Drumming, Dancing & Dining

A lazy morning of catching up on emails & getting repacked for tomorrow with a little laundry thrown in. After finishing off our leftover chicken, we hung out until it was time for the taxi to take us to the drumming lesson. Taxis here might be anything with wheels…a local woman living up the street picked us up in her van accompanied by a young woman & her baby sister. The driver told me not to close the van door, & since no one here seems to bother about seat belts, I hung on to the overhead handle in case we took a fast corner.

We were met at the Warasa Garifuna Drum School by a young man with a wide smile named Ray. The “school” was a covered shelter with a floor of sand next to their private home. Also there was Ray’s parents & younger brother in addition to Ray’s Scottish wife. He gave us a quick background of the culture, which mainly consists slaves who were cast out of Honduras by the British as undesirables. With no one strong cultural identity, the Garifunas now are a mixture of Africans with some other cultures mixed in as well, French, Mexican, etc.

Montana and LuRue were given the beats for the large drums, while Ray played the smaller more complicated drum. Montana asked to try the smaller drum & surprised Ray by picking up one of the more complicated rhythms right away. In the meantime, LuRue struggled with one of the basic beats on the larger drum, never quite getting it right.

Then the troupe put on a performance for us of several Garifuna songs, using drums, shakas (like maracas), and song. The last part of the afternoon was the dancing. At least LuRue could shake her hips enough to get a smile and thumbs up from the mother. Ray worked with Montana on how to shake her booty. We’ll be going back next week for a drum-making exhibition.

We got back to Blue Belize in time to head out to Asha’s for dinner—Montana having BBQ ribs & LuRue trying the lionfish. We have eaten there twice now & still can’t see why it’s so popular. We think it’s just OK.

We were surprised when Simon & Tracy from ReefCI came in. They pushed another table up against ours & said they were expecting more. Before we left, we did meet three new divers, a woman from the US and a couple from Croatia/Slovenia.

More lightning & rain tonight. Sure hope we don’t get another tropical depression moving through.

Once on the island, LuRue’s computer went completely dead. Then it beeped for awhile & eventually came back to life. Now Montana’s computer has gone into permanent hibernation. We keep trying to nurse it back to health, but for now we’re expecting the worst, but hoping for the best.

If our blog suddenly stops, you’ll know the reason why.