9 Mornings Update and Holiday Cookies

As it turns out, my original goal of going to 9 Mornings every day was entirely too ambitious. Especially since I never get to bed before 11 pm and the 3:30 am wake up requirement left me in a perpetual zombie-like trance. I did manage to haul myself out of bed for 3 of the 9 Mornings and was glad I did. First of all, it is amazing to be outside in the early morning in St. Vincent because it's cool, quiet and you can see approximately 1 billion stars. And since it is so dark out in the country (coupled with the severe lack of sleep), the lights at 9 Mornings seem even more stunning. The entertainment varied each day, but usually there was some sort of karyoke, guessing games for children, traditional Vincentian dishes like callalou* and bush teas**, costume contests and special appearences by local celebrities. The ceremonies are generally aimed at children, but adults join in the fun as well. The organizers also created special contests for Vincentians living abroad who returned for the Christmas season and visitors experiencing 9 Mornings for the first time. The first day (Tuesday, December 16th), I went to the Carriere 9 Mornings, which is about a half hours walk from my house. I thought it was really nice, although it was on a much smaller scale than other 9 Mornings. On Thursday, December 18th, I went to 9 Mornings in Kingstown, which was significantly larger and more crowded. We tried to go to the Mespo 9 Mornings, but someone apparently dropped the ball, because even though they hung a sign and lights, no one ever organized the 9 Mornings ceremony! Fortunately, a van drove through at 4 am and took us to town. This day was "Audience Day," so anyone who wanted could go up on stage and sing or dance. Skarpyon, a local celebrity, also performed on this day. The last 9 Mornings I attended was on Tuesday, December 23rd in Carriere. I think everyone was pretty tired by this time, because it started an hour late, a pretty significant delay in a 2 hour ceremony! All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by what I saw of 9 Mornings. I'm glad that I was able to experience this entirely Vincentian tradition and I hope to power through at least 4 or 5 mornings next Christmas. I'm posting the few pictures I have.
On Wednesday, December 17th, I invited the other volunteers over and we made Christmas cookies, which may be an entirely American tradition as my neighbors and friends here thought it was strange that we would bake cookies instead of cakes. Even so, we had a lot of fun and watched Christmas-y movies like "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and "The Nightmare Before Christmas." In fact, it was so fun that I invited some of the neighborhood kids over yesterday to bake Christmas cookies. It made for quite a crowded kitchen (4 - 6 kids plus me), but they were great - there was surprisingly little fighting over who got to do what and then only thing they needed help with was cracking the eggs. The most fun part was that each kid got his or her own bowl of dough to add food coloring to. Most of them went a bit color-happy and ended up with greenish-brown gloop, but there were a few nice looking results (notably a purple and green swirl pattern). The important thing is everyone had fun and it was a great way to curb boredom for an afternoon.
On an unrelated note, those of you following this blog will be excited to know that my eggplant plant survived the caterpillar mauling and is now growing new leaves and the pepper plant has begun to form a tiny bell pepper!
Happy Holidays!

*Callalou is a soup made from dasheen leaves (called callalou), coconut milk, potatoes (or other starch) and some kind of meat.
**Bush teas are just teas made from local plants (bush).

A Very Vincy Christmas

Here is a Vincy-style version of "'Twas the night before Christmas," written completely in dialect (by me). It's certainly not perfect (my dialect definately isn't!), but it's not bad and should make for a fun read. I've added some translation notes at the bottom. Enjoy!

‘Twas e night befo Chrismas an all tru Hairoun
All nayga was windin to e new Soca tune.
De cutlasses heng on e front porch wit might
Ready to chop jus in case of a fight.

Nine marnings dun now, all dat sweet bacchanal
An mammy bin kill e fat holiday fowl.
E breadfruit dun roas an e pickney bin lick
Der was nottin to do, ‘cept wait fuh St. Nick.

E pickney was sleepin, tree to a bed
Wile tots of guava jelly dance in dey head.
An mammy in she kerchif and unclo in he cap
Had jus settloed in fuh a lang winter nap.

When out in e yard der arose such a drum
Dat mammy jump up an yell “Rain ah go come!”
She run to e window to close up e shutter
Bu instead see a man in a red Chrismas sweater.

“Way yo a do?” yell she a e man in she yard.
“Leave arwe or me chap yo real hard!”
Bu e man only smile in he red Christmas sweater.
Which mus a bin hot in e tropical wedder.

E man belly real roun along wit he bum
He nose like red mango fuh all dat strong rum
He beard lang and white jus like a new rag
An he drogh on he back a big scarlet bag.

He reach in he bag an he nar mek a soun
Wile he a lay plenty of gif on e groun.
Toys fuh e pickney, a fish fuh e cat
An fuh mammy a red an blue Church-gwine hat.

Den fas as iguana, he turn an he run
An he jump in e front of a idloing van.
An as e van drive, he yell out e rear -
“Ah bussin it, Merry Chrismas, yo hear!”

