thepancollective

everybody get down if you feel me

Robyn Rihanna Fenty is Barbados's biggest musical export since... well, since forever.  In the past year or so, the 18 year old R&B/pop singer has made major strides in the showbiz world — her achievements have included platinum selling albums, chart topping singles all over the world, lucrative endorsement deals, music-industry awards, and acting roles on TV and in film.  Despite reading about all these things in the local press, I don't think that I really twigged to just how big our homegirl was, until I made a trip to Europe and saw her face, larger than life and twice as lovely, on billboards and posters and TV screens all over the place.  It was then that I realised that Rihanna had really hit the big time.

The first time I heard of Robyn Fenty (before she was Rihanna) was a couple of years ago; she had just won a secondary school pageant, and there was a small story about her win, accompanied by a picture.  I remember thinking, Oh, she's pretty, and turning the page. Then a few months later, she was "discovered" by an American record-producer in Barbados on vacation, and she became the talk of the town, and arguably the most famous Barbadian in the world right now.

Not all the local comments on her sudden rise to fame and fortune have been positive.  I've heard deprecating remarks that have seemed to me to be motivated by nothing more than a bad case of the Bajan equivalent of Tall Poppy Syndrome.  (People can be too bad-minded and grudgeful, though.) And I think she's had to learn pretty quickly that being in the public eye, being a bona fide celebrity, seems to mean that you are fair game for all kinds of criticism, constructive and otherwise.

As for me, I'm pleased as punch by Rihanna's stardom.  I get a kick out of seeing her face on billboards and websites and magazine covers.  I think it's fabulous that a little Bajan girl from out Westbury side is a big deal in England and Switzerland and Australia and Japan.  I love that every bio and every story that I've ever seen or read about her mentions that she is from Barbados, and many refer to her Bajan accent. I am delighted that she is often referred to as charming, well-spoken, polite (as we Bajans would say, she got real broughtupcy!).  I am not a big fan of the particular brand of pop music that she delivers, and I am quite cynical about the whole Hollywood-type celebrity thing, but I don't begrudge Miss Rihanna her success; indeed I wish her plenty more of it, and all good things.

(Pictures courtesy of Def Jam's official Rihanna site.)

fire

There is smoke in the air tonight, together with flames of bright red and yellow contrasted against the dark starry sky.

No, Aruba didn't suddenly turn into a group of pyromaniacs, it's Saint John's Day, or Dia di San Juan as we say here. While that sounds very Catholic, our native ancestors left a mark on it by incoorperating a distinctive pagan ritual, burying the rooster (Dera Gai). Another tradition is to build bonfires. These can turn massive, and the fire department will have their hands full tonight.

Nowadays no roosters are harmed in the celebrating of this festival. Instead a fake rooster is put in the middle of a circle. This circle is formed by dancing men and women clad in bright red and yellows, the colors of fire. One person is blindfolded and tries to hit the "rooster". The people in the circle sing:

San Juan ta bin, San Juan ta bai/Ate cu e palo den su man (Saint John comes, Saint John goes/There he is with the stick in his hand)

It's a very simple song, but it is one of the few 19th century local songs that is still known.

I like this festival a lot because it celebrates how two cultures merged and produced something new.That's something that modern Aruba could learn a lot from.