What Is A Sugar Cake From St Kitts

I've spent some time digging through St. Kitt's webpages about Carnival and Sugar Mas 42. I know enough to pass on some information to readers but there is and so much going on in the month of December during Sugar Mas that it's difficult to figure out accurately what is going on when and where.

It'due south fair to say that the celebration is going to be huge when the authorities creates a complete department to organize and run this event. The St. Kitts Section of Culture preserves Kittitian culture by promoting traditional celebrations, visual art, literary art, culinary art, performing arts, and much more. Sugar Mas happens to be a combination of all these things wrapped into one. (The Department of Culture has a facebook page too.

The challenge of defining St. Kitt's Sugar Mas is that it, along with a lot of the culture here it is similar a huge woven rug that combines threads and fabrics from many different countries and time periods. In gild to understand the entire rug we have to pull out each piece of cord and closely examine it.

Saccharide Mas is not one event but a large conglomeration of celebrations, parties, and events that begins effectually the twentieth of November and doesn't end until around the 5th of Jan. As a historian I had to rely on my fourth dimension tested arroyo of tackling this mammoth by trying to make historical sense of it.

So what is Sugar Mas? Skilful Question. The give-and-take "Mas" is the shortened form of the discussion Masquerade. In about every Caribbean area country they gloat a Carnival or sometimes what'south referred to as a Carnival Masquerade. Now they all don't take place in December either, but that'due south another topic. Anyways, Sugar Mas i'm guessing is simply the specific proper name of St. Kitt's Funfair because of the importance of sugar in the country for then many years.

So allow's back up again to Carnival. This celebration began many years ago and is celebrated around the world in different forms. The celebration coincides with the Catholic religion and Lent. Lent is the menstruation of fasting before Easter, for 40 days earlier Christ'southward resurrection date, signifying his wandering in the wilderness for that many days.

Carnival painting past Pieter Bruegel. 1559

Traditionally all of the rich foods such as sugar, meat, dairy, and potable were tending of or used up before Lent since no parties or consumption of these foods was allowed during those four weeks. Therefore, the consumption of all these foods and drinks is believed to be what started Carnival. Some believe it may have started as early as Roman times and was adopted into the Christian culture.

Originally Europeans, namely the French Catholics, brought the celebration to St. Kitts and other Caribbean countries, but slaves were excluded from participating.

Therefore modern Carnival has evolved from the combination of elements simply what we gloat today has four main elements: ane. Song two. Music iii. Costume 4. Dance,which all translate as calypso/soca, steelpan, mas or masquerade, and trip the light fantastic toe.

In order for slaves to hold onto their traditions they combined what they knew in Africa to events in the Caribbean too. For case the modern Carnival got its idea of parading because of what was called Canboulay , an African Yoruba tradition during slavery on saccharide plantations. The Canboulay was the event of organizing the slaves into large groups where they would drum, sing, and march commonly at night to put out sugar cane field fires. The marchers used torches, stick fighters, and chanting to build up their confidence along the route. Canboulay afterwards was historic by the slaves in parallel to Carnvial and was somewhen outlawed besides. Canboulay later on involved beating sticks after drums were outlawed.

After emancipation in 1834, the former African slaves made Carnival about liberty and through satirical interim made mockery of their old taskmasters. Some say Carnival also serves as a reminder of the evils of slavery likewise. Since many of their traditional customs utilized similar masked celebrations with song, dance, animals, and costumes it easily became their ain commemoration.

Old depiction of Carnival in Trinidad.

The British did attempt to end Carnival afterwards Emancipation considering they saw it every bit brutal and every bit a threat to peace and order. In Trinidad the British banned drums,(This led to the apply of the bottoms of oil drums for steel pan drums), limited the number of bamboo stick fighters, and forced everyone to have restrictive permits for the celebration, simply Carnival survived and is one of the largest events in St. Kitts and other Caribbean countries.

Back to those main elements of Carnival: Vocal is very important for the event and and then far I've heard two major types of music being described on the radio or being thrown around during the vacation season. The first is Calypso. What is Calypso? My idea of information technology earlier I came here was a sort of happy joyous island music, merely information technology's more than that. Calypso originated in medieval France and is associated with the traveling troubadours. When the French brought slaves and indentured freed blacks to Trinidad they again brought with them another cultural chemical element that yet exists in the Caribbean, Calypso music.

2013 National Senior Calypso Monarch King, Ritchie Buntin being crowned by Prime Minister Denzel Douglas. Courtesy SKN Vibes.

The slaves already had a system of singing under their slavery in Africa called Kaiso music. Once once more they adapted information technology on the plantations because they weren't immune to talk in the fields so they sung, originally in French Creole. The songs were led by a leader or Calypsonian and again mocked the slave owner and helped them communicate with each other.

By the belatedly 1800s Kaiso was being called Calypso and every bit a side note, Kaiso music is supposed to be where the limbo trip the light fantastic toe came from. The participants were urged on nether the stick. The Calypso music in more recent times held political and social themes and served as a form of news communication throughout Trinidad and other countries. By the 1970s Calypso music lost its popularity to a more upbeat music called Soca and some people believe Hip Hop arose out of Calypso music.

During St. Kitts Carbohydrate Mas they have held many Soca competitions and Calypso competitions. I personally enjoy the Calypso music much more considering of its humorous, yet truthful content. Information technology's almost all political in nature and also "calls" out people who are greedy or not "living correct." The winner of these competitions is crowned the Calypso King or Queen Monarch until the next year.

Calypso music has given manner to Soca music which is much more upbeat, loud, and is generally electronic music with repeating rhythms and lots of bass. It sounds like circus music to me, but who am I to judge.

So as we examine Carnival piece past slice nosotros learn that it is fabricated up of a ton of history and civilisation. I'k adequately certain that the majority of revelers who started partying and drinking at iii a.m. J'ouvert the other day have no thought where this tradition started and how much importance information technology has had to Caribbean people.

J'ouvert morning time this year.

I do know that the celebrations have been great and through some inquiry I can at present understand and appreciate the importance of Carnival for St. Kitts. I am also thankful to be able to experience this uniquely Caribbean event.

Stay tuned for my side by side mail service where I'll mail service more photos of Jouvert and Carnival!

During my research for this post I found a actually cool, sometime photo of a play washed in St. Kitts in 1901.