Our unbounded influencence

Very few people appreciate the role music played in lightening the load of our ancestors during slavery better than Colin Smith. 

Smith who was awarded a Badge of Honor by the Jamaican government in 2025 for his role in the preservation of Jamaican culture, is not only the Chairman of the Louise Bennett Heritage Council but is also founder/leader of  the Miami based Tallawah Mento Band. It's in that role that he was recently invited to Costa Rica in April 2026 to address the 2nd Marcus Garvey  Symposium on the topic "How enslaved Africans used music to lighten their burden."

The heart of Jamaican culture in Costa Rica is in the province of Limón where it is estimated that of the over 65,000 population there, 75% have Caribbean ancestry, and also in nearby Puerto Viejo (translation Old Harbour!) where Jamaican colors and food dominate. 

Some Tallawah band members pose beside the sign.

Like so many other places in Central America, thousands of Jamaicans moved there and settled after working on the Panama Canal and they retained their culture.

I first visited Limón decades ago after hitching a ride on a Jamaica Producers vessel which used to go there to fill up with bananas to meet its British quota.

What stood out in my mind then was not only how most people could switch from our patois to grammatical Spanish seamlessly but also how our favorite traditional dishes were easily available everywhere. 

On my second visit, I learned that Hon. PJ Patterson, Prime Minister was honored there in 2001. 

What I never knew then was that Garvey was held up in such high esteem there that each year on the 18th April, they put on activities to honor him. 

He had been working there as a timekeeper and between 1910-1911. When he saw the exploitation of the black workers on the banana plantations there, he not only established a branch of the UNIA but also a hub there for his Black Star Liner.

In 2023, Costa Rica declared Garvey an honorary citizen for his contributions to culture and human rights.

It was no doubt a great honor for the Tallawah Band, one of the last surviving mento bands, to be included in this year's festivities.  

They even performed on their first  night in Costa Rica at La Caribena in the Capital San Jose, before going  

on to Limón. 

The performance there  received overwhelming applause. 

I really don't know that too many of our countrymen really appreciate how our culture is revered in so many corners of the globe and the fact that we may even still have many relatives in diverse places that we know little about.

Below are snippets of Tallawah's performance in Costa Rica. 

Nb. Pics and videos contributed by Anette Smith.

Exploring Africa!

I had the opportunity to visit the Motherland twice in 2023, but found it intriguing when quite a few of my fellow countrymen/women, asked incredulously  "how yu go a Africa so often?"

Had I visited Europe or North America twice in a year, it wouldn’t have seemed so strange to anyone.😥.

Snow-capped Kilimanjaro in Tanzania,
as seen from Kenya.

You see, we Jamaicans were brainwashed for decades (even after independence😡!) into believing that the European and North American  continents are the epiphany of civilization, whereas Africa is a dark undeveloped place that no one should visit.

Serious ting.

It may appear strange, but many Jamaicans even think of Africa as a country and not a continent made up of 54 diverse and independent nations!

This is because we have been fed so much negative crap about Africa as a whole, that most have not had the interest to research the facts for themselves.

Anyway, I plead guilty to belonging to the class of travelers who have avoided Africa for far too long!

I actually reached the south-western tip of the continent😊

So, for decades when traveling to faraway lands for pleasure, had chosen some exalted city in Europe, never a country in Africa!

 I was bitten by the travel bug from I was 14 years old, thanks to my parents. For it was at that age that they took me to places as diverse as Cuba (then highly developed and not yet communist), a few small eastern Caribbean islands, Montreal and New York.

So, it was from then that I decided that I wanted to see the natural beauty of the world, interact with every animal I could find, and relive history, but bypass cities and man-made edifices.

Playing with a 40-year-old seal in South Africa

But Africa was never in my plans, because of the negative press with which I had been bombarded for decades.

It was only when my Canadian friends who went to work in Kenya, invited me to stay with them after telling me how wonderful it was there, that I decided to explore.😡.

So, Kenya was the first country in Africa that I visited and it was a wonderful experience.

It was also then I  discovered what a fool I had been all along!

Quite frankly though, I was a bit surprised at how developed Nairobi was, because of the negative images that had been implanted in my brain for decades.(brainwashing is real and has proven to be super-effective for decades!)

Well, that's all behind me now, for it will be Africa every time when going on long-haul trips, for there is so much to see and do and so little time. 

On safari in Kenya with my hosts and friends.

Nairobi is very developed

The reality of Kenya certainly belied the propaganda that I had heard all my life. 

What impressed me immediately too, was how highly they respect their own currency, for that's the only cash they accept.

 Better, yet, they are so technologically advanced, that almost everyone pays with their phone. 

So whether you are buying an orange on the street or a car, just pay with the swipe of your phone.

Since that eye-opening trip, it's been Africa all the way for me.

Hanging out in a lobby in Botswana

My second trip to the Motherland took me to parts of Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Robben Island (where Mandela was imprisoned for decades), and Cape Town in South Africa.

With Wendy and family.

This was all thanks to my Jamaican friend Wendy, who lives in Lusaka. She has lived and worked in Africa for more than seven years and knows areas of the Continent extremely well. 

I learned so much just visiting museums on this trip!

She was therefore able to guide me on how to travel, where to go, where to stay etc.

 It was a wonderful trek and I am eternally grateful as I was able to travel to places and experience things I had only heard of, but never thought I could do in this lifetime.

A Mandela memorial on Robben Island

Up to now, I still can't believe I saw and did the things which had only been distant dreams for decades. 

Fact is, the education I received on these brief trips have been more valuable and memorable than I have accumulated in many years.

