Ok, I mentioned elsewhere that last week I was with my family meeting up with relatives on our Jamaican side. Here's a series of photos to show where we went and what we got up to on one of the days;



















The land was a fruit plantation owned by my wife's family in first half of the 20thC, and the trip was to find the gravestones of that family. Some folks from the neighbourhood knew where they were and helped us find them.

I'm not familiar with Mansfield Park (Jane Austen?). My wife's mother's family are Afro-Caribbeans from Westmoreland County, Jamaica, most of the land there is on steep hill/mountainsides and has been owned by black families for over 150 years, not uncommon for a family to own half a mountain. The steep ground is very fertile and they used to grow oranges, bananas and other tropical fruit that are commonly cooked in Jamaica.

Indeed MJ, if the family had stayed in Westmoreland then my wife would never have existed 

With the photos I was trying to convey that the gravestones were totally overgrown, no shortage of machetes to hack away at the ferns and young trees. The trees that you see were also grown, I forget what type of tree but they are very straight so were good for lumber and also the resin could be 'bled' and used to make glue.


John W

While on that hillside I was impressed by the flora, my attempts at photographing show a lack of care in the focus department but this is what I got

I've only identified the LAST species 
















Yeah man!

Does that explain your new avatar John 

That's just one of the things that I think we in the West are in danger of losing: OK, granted I didn't go to pubs that had music when I lived on the Sceptred Isle, but I really worry that music making by Joe Public is almost gone.

Soz for hijacking the thread. OK, more photos PLEASE!

Ah calypso, I suppose the steel drum music we occasionally heard in restaurants was probably in style like calypso. Calypso DID originate in Trinidad, and is heard all over the Caribbean, though very often you can hear that it's modern pop tunes that are being played.

I think reggae hit it's peak in UK in the late 1970's, around the punk time and there was a ska revival then too with the Specials etc., and I have many albums (on the Island label) which demonstrate how inventive the genre had become with percussion, bass and vocals and electronic effects quite ahead of all other pop genres at the time. And the genre is timeless, as I said, with all age groups appreciating and enjoying reggae, I suppose largely because it's a dance music that all black people can respond to. And I agree with Kittybritton, I think what she was getting at, for some reason in UK many people tend to fit themselves into a musical compartment and won't try to listen or appreciate anything else, and are openly disrespectful about other music.

John W

Thanks MabelJane

(maybe our new mods can move all this discussion with my photos to a Reggae thread? an exercise in thread splitting  and let our proper photograhers get back on topic).

I recorded the listen-again during lunch and listening now, most names I'm not familiar with from the early reggae days though there was mention of Burning Spear, Gregory Isaacs and trombonist Rico who I have on albums

Of course reggae has a particular beat, always 4/4 but with an emphasis or a drum rimshot on the third beat which just makes people dance. The early reggae tended to be a bit fast, but from the late 70s many slower reggae tunes emerged from the likes of Toots & the Maytals and Bob Marley and that became the more popular for the slow dancing and the close contact dancing enjoyed at most 'black' parties I've been to 

John W