Carifesta X a tremendous success
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| Published on Tuesday, September 2, 2008 |
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By Oscar Ramjeet
Caribbean Net News Special Correspondent
Email: oscar@caribbeannetnews.com
GEORGETOWN, Guyana: Carifesta X was a tremendous success, with more than 500,000 persons from more than two dozen countries participating and attending the scores of shows, lectures, symposia, cultural and other presentations during the ten days of festivities.
Among the highlights at the closing session were the Guyana Defence Force parachuters jumping from some 3,000 feet above the ground to kick things off, to beautifully choreographed dancers from the National School of Dance heading to the stage.
Several of the Caribbean’s top artistes participated fully and some of them made some valuable contributions and suggestions about preserving Caribbean heritage and culture.
The Stabroek News in a front page story on Monday highlighted the closing activities and said, "Fireworks went off as expected, but the real display was actually happening on the ground where Guyana and the participating countries mingled in fine style. It was kaleidoscope of colour and raw, infectious energy."
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| Guyana President Bharrat Jagdeo. AFP PHOTO |
President Bharat Jagdeo told the gathering at the closing ceremony that Guyana did itself proud in hosting the festival.
He said, "As a nation, we rose to the occasion, we did ourselves proud."
He stated that, based on statistics received from the Carifesta Secretariat, more than 500,000 people had attended the various activities held across the country.
The festival celebrated the rich cultural diversity of the region, and Jagdeo stated that the festival presented young artists with the opportunity to interact with some of the best artists in the region.
Jagdeo expressed special gratitude to the foreign delegations for their participation and said that they had represented both themselves and their countries well.
This is the second time that Guyana has successfully hosted Carifesta. The first was in 1972, which was incidentally the first and an idea that was conceived by the late Forbes Burnham who was the Prime Minister of Guyana at the time.
Stabroek News reported that Carifesta's close was really a moment of reflection of what had unfolded on local soil over the past few days. Reference was made to the role the Antiguans,Trinidadians, Barbadians, Dominicans, Kittians, BVI Islanders, Jamaicans, and artistes from other islands played.
The next Carifesta will be held in the Bahamas. In fact, that country's Minister of Culture, Charles Maynard, formally accepted the mantle on Sunday night when a slice of the Bahamian Junkanoo festival hit the National Stadium at Providence. | | | | Reads : 258 | | | |
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