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Keeping The Culture Alive

A Drummer's Passion

In Gales Point, in the middle of the village, when the moon is full, the djembet drums begin to beat as the Maroon sambai dancer gets ready to circle the fire preparing for the fertility ritual dance.

Gales Point is home to the Maroon settlers, slaves who escaped from Ebo Town over 200 years ago. And sambai dancing during the full moon remains traditional to the village. The dance is performed to the beat of the djembet, an authentic African drum created at the Creole Maroon Drum School.

Drum makers Boombay Andrewin and Emmett Young import their goatskins from Africa and professional sailing rope from Guatemala and New England. Mahogany, coconut, and cashew woods are fashioned to create the cylinder base. Mango and cedar are sometimes used as well.

For Boombay drumming is spiritual, and to Emmett it's about being the best he can be. He practices day and night with the desire to be the most accomplished djembet drummer. And the motivation behind both is their desire to keep the traditions of their culture alive.

Boombay and Emmett perform at festivals throughout the country, manage their drum making school, teach drumming lessons, and go into communities to conduct drum making workshops for youth to encourage them to learn how to make drums. Anyone visiting Gales Point is welcome to participate in a two to five day drum making session. The length of the session depends greatly on the size of the drum desired.

To support the efforts to keep this culture alive, purchase a Talla Walla Vibrations CD available at the school in Gales Point.

Retreat In The Wilderness

There is a unique space near by, one of those one-of-a-kind types of places, where the earth comes alive. Poustinia Park is a land art sculpture project and a retreat in the wilderness of western Belize. It is an opportunity for local and international artists to create sculptures in the rainforest using natural and organic materials. At the same time, it is a retreat for those who are drawn to the desert of their spirit.

Sited sculptures at the park are three-dimensional objects carefully placed in their surroundings. Since sculpture and landscape are closely related, they blend and complement one another. Land art relates to the manipulation of the surroundings. It uses landscape and changes it into sculpture through the use of available materials to create either internal or external spaces, or both. It becomes then a form of architecture.

Most sculptural objects in Poustinia are man and nature made. The artist initiates the process and then allows nature to take over and shape it at its will. The object is then transformed. What was thus an inert object gradually gains life. Branches grow; termites nest, and butterflies alight as spiders spin their webs on it. The spirit then comes alive in art, an art that is alive in communion with nature.

Located three miles south of Benque Viejo del Carmen, Poustinia Park extends over two hundred and seventy acres, sixty of which have been shaped into a more formal garden. The remainder is secondary forest and bush - a dense cover of pioneering shrubs and herbs. Poustinia also contains Maya mounds, ponds and trails. With its different types of habitat, it supports a wide variety of flora and fauna.

Poustinia Foundation was legally established in December 1997. It seeks to establish a place where earth art can thrive. The Ruiz family, founders of the project, work with local artists and conservationists to create the park within an arboretum of rare and endangered hardwoods of Central and South America. A further aim is to produce a steady supply of low cost hardwood saplings and exotic plants to encourage planting projects in Belize.

The park is exclusively open for artists, writers, and those who may wish to conduct seminars or conferences or retreat on their own. Educational tours for groups, schools and colleges are arranged on prior notice. A modest, open building provides a conference area for about forty persons. Residential facilities include two hermit-style cabins.

www.poustiniaonline.org