**Translation Notes**

Hairoun = SVG
All nayga = everyone
windin = dancing
bacchanal = a fun time
pickney = children
"Rain ah go come" = "It's going to rain"
"Way yo a do" = "What are you doing"
"Leave arwe" = "Leave us alone"
fuh = for
drogh = carry
nar = never
gwine = going
"Ah bussin it" = "I'm leaving"

Nine Mornings Kick-Off

On Sunday, I went to the 9 Mornings Kick-Off Festival in Kingstown. 9 Mornings is a strictly Vincentian celebration, which runs from the 16th of December to the 24th of December, basically the 9 mornings before Christmas. 9 Mornings events are held all over the island, and the village with the best 9 Mornings celebration wins the title of "Best 9 Mornings." Last year, the title went to Carriere, a village within walking distance of my house! Each morning, people assemble really early (around 4 am) at their local 9 Mornings celebration, although not every village has one. There, they play Christmas games, sing carols, eat and drink and make merry. The party lasts until about 7 am, when people have to start going to work. Everyone has been talking about 9 Mornings for months now, so I know it will be great. The Kick-Off Festival was really nice. There was a parade through town, which ended in the main square, where the big event was held. There was a Christmas concert and the Minister of Culture spoke and, as always, there was tons of food. Plus, a surprise fireworks show (or at least, a surprise to me). I'm posting pictures. Tomorrow evening, Carriere is having a Kick-Off Festival too, which I am also attending so I will put up pictures of that as well.
Yesterday was our last day of school. We had a school closing assembly in our "assembly room," which is really just a bunch of classrooms that connect through partitions. The teachers gave a short sermon and then led the students in some Christmas carols. It was nice, but a bit noisy. Both campuses met at the main campus, and that is a lot of students in a small space. I also tried my first red mango, which is a mango that has been soaked in a vinegar solution - it looks and tastes kind of like a pickled beet. People here love them, and they're really not bad after the initial shock of the vinegar taste.

Thanksgiving and World AIDS Day

Hello again. We're in our last few days of exams now and I and the students alike are really looking forward to the break. I hope to use it to explore SVG a little more.
Thanksgiving was amazing. Like I said before, it was at the Taiwanese Embassy and each PCV signed up to make a dish. I, along with 2 others, signed up for apple pie, and since I live the closest to the Embassy (about 25 minutes by bus), we spent Wednesday night here baking, baking, baking. The pie making went reasonably well. Our first attempt at crust was a sticky mess, but it tasted good anyway. And then we nearly forgot to add sugar to our first pie, but it fortunately became our penultimate step, just before we pushed it into the oven. Fears of exhausing our propane supply (my oven/stove runs on a propane tank) were unrealized in the end and all 5 pies (that's 3 hours of oven time) were delicious, if a bit lopsided. The transformation from pie #1 to pie # 5 is actually quite amazing - with our baking and teamwork skills refined, we were ready to open our own bakery...that exclusively serves apple pie, as that's the only thing we make well. I'll post pictures when the photographer of the night emails them to me.
So, back to Thanksgiving. We arrived at the Embassy at minutes to 12, carrying pies only slightly worse off for the van ride (a testament to our skills) and were astonished by the sheer amount of food that awaited us. The event was large - 26 PCVs plus staff, 4 Taiwanese volunteers and the entire staff of the Taiwanese Embassy pushed our numbers to 40+ - but I think we had food for twice that. Someone donated 2 enormous turkeys of at least 30 - 40 pounds each, we had buckets of mashed potatoes, gallons of cranberry sauce, ham, green bean casserole, stuffing, yams, apple and pumpkin pies, cheesecake, spice cake, PLUS an assortment of delicious Taiwanese foods. It was fantastic. And on top of all that, they had really good coffee, a luxury I've been craving since I got here. It was really nice to interact with the Taiwanese volunteers as well. They are working with agro-tourism and they also have a 2-year commitment. At the end of the afternoon, the Embassy bestowed us with parting gifts - a mug and re-useable shopping bag displaying their national bird, the blue-magpie. It was such a great time that PCVs unanimously suggested that we hold Thanksgiving every 6 months!
Yesterday, December 1st, was World AIDS Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness worldwide about HIV and AIDS. At EHS, we were able to have a short program for all Form 2 students about HIV and AIDS, run by a nurse from the Mespo clinic and a representative of the SVG AIDS Secretariat. I think it was really successful - the facilitators spoke about how to prevent the spread of HIV and, more importantly, how to reduce the stigma associated with the disease. At the end of the presentation, the students asked a lot of (mostly) thoughtful questions and I think the overall response was positive. I think that it is important to put the issues out there as often as possible - really push the subject so that people understand fully that HIV is about lifestyle choices, that it is a truly preventable disease. I hope that our presentation will prompt EHS students to make better choices in the coming years. I will post pictures when they are emailed to me.