Come tomorrow, the YMCA Grill Fun Park will be the venue for the first ever Guyana Venezuela Day Affair, featuring food, songs, dance and handicrafts from the two cultures.
The event is being presented by three organizations – Spanglish GY, the Venezuelan Support Group and the United Nations Refugee Agency.
One of the coordinators of Spanglish GY, Charlie Tokeley, speaking to The Scene, said that the Guyana Venezuela Day event is to promote both cultures and have persons engaged in the tasting of the foods, being exposed to the traditions of the countries in a fun way. “We are hoping this fair will be an annual one. As this is the first event, we have to see how people will react to it. We hope it’ll have a positive impact… This will be a family-oriented event, but it’s also open to anyone who wants to come and have a fun day out or try some food from the different cultures and experience culture from a different country. We will have an area for children so it’s very much for families but it’s open for couples and anyone who wants to come and buy some food and relax and enjoy the music.”
The fair is expected to have eight to twelve live bands from Guyana and Venezuela. Guyana’s musicians will include the Bishops’ Steel Pan Band and Eze Rockcliffe while making the list of dancers is the Jewan Ka Nritya Dance Group.
Food will include pepperpot, cook-up and curries amongst other dishes while Venezuelan delicacies will include arepas, empanadas, pastalitas.
Spanglish GY, Tokeley shared, was formed in March of this year. They primarily organize events centred on boosting second language in Guyana but in a social setting. Their goals are to make language exchange fun and allow people to access the culture through practicing same. Already this year the organization has organized nine events in a variety of locations around Georgetown which have seen hundreds of Guyanese and internationals in attendance. The events are said to always be free, fun and casual. Spanglish GY has also a strong human rights and social activism base as well and took part in the recent Human Rights Film Festival at the Brazilian Embassy. The organization is looking forward to continuing in this vein of including all of the different minorities and language groups in Guyana and ensuring that no individual feels excluded because of the language they speak. Currently they are offering English classes for persons who don’t speak English. The group hopes to in the future offer other courses in the language. Persons can keep updated by visiting their Facebook page at facebook.com/spanglishgy
The Guyana Venezuela Day event begins at 11 am and continues until 6 pm. However, peak time for the mini concert will be from 1 pm -3 pm. Dress is casual.
