IFYE Program Newsletter

Welcome to another 4-H training day. Like me, when most 4-H club-ites hear those words, they automatically think boring, right? Well, that held true until just the other day.

On Wednesday, September 27, I, along with several other 4-H and agricultural persons, headed up to the top of John's Mountain, St. Thomas, where the training was to take place. We were going there for a ginger field day and project kick- off function.

The road leading up to the top of the mountain was in very poor condition. There were huge rocks, deep potholes and trenches everywhere. Travel required a 4x4 vehicle. At the top, we learned how to properly plant and raise a crop of ginger in the hills of Jamaica. I do not know how the training crop had survived, because it was growing on the side of a steep hill.

After the practical demonstration part of the training was finished, we moved on around the mountain to a small schoolroom for the kick-off function. The ginger project was actually a project being funded by the European Union here in Jamaica to assist small, poor farmers.

Dr. Fenton Ferguson, Minister of State in the Ministry of Agriculture, was there to officially launch the project. From there, we went out to the canteen for our lunch. During lunch, I heard several people talking of a roadblock on down the mountain, but because they like to joke a lot here, I took it as just that, a joke.

So we headed on toward home. Of course I know that none of that sounds interesting compared to other training days, but that is because I have not yet gotten to the good part of the day. It turns out that the talk at lunch was far from a joke.

Local residents of the mountain had actually staged a roadblock as a protest to the Minister about the poor road and water conditions on the mountain. This was bit more than just a little road- block. It was a major demonstration as well.

Local residents had spent their time cutting down trees to block the road all the way down to the bottom of the mountain, and lit a pile of bamboo on fire near the start of the demonstrations. Little children were holding homemade cardboard signs with misspelled words on them, and many adults were carrying machetes with them.

Dr. Ferguson was in the middle of the rioting crowd trying to reason with the angry people. I was so excited! I had never seen anything like that before except an occasional clip on the local news. While they went on negotiating and protesting, I just took a seat on a nearby log with my camera to take pictures.

Several 4-H people kept asking me if I was nervous. I said, "No! Are you kidding? I would have to pay $7.00 to go see a movie at the theater to see this much action back home." They all seemed to find it quite amusing.

The police had to come with a bulldozer and chainsaws to cut us out, so that we could go home. After four hours of being stuck on the mountainside we were free to go. Luckily no one was hurt in the incident. I must say that it was one 4-H training day that I will never forget.

Everyone kick back your seats, grab your popcorn and soda, because I have a little story to tell you. The other day the 4-H staff had their fun day/social at a place called Cranbrook Farms in St. Ann on the north coast. We enjoyed games of dominos, checkers, Scrabble, soccer, and volleyball.

I chose the volleyball option, but after just a short time of playing the game, I was burning up from the hot sun. So, we broke from the game for a little dip in the river. Now, as some of you might have heard or seen there have been several hurricanes moving around out in the sea.

They have been causing heavy rains at times here on the island, making the rivers a little bit swifter than usual. Rivers here are more equal to the streams of West Virginia rather than a river. The other IFYE, a few Jamaican friends, and I all changed and headed upstream to find a good swimming hole. After a few minutes we finally reached a point where one of the girls wanted to cross the river.

I did not want to get my shoes wet, so I took them off and tossed them to the far bank. No problem. I was ready to swim across. Just as I started to step in, Katie, the other IFYE, handed me her Dr. Martin sandals to throw across. Her sandals were a little heavier than my shoes, but it was no problem, because the river was not that wide. I had forgotten that I was standing in the water where the rocks were slick. As I let go of the first one, I slipped on a rock, landed on my backside, and the shoe flew straight up and came down in the swift water.

Earlier I told you that the water was a little swifter than usual, but I did not say just exactly how swift it was. I would compare it to trying to go whitewater rafting without a raft. Man, was it ever flowing. Katie screamed at me and told me that I had to catch it. I sprinted up the bank and down the trail along the river. One of the Jamaican girls ran down that way as well. She stopped and I continued to run a little farther.

I stopped when I heard her scream to tell me where the shoe was. Quickly I rushed back that way. As she pointed to it, I dove in and swam out to grab it. I managed to catch it just before it went over the falls. Hurray, the day was saved! It's a good thing I did, because she would have beat me if I would not have caught the sandal!

We all met back at the swimming hole, dove in, and lived happily ever after. The moral of this story is that when you go swimming make sure to wear old shoes.

Jamaica, the land of reggae, rum, and rastas. Everyone knows what reggae and rum are, I am assuming, but not many know what a rasta is. What exactly is a rastafarian? Well, I thought that I would take this space to explain just what one is since I decided to use them in the title of my newsletter.

Rastifarians are a group of people comprised of both men and women, however you rarely ever see a rasta woman out on the street. With their uncut, uncombed hair grown into long sun-bleached tangles known as "dreadlocks" or "dreads", they can be spotted everywhere across the island. Many choose to wear crocheted red, green, yellow, and black hats to controls their dreads, but others choose to let them hang freely and drag the ground.

Rastafarians have their own religion or faith and do not belong to a church. They use the basic principals of Christianity, but change them to fit their philosophy. The philosophy was started in the early 1900's by a popular black nationalist named Marcus Garvey.

He established the United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in 1914. The purpose of the organization was to unite all the Negro peoples of the world into one great body to establish a government and country of their own. The rastas looked to him as their prophet according to his philosophy.

Garvey predicted that a black man, a Redeemer, would be crowned king in Africa. When Haile Selassie was crowned emperor of what is now Ethiopia in 1930, they considered the prophecy fulfilled. From that year on, Ethiopia was considered the center of the Kingdom of Rastafarianiam. Selassie claimed to be the king of all Africans. He took the title, "King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah." His followers believed he was their God. They adopted his pre-coronation name, Ras Tafari: Ras (prince) and Tafari (to be feared).

Most all of the rastas smoke and grow a lot of ganja, because they believe that it provides a line of communication with God. Through smoking the ganja, they claim to gain wisdom and inner divinity.

Now, just like everywhere else, there are different levels of support for these ideals in the rasta community. Just because a man or woman wears her hair in dreads, doesn't mean that he or she supports the whole philosophy that goes with Rastafarianism.

The true, full -fledged rastas live in their own villages and educate their own children on the rasta philosophy rather than sending them to school. That is rastifarianism in short!

Chris