Adults’ Parade puts on dazzling show
Published: May 3, 2010
Font size: [A] [A] [A]
The Shaka Zulus perform in the Adult Parade.
ST. THOMAS — Carnival kallaloo: mix one part soca, two parts spandex, 15,000 feathers and 5 million sequins into one big, hot pot. Simmer.
While the official theme of this year’s Carnival was Bacchanal Again in 2010, the Caribbean stew honored in Spectrum Band’s hit was the unofficial theme, with glittering floupes and troupes giving the crowd “some ting to make it spicy, some ting to make it hot.”
It was plenty hot. The Caribbean sun hammered down on the parade but did not melt the spirits of the majorettes, bands, queens and kings, mocko jumbies, floupes and troupes that danced and strutted and bambooshayed down Main Street on Saturday.
“The sun is very draining, but we do it because we love it,” said Dianna Garcia, acting director of The St. Croix Majorettes. The members of the group spinned and twirled wearing show-stopping blue velvet jumpsuits with burnt orange sequins.
Garcia said that as they walked down the parade route, the crowd kept cheering for more, and by the time they got to Lionel Roberts Stadium, the twirlers were exhausted.
While the St. Croix Majorettes stuck close to Carnival’s official theme, Sebastien Majorettes performed a tribute to Michael Jackson. Led by University of Puerto Rico student Joel Claudio, a nationally renowned collegiate twirler, they wowed the crowd in white sequined military jackets with gold trim, gold hot pants and black fedoras.
The Ultimate Dance Experience Troupe was dressed in sizzling, skimpy fire shades as they wound their way down to the asphalt in front of Post Office Square. The dancers travel to St. Thomas from New Haven, Conn., every year to perform in Carnival. The wife of a St. Thomian, choreographer Leah Davila mixed soca, American calypso and African styles into a kallaloo of dance she teaches students at her New Haven school.
Real Mas Carnival Troupe was another hot number. A small, tight-knit troupe of young women who have been dancing together since they were little girls, the members gyrated to the beats of Mas In Tension at the end of the parade route, and they seemed undaunted by heat or fatigue. They designed their costumes themselves and spent months painstakingly crafting them by hand. In the crunch time of Carnival week, the women stayed up all night cutting, sewing and gluing.
“We’re living off of Red Bull,” troupe member Teisha Coleman said.
Real Mas’ sizzle and sparkle was in contrast to Waseen Dominic Culture Roots Troupe. Masked troupe members donned burlap bags and bull horns as they strutted down Main Street — a nod to Carnivals past.
“We believe in the old-time tradition,” said Waseen Dominic president Paul Alexander.
Genora Abbott wore the featured costume, made of animal feed bags shredded into long white strips that covered her from head to toe, topped with long, curving bull horns.
“We did this to show you can use anything to make a costume,” Abbott said. “It’s a form of recycling.”
The V.I. Freshwater Association also gave a nod to the past with their Roaring Twenties theme — black and white flapper dresses for the ladies and pinstriped suits and fedoras for the men.
Helen George, the troupe’s leader, participated in the first modern-day St. Thomas Carnival in 1952 and said that the goal of her group’s costume was to get away from the flesh and flash of Trinidad-inspired costumes and go back to basics.
“I like to see troupes in something like what we have on today,” she said.
The Traditional Indians, the St. Thomas Tropical Masqueraders and the Zulus all kept Carnival customs alive Saturday, as they strutted down the parade route in wild feathers, colorful clown suits and face paint. The Jesters and the Gypsies gave a nod to the simpler, less-splashy costumes worn in past carnivals. The Jesters were decked out in grass skirts and Hawaiian shirts, while the Gypsies wore brightly colored, ruffly tropical attire.
“We’re maintaining the old culture,” said Gypsy Clarence Payne.
The Rising Stars Youth Steel Orchestra also kept traditions alive. Dressed in Hawaiian shirts in sunset shades, the troupe performed a medley of local calypso tunes as well as a few long pieces “to show off the skill and ability of the players,” Rising Stars chief instructor John Hodge said.
The Guardians of Culture Mocko Jumbies personified tradition as they strutted down the parade route on seven-foot-high stilts wearing brightly colored costumes, each decorated with a different symbol. The symbols mean peace in different African cultures, according to Michon Fabio, one of the group’s organizers.
Peace was a topic brought up again and again Saturday, by paraders and spectators alike.
