? Finally a pang runs through your system for not having paid attention when it counted. Eventually, you wonder how (or if) you should call to say “Hi – my name is ….. and I was just looking through some old stuff and noticed our class picture and…” Perhaps not, but then again – could it hurt? The answer I live with is that people (even when they are details) need attention at the time you are with them and not in retrospect. At least that is the answer that works for me - and that makes paying attention to the details important and eventually a habit.
It was the time just before the event. Pre-Grand-Parade is a good term. People walked openly on the streets and looked off to the sidewalk trailers to either notice or be noticed on this special day. Most trailers had their massive speakers pointed to the streets and most connected to tuners that were mostly on the same FM radio setting. The effect is something like walking down a tunnel of pulsating sound with walls made up of laughing faces. The senses are inundated with rhythms and aside from the sounds - the air is filled with BBQ - Balashi and abundance of laughter.
The home made trailers line both sides of the streets that make up the parade route. Each trailer is painted with some sort o f a carnival message. These painted messages or “Slogans” all face the parade side of the street and as you walk down the parade route you see the wall of hand painted pictures much like a hysterical Caribbean Art Gallery. Here and there are more subtle gatherings. One of these is a large white tent that is sponsored by a local bank and bearing the initials CMB as its only decoration. No booze or Balashi in this group. No blaring ten foot towering speakers. Just wooden folding chairs in a series of rows and serenity – almost as if preparing for a tent church revival. This tent is for those that are challenged. They are challenged because they see a beauty we never will and do not know how to explain it in terms we would understand. Their music is the same as ours yet has a different rhythm all together – I know this because as a carnival calypso tune played, two boys danced (as if at cotillion) in a perfect waltz. To keep the waltz dance in good sequence, one of them repeated – One two three -- One two three. It all made so much sense especially in the midst of the Aruba Grand Parade Carnaval. Nothing out of place. It made sense – to me anyway.
In the utmost last back row of seats under the tent canopy was something that did not make sense. An older man, also challenged, was sitting with his chair facing the ocean and with his back to what would be the carnival parade. He had a peaceful look on his face and was talking to the ocean. He said “ Wak – ta bunita” (Look – How pretty) He repeated this several times over and then closed his eyes. A lady that looked or seemed to be one of the caretakers for this group, asked him “Ta kiko ba wak dushi?” (What is it you saw sweety?) He thought a moment and then answered – “Carnival di piska chikitu” (A carnival of small fish). The lady put her hand on his shoulder and also looked out to sea. I imagine she was a bit challenged to see those fish yet she said “Bunita!” (Pretty!)
If ever I feel that my powers of observation are OK, I will think on that moment and know that I am challenged to see what they did, because:
here on Aruba
while under a tent
looking out to the ocean
on a parade Sunday
a carnival of fish swam by and
so many of us missed the parade.
be well
charles
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thanks for sharing
lost in translation
Originally Posted by Caribbean-tattler
