Rastas and Maroons, a Reasoning in Charles Town

NOTE: I have been known to bore my audience, compulsive, too deep into a subject. Here, I've shunted some of this detail into footnotes at the end, there for those intrepid enough to want to read them, but not necessary.

Colonel Frank Lumsden, head of the Charles Town Maroons,
playing the abeng in an old photo from Google. The abeng
is the cow horn that helped confound the British,
communicating across the dense mountainous foliage
using a secret code, like Morse code.

Sometimes, the search for something will fail to discover its goal, yet still deliver up a different, unforeseen prize. In my case, I wanted to visit a Jamaican Maroon community (see below*), hoping for insight into the history of their music and possible retentions of the island's indigenous culture. Instead, I stumbled upon a formal discussion, a reasoning, between them and a no-less independent contingent of Rastas.

In a narrow canyon of Portland parish, up the kind of road where I had to back up to allow an oncoming car to pass, lies one of the few extant Maroon communities in Jamaica. The Charles Town Maroons, who, for the last 7 years, have hosted a Maroon conference: a gathering to discuss, celebrate and share their culture. Without knowing exactly what to expect, I came alone from Kingston, my wife and son recognizing this outing as one of my Quixotic exercises, not willing to endure the 2hr drive there and back based only on the hope of experiencing the music and dance of Maroon gatherings. In this respect, their doubt was proven wise.

Mutabaruka, the barefoot poet

I arrived much too early at the Charles Town yard (community space), an open-air grassy enclosure with a small stage and a smattering of vendors outside. It was hot, even in the shade, and I waited 90minutes before they kicked off 3 hours of scholarly, mostly boring presentations to the 20-30 of us wilting in the audience. Some little girls climbed around me, grabbing at my sunglasses, before a stern auntie sent them off with stern admonishments about bathing and returning presentable for the event. I cooled off: first with a fiery, natural ginger-beer, then with a fresh and refreshing coconut (though I did commit the faux pas of not opening the coconut and using its shell to scrape out the meat inside...I gotta learn the trick to that). In one corner, a large, 60-ish, barefoot man sat draped in African robes, earthy rings and bracelets, and a frown. Elsewhere, a spry grandmother type wore hemp clothing and seed-pod rattles as anklets. But then, too, there was a small group with iPads and smart phones, there to promote their Maroon comic book for children, based on the various spirits and myths that inhabit Jamaica's natural world (see below**).

Mau Mau G
(from Google, I couldn't get a photo)

Finally, blessedly, the sun went down, and Colonel Frank Lumsden used the abeng to call the village elders back to the yard as a panel took the stage for the reasoning. It turns out that the shoeless man was the famous, barefoot dub poet Mutabaruka, there to represent the rastafarian point of view. The grandma was Mau Mau G, a Maroon matriarchal figure. As far as I can tell, there are some frictions between Rasta and Maroon (e.g. a 1740 treaty guaranteeing independence for the Maroons from the British also stipulated that they become trackers of newly escaped slaves). But they find common ground in their rejection of colonial oppression and the sins of modernity, and this reasoning was a forum for that. Muta spoke powerfully, his oration delivered with barely contained fury, pointing out today's moral bankruptcy and advocating for self-reliance and African identity (see below ***). Mau Mau G also spoke of self-reliance, she lives without electricity, using the natural world around her for food, clothing and medicine, living like a Maroon matriarch would have long ago. A jumpy Rasta posed a question: how to reconcile the Maroon pantheon of nature spirits with the rastafarian deification of the onetime emperor of Ethiopia, "the one true Jah, the Lion, Heile Selassie"? But the panel refused to be drawn into a theological argument, turning the focus back to the practical need for a strong, proud self-identity, skeptical of the white man.

Seems reasonable.

---

* 'Maroon' is a general term, referring to any number of communities (mostly in the Caribbean, I believe) that trace their heritage to enslaved African peoples who escaped into the bush and banded together with indigenous peoples and other escapees. Shortly after Columbus, Jamaican Maroons confounded the Spanish, then the British, successfully creating a fiercely independent culture that has survived for centuries. The way Jamaicans think about the their Maroon history is nuanced, not immediately graspable by an outsider. I've only begun to read, both about Jamaican Maroons and various others (Belize, Trinidad, Cuba, Haiti, 60,000 in Suriname and French Guiana, the kings of the "Mosquito Coast", Black Seminoles in Florida, etc. etc.). It is seriously interesting. 

