Goombay Day in Village West

It must have been 100 degrees on Saturday, but it was worth being out in Village West through every hot degree. KROMA Gallery and friends threw a mini Goombay festival to announce the return of the big festival next June 2018 (make a note of it).

Of course the best part of Goombay is the Junkanoo parade, which made an entrance on Grand Avenue to everyone's delight.

This is why Village West needs to be protected from the wrong sort of development. Goombay is a community thing. It's part of the fabric of Village West.

When there are events in Village West, I get the feeling I get in New Orleans  during their events. I don't mean Mardi Gras, I mean local events and parades, like their Christmas Parade and their Easter Parade. 

The people in the parade know the people watching the parade, and it's one big community thing. It's a local thing. This little guy up front, four years old, is the grandson of the head of the Junkanoo parade.

His grandpa has been running the Goombay parade for 35 years, and hopefully in 20 or 30 years, this little guy can take over the Junkanoo and there will be a Bahamian-based community left in Village West to enjoy the parade and the culture.

On Saturday, there were booths set up on the street and the KROMA Gallery had food and drink and lots of Junkanoo costumes spread out around the gallery.

But of course, all the neighbors came out when the Junkanoo parade started. The best part of the day. I went live on Facebook for part of the parade, it's archived at our Facebook site here.  Please like the page while you're there, you can see videos and things from events often. Things not posted here in the Grapevine.