It All Started With Jouvert!

Tucked in between St. George's Caye, or National, Day, and Independence Day is a little celebration called Carnival! Carnival actually kicked off several weeks ago with the crowning of the Carnival King and Queen that I talked about in my last blog. But, the official party started at 4am on Saturday morning, when a few thousand people assembled in the street where Central American Blvd and the Northern Highway meet. A truckload of people drove through the group throwing buckets of mud into the crowd. And when we were all covered from head to toe, a flatbed truck with a huge PA system strapped to the back started down the street with all of us following behind dancing to the sounds of soca music. It's called Carnival Jouvert, and the dancing is called "jump up" because that's what we did all the way to the sea, where everyone jumped in and washed off the mud.

Then it was home to shower and get to bed so I could be ready for the Carnival Parade. Fellow Peace Corps volunteers, KC, Gayla and her friend Patti, from San Diego, came to join in the festivities and we all headed out to find a good place to watch the parade. It was festive, fun and fantastic with bands, floats, ornate costumes, music and dancing that kept coming and coming over the bridge for over two hours. I've put a lot of pictures from the parade on the slide show at the top of my Blog. It's been a really fun month, but I think I'm ready to get back to work - until the next holiday!