** http://www.leagueofthemaroons.com/   A large host of West African nature spirits came over with the slave trade and, like the Maroons, found a way to survive in the Jamaican wilds. But it was a new land and the African spirits could not represent it all, so new spirits were invented/discovered, creating a new, Africa-Jamaica hybrid mythology unique to the island. The kids in the comic book deal with the spirits using iconic Maroon objects (like the abeng/cow horn). Not all Jamaicans are as enamored of this cultural history, disliking its paganism, some even disliking its Africanism, and the idea of getting the book in front of children is complicated.

Rasta calabash bag a carver sold
to us along with a bone pendant
for Carter.

*** It is probably not necessary to point out that true Rastas are serious about their beliefs and African identity...very different from the hippy fashion version in the U.S. that's preoccupied with dreadlocks, reggae and ganga. In Jamaica, there are various rastafarian groups, from orthodox to almost secular, it seems. The common themes are the evils of Babylon (Euro-American imperial culture) and the spiritual (or literal) return to the Africa they were ripped from centuries ago. Like the Maroons, Rastas have not always been accepted by Jamaicans. Until the 1970s, they were viewed by most as druggie malcontents and it was reggae and black pride that began to turn that perception around. Some Rasta are vegan, some wear only natural fiber, their men recognizable with dreads often piled high into cantilevered hats. But they remain a minority in Jamaica; on weekends they are far outnumbered on the roads by church ladies wearing prim hats. Jamaica has, per capita, more churches than any other country. So here, a Rasta continues to be somewhat a revolutionary.

Around Kingston, Part One

Giddy house at Port Royal

Port Royal

Kingston harbor is separated from the sea by a 9-mile spit of rock, mangrove and landfill. Out on the western tip, the old and weathered ghost of Port Royal sits quietly, guarding the mouth of the harbor. You may not know it, but you already have a mental image of what Port Royal once was. Pirates of the Caribbean, but probably with less romance and more syphilis. The wiki entry makes for fun reading, but let's just say that Port Royal was the kind of place where a pirate like Henry Morgan could become governor of Jamaica. What you may not know is that 1/3 of the original town lies 30ft under the bay, swallowed during an earthquake in 1692. On that day, poor souls were trapped up to their waist as the sand spit liquified, the ground dropped and the sea rushed in. Today, there is a small

Curry shrimp, jerk shrimp, brown stew fish

fort with cannons and some artifacts, and a tilted "giddy house" that partially sank in another earthquake (1907) and is surprisingly disorienting upon entry. There's not much to SEE really, but a sleepy vestige of the feeling permeates the place, best contemplated in the breezy upstairs of Glorias, where I enjoy sipping ginger beer and eating curry shrimp while watching local fishermen putter out and cargo ships come in.

Ded Leff

nine-night drum circle at Ashe

In Jamaica, the passing of loved ones trigger elaborate traditions, a combination of Christian practices and West African ideas about how to treat the spirit of the deceased' ("duppy"). There is a funeral, but the days and nights leading up to it are also important…culminating in the "nine-night" wake before the funeral. Our housekeeper, Barbara, goes to the bank every month to pay funeral insurance for her mother, funeral costs are steep and the nine-night can is a giant party with food and music and plenty of rum. At a local cultural center, Jen and I saw a musical play centered on this tradition, about a Europeanized Jamaican returning home to face his family and birthplace during his father's nine-night. Ashe, the cultural center, is an LGBT support community, but it can not advertise the fact here in Jamaica where homosexuality is a target. The playwright at Ashe has given musicology presentations to Peace Corps trainees and is a member of the faculty at the University of the West Indies. Starting next week, he and I will begin a collaboration on a visual map for Jamaican music history; I'm excited to see what comes of this.

Famous People

It's a small country with more than its fair share of interesting people, so it is not uncommon to cross paths with them, particularly within the small circle of privilege we travel in. We've run into Chris Blackwell, the famous music producer, at one of his hotels. We ran into a sashed Miss Jamaica when

Sweet Honey In The Rock

Sweet Honey in The Rock performed a few songs at the ambassador's house (where Miss Jamaica got a bangle snared on her lace dress and Jen took her to the bathroom for a wardrobe adjustment). Actually, we saw her again at some waterslides (no sash this time), where some little girls swam giggling after her. I have to say, seeing the light and pride in those girl's eyes causes me to temper some of my attitudes about the whole pageant thing. On the whole, I feel like we are never very far removed from some of the island's vibrant individuals: a restaurant belonging to Usain Bolt (no sighting yet), kids who play with Shaggy's kids, jazz by the family of one of Marley's mistresses. But, of course, the most famous sighting we had was not a Jamaican at all, it was President Obama.

