Sunday, May 31, 2015

Caribbean rhapsody

A friend of mine just got back from Jamaica. He'd been away for awhile. It was the Peace Corps, so by "awhile" I mean two years.

It is, by his account, a very religious country. Not Rastafarian, as some might think it--and the public perception of Rasta as a constant excuse to party is distorted in itself. No, there's a great deal of Christian activity down there. Missionaries, yes, but also established churches in every denomination you could name.

He also sampled some bootleg movies. It's still done the old way of pointing a video camera at the screen and recording everything, including audience chatter.

2 comments:

susan said...

I'm actually surprised to know the Peace Corps is still around. Do you have to be a doctor or teacher to join up now or do they still take anybody? I'm guessing that even if Jamaica isn't totally Rastafarian they still have excellent ganja and great music.

The bootleg movie thing really does sound like MST3K, doesn't it? Maybe without the sly cultural references.

Ben said...

That's a good question. This fellow is an artist but he had done some farm work before, which helped him in the Corps. I know like just about any other employer these days they do some heavy vetting. Not sure how many disparate job skills they're looking for.

Confirmation on the great music. From what I hear you might need some good ganja just to deal with the bugs.

MST-ed bootleg movies sell to a specialized audience. :)