Island Hopping in Turks and Caicos

Lorraine McKiniry:: I've heard that to get a true of taste of Bahamian culture, you have to check out Junkanoo. Female: This is what you would call an Off the Beaten Track behind the scenes. So true, Bahamian experience, 90% of the visitors who come through here have never heard the word Junkanoo before, it’s a strange word for a strange festival. It’s the national cultural festival of the Bahamas traditionally celebrated at Christmas time. We have two parades, one Christmas night and one New Years morning. And so it’s a big party and we need you to be there to dance on the street. Lorraine McKiniry: Oh, I would love to. Female: It’s been documented in the Bahamas for over 200 years and in a nut shell under British law slaves will given three days holiday at Christmas time and in the Bahamas they did something very special they stole the undercover of knight to re-claim their humanist by recreating the African festivals. And so over the years, this has come to be a wonderful celebration of life out of the strength of the people of the Bahamas, they told their children never to forget. Lorraine McKiniry: I can't believe how detail the costumes are. Female: Very much so, very much so. Lorraine McKiniry:: So, it was very labor intensive, this process. Female: Very labor intensive in the African tradition of the layering of a costume so you never just put it on, you put it on in layers and this is great paper that’s put on to cardboard and it’s put one tiny strip at a time. So, we are already working on the costumes for this Christmas, it goes on the entire year. Lorraine McKiniry: Oh, my goodness. Female: This room is dedicated to Wood Chunk who looked like in the first half of the last century. And allow me to introduce you to Sponge Bahaman Bob and in the first half of the 2010—squeeze it, it grows on the ocean floor in the Bahamas in the days of indigenous costumes. Sponge was quite a popular material to make costumes from and the progress you have rides, newspapers when you couldn’t find anything else, tissue paper was very popular in the first half of the 20th century and a list of colonial colors and then we move to crepe paper in the 1950’s, socks we’d be using today. Children come from local schools and they come to do a Junkanoo workshop. And I teach them about the history and their heritage and national pride. Lorraine McKiniry: So, this festival is actually a part of everyday life here. Female: It’s a part of our lives Junkanoo is in the soul Bahamians.