POTUS

Peace Corps bus

Obama is huge in Jamaica. My doubts about his presidency are significant, muddled with the good, but seeing him through the eyes of Jamaicans, seeing him for his symbolic power as a black man leading the "free world", is illuminating. I have come across more than one street mural that places him abeside other national heroes like Marcus Garvey (the founder of pan-African nationalism) and Paul Bogle (leader of a major slave insurrection). Days before his short, overnight stay in Kingston, I stood on our balcony with binoculars, watching Osprey aircraft land at the airport, flying like planes but tilting their propellers to land like helicopters. Obama scheduled 20 minutes to meet with the embassy community, and Jennifer was able to invite a busload of Peace Corps volunteers (many of whom slept on our sofas). The energy was infectious, and many Jamaicans expressed their positive feelings for Obama to me. We parked at the embassy in order to bus to the venue, and I wandered through the motorcade prepping for his arrival. The vehicles were like space ships masked to look like cars, a pile of arms and equipment was being sorted by buff men in khakis and sensible shoes, looking as able to kill you with jujitsu as save your life with street surgery. Aboard the Peace Corps bus, though, the excitement was bright and optimistic. Then we were all forced to stand for 90 minutes behind the velvet cordon of a banquet room, the kids off to one side because Obama specifically wanted to greet (and photo-op) with them. I had a good spot, though at the critical moment certain mothers got very sharp elbows, but at least Carter was up front with the very civil group of kids. He got to shake hands, as did Jennifer, and then POTUS was gone. He did not, however, leave Jamaica without stopping at the Bob Marley house. This bit of respect and love for Jamaica, stagecraft or not, only deepened the well of affection for him here.

I'm in the back-left, Jen is by the little girl in red, Carteris by the boy saluting.

Little Bay

The Road From MoBay to Kingston

Sharky's seafood grill shack, St. Ann

We recently received our first visitors here in Jamaica, a quartet of Portlanders, flying in to Montego Bay airport on the other side of the island. I broke my journet to the airport when I threw on my fins, hid the car keys in a stump, and snorkeled in almost perfectly clear water. So I was in a fine mood when Cassie and Jason arrived (earlier than Tonya and Chad, an hour we easily killed with rum punch). MoBay, as it is called, lies up on the northwest coast, shiny and touristy. So coming back, we wound our way east through resorts and malls, but pretty soon the turquoise upon turquoise waters dominated the scene, much to the 'oohs' and 'ahs' of my passengers. Resorts still pepper the coastal road but also small towns on pretty inlets, caverns, cane fields. History is dense in Jamaica, but easily overlooked because one is blinded by the bright light and sheer beauty. For instance, along this road, Columbus was stranded for a year, several slave rebellions took place, even a massacre of Rastafarians just 50 years ago. Small roads reach uphill towards rougher country, while rivers and streams bring the island's famous spring water down to the sea. We passed Discovery Bay, supposedly where Columbus discovered Jamaica, now dominated by the gigantic metal dome of a bauxite mine, and stopped for lunch in Runaway Bay. I ordered a seafood platter and, not uncommon, watched a fisherman walk a bucket of lobster from the sea to the kitchen. That's how fresh it is. After lunch, our route cut overland at Steer Town, winding up and over the spine of the island. Here the potholes are frequent and pedestrians and goats share the road…at least until the Chinese construction company finishes the major toll-road they are building.

As it is, the two hour drive has 2 or 3 toll roads that are as big and wide as any modern highway. Yet the stretch cutting inland is still a slow, slightly nerve-wracking drive through rolling hills of green turf, cows, old stone churches and the occasional giant cotton(?) tree so imposing that its 5-story high branches host an elevated ecosystem with succulents as big as a VW Bug. Cupped in the middle of the central hills is a wide, bread-basket valley where the road is lined with shacks selling banana, pineapple, ackee, bamboo. That is, until the road begins to cascade down the slope towards the southern slope, following a pretty river in a narrow limestone canyon. Finally the road pops out of the canyon at Spanish Town, the one time capital. Here one is reminded that not everything in Jamaica is a postcard; the architecture of hardscrabble, corrugate shacks runs into the distance and dancehalls and bars line the road. Finally, I was able to point out to my passengers the Kingston dump, signal of our arrival in Kingston, and still smoldering after 2-weeks of burning and blanketing the city in a toxic haze.

Little Bay

Little Bay Jamaica, showing the village on the other side

After showing our guests around Kingston a little bit, we left Carter in capable hands and headed out to the leeward (western) tip of the island for the week. The road at one point goes through a mile-long tunnel made of giant bamboo. Cassie and Jason went ahead, Tonya and Chad rode with us, gamely stopping off for a roadside lunch at a crossroads where we were served lunch from kettle over the coals while high school boys rented time on an Xbox set up in a shack and a drunk jabbered at us. Our destination, Little Bay, is not that far as the crow flies from the tourist hotspot Negril; but it is off the beaten track, indeed our route ended on a lane where brush scratched the sides of our new car and I had to honk to clear the way of goats. We later discovered a better way to get there, but you get the picture.