Sections of Cape Town, South Africa

More recently, I had the opportunity to visit Ghana and even got my new name, KORLEKi.

I felt so at home in Ghana for the foods, flora, city scenes, lifestyle, fauna and even the huge gap between the rich and poor, seemed so much like ours at home.

But boy is their culture deep.

Joan, my views: A cultural powerhouse (joan-myviews.blogspot.com)

I now understand why Rita Marley made that county her home for some 20 years!

I understand that the properties above are part of the Marley portfolio I Ghana.

Ghanaians are also super-welcoming but interestingly, while I had been under the impression that most of the slaves that were transported to Jamaica had Ghanaian roots, on my visit there, I learnt that only 23% did. 

Joan, my views: Religion and slavery (joan-myviews.blogspot.com)

Although i  had long ago been told by my grandmother that our actual roots were in Sierra Leone with the Mandingo tribe, I still felt at home in Ghana and honored to be inducted into the Krobo tribe.😊

These school children reminded me so much of our own💓 

I also discovered that many Ghanaians are outstanding linguists, speaking French, and German due to their close association with Brussels where thousands live and work. 

Most also speak English very well as it is compulsory in school and they all speak many tribal languages as well.

The magnificent Mosi-oa-Tunya which spans sections of Zambia and Zimbabwe, is named among the top 7 natural  wonders of the world.

Because I am crazy about animals, I think the country I need to return to soon is Botswana, although I still have another 48 independent nations in the homeland to sample!

You can easily do both land and river safaris in Botswana 

So much to do, so little time.

Oh well, it was the insightful Lao-tzu who said "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step," so I should be grateful that I got the opportunity to take that single step a few years ago.

Now its on to the rest of the journey.

Religion and slavery

Yesterday was our day to face the atrocities of the Atlantic slave trade. 

For this, we undertook the 135km journey from Accra to Cape Coast.

The roads are relatively good and we had an excellent driver in Livingston, who doubles as my informant on everything cultural, tribal and historical.😊.

He is well rounded.

Livingston is extremely knowledgeable.

Ghanaians, I find in the main, to be very polite and capable drivers and they are prevented from speeding too much due to the proliferation of speed bumps, (aka. sleeping policemen) large and small.

 Elmina Town today is a bustling fishing village, to which traders come to from near and far to get supplies.

The building on the hill is where the army barracks were for those who guarded the slaves and the fort at Elmina. In front, people hanging out at the bridge watching fishing boats come and go.

The market is below.

A long sea wall keeps out the water from the angry Atlantic Ocean.

The castle bears the memories of 'man's inhumanity to man' and the evils of Christianity.

Biblical quote in chapel above where slaves were tortured.

It was first erected in 1482 by the Portuguese as a trading center until they realized how much more lucrative it was to trade in humans rather than goods.

It is today a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The Dutch seized the castle and fort from the Portuguese in 1637 and like their predecessors, used the promise of milk and honey through Christianity, to fool native chiefs and lull them into complacency while they continued the lucrative slave trade across the Atlantic, there.

Britain was one of the most successful slave-trading countries. Together with Portugal, the two countries accounted for about 70% of all Africans transported to the Americas.

Britain was the most dominant between 1640 and 1807 when  it is estimated that Britain transported 3.1 million Africans (of whom 2.7 million arrived) to the British colonies in the Caribbean, North and South America and to other countries.

The British took over Elmina Castle and the fort in 1837 after they claimed they had officially officially abolished slavery In 1807. However their traders either outrightly continued the trade or owned most of the ships that took millions of captured Africans to their doom.

You could often hear our guide's voice crack with emotion as he related some of the atrocities our ancestors experienced.

 He reminded me a lot of our guide at Robben island where Mandela had been imprisoned 😡.

Slaves were kept on the ground floor of the castle. The second floor was a chapel and where religious leaders lived and the third floor was the governor's residence.

Taking a break from the heartbreaking stories 

This is a museum today but it was also a chapel on the second floor. On the ground floor slaves would be paraded and buyers would inspect them through the peep hole on the chapel floor and choose the ones they wanted.

They would then be branded with hot irons bearing the names of their new owner.

The passage leading to a dungeon

This is where female slaves were held naked and chained. Sometimes they never received any food for 72 hours and all bathroom activities happened right there 😡.
The traders did not bring women so when they wanted sex, they would take one ore a few out and wash them off. The water used to bathe them came from an underground drainage which the Dutch said they could never use themselves, as it was toxic.

Those females who resisted were brutally punished.

 Those who got pregnant would be taken away to deliver and brought back to the dungeon immediately.

Their children were never seen by them.

The door of no return through which slaves were transported to small canoes. The canoes took them to the large slave ships anchored offshore.

The dungeon to which rebellious slaves were taken. It had no ventilation and they were starved to death, then their bodies dumped in the ocean.

One of the smaller religious billboards on the roadside.

I am shocked at how much Ghanaians are into Christianity today despite this stark reminders in their midst of how evil it was! (25% of Ghanians are Muslim, the rest are christian.)

This Methodist church was built in 1900.

I have never seen more posters and billboards vying for people's souls anywhere else in the world as on this road from Accra to Cape Castle. For, I dear say, at least 70% of the roadside ads were about church activities, a small number advertised funerals and memorials and the rest were commercial.

 I conclude therefore that Ghanians worship one spirit only!😁

Jamaica has just as many actual church buildings as they do (proportionate to size and population of course) but whereas in Jamaica, there is a bar beside each church (for the men?)😚, I saw very few bars along the road to Cape Coast.