“It’s fun,” spectator Connie Edinborough said. “There was no fighting. Everything was well-organized.”
“There wasn’t much violence, if there was any at all,” Trisha Smith, another spectator, said.
Metal fencing separating spectators from troupe members was credited with helping to keep things organized. The fencing was put in place for the first time this year, and several people said it made the parade seem less chaotic.
Gov. John de Jongh Jr. walked up the fencing one way, and down the other, shaking hands and chatting. DeJongh said it takes him between seven and eight hours to get from one end of the parade route to the other, and back again, as constituents always have something to tell him.
“Or a couple somethings,” he said, laughing.
DeJongh said he looks forward to the walk, which he has made every year on both St. Thomas and St. Croix since 2002.
“I really enjoy coming out and talking to people and seeing what they’re thinking,” he said.
DeJongh said that Carnival is a time for St. Thomas to be at its best.
“We are very much a community,” deJongh said. “This is very much our culture.”
Damelia Correa said that was precisely why she brought her 9-month-old daughter Denaiya Smith to the parade.
“This is her first Carnival,” Correa said as the Zulus passed by. “I want her to see what we enjoy, our culture.”
Just then, a snarling Zulu brandished its spear at the toddler. She did not even flinch.
Visitors to St. Thomas got an eyeful of culture at Saturday’s parade, and they said they loved every minute of it.
“You can’t beat the islands during Carnival,” North Carolina resident Kevin Griffith said, adding that his home state has festivals, “but nothing like this.”
“It was the best thing ever,” Connecticut resident Linda Griffin said. “Everyone should come to Carnival every year.”
“It was the best time I had in my life,” her teenage son, Michael Griffin said. “But I can’t live here. The streets are too small.”
Malvern Gumbs, lead vocalist for Spectrum Band, said that giving a taste of St. Thomas’ cultural kallaloo was the goal of his hit song, which could be the road march for Carnival 2010.
“It’s a local dish, but instead of adding food, we added riddim and wukkup and grinding!” he said.
Party Lovers, Mystique and Associates and Elskoe and Associates served up the “wukkup” in a flurry of feathers, sequins, and colors. Accompanied by a pounding techno beat and led by tall, model-gorgeous women in lime green feathers, Inferno Troupe divided into three precise lines — each with a different costume — and performed a choreographed routine for the judges in Post Office Square. They were followed by Fun Lovers Troupe — decked out as angels, tinsel, poinsettias, naughty holiday trees, and little drummer boys for a Carnival Christmas theme.
Spectators oohhhed and aahhhed as the parade progressed. No two people named the same troupe as their favorite, but all said they were waiting to see Hugga Bunch.
Finally, around 6 p.m., as the sun cast long shadows across Main Street, a semi-truck hauling enormous speakers and the St. Croix soca band UMB Soldiers pulled into Post Office Square. A young woman with a slender waist and long, dark hair hung from the truck, gyrating. The wild women came first, young, tattooed, wearing beaded skirts and white plumed headdresses, grinding all the way down to the ground and back up again. Soon, Post Office Square was flooded with a sea of white feathers, and the headdresses just kept coming, as Hugga Bunch’s 600-plus-member troupe poured down the street.
The young ones, the old ones, the big ones, the small ones, the exhausted ones, the exuberant ones, the timid ones and the wild ones — the troupe came in all types, and as they poured into the square, Daphane Gumbs, their leader and den mother, just beamed.
The 2010 Carnival was the 25th anniversary for the troupe, and Gumbs has been with them since the beginning.
Feathers finally began to subside as Sheryl Boynes-Jackson, the queen of the band, strutted down the street in an enormous hooped skirt and with a starburst backing so heavy it had to be carried on wheels. She was followed by Lorna Freeman, whose Ave Maria costume was a tribute to the late 2009 Carnival Queen Karence DeCosta.
A mocko jumbie brought up the rear, along with a raucous group of men in silver top hats and tails, and a papier-mache champagne bottle float, which poured into a tower of champagne glasses.
The rowdy men encircled Gumbs, yelling, jumping and hugging their troupe mom. She just smiled.
“It’s Carnival baby,” yelled Rudel Hodge, the leader of the young men. “This is what we do!”
— Contact reporter Constance Cooper at 774-8772 ext. 364 or
e-mail ccooper@dailynews.vi.
