The day that we have anxiously been awaiting, Friday the 13th, the first day of Carnival has finally arrived. At 4pm, Fanuel came with a bus to take us and some others from here to Carnival. He came with a special made hat for each one of us so that we would be dressed and ready for the day’s festivities. First, we arrived at Pastor Louis’ church in downtown Les Cayes where many people were meeting inside for a pep rally of sorts to start things off on the right foot. The place was packed and everyone was dancing, singing, praying, waving their arms in the air along with flags and banners. It definitely looked like the party was starting in the church and moving out to the street from there. From the church, we all headed out to the street where tons of people congregated in the middle of the street at an important round-about. By this point, the crowd had grown from the 1,000+ people inside the church to more and more people. There was more singing, dancing, and praying and some of the local pastors and authority figures spoke briefly and prayed passionately to start off the festivities. Now the party really begins.
Seemingly from nowhere came this large bus that was just packed full of speakers on all sides. This was the source of music for the party as it very slowly inched along the street. They were blasting Christian songs/dance music from the speakers. Our group of 8 and Fanuel (who acted as our Hatian bodyguard) were literally right behind the bus or maybe more accurately smashed up against the back of the bus. Fanuel was brilliant in coordinating for us to stand in this location as it made it much easier to keep our group together in the midst of what felt like a crowd comparable to that of New Years Eve in Times Square or Love Fest in Berlin. Granted, I am sure there were not literally that many people but, the number was definitely in the thousands. We were behind the bus waving our arms and hats in the air, singing, dancing, shouting our praises in Creole, French, or English and partying it up for Jesus. It is difficult to describe because it is nothing that I could have possibly envisioned before I was in the middle of it. It was a wild and crazy party, but there was no alcohol, cigarettes, inappropriate behavior, or sex-filled music. It was a party for Jesus. In so many ways, it was a totally foreign concept.