Bay view / Red Stripe at beach bar / our route to Little Bay

Little Bay is a very small, reef-enclosed bay with a set of 10 or so tourist cabins, a handful of houses in the fishing village, and the ghost of Bob Marley. That's about it. Most of the cabins are small, with plywood partitions that put you in earshot of every noise your fellow guests are making. This was the only downside of the intimate charm of the place…we were unlucky enough to share the area on the one hand with a group of loud, smoking midwestern ladies and on the other with a group of loud, arguing New Orleans ladies. We gossiped that at least one of these groups were on a ladies' sex vacation (which apparently is a thing…there's even an "exposé" film called Rent A Rasta), but mostly we were lucky to have a larger cabin set well away from the rest, with a porch separated from the lapping waves only by a strip of trees. After dusk, large bats

Fruit bats at dusk

would come do magical acrobatics in the trees, and several evenings we stood out there letting them zip around us. The bay was tranquil for the first 3 days, so we made good use of it…commuting the handful of steps to the water, snorkeling out to the reef offshore or paddling kayaks or simply floating in tubes at sunset. It was in Little Bay that I realized that I am becoming a little snorkel-crazy, coming back in only to rush for my fish identification book and log all my new discoveries.

We ate at the little restaurant at the cabins, but it was pricey, and the village beckoned anyway. There aren't traditional restaurants, instead we found a couple establishments where if you tell them several hours in advance, they will cook up locally sourced Jamaican meals, served with Red Stripe beer and a soundtrack of reggae. The fisherman would motor out every so often, lobstering and fishing. One of these boats was dugout from a cotton tree, but judging by the 5 lobster and bucket of fish…that man's boat was no handicap.

Fisherman out by the reef

We picked up dinner at a shack in the sand one night, another night we sat outside as the mom cooked and a son Carter's age waited upon us with formal, if wobbly, attention. Later, Chad found "the best chicken he had ever eaten"…you need to know Chad to understand the magnitude of this.

Bob Marley

Little Bay was once where Bob Marley kept a love-nest, which means that other than beachside life, the only thing to do there is go on the Marley walk (assuming you are not interested in Rent A Rasta). A guy from the cabins took us out on the dusty road through the village where we were quickly joined by a local man. He wasn't really invited, like a remora, and he was clearly the town's red-eyed ne'er-do-well, but at least he was talkative and lively. We immediately saw that there was a big fat sticky marijuana bud clinging unnoticed to the back of his shirt. Ganga is obviously profoundly available (was he sitting in ganga?). A young boy rode by waving a large branch of buds. By the way, I have worked out, when offered the herb, how to politely decline…I tell them the truth, it makes me "lonely", which the purveyors seem to understand. Anyway, our walk drifted back into the trees, past a cinderblock school ringing with young voices, to a bat cave. This cave, perhaps like many Jamaican caves, is pockmarked with openings where roots and tendrils twist down from the trees above and shafts of sunlight look like translucent columns holding the roof up. Once your eyes adjust, it's clear that the roof is alive with small bats jostling for purchase. After the cave, we went over to what used to be Marley's shoreside property, where Jason and I plunged in the mineral spring where he used to swim.

Marley's shore / sitting at Marley's spring

The spring is small, tucked under a lip of rock and no more than 15ft across, but probably a good 8ft deep. I think the property was always rustic, but since Hurricane Ivan there is nothing but a foundation left. Still, seen simply as a beautiful spot haunted with Marley's positive vibrations, it was pretty cool. We watched some teenagers jumping off the rocks looking for conch, before heading back the way we came. On the way, we passed the spring where there were now 4 young men hanging out. One of them showed us the honeycomb he had pulled from a tree, squeezing out the mana onto his hands and eating it up. But then, as if embarrassed for his niceness in front of his friends, he said something rude in patwa ("honey make da pussy sweeter"). I think about that sometimes when I consider the Peace Corps experience of female volunteers here…so much beauty and pride and positivity in Jamaica, but also not free of their own brand of anger and sexism. Anyway, our walk was over, we tipped our guide who then tipped the ne'er-do-well, actually not him directly, rather his family. Better that way.

We did go 20km for lunch in Negril, the tourist town of the leeward coast, where I jumped off a rock at a tourist bar that we quickly fled as catamarans started dropping off hordes of people. Other than Negril and the Marley walk, the vacation was mostly comprised of mellow joy and unhurried activities back at the cabins. But how much can one write about yet another snorkel, yet another game of Mexican Train Dominoes, yet another Red Stripe?

Playing around with the iPhone's panorama function

Jennifer in her natural element