As they do every year overseas-based Guyanese artiste John ‘Slingshot’ Drepaul and his wife Ingrid were back in Guyana last month for Mashramani with a new song and a Mash band. Unfortunately though, events conspired against them and few of their many supporters got to see them in the Mashramani Day parade.
Slingshot’s new song launched this year was called “Guyana Fun Time” and according to him it tried to incorporate everything Guyanese had fun doing before the advent of the computer age. He said today’s children know about twittering, iPhone, iPad and iPod, but as a child in his times they had bat and ball, dominoes, swimming, cards. Yes, they had telephones, he said – “two tin cups attached to a rope”. He added that they also used to run about rolling a bicycle rim.
“That’s what we tried to portray on the road… The song itself was composed around that and talks about coming to join us on the road.”
Slingshot reflected that sponsors were there for him and he extended gratitude to them for their sponsorship noting that when they were approached they were not “stingy”. But he was troubled by the fact that they would not give unless he himself approached them and while there is a reason for that it is also a “sad reflection of what a man’s word really is and when a man really gives his word… It’s a sad reflection on the social trustworthiness of Guyanese…”
Slingshot was also perturbed by the lewd display on the roads and says it is not the way Mashramani should be celebrated. “Look at the lewd display of gyration. It’s not culture. It’s not Mashramani… Mashramani is not a carnival but nobody wants to see what is socially acceptable…”.
Slingshot stated that if this is the way things are going the little bands like the Holy Cross people, the religious groups, the Slingshot Group and all the other small groups who are trying their very best with the little source of income that they get through sponsorship will not be needed. He described them as “Little David with my slingshot against the big Goliaths.
“If that is the case the word Mashramani should be condemned and let us just say it is Republic Day and is a carnival and that may be acceptable. It will tell the Holy Cross people and people like me that ‘Hey we don’t need to be engaged in the bacchanalian display of what Caligula and those used to do back in the Roman times.’”
Turning to the music played on the streets on Mash Day, he said, “I have been hammering this point from long. Let the ministry hand down an edict, the only time they will listen is when the edict is handed down from the ministry saying ‘I want no foreign music played on the road’ and let the judges and Marshals on the road stop them and say ‘Hey take that music off and play Guyanese music’ and if they do not comply say ‘we will take you off the road’ and the moment they hear they will play Guyanese music or just get the police to divert them out of the main route,” he said. He added it is an uphill battle. Adding that all Guyanese music should be played all through the route not only at the judging point and he called it a sad reflection of what the young Guyanese have come to accept of what Mashramani is.
Meanwhile, everyone is focused on three entities on the road that come at the end of the parade because they want to be in the limelight; some of them sending off fireworks and others pretending they are very angelic.
He questioned “Yes you pretending you are angelic, but what are you doing? Is this what Guyana is about right now? The honesty is there no more?”
All in all, Slingshot said he was disappointed with the result of the overall presentation of his Mash band ‘Guyana Fun Time’. “The costumes and band itself were not attired to our expectations and disbursement of finances,” he said. He said that the costumes were not what they expected and could have been better, adding, “designers are designers by name not reputation because their reputation is not healthy”. Slingshot sadly reflected, “Sometimes you wonder if people really pay attention to their word and to this thing that is called pride…”
Slingshot’s band was entered in the Semi-Costume large band category, but he subsequently received numerous phone calls from disappointed onlookers who were out there with their signs and banners awaiting his arrival but never saw him. He deeply apologized to them for this.
Slingshot sadly said that his band normally kicks off at 12:30pm, but this time they were on Church Street as the second band lined up and the parade started promptly at 10 am.
“There was nobody on the road when we started and people were now setting up… Even though they were along the road and waited for us they did not get to see us because we were first in line and we were finished at the National Park at 12:15.”
Slingshot’s song for next year’s Mash is inspired by all that happened at this year’s Mash, and the band has already been putting together thoughts and planning ahead for next year.
However, despite all that, Slingshot said he and Ingrid were very happy that they “were there to enjoy the Mash with the Guyanese”.
The husband and wife song writing and creative team will be back again come Mash 2013.
